“Remind me to gloat with the same level of delight when I discover something you suck at.”
“So pretty much anything?”
“I can think of a few things you’re good at,” Ryce murmured, sliding from his seat and onto Matt’s lap in a fluid motion.
Matt’s heart sped up. He pulled Ryce closer, greedily drinking the kiss as he closed his eyes and lost himself to the whirlwind of stars around him.
He slid his hand over the front zipper of Ryce’s fatigues, but then the other man withdrew abruptly, frowning. Ryce touched the adapter on his temple, the one linked to Lady Lisa’s computer.
“There’s an incoming call,” he said.
“They’ll call later,” Matt said impatiently. Whoever it was, they could damn well wait another ten minutes. “We’re kind of in the middle of something here.”
“It’s a military channel.” Ryce’s frown deepened, and he stood up to sit back in the copilot seat.
“Damn it.” Matt sat up in his chair, pushing down on his arousal and frustration. His disdain for authority didn’t extend as far as ignoring contacts from the military. This could just be Nora, of course, but his sister rarely used encrypted communications simply to check up on him. “Bring it on screen.”
The face that appeared in front of them was familiar, but it wasn’t Nora’s. Nor did the bright white background look like the bridge of a ship. Something beeped steadily just out of sight, jolting unpleasant memories of Matt’s several stays in medical facilities.
“Commander Walker,” Matt said, trying to keep the worry out of his voice. “Not to sound rude or anything, but why are you calling?”
Matt remembered being questioned ad nauseum by the man almost eight months ago, after their unfortunate stint on the Colanta-3 moon and the discovery (and subsequent destruction) of a Mnirian superweapon. He didn’t like Walker then, and he wasn’t thrilled to see him now, but he couldn’t deny that he owed the commander his life after being saved from a slow, oxygen-deprived death in the depths of the alien bunker.
“I’m contacting you on behalf of Major Cummings.” Walker sounded unusually subdued, and Matt noted the deep stress lines around his eyes and mouth, marring his otherwise classically handsome features. “I thought you should know your sister was gravely injured in the line of duty.”
Ryce’s sharp intake of breath indicated that Walker had said something terrible, but for some reason, the moments stretched and stretched until the meaning of the words had finally registered in Matt’s brain, hitting him with the force of a freight barge.
“How gravely?” he asked, digging his fingers into the arms of his chair.
Walker pursed his lips. “Enough for me to contact you out of my own initiative,” he said, his voice clipped.
“What happened?” Ryce asked while Matt was busy remembering how to breathe.
“We were deployed back in the Sonora sector, and our ship, the Lennox, was on her way from Freeport 16 to the Sonora-11 outpost when we were attacked.”
Even though they weren’t touching, Matt felt Ryce tense beside him.
“Attacked? By whom?”
“An Alraki frigate,” Walker said after a pause. “A torpedo took out a portion of the bridge. Major Cummings was lucky to be able to get out before the shields gave and the section was sealed off.”
Matt and Ryce exchanged a look. Judging by Ryce’s startled expression, the same thought passed through their minds, one that made Matt’s stomach, already tied in knots by the news, lurch with awful premonition.
“I haven’t heard anything about the fighting reaching as far as Sonora,” Ryce said, frowning. “The military bases in this sector are designated mainly for training and redeployment.”
“It hasn’t,” Walker said. “This was…an isolated incident.”
“An Alraki frigate attacking a destroyer battleship in the heart of Federation space?” Matt said, barely recognizing his own voice for the strain. “That’s—”
“Disturbing. I know,” Walker said. For the first time since Matt had met the man, he looked troubled, but a second later, he visibly pulled himself together, as stern as ever in his officer uniform. “By rights, I shouldn’t even be telling you this. But I know how much your sister cares for you, and I thought you should be here by her side. Before it’s too late.”
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Table of Contents
A NineStar Press Publication
In the Winter Woods
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Coming Soon from Isabelle Adler
Also Available from NineStar Press
In the Winter Woods Page 20