Chapter 33
SOLEIL
Soleil folded the last of her clothes into a canvas bag while Santi moved through her tiny hovel, doing final checks and cleaning.
His broad shoulders brushed against the ceiling’s rusted panels and worn beams, tidying the place for its next renter.
They stepped out together, locking the door for the ultimate time.
The air outside was damp with mist from the port vents, curling around Soleil’s ankles.
Down the hall, the caretaker, Old Thari, waited by the front desk.
‘Leaving for good?’ she murmured. ‘With your prince charming, too? Don’t think I didn’t spy him watching over you every night.’
‘I’m nothing special,’ Santi rasped, kissing the back of gnarled hand, ‘not when I’m in the presence of a beauty such as yourself, Thari.’
The woman simpered. ‘If you ever get tired of him, bring him my way.’
Soleil laughed. ‘Not a chance, but I’ll keep it in mind. Sante for helping me get the room and for your kindness.’
She slipped a bundle of schill notes into Thari’s hand.
The woman blinked, then pocketed them without a word, her thin mouth twitching into the closest thing she had to a smile.
‘Go well, Soleil. I’ll miss your sunshine and your delicious vanilla cakes.’
As the couple tracked to the elevators, Santi adjusted the bags over one shoulder, the other arm sliding around Soleil’s waist. ‘You ready?’
‘Almost,’ she said. ‘I want to stop by Kahawa Metro. Just one more time.’
Santi nodded and shielded her on the maglev and through the foot traffic at their stop, his towering presence a silent ward against the crowds.
The moment they stepped into the café, Kharon spotted her.
His frame blocked the swinging kitchen door, his eyes bloodshot and lips curling.
‘You’re late, again,’ he snapped. ‘ You think just showing up whenever you like, bitch? You won’t get paid today!’
‘What did you call her?’
Santi strode around his woman as his aura flared, just enough. Lycan menace rolled through the room like heat off asphalt.
The overhead lights buzzed and dimmed, causing Kharon to pale as his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth.
Soleil pulled her work badge from her vest and set it on the counter beside her faded apron.
‘I’m quitting. This is permanent, and I want my full wages. No stalling, no deductions.’
Kharon’s hand shook as he swiped over credits to her wrist comm, which she checked, nodding at the right amount.
She turned to her coworker, Lina, a soft-spoken woman with burn scars on one arm and the best laugh in the whole station.
Soleil flicked half the earnings into Lina’s wrist comm and smiled. ‘Consider a thank you for helping me learn how to make a mean macchiato.’
Lina gasped, and her lip trembled as she hugged her friend. ‘Soleil, sante.’
Santi flicked a small holo card to her. ‘If you want off this terminus and a job on The Sombra, let Miral, the ship’s Synth-AI, that Santi, the XO, sent you.’
Lina’s eyes dilated.
She gazed at the couple, speechless.
Kharon, finally catching onto the drift and awed by Santi’s credentials, plastered on a syrupy smile.
‘Well, well, maybe I was too harsh. If you ever want to come back, Soleil, I have a place for you. Better still, I could relocate Kahawa Metro to that awesome ship, nada? If you have room for a humble kinai like me?’
Santi tilted his head, menace rolling over him like a wave.
He arched a brow and raised one calloused hand, giving the man the middle finger.
Leaning in, he rasped in a muted growl. ‘We don’t take your kind, y’know, bosses who exploit workers and treat them like slag. Your face and name are now on a no-fly list. You’re stuck here, Kharon, and my deputies will be watching you. If I hear you’ve mistreated anyone else?’
He leaned close enough for the cafe owner to flinch. ‘You’ll be scrubbing sewage units on the lowest level of this forsaken rock.’
‘I’d listen to him,’ Soleil added. ‘He’s Signet, and that middle finger was him telling you how many seconds you have left to breathe free if you violate his orders.’
The couple turned as one and prowled out.
Soleil bit her lip as they prowled out into the corridor, then finally let out a laugh. ‘Stars, Santi, Kharon almost had a heart attack.’
He glanced sideways, the barest smirk tugging his mouth. ‘That’s how Signet rolls, when we enter a space, we don’t turn the lights on, we switch the dark off.’
She laughed even as she rolled her eyes. ‘So freakin’ cheesy, Alvarro.’
‘So fokkin’ true,’ he growled.
She chucked again, as they tracked away from the life she was never going back to.
‘That is so much bed,’ Soleil gasped as she entered Santi’s quarters on the El Lobo.
‘The better to love you in.’
He came behind her, trailed his hands down her arms, and turned to face him.
His touch went to her thighs as he hitched her legs around his waist and walked them back to the divan.
‘Again, honey?’ she murmured.
‘I’m insatiable for you,’ he growled, one knee sinking into the surface.
He lay her down and slid to his knees, and worked her trousers and boots off.
Followed by her underwear.
She gazed on, her eyes alight and with a slight smile on her face.
Fokk, she was beautiful.
‘Ready for some one-on-one loving with limitless space?’
She nodded.
He dipped his head, amethyst locks swaying and parting her thighs, and he lowered to her clit.
Her head fell back with a soft moan. ‘Santi, naam.’
He licked her folds until her limbs shook and her hips jerked, pushing her sex into his mouth.
He glided a finger between them, adoring how undone she was by his devotion.
When she lay shuddering in bliss, he stood and stripped, eyes on her, on the heave of her tits and how she stroked her slit, still moaning.
With a growl, he bent over he, one elbow by her head, the other hand guiding his cock into her.
She hissed as he slid in to the hilt, her thighs coming up around him, hands to his tight ass, pulling him deeper.
He groaned as he began to fokk her, long and deep, every thrust pushing her into the silken coverings under her.
They moved together, breathless, bound in sweat and shadow, their limbs tangled in the hush of his quarters.
The world outside was quiet, irrelevant.
Only she existed for him; the curve of her body, the hitch of her exhalation, the wildfire in her eyes.
He shifted to kiss her, and she lifted a finger to his mouth, still wet with her own essence.
‘I love you,’ she whispered.
Santi’s muscles locked.
His breath caught in his throat, hovering just above her, trembling, overwhelmed with sensation.
His gaze fixed on hers, searching. ‘What did you say?’
Soleil’s hands were at his jaw, gentle, steady, as her lips curved again.
‘I love you, Santi.’
The words hit him like a meteor through his chest.
His soul jostled in his ribs. He stared down at her, stunned, the heat of her confession lingering in the space between them.
‘Is that right?’ he rasped, not because he doubted her, but because it undid him.
She nodded. ‘You had my heart from the start. I didn’t know how to trust it, but now it’s marked with your name.’
His eyes lit with a fierce and bright inferno.
‘I love you more, Soleil,’ he growled. ‘You’ve evolved into my sun, my reason for rising. I’d move the heavens and planets so you never, ever have to wonder about my commitment to you, for now and eternity.’
She stared at him, wonder swimming in her gaze, her fingers brushing his cheek. ‘May I?’
He stilled again, arms braced over her.
He knew what she meant. She didn’t have to explain.
Without a word, he tilted his head and offered her his neck.
Her lips met his skin with care, her fangs extending slowly.
His entire body jolted at the contact, and he let out a guttural, shaky breath as heat bloomed outward from where her incisors sank into his flesh.
Aether trembled.
Lightning, red, silver, violet, crackled through the air, tracing along their spines, arcing over the cot in fractured bursts of cosmic light.
His spectral wolf shimmered behind his eyes; hers glowed like a flame within her own.
Her mark burned into his neck, her sigil etched beside his pulse.
She pulled back, panting.
‘Marked for life,’ he murmured, awestruck.
With a growl, he bent and did the same to her nape, branding her as his.
His heart soared as her fingers pressed to her new scar.
His cock hardened once more, and he surged into her, cradling her body to his as he resumed their rhythm, his timbre hoarse with love and promise. ‘For eternity.’
SANTIAGO
‘You’re now the Khan, my friend, Head of Security on Cybele.’
Lesedi N’Komo froze as he stood before Santi in his office.
For a second, Santi’s words to him didn’t register.
‘Boss?’ Lesedi breathed, his utterance rough with disbelief.
Santi rounded the desk and clasped his shoulder, pinning a silver-edged badge to his lapel.
The symbol of the Signet Group gleamed against the dark navy uniform of the handsome, dark-skinned man.
‘You’re the best man for it, Lesedi. No one else I’d trust with this station.’
They stood in the refurbished Signet outpost on Cybele.
The compact command office sat perched high enough to overlook the warren of levels sprawled beneath it like a tangled spiderweb of steel and neon.
From up here, every screen, transport log, and maglev corridor could be monitored in real time.
‘You took the reins these past few weeks when I threw a full systems overhaul at you,’ Santi continued, his tone even but proud.
‘You didn’t just keep up, you handled it.
Upgraded protocols, reinforced weak zones, and shut down two coordinated skirmishes in Deck Nine and the market bay.
Those Accord and Legion cowards didn’t stand a chance. ’
Lesedi’s posture straightened with quiet pride. ‘I won’t let you down, sir.’
Santi gave him a short nod. ‘Do well, and you’ll earn passage to Pegasi in under two years. That’s a promise.’
Lesedi grinned, showing off his gleaming teeth. ‘Then I’ll exceed expectations.’
Santi turned to the others, scanning them with a slight smile.