Chapter 4
4
THREE MONTHS LATER
The Argosian took up most of the bed, his massive arm slung over my waist, pinning me in place like a nova beetle on its back. And I thought, while staring at his gargantuan and extremely naked body, that there was no way in hells I’d had sex with him last night. None. Physically impossible.
This was a mistake. I had made a terrible mistake. But when a being spent the last several months chasing after the high of the best one-night stand of her life, mistakes were bound to be made. And while this was, admittedly, the biggest mistake I’d made so far, it didn’t change anything. I wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t. Because no matter what I did, or who I did it with, nothing erased the feel of his hands on my body, the taste of cherries on his lips, the way he looked at me like I was the only?—
Where are you? Elanie barked through my VC. You’re late.
I groaned, froze as the Argosian stirred, then commed, Wrong number.
Don’t start with me. Elanie, per usual, was in no mood. I’ve laid an outfit out for you on your empty, unslept-in bed. We have a staff meeting to welcome the new languages and customs expert in twenty minutes. Please get your ass to your pod directly.
I don’t appreciate your tone, Elanie. I’m hungover.
Really? Because you sound like you’re still drunk. And I did say please.
Gingerly, I scooted back toward the headboard and tried to sit up. The room spun. My temples throbbed. I guess I was still drunk. Argosian ripple took no prisoners. What if I can’t move? I asked, peering down at the arm now slung across my thighs.
Elanie’s sigh was deep, long-suffering, and entirely too dramatic for a bionic. Which filled me with pride. I was training her well, like my half-robot little sister.
Please, she commed. For the love of all the stars in all the skies, bid farewell to whatever disaster you’ve wrought upon yourself and make your way to your pod. You do not want to miss this meeting.
Roger that, I replied, relenting. Because, enormous Argosian mistakes or not, I did have a very busy day ahead of me. Pinching the purple arm squishing my thighs, I cleared my throat. “Ahem, darling? Wakey, wakey.”
A deep and resonant grumble was his only response.
“Hellooo,” I said a little louder. “Although last night was”—I stalled out, having no idea what last night was—“memorable, I’m sure, if you wouldn’t mind, would you please move your arm? I’m running late.” I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little worried I might not be able to walk out of this room if we’d somehow made the impossible possible, but first things first.
When the Argosian rolled onto his back, taking his tree trunk arm with him, air flooded my lungs. “Much better.” Without much grace, I slid off the bed, thrilled that all my pieces and parts seemed to be functioning normally. “I’ll just find my clothes and be on my?—”
“You will not find them,” he rumbled with a sleepy smirk. Golden tattoos embellished his broad chest and firm stomach—a scythe, harvest moons glowing over a field of grain, exquisitely detailed seeds—images meant to pay tribute to the agricultural life that drove his planet’s economy.
“I can see that,” I said, looking around his room. “Happen to know where they are?”
“You do not remember?” His smirk stretched into a full-fledged grin. “They got…messy. We sent them to the laundry.”
I blinked. I did not, in fact, remember. And didn’t particularly want to. “Super.”
Scratching his chest between his stunning pectorals, he said, “Argos makes a strong drink. Do not be ashamed.”
“Did we…? Did I…?” I forced down a swallow.
He shook his head. “You and I had much fun times, but we did not join. We were not worthy of each other.”
A profound relief buckled my knees. Worthy , on Argos—where males tended to outweigh females by one hundred kilos or more—referred to the way body parts might or might not fit together between two partners. I offered a silent prayer of gratitude to the gods of fermentation for blessing me with complete amnesia of the evaluation of our worth .
“I guess anatomy strikes again, eh?” I said, snatching his yellow coveralls from the bed—the preferred outfit for all Argosians for reasons I’ve never quite understood—and wrapping them around me like a robe .
“Those are mine.” His deep voice reverberated through my ribcage.
“Well, I can’t walk back to my pod naked, can I? I’m sure you understand. I’ll have my assistant return your… garment to you straight away. You have my word.” I reached out awkwardly to pat his big toe, which he wiggled under my palm. Then I straightened, tied his coverall arms into a bow around my chest, and recited my customary closing remarks. “I trust you are enjoying your stay aboard the Ignisar . And I sincerely hope you will look no further than LunaCorp for all your future holiday and interplanetary travel needs.”
Giving him a curt nod, I scampered from his room while he chuckled, shaking his gigantic, golden-tattooed head.
Holding up the too-long legs of the Argosian’s coveralls, I tried my level best not to trip over them on my way into the staff elevator. Never empty when I wanted it to be, the elevator was packed full of two exhausted-looking, sunglasses-wearing Ulaperians who’d likely just finished their shift at the Voyager Club, one quad-armed room attendant from Gorbulon-7—two of those arms busy teasing his hair up to the ceiling—and one way too good-looking Blurvan, who I was fairly certain worked at one of the bars on deck thirty-six. The Blurvan, leaning his humanoid torso against the back wall of the elevator while his gelatinous lower half jiggled, took one look at my outfit, arched his brow, and asked, “Rough night?”
Mashing the button for deck twelve, I muttered, “No rougher than usual,” and wished for the thousandth time that I had more privacy on this ship. Yes, I knew my life choices were sometimes questionable, but why did everyone else have to know it too? Maybe if that Blurvan had been through a fraction of what I’d been through, he’d understand. Maybe he’d be ashamed of that smug, judgmental expression on his face. But then he popped his pecs, twice, and I realized…probably not.
Scurrying out of the elevator toward the staff quarters, I smiled stiffly at a duo of hopping Vorpol maintenance technicians. When one of them asked the other, “Is she wearing Argosian coveralls?” I ducked my head and double-timed it toward my pod.
Scowling deeply, Elanie stood in front of my door, her arms crossed under her perfect bionic cleavage. “Staff meeting is in ten minutes. I hope it was worth it.”
Artificial intelligence with DNA spliced between the wires, all bionics were designed to emulate the peak physical characteristics of their particular species. Elanie, for example—with her silky brown hair, straight nose, and big brown doe eyes—always looked as fresh as spring rain. While I, on the other hand, probably looked like the refuse compactor on jettison day. It was certainly how I felt.
“Is that a pair of Argosian coveralls?” A look of pure horror overtook Elanie as she realized what species I’d shacked up with last night.
Always endeavoring to project the appearance of having my shit together, even though I rarely did, I replied, “It is, and it was completely worth it.”
“An Argosian? Sunny, you could have been killed.”
Blowing air loudly through my lips—even though she was right—I waved her off.
She placed her hand on her hip. “You are not a sex worker, Sunny. You are a hospitality specialist. You do not need to sleep with all these males?— ”
“And females,” I interjected with a raised finger, sliding past her into my room.
“—to be good at your job.”
“At the risk of shocking your bionic sensibilities so thoroughly you’ll need a full factory reset, I will only say this.” Throwing off my coveralls robe to put on something more appropriate for a work meeting, I winked. “Life is far too short not to do what you love as often as you can.”
Her eye roll was monumental. “You have nine minutes.”
Slinging on a pair of kitten heels, I tucked a white button-down into a black pencil skirt, pinched my cheeks, then waved a hand over my body. “Yes?”
Elanie frowned. “No. Your hair looks like a trestal’s nest.”
“Right.” Running water over my hands, I wetted down my short, jagged blond hair, then ducked underneath my quikDri. “Better?”
One of her shoulders rose a fraction, the gestural equivalent of I can’t begin to tell you how little I care .
“Elanie?” I squinted at her, suspicious. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” she replied flatly. “Why?”
She didn’t seem fine. Even for a being as universally annoyed by my antics as she was, she seemed…moody. “It’s just, you’re a bit pricklier than usual. What’s it been, three months since LunaCorp released the hormone upgrade for generation twenty-six bionics? Any chance you finally decided to install?”
Her entire body shuddered. “No.”
“Why not?” I waggled my brows. “Could be fun. I could take you up to deck thirty-six. We could visit the dance clubs, the pleasure pods, go to a live sex show?—”
Holding up her hand, Elanie said, “I hate that deck. And I already tried the trial version. ”
“Really?”
“For 0.025 milliseconds.”
“Wow,” I said. “That long?”
Missing the sarcasm, she made a pinched, repulsed expression, like she’d sucked the slime off that elevator Blurvan’s seventh toe. “It was long enough, believe me. It was…messy.”
“That’s fair,” I conceded. “But you should do it anyway. You may find it won’t kill you to participate in something other than categorical disdain every once in a while.”
“Well, Sunny, as someone once said, life is far too short not to do what you love as often as you can.”
While I burst into laughter, Elanie left my pod, flipping her soft, glossy hair off her shoulders as she walked through the door.
Accessing the files in my VC while I made my way to the staff room, my headache fading to a dull throb, I perused the dossiers of the special guests expected to board in the upcoming week. A conference of Delphinian magicians had arrived earlier in the morning. Delphinian magicians, while mostly harmless, were occasionally disastrous guests. A drunken magician’s finger snap three years ago had resulted in the still unfillable pool on deck sixteen. Every time the crew tried to fill it, the water vanished with an infuriating fizz-pop sound. Considering the pool on sixteen had been my favorite, I had a hard time hiding my annoyance with the outer-rim planet’s obsession with tricks.
A senator from Tranquis would arrive tomorrow. This was odd. We didn’t get many politicos on the ship—something about our reputation as an orgy-in-orbit tended to keep them from booking. And this senator, Sonia Ramesh, planned to stay with her wife and ten-year-old son until they reached Portis for the Known Universal Senate meeting. Which would take more than a month. The Ignisar was not built for speed, and if this senator wanted to use the ship simply to get to Portis, there were much more efficient and economical methods of travel available to her. With much less of a risk of destroying her political career when she accidentally ate a piece of warple cake at Sunday brunch, and vids of her dancing naked in the atrium went viral on Vchirp.
What do you know of the senator? I commed Elanie.
No more than you, she responded. Why?
You don’t think it’s odd? A senator on holiday with her wife and child on this ship, of all places?
I’ll admit it is a strange booking. But we have been marketing more to families with our Wholesome Deck Initiative. Perhaps the WDI is working. Hurry up. Chan brought cake.
Cake? This perked me up. I’ll be right there. How’s the new L
There was a moment of silence before Elanie replied, He is…adequate.
Detecting the rare hesitation in her response, I said, Only adequate? Is that all? Chan must be so upset.
He’s…fine.
More hesitation. Now she had my attention. Fine? Elanie, are you blushing? I can hear you blushing.
Just get in here.
When I walked into the staff room, I found the rest of the crew huddled at the far end of the big table. I was a breath away from announcing my presence when I realized someone was talking, telling a story. The new L Stars above, Sunny. Must you sleep with everyone in the entire Known Universe?
I registered Elanie’s snark, but she sounded like she was a million kilometers away, on a raft, in the middle of an ocean, all the way across the wormhole. Maybe on Venus.
“Phoebe?” Joshua—or Freddie—repeated while he stared at me with those intense, storm-gray eyes I’d been dreaming about for months. “How?”
“You two know each other?” Chan asked, his gaze shifting between us.
“Yes.” Freddie’s expression was blank, and his voice—missing the sultry swagger I’d remembered—warbled. “We’ve met.”
This was bad. This was very, very bad.
“Sunny?” Chan’s head tilted, his finger flicking out to point at Freddie. “You know our new L&C?”
I couldn’t answer. I was too busy swallowing what felt like a gwarf—an Aquilinian fruit resembling a golf ball covered in mildly poisonous spikes. He was a dream, a memory. He was supposed to stay that way. And now he was here. He was a member of my crew. I’d have to see him every day, live with him on this ship, work closely with him. Permanently. Holy shit .
“I’m terribly sorry,” I said to no one in particular. “If you’ll excuse me for a moment.”
Spinning on my heel—because while I had no idea what to do, I knew I had to get out of there—I attempted to walk smoothly through the door. But I tripped over the threshold and stumbled out into the hallway instead.
“Sunny, wait. Stop.” His honeyed voice had its own gravitational field, slowing me down, pulling me back. Reeling me in.
I took a deep breath and blew it out. Get a grip, Sunny . I was a grown woman. This was my ship. And I refused to be stunned into silence on my own ship. It was a shock, seeing him again, but I could do this. I could say words to him. I could converse. I could be normal. When I turned around, however, his smile took me out at the knees.
“Sunny—or is it Sunastara? That’s a beautiful name,” he said once he reached me. “You work on this ship? You… I can’t believe it.” He took my hand in his, pulling me into a quiet alcove next to a moon jelly tank. The watery blue light emanating from the tank danced over his cheekbones in graceful ripples. “Sunny, say something. Anything.”
You’re beautiful. You smell like the best dream I ever had. I want to lick your face. “Hello, Fredrick,” I said stiffly.
“Freddie, please call me Freddie.”
“Okay, Fred?—”
“I thought I’d never see you again,” he said in a rush. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since that night. I tried to find you on Squee , but your profile never reappeared. And now you’re here.” He released my hand only so he could reach out and cup my cheek, making me wonder how something could feel so good yet so awful at the same time. Like watching a perfect sunset with sand in your eye. “It’s impossible,” he said. “Isn’t this impossible?”
I wanted to tell him that it was impossible. That I hadn’t stopped thinking about him either. But fear flooded my veins, my bones, my skin. The same cold, paralyzing fear that always gripped me when someone tried to get close or looked at me the way he was looking at me. I had to make it stop. Like my life depended on it. So I backed away from him and said, “Freddie, I?—”
His sharp inhale stopped me short. “I didn’t even think to ask. Are you already with someone?” He looked devastated, like someone had popped a balloon full of puppies .
“No, I’m not with anyone.” I will never be with anyone. That’s the point.
“Thank the stars.” When he tried to take another step closer, I stood straighter.
“But I can’t be with you either,” I said, each word scraping its way out of me. But at least this much was true. “I don’t get involved with my coworkers. Ever.”
He didn’t miss a beat. “Is that all? Not a problem. I quit.” Wheeling around, he shouted back toward the break room, “Sorry, Chan, but I qui?—”
“ Shh .” I threw my hand over his mouth, smiling despite myself. “You can’t quit. We need a good L&C, and I’ve heard you’re one of the best.” His lips curved against my palm, and I yanked my hand back like I’d been electrocuted.
“You can find someone else,” he assured me, unfazed. “It’s not a difficult job.”
“Right,” I said. “It only takes nine years of higher education, an additional five of fieldwork, and two advanced residencies. Languages and customs experts practically grow on trees.”
“They do, in fact. I can recommend several.” His voice went so soft I could have fallen into it. “I have to be with you, Sunny. I’ve never felt anything like the connection I felt—I feel —when I’m with you. And to meet again, here…” He looked around the deck like he couldn’t believe his luck. “It has to mean something.”
It was true that when I saw him leaning against that shelf, I wanted nothing more than to run to him, throw myself into his arms, and kiss him until we both nearly died from it. But he had no idea who he was talking to. He knew Phoebe, not Sunny. Phoebe was put together. Phoebe was carefree. Phoebe was light and fun and desirable. Sunny was none of those things. Sunny was a disaster. Sunny still spent her days walking over the thinnest layer of ice, knowing that any extra weight would shatter the surface beneath her feet, and she’d be lost.
Providing a blessed break in the tension, a group of Delphinian wizards—as this particular group of magicians wanted to be called—swept down the hall, their red and black robes swishing against their legs. One of them said, “That’s when I realized the incantation, when recited quickly, sounded just like, ‘I poured butter on a bear’s underbelly,’ in Common.” And when another replied, “That’s random. Remind me again, what is a ‘bear’?” I tried not to laugh, but I was treading dangerously close to hysterical, the type of hysterical where everything was funny, whether it was catastrophic or not. So a shrill laugh came out anyway.
When Freddie laughed too, delighted, like hearing my laughter delighted him, I gave my head a firm shake and said, “Maybe all it means is that you and I were meant to work together.”
He scoffed. “It’s more than that.”
Somehow, by the grace of the cosmos, calm returned to me by degrees. I hadn’t seen this man in months. We probably had nothing in common. He probably liked sardines and hated reality television. “Freddie,” I said, trying to sound convincing, “we hardly know each other. Trust me, you don’t want to throw this job, this very good job with an excellent crew on a beautiful… ish ,” I clarified, “ship away over one random night months ago. You’ll love working here. And you and I? Well, we can be fr?—”
He moved so close that his breath brushed over my lips. It smelled like cake. “If you say friends, I’m going to shout fire .”
I tried to back away, but my ass bumped into the moon jelly tank, startling the little blobs into a slightly less slow-motion whirl away from the glass. Freddie’s lips hovered a hairsbreadth from mine, and my weight tipped itself onto my toes to get closer to them—entirely without my permission, I might add.
“Sunny—”
“I can’t,” I said, placing a hand on his chest, ignoring the warmth of his skin under his shirt to push him away. “I’d like to be fr—you know what I mean,” I said with a flapping gesture that I hoped conveyed please don’t actually shout fire. “I understand if that’s not something you want. But I can’t give you more.” Because I had nothing more to give. All I had was this job, this ship, this little life . And I couldn’t lose any of it. Not for all the orgasms in the galaxy. “I’m sorry.”
Backing away, some invisible bucket of cold water washing all the heat from his expression, he said, “I see.” He slid his hands into his pockets. “Then I’m sorry too.” Clarity surfaced in the deep pools of his eyes, along with something like shame, which made me feel awful. He had nothing to be ashamed of. He wasn’t the problem here. This was all me. “I shouldn’t have come on so strong.”
“It’s fine,” I said, needing the moment to be over, needing some time and space to process…everything. “But we should really get back to the party. You’re the guest of honor, after all.”
“Of course,” he said with a slow nod. “After you.” He stepped to the side, and when I made myself walk past him back to the staff room, he watched me go without another word.
“Everything all right out there?” Chan asked around a mouthful of cake as I walked back through the door, Freddie filing in a few steps behind me.
“Right as rain, Chan,” Freddie said, his voice reed thin. Then, in a lighter tone, “Would you look at that? I leave for five minutes, and my new crewmates try to finish my cake without me.”
Tig, our head of IT, froze, her blue eyes wide and her bite of cake halted halfway to her mouth. “Sorry, Freddie,” she said, pushing her plate away and pulling the hood of her sweatshirt over her pink hair, her small, round face disappearing in its shadow.
“I was only joking.” He slid her plate back in front of her. “Forgive me, Tig.”
I pulled out my chair, my heart still pounding, my palms still sweating, my chest still tight. While I sat, shaken but determined to pretend that everything was normal, Chan, Elanie, Tig, and the twins, Rax and Morgath—hulking, green-skinned ex-Royal military from the smaller planet of the Aquilines who ran our security—gorged themselves on sheet cake with chocolate frosting and Welcome to the Jungle scrawled across the top in blue icing.
Eventually, Chan raised his cup in a toast. “Well,” he said with a tight, nervy laugh, “it seems our new L&C has already made quite the impression on our little group.”
My gaze betrayed me, sliding to Freddie’s across the table. When he smiled, meeting my stare, I whipped my head back toward Chan so fast, something in my neck popped.
“Yeah,” Rax said, frowning at me in that way he did when he was wondering if someone needed straightening out , which in the twins’ world usually resulted in a trip to the med bay. When he looked at Freddie, his frown turned downright menacing. “What was that all about?”
“They slept together,” Elanie stated like she was reading the weather report.
I choked on nothing while Freddie’s eyes tripled in size .
“Elanie,” Chan hissed.
“What?” Her shoulder hitched. “It’s true. Sunny, tell them.”
Since Elanie was a relatively young bionic and still unskilled at societal norms, I gave her a pass. But that didn’t mean I wouldn’t be talking to her later about why we don’t air our coworker’s dirty laundry at staff meetings. “Just to keep ship gossip from reaching critical mass,” I said to the room. “Freddie and I met on the CAK a few months ago. We had a”—heat seared my cheeks—“nice night. However, that is in the past. We are both professionals and will behave accordingly.”
All eyes turned to Freddie as color rushed up his throat, a throat I wished I didn’t remember kissing and licking in such vivid detail. “Oh. Um, well. You see,” he stammered. “What Sunny says is true. We, uh, did…” He trailed off, straightening his tie, reminding me of his other tie, the one currently coiled under my pillow. “I am a consummate professional, however?—”
Morgath snorted. “Y’all got freaky, didn’t you?” He grinned, scratching his thick fingers into his unruly mop of green hair.
Elbowing his brother in the ribs, Rax muttered, “Shut up, dingus.”
“Anyway,” Chan said over the chatter. “Welcome to the team, Freddie. Our last L&C was exemplary, so you’ll have some very big shoes to fill. But I’m sure you’ll be plenty big enough.”
Freddie coughed on his vitoWater.
Chan’s gaze flew to mine, surely finding what the actual fuck ? written in my expression.
“I mean, your feet ,” he amended, wincing at Freddie. “Your feet are big, not you. Not to imply that you’re small… ”
Bright-red patches exploded across Tig’s cheeks. Rax and Morgath turned even redder as they tried not to laugh. Freddie stared industriously at his uneaten cake, as if it held all the secrets of the Known Universe. And I prayed to all the stars in all the skies that I would somehow get through this without blowing up my entire life, a life I was barely holding together as it was.