Chapter 46
Forty-Six
Holly watched Rasker. He stood with his arms at his sides and let Cody finish, absorbing the threats and the contempt and the ugly confidence, without interrupting.
Without flinching. She had seen excellent negotiators during her time at Sol-Arc.
She’d watched people work a room with expert patience and control, and she recognized what Rasker was doing now.
He was letting Cody talk himself into a corner.
“You’re right that Complete Respite has significant legal resources,” Rasker said when Cody had run out of air.
His voice was calm, as if he were just laying down cards.
“What you don’t know is that I’ve been sharing everything I’ve learned with my client, Rest ’N Recharge, since I suspected what you were doing. ”
Cody’s expression flickered.
“Obviously, Rest ’N Recharge is Complete Respite’s main competitor,” Rasker went on.
“They are also, despite their hideously designed stations,” a murmur of grim amusement from the crowd, “a legitimate operation. They don’t sabotage.
They don’t blackmail. They don’t plant operatives to destroy independent stations from the inside, but they are happy to expose corporations that do, especially if it means eliminating a competitor in their tight market. ”
Rasker swiped his d-pad. A new set of documents appeared on the holographic display.
“Three days ago, Rest ’N Recharge filed an official grievance against Complete Respite with Galactic Enforcement and the Commission of Balanced Systems, alleging corrupt acquisition practices, deliberate sabotage of independent infrastructure, and conspiracy to manipulate Way Station Registry’s inspection process.
The grievance cites Moone’s Landing as the primary case, supported by the evidence I’ve just presented.
It also references the three other stations I identified, whose owners now have grounds to reopen their cases. ”
Holly stared at him. Every disappearance. Every day he’d been gone without explanation, every time she’d watched him leave with his d-pad under his arm and wondered what he was doing. This. He had been doing this.
Cody’s posture changed. The arrogant confidence slipped, just slightly, like a mask that had been bumped.
Rasker grinned, cold as a shark. “You’re incorrect about Galactic Enforcement’s jurisdiction, by the way.
With the Saga-1 station being built, Enforcement added a team to cover this corridor.
They’re eager to keep this sector clean and tidy.
” He gave a meaningful glance at Harry, who looked down at his shoes with an expression that was not remotely innocent.
“Complete Respite is cooperating, from what I’ve heard, and Enforcement officers will be arriving here within two days.
I wonder what they’ll find in room four of the hotel. Your room, Cody.”
The mask slipped further. Cody’s jaw tightened. His gaze darted to the hotel.
“You told Holly that Complete Respite’s lawyers would tie this up for years,” Rasker said.
“You may be right. Corporate litigation is slow. But Galactic Enforcement investigations are not, and the Commission of Balanced Systems has the authority to freeze Complete Respite’s assets during the investigation, which they have decided to do.
Which means the company that’s supposed to protect you won’t be able to.
You’re an operative who just confessed, in front of two dozen witnesses, to every crime you were paid to commit. Luv, you recorded all that?”
“I did, Rasker,” the Homeboti replied.
The square was very still.
Cody looked at Holly. The contempt was still there, but beneath it, for the first time, she could see something else. Fear.
He turned to her with a snarl contorting his face. “This is your fault.” His voice shook, stripped of its studied cool. “You should have sold. You should have taken the money and left. But you had to play house on this rock, and now look where we are.”
“Where you are,” Holly corrected. Her voice was quiet, but it held. “I’ll always regret not kicking you out after firing you.”
Something snapped behind Cody’s eyes. He lunged forward, faster than expected from a man who moved through life like he was made of liquid, and he was coming for her.
He didn’t reach her.
The residents of Moone’s Landing moved as one. They had decided, collectively and without discussion, that this person was not going to touch one of theirs.
Holly’s parents pressed close to her. Harry stepped in front of Holly, his broad frame blocking Cody’s path.
Mish moved to his left. Alyce to the right.
Tyer, who had been watching the scene unfold with studied disinterest, straightened and placed himself between Cody and the crowd with the fluid grace of someone who had once known how to fight.
Even Orba and Sula shifted forward, their opalescent skin catching the light, their presence suddenly less serene and more immovable.
In front of them all, forming a wall unto himself, was Sam.
Cody collided with Sam’s chest and bounced off it like he’d hit a wall.
Sam cocked his head. While Cody was still dazed, Sam seized him, spun him around and lifted him as though he were handling a sack of carbohydrate powder. Sam tucked him under one arm.
“Let go of me,” Cody spat, thrashing. “You can’t do this. I have rights.”
“You have a detention cell,” Sam said flatly. “In the control tower. Added it myself many years ago, just in case. And, as a former officer of the Alliance Defense Force, I can arrest you.” He looked at Holly over Cody’s struggling form, one brow raised. “I assume you approve?”
“Yes.” Holly’s voice sounded like gravel, but she got the word out.
With a nod, Sam calmly walked toward the spaceport with Cody, thrashing and cursing, locked under one thick arm.
The square was quiet again, except for some surprised conversation: Did you know Sam was in the Alliance Defense Force? He never talks about his past... He must have seen some terrible things... Do you think he fought in the Tak-Voalt war?
To Holly, Sam’s ex-military status explained the cybernetic body parts, the discipline, the composure. But it also raised more questions. Like why did a military veteran choose a place like this to put down roots? But that was a question for the future. Now was a time for other things.
Holly stood in the middle of her community, surrounded by people who had just put their bodies between her and harm, and she couldn’t speak.
Her throat was sealed shut and her eyes burned and her hands trembled.
If she opened her mouth just then, she was going to fall apart in a way that could not be reassembled easily.
And she’d spent enough time in pieces recently.
The crowd parted in a quiet shifting. Kind words murmured, gentle touches to her arm, shoulder. They each took a step back here, a turn of the shoulder there, until the space between Holly and Rasker was clear. Even her parents slid away, leaving her to face the man she’d accused of playing her.
He stood where he had stood throughout his presentation, in front of the broken fountain, his d-pad at his side, and his face open. Unguarded. Afraid, a little, as if he wasn’t sure if what had gone wrong between them could be fixed.
Holly crossed the space between them. Her legs were unsteady and her heart hammered. Bean pulled at the leash, and she stopped in front of Rasker and looked up at him.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked.
He held her gaze. “I tried. Twice. In the control tower, after the inspection notice came in.” His eyes crinkled. “And there were all the messages I left on your comm.”
Which she had turned off. Holly closed her eyes, remembering his muffled words. A lead. Leverage. The game. Ah, she remembered. The exhaustion. The overwhelm. The hopelessness.
“Before that, I didn’t have enough to make a case. Everything I had was circumstantial. Patterns and suspicions and a campsite in the woods. None of it was proof.” He paused. “And I was aware that you were starting to doubt me.”
Holly winced.
“You had every reason to,” he said. “I know what it looked like. The station was failing and the consultant who’d come to buy it was disappearing for days at a time with his d-pad. I understand why you pulled away.”
“I’m sorry.” Holly closed her eyes briefly.
“Don’t be. You were protecting yourself. I would have done the same.” He took a breath. “Holly, I wanted to tell you what I was so close to proving, but I could see that you were finished. Finished with fighting and struggling. Finished with me.” His jaw tightened.
“You went professional.” Her words sounded more like a croak than a voice. “You turned back into the cool consultant. I never liked that guy.”
“I know.” His mouth moved between a grimace and a sad grin of acknowledgment.
“I didn’t know how to reach you, Holly. I guess, I was trying to protect myself from being hurt, too.
” He ran his hand through his hair. “The entire time I was investigating Cody, I thought you had a safety net. Even if the worst happened and the station was lost, I believed you would walk away with a significant sum from the sale. Just before you came to see me after the inspection, I had convinced Rest ’N Recharge to make an enormous offer if you decided to sell.
Enough that you would never need to worry about nits, or Sol-Arc, or any of it.
You could make your own future, wherever and however you chose. ”
Holly stared at him, processing everything he was telling her. He didn’t know that she’d officially quit Sol-Arc. That was how distant their relationship had become.
“When you told me the will gave you nothing,” he said, “that the proceeds go to a statue and the lowest offer is taken, I was so furious with Cody, and your grandfather, I wanted to beat both to a pulp for causing you pain. I could barely see, I was so angry.” His gills flared, seemingly, at just the memory.
“You told me once that your biggest fear was failing this place and the people here, and I was terrified that I’d failed you.
I couldn’t figure out how to tell you that despite investigating your cousin for weeks, I hadn’t managed to stop Cody in time. ”
The honesty of it made an ache in Holly’s chest. She had spent days in bed believing he didn’t care.
Believing the consultant had been the real man all along and the rest had been performance.
Believing she had been foolish to trust him, foolish to fall in love, foolish to let herself be carried through a doorway by someone who would walk out of it without looking back.
She had been wrong.
“I thought you didn’t care about me,” she said, and her voice broke on the last word.
“Holly.” He stepped closer. Close enough that she could see the fatigue in every line of his face and the raw, unguarded feeling in his eyes.
“I have cared about you since the morning you called me a condescending snob and said you didn’t like me.
It only grew from there. Wherever you were, I found myself wanting to be there.
I craved seeing a smile on your face, and then it became my goal to put it there.
” His hand came up and his fingers brushed her jaw.
“I cared about you every single day I spent on this station, and the days I didn’t.
” He gestured toward the dome, toward the dark sky beyond it, “I was trying to find a way to save your home.”
Holly’s vision blurred. “Rasker.” There were many things to say.
So many feelings to unravel, but all she could do was say his name, and throw her arms around his neck.
His arms closed around her and pulled her close against him.
A shuddering breath escaped him, as if he’d been aching for this contact.
She breathed in his scent, sea spray and wood, and sank into it.
Into him. “Thank you. I love you. I—I have for a while, and…” She pressed her eyes closed.
“No, that’s all I’ve got. I love you, and I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you. And thank you.”
“I love you, too, Holly. I want to stay.” His voice was muffled in the crook of her neck. “Here. On Moone’s Landing. With you. Not as a consultant, not as a guest in room seventeen. As someone who belongs here, if you’ll have me.”
“Stars, yes,” she said, and kissed him.