Chapter 11 #3
Beau joins us on the bridge, slipping alongside us on soft feet.
As muscled as their countenance, they’re assassin quiet when they move around the ship, as stealthy across metal as over carpet.
I watch Beau make eyes at the AI and remind myself that no one can move like that and genuinely be so insipid.
It’s an act—I just don’t know enough about them to guess why they bother.
“Hello, Beau.”
Beau gapes at the hologram and then at me. “Kit? Since when has she been able to do this?”
“It’s a not-so-recent upgrade courtesy of Gryphon Tech, although our last captain wasn’t interested in activating it,” Kit answers. “Would you like me to walk you through all the updates?”
“Beau, why don’t you take point on this and show the crew later how it all works?”
They grin, folding their arms and looking Kit up and down.
“You know they’re essentially checking your sister out, right?” Marlowe stage whispers.
“Don’t worry, love. You’ll always have my heart.” Beau winks at her.
I carefully arrange my expression. I didn’t know people winked in real life.
I peer at Marlowe to see if I can gauge her reaction, but she simply snickers and pushes at Beau’s arm playfully.
It took me five minutes after first meeting Beau to realise they would flirt with algae if it could talk back.
They’d even tried it with me until I put them straight.
It’s harmless, but I’m not a good flirt, and besides that, I don’t encourage work affairs.
“And if this is what your sister looks like, Cap, I’m going to need introductions. You may have turned me down—crazy decision, by the way—but I’m sure she’ll see the errors of your ways.”
I don’t understand how a moment of wanting to impress Marlowe has turned into this.
“We’re leaving. Please have Kit run you through the calibrations of her new interface and add any essential information to my log.”
Amusement, never far from Beau’s face, brackets their cheeks with laughter lines as they salute.
I sigh and gesture for Marlowe to follow me out.
It takes work to ignore the looks she keeps darting my way as we head through the ship towards the airlock.
It sends little shocks of electricity over my skin; I’m not used to having so much attention paid to me.
Minutes later, Marlowe speaks.
“You’re not very good at flirting, are you?”
I miss a step and just about manage to stop myself from taking a dive. When I meet her eyes, it’s a relief to see that she isn’t laughing at me, as expected. She looks contemplative. I suppress a familiar sensation in my chest and turn my attention back to the ship as we walk the halls.
“No, I’m not.”
If I expected her to leave it there, I was kidding myself. If I’ve learned anything over the past four days, it’s that Marlowe is as inquisitive as her son.
“I’m surprised,” she says.
What am I supposed to say to that? I opt for the safe option and say nothing at all. Marlowe—not one to take silence for an answer—bulldozes on. Kit could teach her something about tact, I think.
“You just don’t strike me as the kind of person who would be... I don’t know, shy?”
I stop walking. Ridiculously, I have the urge to show Marlowe just how incorrect that is.
Not for the first time, the memory of pressing her against the bulkhead flashes through my mind.
She smelled like tart wine and felt like sin, and I’d never wanted anyone more.
She hasn’t mentioned it since, so I haven’t either, for fear that she regrets it.
After all, I’m the person delivering Vee to Gryphon and she has every right to distrust me.
I was surprised she’d let me that close to her in the first place.
“What gives you the impression I’m shy?”
Chestnut eyes meet mine as I look down at Marlowe, not a shred of uncertainty behind them.
She’s at least half a foot shorter, but you wouldn’t know it by the way she stares back at a person, like there is no height in the world she won’t reach for if she has to.
It’s one of the first things I noticed—and respected—about her.
It didn’t escape my attention either that my clothes mould to the curves of her body like the absence of light defines space: like a truth, like a phenomenon, like a wonder.
I fight to keep my eyes above her mouth, even now, as I worry about what she’s going to say next.
It’s not such a punishment, not when the corner of her mouth curls and her cupid’s bow deepens and there’s just the flash of white teeth through her lips.
I push my hands into my pockets to stop from reaching for her. She couldn’t even stand to look at me earlier.
Marlowe shrugs. “It just seems that someone who carries themself the way you do would be better at reading situations. It makes you come across as shy.”
“How do I carry myself?”
Marlowe drops her gaze and drags it from my boots to the top of my head with such weight that my stomach tightens. It’s a controlled burn simmering over my skin. My hands curl into fists.
“With confidence. Authority.” She cocks her head and meets my eyes. “Some might say prowess.”
It’s the first time anyone has ever said anything like that to me—then again, it’s the first time anyone has ever paid so much attention to me. This is how she sees me?
It takes me a moment to right my thoughts and think back to what she’d accused me of. “Again, what, exactly, makes you think I’m shy?”
“Like I said: you’re not very good at reading situations.” I open my mouth to question her on this, but she continues to speak. “Poor Beau on the bridge back there, trying to joke around... You just blew right past them. They weren’t really flirting with you, you know.”
“I know. I’ve experienced what it looks like when they really turn on the charm. I’ll tell you now, I didn’t find it very charming at the time.”
“But you don’t play along.”
“I’m the captain of this ship and Beau’s superior.”
Marlowe laughs softly. “Something tells me you wouldn’t even if you weren’t the captain.”
“Does that upset you?”
“No, why would it?” She raises an eyebrow. “I’m just stating a fact. I’ve noticed you like those.”
I don’t know how to take that, so I set it aside to examine later. Marlowe has the ability to get under my skin in all the best and worst ways, and it’s unbearable as much as it is intoxicating.
“I find it curious, is all. You might be the most competent person I’ve ever met, but I have yet to see you read a room.” Marlowe smiles suddenly and starts walking, taking the lead as I falter out of confusion. “Anyway, forget I said any of that—I’m supposed to be mad at you, Captain.”