Chapter 3
SOLEIL
It had been hours since the embarrassing encounter, yet Soleil’s cheeks still warmed at the mere memory of him.
She now sat in the staff galley staring morosely at her kahawa mug.
‘You walked in on a man showering by the lake?’
Astra’s voice lifted half an octave, a rough sound as she shoved a forkful of spiced beans into her mouth.
Soleil’s workmate and friend was slight, of Afro-Brazilian background, with a beautiful, lithe frame, a stunning complexion, long braids, and a mischievous smile.
When it came to opinions, she never held any back.
Confidence was her crown, and she wore it well.
The two women occupied a corner of the staff mess, a space crowded with workers fitting in dinner between shifts and mandatory rest periods.
Soleil stared into her dented tin mug, wishing it would open a wormhole and swallow her whole.
‘Naam, I burst in on a naked man in the shower,’ she muttered. ‘It was a genuine mistake. I didn’t intend it.’
Across the stained steel table, Astra settled back in her chair, her expression a blend of shock and amusement.
‘You didn’t die of mortification? I would have collapsed. Flat out. Right there at his feet.’
‘I came close. I think my soul vacated my body for a second.’
Soleil buried her face in her hands, a groan escaping her.
‘Astra, what makes it worse is that he was magnificent.’
Her friend choked on her food.
‘You speak of it like it’s a curse.’
‘It was!’ Soleil hissed.
‘I opened the stall door, and there he stood. Beneath the shower, like some war god forged from marble, gilded metal, sin, and wet dreams, covered in ink.’
‘Nude?’
‘Butt naked as the day he was born.’
Her last words caught the attention of two maintenance workers passing by.
One whistled.
Soleil ignored their intrusion.
‘His eyes,’ she continued, her voice holding a slight tremor of disbelief. ‘Sapphire blue and indigo locked straight into me. Then he smiled.’
‘Oh, the sheer horror,’ Astra deadpanned, savoring every detail.
‘Nada, you don’t understand. I got rooted to the spot, until my freakin’ knees almost collapsed on me.’
Astra inhaled and even grunted, her body shaking with silent mirth.
‘I couldn’t even execute a decent retreat. I mumbled an apology, tried to bolt, but then he asked if I was new to the deck.’
Astra’s head struck the wall behind her in exasperation.
‘Please tell me you flirted with him?’
‘Nada! I panicked. I squeaked something about being the cleaner and then sprinted away like my jumpsuit was on fire.’
Astra erupted in laughter, almost losing her breath.
‘Woman, only you would run from a chance to score a hot date with a naked Adonis!’
Soleil delivered a quick, reproachful kick to her friend under the table, yet the heat of her encounter remained on her cheeks.
When her gaze fell to her mug again, her mind’s eye kept seeing his face. She could not banish the image of him, no matter the strength of her will.
Nor the vision of the water cascading over the carved lines of his inked chest.
That amused, unbothered expression.
The curve of his mouth.
That voice, not a crime, and the way he pronounced carino, his timbre not unlike molasses and thunder wrapped in midnight.
She exhaled, the heat pooling in her belly once more.
‘Who was he?’
Astra asked, her fingers flicking across her cracked data pad.
Soleil managed a shrug, hiding her flushed face in her palms.
‘I don’t even know his name.’
Astra grinned, a mischievous gold sparking in her amber eyes.
‘Don’t worry your little head. I can track him down. Everyone utilizing the executive-level showers must log in and out for security records. The maintenance team receives that record to verify who is in the area during our assigned duty.’
‘Astra, no way,’ Soleil protested.
‘You probably didn’t know about it because you got switched out with Keera at the last minute, so you didn’t get a briefing. I’m thinking we check who was clocked into the lakeside bathhouse at that time.’
‘Nada, don’t you dare!’
Soleil lifted her head, stretching a hand to stop her friend’s action, but she was too late.
Astra was already submerged in the roster manifest, scrolling through screens with a triumphant smile.
‘Shower block, Deck 27, stall three. Your time stamp states 1445. Let’s cross-reference it with the internal logs.’
Her fingers moved with swiftness.
‘Bingo. Only seven authorized pings on that level at that time. Six were maintenance tags.’
Astra’s eyebrows rose, her gaze glittering with victory. ‘One is priority-ranked.’
Soleil’s stomach plummeted.
‘Oh my freakin’ stars, the name comes up as Santiago Alvarro.’
‘Who?’
‘Only the Executive Officer of La última Sombra.’
Astra fixed her gaze on her friend, whose eyes glittered with emotion akin to terror.
‘Nada’, Soleil whispered.
‘Naam,’ Astra confirmed, her voice laced with excessive delight.
‘You walked in on Xander Levine Roman’s deputy. The second most important man on this fokkin’ dreadnought. One of the most lethal men in the entire flotilla.’
Soleil fought the hysteria climbing in her chest.
‘I’m dead. So freakin’ dead.’
‘Oh, you’re not in the least,’ Astra corrected, her tone playful. ‘But you’re toast to some degree. Charred, flame-grilled, and scorched for him, from the look on your face.’
Soleil was no longer listening.
Her mind spun. The XO? A member of the Signet strong guard, the core unit that commanded the dominant mercenary group and prison ship in the galaxy?
A man rumored to make entire pirate fleets vanish?
Who flickered in and out of restricted weapons depots like a wraith?
Worse, she also had a mental image of him naked.
Not just a glimpse, but a full-bodied stare at his freakin’ generous junk.
Fokk.
She bit her lip, panic tightening its grip.
‘What if this Santi XO reports me? If Wren finds out this, will I lose my job?’
‘It’s been hours. If you were going to be sanctioned for an innocent mistake, it would have already happened,’ Astra soothed her, a wry smile softening her face.
Soleil sighed, letting out a rush of breath.
Then a thought slipped in, quiet and unexpected.
What if the XO of The Sombra found out she had a lien on her life, one cast on her by the Wildlight’s most evil manipulator?
A frisson of terror sliced through her.
She made a vow, internal and fierce: she would use every means available to ensure he never found out.
Soleil’s world on La última Sombra consisted of grime and drab corridors.
Where the constant odor of industrial cleaner, the hiss of pressure valves, and the steady thrum of distant machinery were her unwavering companions.
She worked the lowest, oldest decks of the dreadnought, where polite company dared not tread, and maintenance halls where cables sometimes erupted from the walls like decaying vines.
Despite the ship’s sophisticated engineering and luxury upgrades, The Sombra still carried the scars of its former life as a prison vessel.
While the upper levels were at present restored and climate-controlled, the lower levels reeked of mold, refuse, and leaking effluent; a funk that persisted no matter how rigorously their surfaces were scrubbed.
Soleil spent hours scraping bacteria from restroom walls, scrubbing off layers of bilge from ancient tiles, and prying gunk from the corridors’ floors.
It was solitary labor, the kind that was only ever noted when it remained unfinished.
Soleil, with her red-tinged brown hair pulled into a severe knot and a cap that concealed her features, blended in.
Most people never afforded her a second glance.
She didn’t mind being unnoticed; she was not here to attract attention.
She was here to survive.
That and keeping the one soul dependent on the success of her mission was her singular focus.
After Astra left her, still amused by her interaction with the stranger by the lake, Soleil ate a quick breakfast of oat squares and dried berries.
She then dove straight into her regular rotation, mopping floors in the busy passageways of Deck 12.
Half an hour in, her wrist comm flashed.
She glanced at the message flashing on it.
A priority hail from the boss?
She sighed, dreading what news he might deliver. Had the XO complained?
With some trepidation, she made her way to the maintenance office and knocked on the supervisor’s open door.
Taking a deep inhale, she stepped in at the impatient wave Wren Dravick gave her.
He sat behind his overflowing desk, dressed in a greasy, blemished, and wrinkled uniform.
He maintained that his appearance was essential, a demonstration to the top-ranking officials that he achieved results by getting his hands dirty.
Soleil, conversely, preferred keeping her navy jumpsuits starched and pressed.
Despite his gruff exterior, Wren was fundamentally kind at heart.
The grizzled ex-sapper with oil-stained mitts and a permanent shoulder tremor scowled as he flicked a new work order toward her.
His breath carried the odor of synth-tobacco.
‘You’re back to Deck 27,’ he grunted.
Soleil blinked.
‘I get another pass at the high life?’
Wren raised a weathered brow.
‘Don’t make it strange, girl. Clean is clean. ‘Sides, it appears you made an impact. The request originates from the top echelon.’
‘Who?’
‘Does it fokkin’ matter? Means more pay per hour for you, so just shut it and get it done.’
Her brow furrowed, confused. ‘What’s the task?’
‘They want you on the cabin cleaning crew. Starting with the executive-level lodges along the lake. I’ll transmit to you the holo map and entry codes now.’
He dismissed her with another wild gesture.
In shock, Soleil walked out.
Moments later, her shock dissipated, replaced by relief that her earlier encounter had not resulted in censure.
However, Soleil shivered with a suspicious intuition about who requested her.
After securing her gear, she boarded one of the express lifts from the lower decks up through the vessel’s core.
The higher she ascended, the brighter the surroundings became.