CHAPTER 6 LEE
LEE COULDN’T get over kissing Kat.
She’d come back over to his dorm last night for round two, this time without the interrupting cadets, and they’d stayed up for hours tangled up in each other. Talking. Laughing. Finding out how many ways he could make her skin heat… They’d gotten better at not falling onto each other. Mostly.
She was a fever dream, or perhaps a real dream, concocted on hope and desire.
One he only trusted to be reality because her treetop scent of wild azara and orange blossom was all over everything.
On his pillow and on his clothes. Every movement sending visuals of her straddling on top of him and falling over him once again.
He’d never be over this, over her. Over the way she’d bite her swollen lips when they’d come up for air. And the self-conscious way she’d fuss over her messy, tangled hair. Or the way it felt to just hold her in his arms.
She’d been his friend long before they’d ever tried any of this. But void, now that he’d tried her, he was never going back.
He slipped out of his dorm to take a nice, long cold shower before heading down to the training levels.
The ship was quiet down here this morning. Sunday was a free day and the only day cadets ever bothered with sleeping in. Which gave him his pick of the training rooms.
He had a hand by the plate of one of the matted rooms when he heard the heavy weight clatter down in the next room over. Drawing in a tight breath, Lee went through the other door.
There were two cadets inside using the weights. An X and Zane.
Lee strategically chose one of the machines down the line from them, taking his time as he started in on a workout.
It made for an interesting hour in the gym, especially after the X cadet noticed who he was sharing the space with and attempted to schmooze them both with compliments on each of their “intense performances” in the Laser Rounds the day before.
Intense was definitely one word for it, although Lee could think of some better adjectives.
It wasn’t until the X finished his workout that Lee got up to grab his water. Zane shot him a glowering look as Lee came over, looking very much like he might smack him or chew him out before taking up his next set.
Either would be fair. Lee had been a dick the other day, and he knew it. He’d just had limited options.
But Zane interjected before he could get into any of that. “I played your games, you had your fun. I’m assuming this means you’re ready to talk?”
And apparently dick was a two-way street.
Lee cut him a slash of a grin. “Depends on the conversation.”
But then he sighed, letting his grin fall with the facade. He had no beef with Zane. “Look. I shouldn’t have used you in the Rounds to get my point across, okay? Not without conversing with you first.”
Zane scrutinized him. But then he dropped the front altogether. “I got your message about Levy. She was a good cadet.”
“That she was,” Lee agreed, finally taking that sip of water.
“I mean it. I’m sorry she got dragged into this. I’m sorry any of us did. We were reckless. I share a part of that blame.”
“There’s no blame. It was our choice.” Lee gripped the warm skin on the back of his neck.
“Sure. Let’s go with that.”
Lee glared over at Zane.
He glared right back. “This goes beyond you and I. How can you not see that?” Zane’s fist shook at his side.
“You think I don’t know that? It’s not my life I’m worried about,” Lee countered, now pinching the bridge of his nose to contain the sudden flare of frustration. There was a reason they’d always butted heads. But they’d managed to find common ground before.
Lee blew out a breath, shoving his hands into his pockets so he wouldn’t be tempted to use them.
Zane also relinquished some of the tension in his arms and shoulders as he rolled them back a few times.
“Maybe it should be,” Zane said quietly. “I think you’re aware of just who we’re dealing with and how much power he wields.”
“We can shoulder it.”
“Can we?” Zane asked, his challenge a reminder of the stormy look he’d given Lee in the Laser Rounds, and outside the Command wing that day. And the promise Lee had made to Kat.
“We got off easy. I know we made a choice out there,” Zane said.
“But General Narron has had this scripted from the beginning. Not even Commander Blanche, I think, fully saw this coming. He was never going to allow Segura to exist; one way or other, that ship had to go. In helping them escape, we played right into his hands. And now he’s got that ground to stand on for whatever comes next. ”
And for some reason, Lee had a feeling he really didn’t want to know what these plans entailed. But he couldn’t deny the sudden rage that built up every time he pictured the look on the General’s face. The desire to fight all over again.
“It doesn’t matter what else we want right now, or what we wish had happened with Segura,” Zane said. “If we want to be here, we’ve got to play it safe. We can’t afford to draw any more attention.”
On the topic of not drawing attention, though… “How’s Neha handling the raid restrictions?” Lee asked. Kat had been with him through all of this, so they were on the same page. But for those like Whistler and Zane whose squadron leads hadn’t been on their raid…
“We’re dealing with it.” Zane frowned. But then he shrugged. The casualness and implication of the she’ll-get-over-it gesture was enough to make Lee chuckle.
“How’s Kat?” Zane countered with a smirk.
It was Lee’s turn to shrug, but he let some of the feral, fanged creature bare its teeth as he cut back. “We’re dealing with it.”
“You haven’t done her yet.”
“Piss off.”
Zane was laughing as Lee shot him the finger on his way out of the training room. No one did her dirty and got the last word.
Kat was already in the Canteen by the time Lee showered and headed down for a late breakfast.
To be sitting down at their table again was one thing, but to see her down here laughing and seeming to genuinely enjoy herself? Her eyes sparkled, her vanilla-blonde hair shimmering as she said something to Whistler and the dark-haired cadet beside him.
Lee allowed himself a quick look before carrying his tray over. He nodded to Kiara and Kamata as he slid into the seat alongside Kat.
“Hey you,” he said.
She beamed up at him. “I did it,” she sang, her warmth seeping into his side as she leaned into him almost subconsciously. “Day two, and I’m officially over my fear.”
“So I see. Very nice,” he said softly into her ear, enjoying the way she melted further into him with the sensation. It probably helped, too, having her friends here with her again.
He peered past the cadet by Whistler, to the tables nearest them.
Lee had to admit, the twins had done well with their little alligator rumor.
Even sitting here with some of their former squadron and three of the four squadron leads who’d been out that week, he didn’t hear any odd whisperings—not unless he counted some of the IRs in their little cluster next door.
Apparently space alligators really loved power drinks.
He snorted, Kat peering up at him curiously.
“It’s nothing,” he said, giving her a smile. Give it a day. A half-day. Word of their doings with the raid would eventually circulate. But its delay had gotten Kat back into the Canteen, so he was taking that small victory for what it was.
His gaze lingered again on Kat, her lithe shoulders bouncing as she rejoined the current conversation, boasting of their skill climbing at the Wall. She would be fine; she was strong.
“Hey Waters, you haven’t said much over there. I know Kat says you’ve got some moves. But you sure you can handle our style of climbing?” Kamata called over the table.
Lee picked up the fork from his tray, twirling it between his fingers as he met Kat’s glittering eyes. “I think I’ll manage.”
The crew had gone before with Kat. But they hadn’t gone with Lee. It was a good thing his hands were itching for a scale.
The moment their plates were clean, he was being ushered back across the skywalk and into the training levels. Apparently someone had talked him up like nobody’s business.
It had been a minute since he’d been in here, but his hands remembered, a jolt of adrenaline shooting down through his fingers as they curled around the pocket-sized route controller.
He toggled down the difficulty levels, flicking through several different routes until he found the one he’d been searching for.
Freestyle – Cragmonster
Kiara leaned around his shoulder, one of her pigtails scratching against his arm, as she noted the yellow route he’d selected.
Brow lowering in concentration, she fiddled with hers until she’d selected the same. “I never pegged you for a freestyler.”
“You don’t know me very well.”
With a wink at Kat, he followed the fair-haired twin over to the wall.
One scan from their controllers, and the entire face began to reshape and reform, a little mechanical miracle as thousands of tiny planes were rearranged.
The yellow footholds were the last to emerge, riding up the side on little duro-pulleys.
“So what’s your game?” he asked when the wall had settled and he and Kiara peered up the ten-meter expanse. “First to the top?”
Kiara nodded, “And winner takes all.”
“I’ll give you a head start,” Lee offered.
She didn’t give him a chance to take that back as she grabbed her first hold, muscling herself straight up the broad face. Bold, he liked that.
But this was freestyle. Crimping one of the ledges off to her side with his fingertips, Lee swung himself up in a game of puzzles.
A pocket here and a flake of thin edge there.
But Lee didn’t need conventional handholds and footholds.
He threaded himself up the wall, shooting along like the adrenaline through his bloodstream.
The familiar strain through his arms and back was a song.
And as he made the final leap, muscles warm, he pulled himself up and over the ledge.