by Dena Christy
“It’s done. I’ve kept up my end of the bargain, now you must keep yours.” He didn’t wait for a reply from her and he turned and walked back down the hall. Evie closed the door and sagged back against it.
Her father had saved Rebecca, and now if Cynric came to her to ask if she wanted to go to Latroth she had to tell him no, and make no mention of the devil’s bargain she’d made with her father. She had no idea how she was going to do it without breaking down because if he came to see her it would be the last time she would get to speak or interact with him. She would have to say goodbye and that was more painful than the thought of living under her father’s thumb for the rest of her life.
Chapter Eighteen
It was finally happening. They were going home, and only one thing needed to be done before they could get off this planet. He needed to ask Evie to go with him. The mark had not appeared, and he didn’t care. He wanted to be with her, and they would leave this planet together and build a life together. He was certain the mark would come in time.
He strode down the hall toward the room Evie had been put in. Why had she been escorted away from the other women and taken here? The soldier who’d brought him in this direction hadn’t known and said that he would have to ask her. It didn’t matter. She wouldn’t be staying in this room long enough for it to matter. She would come with him. All he needed to do was ask her.
He knocked on the door, and now that the moment to see her again, to finally ask her to leave this planet and come with him had arrived, an uneasy feeling settled over him. What if she said no? When they’d been on the run, they hadn’t talked about what would happen if they had gotten to this point. Maybe neither of them had believed that it was possible. He hadn’t wanted to let himself see a future with her in the event it was snatch away from him. It very nearly had been. If his people hadn’t come to their aid, he would not now be having this discussion with Evie.
The door opened and there she stood as beautiful as ever and his heart hitched in his chest at the sight of her. He searched her face, looking for some sign of the direction this talk would go, and he thought for a moment that he saw a hint of sadness in her eyes. She turned away before he knew for certain that it was more than a trick of the light.
“Please come in.” She walked away from the door and stood with her back to him in the middle of the room. He entered the room and shut the door with a soft click behind him. This conversation was best made in private.
She did not turn to look at him although he was sure she’d heard the door close. He pushed down the uneasy feeling that wanted to crawl up inside him. She was not reacting how he expected her to. He’d thought perhaps she’d put her arms out, and embrace him now that they were both safe. Perhaps she was keeping her distance until she was certain that he wasn’t here to say goodbye to her. She could not know what was in his mind and he’d made no promises to her beyond sharing his body with her.
In fact, all he’d ever assured her of was his willingness to get physical with her. His uncertainty of his future had prevented him from making promises to her that he wasn't assured of keeping. Now that he had a future, how was she to know that he wanted to share it with her? He could not promise her his heart, since the mark had yet to appear, but he could offer her a way off this planet and he was sure that with time the mark would come.
“Evie, will you not look at me? I have something that I want to ask you.” He took a step closer to her and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. She moved away slightly as she turned, making his hand drop from her. It fell back to his side, and the uneasiness he’d talked himself out of returned. She was not reacting the way he expected her to.
“I have a feeling that I know what you are going to ask me. You are going to ask me to go to your planet, aren’t you?” There was a note in her voice, something he didn’t want to believe could be sadness but that’s what it sounded like. How could his asking her to go with him make her sad?
“Yes, that’s what I’m asking.” He paused for a moment as he studied her face, searching for some sign of encouragement from her. She would not meet his eyes, a sure sign that he should end this conversation now, but he continued on as if all the signals she was giving him were not there. “You’ve done so much for me, for all of us. You did it with no expectations of getting anything in return. My countrymen are grateful. I’m grateful to you for all you’ve done. We want to offer you a chance to build a new life in repayment for helping us. You could come to Latroth and build a new life there.”
There was nothing in that little speech about his expectations for their future together, or what he was feeling in his heart. If she’d offered any encouragement, perhaps he would have framed it differently. Perhaps he would have told her that he wanted her to go to Latroth to be with him, to build a life with him. But from the moment he’d walked in the door she’d put up a barrier between them, and he didn’t know what he needed to say to break through it. He could feel her slipping away from him and he didn’t know what to do or say to get her to come back to him. Maybe he’d been mistaken all this time that she wanted a future with him. While he had made no promises of a future together, neither had she.
“Thank you for the offer but I’m afraid I can’t accept. I understand your gratitude, but it’s unnecessary. I did what I did because it was the right thing to do and there is no need for any of you to repay me.” She clasped her hands in front of herself, and he reached out and took them. Finally she looked at him for the first time since he’d walked in the room.
“Tell me why?” She tried to pull her hands away, but he kept them held tightly to him. “I thought we were building something, and I know that we didn’t make any promises to each other, but I thought we had something.”
“Miranda told me that Synn has a mark on his chest, one that looks like her hand. I’m sure Ryce has one on his chest that looks like Collette’s. I know what that means. It means that they are in love, and that they are committed to their women. Do you have such a mark on your chest?” She looked at him steadily, and his lips tightened. Why couldn’t she see that he was offering her what he could? That he couldn’t control the marks appearance and that it was no reflection on what he felt for her?
“You know there isn’t. It doesn’t mean that we can’t be together. It doesn’t mean that we can’t build something, and it doesn’t mean that I don’t care about you.” It was as close as he could get to telling her that he loved her, because although he tried to tell her that the mark didn’t matter, it did. He was certain that given enough time it would come, but it was a promise that he couldn’t make to her because he couldn’t guarantee that it would appear.
“I know you care about me, and I care about you. But in order to build a life together, in order for me to leave this planet and go to one that is strange and unfamiliar, I need more than that. When we started this we didn’t make any promises to each other. There was a reason for that. I think deep down we both knew that what we were feeling wasn’t real.”
“You can’t say that what we had together wasn’t real.” This was not going the way he expected it to, the way he wanted it to. What did he need to do to show her that what they’d had was real and that it was worth taking a gamble on? Her hands were still in his and he pulled her to him, so she was flush against his body. “Tell me this isn’t real.”
He brought his mouth down on hers and kissed her with everything that was clamoring inside him. She accepted his kiss for a moment until she pulled her hands from his and put them on his chest, pushing him away. She looked up at him, with her lips swollen and a profound sadness in her eyes and he knew in that moment that she was lost to him.
“I’m sorry. I can’t go with you and in time you’ll see that I made the right decision. We met under extreme circumstances. You were fighting for your survival, and we were trying to elude capture. Everything we did, everything we felt under circumstances like that would feel strong, would feel more intense than if we were living an ordina
ry life. It’s not real Cynric, and in time you’ll see I’m right.” Tears swam at the edges of her eyelids, and he clenched his jaw to keep from pulling her to him and holding her. Even now, as she was rejecting him and pushing him away, he wanted to shield her from the pain she was feeling. “There is a reason you don’t have that mark on your chest. You’ll see I’m right, eventually.”
“You’re wrong. It was real Evie, and you know it was. I held you naked in my arms, I joined my body with you and it was the most intense experience of my life. You can’t say that what we had together wasn’t real.”
“It was lust, it was passion, but it wasn’t love, Cynric. You know it wasn’t. I felt all those things you are talking about, but good sex is no reason to build a life together. I can’t go with you, and someday you’ll thank me for having a clear head about this. I don’t for a moment regret anything I’ve done with you, and I’m happy that you are saved and can go on with your life. But it’s over, Cynric and I don’t expect that we will see one another again.”
That was it. She would not take a chance on a future with him because for her all their time together had distilled down to good sex and nothing more. She didn’t love him, and there was nothing he could do or say to get her to feel for him something that wasn’t there. The urge to lash out was so strong that he had to clench his jaw to keep the bitterness he was feeling from spilling forth.
He tamped it down. He couldn’t make her feel what she didn’t, and all lashing out would do was hurt her and taint what they had together. She may believe that it was nothing more than lust, but there had been something between them that had been more than that. It may not be something lasting, but in the time that they were together it had been real.
“Thank you for saving me, and for sharing a small part of yourself with me. Take care of yourself Evie.” He took hold of her hand because he could not leave her without touching her at least one more time. He brought her hand up and pressed a kiss to her palm and looked at her. Her lower lip trembled, and a tear slipped down her cheek.
“Goodbye Cynric.” Her voice came out in a husky whisper and all he could do was nod in acknowledgment. He dropped her hand, turned on his heel and strode from the room. If he didn’t get out now, he never would.
He walked away from her and the room she was in as if his heels were on fire. By the time he got out of the building he was running. He ran until he came to the docking bay where a shuttle was waiting. He had to get off the planet, he had to get away from here before he went insane. Rypan's ship was departing ahead of the others, because it was needed back at Latroth immediately. He was going to be on that ship. Maybe if he was away from here, he would see the situation with clarity. Maybe he would see she was right.
The trip up to the ship on the shuttle passed quickly. Rypan had been surprised to see him there, and he’d made up some excuse about wanting to get back to Latroth and his duties as soon as possible. He was shown to a cabin, and the ship left the orbit of the planet that had seen him gaining and losing everything he’d ever wanted.
He sat in his cabin for what seemed like days, and he couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t. The trip back to Latroth would take weeks, and he had nothing to do but think. He tried to block her from his mind, but nothing he did would keep her out. He remembered every moment with her, and with each memory the pain inside him got deeper and deeper. It gained such strength that it felt hot on the skin over his heart and felt like it was burning into his flesh. He couldn’t catch his breath, and for a moment he thought the pain of losing her would kill him. He trembled where he sat in his chair until it passed, and despair replaced it all as he shoved the fabric of his shirt aside and saw the mark. If it had come just a day sooner, he could have shown her that what was between them was more than just passion and lust. But the mark hadn’t appeared until it was too late. And now he was on his way back to Latroth without her.
Evie opened her eyes as she lay on the bed in her room. It had been a day since she’d pushed Cynric out of her life. It had been the hardest thing she’d had to do, to push him away, but it was the right thing to do. There had been an element of truth to what she’d told him. They’d been together under extreme circumstances and how could they really know that what was between them was love. What she felt for him was more intense that what she’d had with Adam, so it could not possibly be the same emotion that she’d had with him, could it? What she felt when she was with Cynric scared her to death, and love wasn’t meant to be scary. Was it?
She sat up on the edge of the bed. She’d made her bargain with her father, and there was no going back on it now. He’d kept his word to her, and now she needed to keep hers.
There was a knock on the door, and she took a deep breath. It was probably someone sent by her father to collect her. Her moment of reckoning was here, and she felt nothing. After the pain of sending Cynric away, there was nothing that could touch her emotions in the same way.
She walked over to the door and pulled it opened. Her eyes widened for a moment as she took a step back. Miranda walked into her room, and there was a look on her face that she had not seen there before. Evie would almost swear that it was anger mixed with disbelief.
“What the hell are you doing? Synn heard that Cynric has already left, so what are you still doing here?” Miranda’s eyes searched her face, and Evie turned away, her shoulders sagging. She’d hope that she would not have to have this discussion with Miranda, that her father would send for her and that she would be gone before the others noticed.
“I’m not on the ship with him because I’m not going.” Please let that be enough of an explanation for her. She’d been put through the ringer when she’d gone through this with Cynric, and while she’d convinced him that what they had wasn’t love, Miranda could see things much more clearly than he had.
“Why? Why are you staying here? I thought you and Cynric had something together, that you meant something to each other.” There was a note of confusion in Miranda’s voice and Evie kept her back to her to keep her from seeing her face. Miranda had known her for a long time, and she would see that there was something more than what she was about to say if she looked at her face.
“Well you thought wrong. I’m going to live with my father and Cynric is going home. What was between Cynric and I was a momentary infatuation brought about by the extreme circumstances that we found ourselves in.” She’d kept her voice steady and hopefully Miranda wouldn’t probe any deeper into it than that. If she was going to keep her composure, if she was going to keep the bargain with her father a secret, she needed Miranda to take what she said at face value.
“Okay, so why don’t you turn around and try telling me the truth.” There was an edge to Miranda’s voice, and Evie knew she would not put her off that easily. She turned around and faced the woman who was her oldest friend, who knew her better than anyone else on the planet and prepared to lie to her. She took a deep breath with the words spinning in her head and she found that she couldn’t do it. Miranda’s gaze was steady and Evie’s resolve crumbled.
“I had to send him away. It was the only way that Rebecca could be saved.” She squeezed her lips together to stop them from trembling. Please let that be enough of an explanation for Miranda. She couldn’t go through everything that had happened with Cynric yesterday all over again.
“What are you talking about? Rebecca doesn’t need saving. She’s going to Latroth with us.” Miranda’s eyebrows drew together, and she crossed her arms over her chest. She would not be leaving until she got more of an explanation. “Tell me what is going on and start at the beginning.”
“My father sent for me yesterday. He told me that I had been asked to have a choice of staying here or going to Latroth. He told me that it was up to me what I decided, but there was no mention made of Rebecca. The authorities consider her brother a traitor, and she’s also a felon, and you know how things work. The government will want a scapegoat for all this, and Rebecca was it. I made a bargain with
my father that if he saved her, if he negotiated to get a place on a ship to Latroth for her, that I would go home with him. I had to make Cynric believe that it was what I wanted in order to prevent a war. I told him that all that was between us was lust and passion, and it wasn’t something that would last.” Miranda gave a shake of her head as if she didn’t believe the last sentence. “It’s true. I asked him if he had the mark, and he doesn’t. You told me yourself that when Latrothian’s fall in love, a mark appears and Cynric does not have the mark.”
“But you love him, don’t you?” Miranda looked at her steadily, and Evie couldn’t bring herself to answer that question. It wasn’t relevant anymore. The answer nagged at the back of her head, and she shoved it aside. Thinking about it would hurt too much.
“It doesn’t matter. It’s too late now, and I’ve made my bargain with my father and I have to honor it.” She expected Miranda to nod in understanding, to hug her and say goodbye. She didn’t expect the curse word that came out of her friends mouth, followed by a growl of frustration as she paced away and spun back to face her.
“I can’t believe how stupid you’re being. You are in love with him and it terrifies you. It scares you so much that you will believe the lies your father has fed you without blinking an eye and sending away your chance at happiness.” Miranda stood facing her, with her hands resting on her ample hips as she glared at Evie.
“I don't know what your talking about. What lies? My father only wants what's best for me. It may not have always matched up with what I wanted in the past, but he's not doing this maliciously. He didn’t have to help Rebecca. He did because I asked him to.” Miranda was wrong. She hadn’t agreed to her bargain with her father because she was afraid, she’d done it because of her care and concern for Rebecca. She was sacrificing for someone else, surely that was a good thing.