Chapter 7 Freya
FREYA
The sheets still smell like him.
Even after three washes—on high-heat no less—I can still catch the musk of his skin, wild and primal, clinging to the fibers like a ghost that won’t let go. I bury my nose in my pillow before cursing myself and shoving it across the bunk. I don’t need this. I need to focus.
For the third day in a row, I pretend not to be looking over my shoulder every five seconds.
Vokar hasn’t come back. Not to my room, not to the mess hall, not even to the negotiation chamber as far as I can tell. And that should be a relief, right? He’s giving me space. I should be grateful. I asked for boundaries.
And yet...
I dream of him every damn night. It’s always the same. His voice in my ear—low, rough, like gravel wrapped in heat. His massive hands pinning me in place, his breath warm on my throat. I wake up aching, soaked with sweat and need, the sheets twisted around my legs like restraints.
“Dammit,” I mutter, fumbling to tug on my standard-issue maintenance uniform. The collar scratches against a still-sensitive mark he left on my shoulder. I hiss, but the pain sends a wave of something else straight through me. Memory. Hunger.
It’s pathetic.
Jorko meets me outside the janitor's hold with his usual lopsided grin. His hoverbelt whines as it lifts him a few inches off the floor, sparing his bad leg from the strain.
“Morning, sunshine,” he drawls, handing me a data tab. “You’ve got conference room two, and Rection’s quarters if he doesn’t chase you out first.”
“Lucky me,” I mutter, trying to keep my eyes from drifting toward the docking bay’s far corridor.
Jorko notices. He always notices.
“You okay, kid?” he asks, voice softer now. “You’ve been... twitchy.”
“I’m fine.”
He squints at me. “You’re not seeing anyone, are you? I mean—on this ship?”
I snort, but it sounds too brittle. “Do I look like I’ve got time for romance?”
He narrows his eyes like he’s trying to read between my words. “It’s just—you know those Reapers. Big, spiky, and full of bad decisions. If one of them so much as—”
“I’m not seeing anyone,” I cut in, harsher than I meant to. “And no one’s seeing me. Trust me.”
Jorko hums, unconvinced. “Good. ‘Cause the last thing I want to do is explain to your orphanage how you got turned into decorative splatter by a warlord with boundary issues.”
I force a laugh, but my hands are already trembling. Not from fear. From memory. From want.
The rest of the morning, I scrub. Hard. My hands are raw by the time I finish buffing the tables in the conference room.
Every time I catch my reflection in the polished chrome, I wince.
I don’t look like myself. My cheeks are always flushed now.
My lips, too red. Like I’ve been kissed into a new version of myself, one that doesn’t fit.
“Stop thinking about him,” I hiss under my breath, attacking a coffee stain like it insulted my ancestry.
But of course, it doesn’t work.
Especially not when I see him.
I’m on my way to the storage lockers, carrying a bag of mop heads, when I hear it—the faint, measured clank of armored boots. My breath catches. I turn my head.
There he is.
Vokar.
Standing at the far end of the corridor, arms crossed, body like a living weapon cloaked in menace. His red eyes catch mine and stay.
My knees nearly buckle.
For a second—just one stupid heartbeat—everything inside me screams to go to him. My skin remembers how he touched me. My bones remember how he held me. And worse—my heart remembers how he looked at me. Like I was a secret treasure only he was meant to find.
Then I remember my pride.
I force my gaze forward and walk past him like he’s nothing but a wall. A very large, very magnetic, very naked wall in my head—but still. A wall.
He doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak.
But I feel him. Watching me.
Wanting.
Naturally, it’s impossible to avoid him, despite my best efforts. It’s almost inevitable that we’ll run into each other again. A couple days later, it happens.
The mess hall’s supposed to be closed. That’s what I tell myself as I step inside, the lights low and flickering in energy-saving mode, shadows pooled in the corners.
I should turn back. It’s late. I’ve scrubbed everything twice already.
But my stomach’s twisting too tight to sleep, and my thoughts are full of heat and teeth and red eyes.
The moment I cross the threshold, I feel it.
The weight. The gravity.
I stop dead.
He’s there. Vokar.
Sitting alone in the back corner, like he owns the damn silence.
Massive, unmoving, a beast in partial shadow.
He’s not armored tonight—bare from the waist up, and gods, he’s cut like stone shaped by war.
His skin gleams in the dim lighting, every muscle coiled with tension.
His eyes open, slow and deliberate, and find me.
I start to backpedal.
“Stay,” he says, voice like a slow avalanche. “Or run. Your choice. But do it honestly.”
My hand hovers near the keypad. I don’t press it.
Instead, I shuffle inside, careful not to make a sound. My heart drums like war in my ears. I move to the nearest bench, far away but not far enough. I sit. I fold my hands in my lap and pretend I’m not shaking.
“You’re hiding from me.”
The accusation is soft. Almost curious.
“I’m not.”
“Don’t lie to your warlord.”
I swallow hard. “You’re not my—”
“No?” His voice rumbles low, like thunder in the bones. “Then why do you wake up smelling like me?”
I can’t breathe.
He doesn’t move. Just watches.
“You marked me,” I whisper. “You came to my space.”
“You let me in.”
We sit in silence. Minutes pass. The ventilation hums. Somewhere, a maintenance bot chirps and wheels past, oblivious to the tension stretching between us like a wire about to snap.
“I dream about you,” he says at last.
I close my eyes.
“You’re soft, but you don’t break. I’ve broken battle cruisers with less effort than it takes to hold you. And still... I held you.”
I feel warmth rise in my chest. Shame, desire, confusion—some tangled root system sprouting all through me.
He leans forward slightly, elbows on the table. “Do you know what power is, Freya?”
I shake my head, because words have abandoned me.
“Power is restraint. True power. It’s knowing you could destroy... and choosing not to. It’s wanting to destroy, and still—holding back. For her.”
My throat’s dry. I can’t look away.
“Do you think I don’t crave to tear this metal world open?” he growls. “To rip the sky down and wear it like a cloak just to see you smile?”
“You’re being poetic,” I murmur, voice tight.
“I’m being honest.”
I look at my hands, clenched so tight the knuckles are white.
“I don’t know what you want from me.”
“I want everything.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Neither is wanting you.”
I glance up. The heat in his eyes is nuclear. But behind it—something tender. Bleeding.
“You think I don’t know how small you are?” he asks. “How fragile? Do you think I don’t lie awake remembering how you gasped beneath me, how you trusted me? That your body, that little shell, opened to me without a word?”
I bite my lip. “You’re scaring me.”
His expression doesn’t change. “I know.”
“And I’m still here.”
That makes him pause. Like I’ve surprised him.
I rise slowly and take a few steps forward. My legs tremble. The air between us thickens. When I stop just short of touching him, I hear the rasp of his breath.
“You want everything?” I whisper. “Then earn it.”
He blinks.
I place my hand on his chest—right over his heart, if Reapers have those.
It’s beating. Fast.
“Because I’m not glass, Vokar. But I’m not yours to shatter either.”
I turn and walk away.
His voice follows, low and reverent. “Then teach me how to hold you.”