Chapter Twenty
Madelaine pondered her life as she held Jack’s hand.
She was getting too attached to him. How could she not?
She loved Jack. Always had. Traveling with him these past days had been a dream come true in some ways, even as the dangers they encountered mounted day by day.
Still, she couldn’t think of anyone she’d rather spend this fraught time with than Jack.
She had always wanted a life with him, but once this dangerous adventure was over, she’d have to let him go. Remember what you had to do to get here…
Because they’d had to go so far out of their way to get fuel at Crooked Halo Station, they had several hours of travel to get back on track and into the wormhole she planned to use to get to Keirios and the next package.
The instructions from the farm planet said there would be a two-step process involved this time. She had to get a locker key from an Archivist who would not speak to her because women did not conduct business on their planet.
Frustrating, but whatever. She had Jack to help her. That’s why she got to marry him.
They’d have to go elsewhere on the planet to retrieve the package and she wouldn’t know how far or exactly where it was until they got the locker key from the Archivist. Again, frustrating, but only because she felt like they were behind schedule because of the stolen fuel debacle.
She spent a few minutes cataloging all the people she’d met along the way who seemed to know a whole lot more than she did about what she was doing and what the ultimate goal was once she’d secured all of the packages.
She’d spent all those years away from Earth training for this very mission like a soldier about to take on the good fight for home and planet.
Through it all, it was impressed upon her that she shouldn’t ask too many questions.
Her job was to follow orders, not to question them.
So, she did her best not to be too inquisitive, even though deep down she was wildly curious about many things.
Quell-don had trained her for this Paladin Courier undertaking, but he’d been more relentless than most about keeping her in the dark about specifics.
What was the life-or-death issue? She didn’t know.
On some level, she didn’t want to know or find out that she was basically on a fool’s errand. The reality had been more maddening than she realized in theory, not knowing the end game for this errand when it seemed like every stranger she met knew more than she did.
She worked her way back to exasperated.
Once she got back to Alpha-Prime, she didn’t expect anything to change. When this errand was over, she’d still have to let Jack go. That would be the hardest thing of all.
It hadn’t taken long—basically, seeing him at the bachelor auction through Seraphina’s violet-lensed spectacles—to fall hopelessly in love with him. Not that she’d ever fallen out of love with him.
It was not lost upon her that she had been afforded the gift of time with the man she loved beyond all reason.
Jack Grey. Her husband.
If the Secret Keeper hadn’t been available to guide her through the first package instructions, she hoped she wouldn’t have opted to read the name in the envelope and chosen to marry Dirk Zandis.
She didn’t even know what he looked like, but disliked him solely based on what the Secret Keeper had told her about his high-handed attitude and woe-is-me insertion into a decision that was hers to make.
No. There had been little chance of her choosing Dirk Zandis over Jack, even if the Paladin Cabal got bent out of shape about it.
Whatever punishment they had in store for her, she would bear it, because spending time with Jack on this extraordinary trip was valuable.
It was time she would treasure for the rest of her days.
Madelaine stared at the trajectory monitor without really seeing it. Instead, she focused on the way Jack’s fingers felt laced with hers, resting on the console like they were a long-married couple.
When they’d been a couple in Alienn, they’d always held hands. It wasn’t even something she’d thought about, but when she was all alone training on Alpha-Prime, she’d missed holding hands with Jack. It had been the first thing she missed about him, but not the last thing. She’d missed all of it.
If they lived to be a hundred, she suspected they would have always held hands. Like now.
But a life with Jack was a dream she no longer got to anticipate. A stray thought wound its way to the forefront of her mind. A wonderful realization crept into her mind and waved a flag. The stray thought bloomed into a solid concept.
They were married. Jack was her husband.
When she’d asked him to marry her, he had not hesitated. In fact, he refused to consider any kind of annulment.
With several hours ahead of them before the wormhole, Madelaine started thinking about the reasonably sized fold-down bed they’d been sharing, mostly separately, so one of them could monitor their flight at all times.
However, autopilot was a very handy device that her ship was equipped with. That led her thoughts down a very different path than the trajectory monitor she no longer saw anyway.
“Jack,” she asked in a low tone. “What would you think about having a honeymoon with me before our next stop?”
His gaze, which had been focused out the front viewing screen of the ship on the endless stars, snapped toward her. His fingers tightened around hers, entwining them even more securely.
“A honeymoon with you? Is that a trick question?” he said.
Jack’s eyes popped open in the darkened room. He couldn’t remember where he was for a second. Not at home. Not in the basement of the Big Bang Truck Stop.
Then he registered that Madelaine was pressed against his side and his recent memories returned in all their splendid grandeur.
The honeymoon had been awesome.
While this was not the first time they’d been intimate, it was certainly the first time in a long while. It cemented his belief that they belonged together. No matter what.
Before they dozed off in satisfied slumber, Madelaine had murmured that perhaps honeymooning had been, if not a mistake, a calculated risk.
“That was definitely not a mistake,” Jack said firmly. “And if it was a calculated risk then it’s not the first time we’ve experienced one of those either.”
She murmured, “Touché,” and fell asleep. Her cheek rested on his shoulder. Her soothing breath rhythmically wafted across his chest. Her arm was wrapped securely around his middle. Jack was in heaven.
He fell asleep thinking about a calculatedly risky trip they’d taken during high school the summer before their senior year, not far down the road from the Alienn Bauxite Mining Company.
It had involved trespassing on a thickly wooded area on the outskirts of town and an abandoned mine they’d discovered and explored, ignoring an ancient, dilapidated, handmade wooden sign that warned them not to enter.
The crude drawing of a skull and crossbones in faded red paint included in the warning had made them both laugh as they promptly ignored the sign and went exploring inside the dark cave.
They’d been young, in love and foolishly fearless.
Luckily, nothing terrible happened on that reckless exploration. They’d never gone back, but every so often, Jack thought about revisiting that forbidden spot to remember the wonderful adventure he’d shared in that cave with Madelaine.
In the here and now on the Paladin Seeker, Jack listened to Madelaine breathing softly next to him, curled on her side, pressed against him. He loved having her connected to him physically.
He didn’t want to do anything to wake her. Once she was awake, this amazing interlude, or rather the calculated risk of a honeymoon, would be over. He wasn’t ready for it to end. Not yet.
Jack glanced at the wall where an electronic life-support panel showed the time. Only four hours had passed. Two more hours until they were back where they’d discovered their fuel had been stolen.
Jack turned carefully on his side to keep from waking Madelaine. He dropped one arm around her waist, pulling her close before closing his eyes, wishing she could remain in his life forever.
He’d take what he could get.
And if the time came when she would have to go back to Alpha-Prime, maybe he’d go with her.
It wasn’t the worst idea he’d ever entertained.