“Pleasing?” Mick asked when a glance at Ariston didn’t give her any hints. “Did you enjoy seeing the captain of the salvage ship running around in his underwear?”
“Gods, nobody would enjoy that. I did get to see you in combat. You’re impressively fearless.”
“Reckless is the word superiors have used to describe me before.”
“That, too, but perhaps if you had a partner to temper your reckless impulses, great things could be accomplished.”
“A partner?” Ariston’s jaw dangled low. “Sir, are you implying—”
“Since I’ve forbidden you to retire and since this woman plans to have you by the balls sooner or later—I can see these things, you know, as age brings great insight—I must therefore hire her as a Star Guardian in order to ensure you have no reason to leave the fold. And because she appears to be a capable warrior who, with a little training, could be an honor to the uniform.”
Mick wasn’t sure which of them was more stunned, her or Ariston. Both of their jaws were dangling now.
“I didn’t come here looking for a job,” she said, though almost instantly, a surge of appeal went through her at the notion.
She’d missed the military and hadn’t known how to find her place as a civilian. And as much as she’d hated that evil planet and those visions, the last one had shown her something she’d never quite understood, that there truly had been nothing she could have done on that hot desert day all those years ago. If she’d done as she’d wanted, running forward to try and stop the boy, she would have died too. Perhaps she was once again ready to be a part of an organization, to have people rely on her, to believe they could do so.
“I suspect you came here hoping to clear your name,” the admiral said. “I’ve taken care of that. Well, I should say that Ariston took care of it with his copious statements regarding your innocence. I’m glad he had a lot of video footage, though, because without it, I would have dismissed him as smitten and therefore biased. Not something I ever thought I’d have to deal with from him, though he is young, so that’s to be expected.”
“Young,” Ariston said with a snort.
“A mere babe. You hardly have any gray hairs at all.”
“I do too—wait, what? Gray hairs?” Ariston gave Mick the most concerned look. “There aren’t any grays, right?”
“Been a while since you looked in a mirror without combat armor on?” Mick asked.
“My father always said looking in a mirror is vain.”
“Then you can’t be surprised if gray hairs creep up on you,” she said. “Don’t worry. There are only a few. And they’re sexy.”
Ariston didn’t look that encouraged.
“Isn’t it vain to be worried about gray hairs?” she asked, a little surprised he cared, but happy to tease him. She figured she still had a few years before she had to start inspecting her hairline with suspicion.
“No, one should be aware of senescence when it approaches.”
The admiral rolled his eyes. “I’m not letting you use this as another argument for why I should consider your retirement.”
“Why would I retire when you’ve offered to send this talented and magnificent woman to Star Guardian training and make her my partner?” Ariston beamed at her.
“She hasn’t accepted yet,” the admiral pointed out. “You should probably slather her with more superlatives.”
“I was going to save that for tonight. I got a nice room for us.”
“I hope acceptance of my employment offer doesn’t depend on whether or not you satisfy her in bed.” The admiral cocked an eyebrow at her.
“No, I’m interested in your offer now,” Mick said, cutting off whatever protest—or claim of bedroom magnificence—Ariston might make. “I’d have to take my scientists back to Earth—Gaia—and cuss out the idiots who funded that mission without talking to anyone else in the galaxy first. But then I could start training.”
“Excellent. Ariston will get your details.” His other eyebrow cocked upward, and he looked at both of them. “For the paperwork, that is.”
“What other details did you think I might gather?” Ariston asked blandly.
“The kind I’m too old to fantasize about. Much.” The admiral winked at Mick and walked out.
She looked around the room, feeling overwhelmed by the last five minutes. She’d come here to argue her case so she wouldn’t be arrested. Getting and accepting a job offer hadn’t been part of the plan.
But the judge and robots had disappeared. It seemed nobody was interested in arresting her.
“Are you truly interested in joining the Star Guardians?” Ariston asked.
“Very much so. I’ve missed being a part of something bigger than myself.”
“Being part of a military organization? That’s essentially what we are.” He watched her eyes as he spoke. “After the loss you went through, I’d understand if you couldn’t do it again.”
She took a deep breath, glad she’d told him about her past, but at the same time, ready to put those memories to bed, to move on. “As crazy as it seems, that planet helped me realize that I’d been beating myself up for something I had no control over. Yes, I’m ready to be a part of the military again.”
Ariston gazed solemnly at her. “I’m glad. Very glad, since I don’t think I realized quite how much I’ve missed having a partner.” The solemnness faded, and a smile flirted with his lips. “So, do you really think my gray hairs are sexy?”
“The black ones too.” She stepped close and pushed her fingers through his locks. “Also, the little furrow between your eyebrows. And definitely that cleft chin.”
His eyelids lowered as she ran down the list, and he gazed at her through his lashes. “My lips?”
“Very likely, but I’ll need to get a closer look to know for sure.”
“Let me oblige.”
He leaned down to kiss her, and she decided that his lips were indeed extremely sexy. Especially when they parted to let his tongue free, to slide along her lips, to tease them open and stroke her tongue.
She broke the kiss for long enough to ask, “Did you say you have a room for us?”
“A large one that overlooks the Leto Nebula. It’s quite magnificent.”
“Did you know I would come?”
“I hoped you would come. Shall we go check out the room now? Or did you want something to eat first?”
“Actually, I’m not quite done looking at your lips.” She curled her fingers around the back of his neck and kissed him again.
“Is it hard to look at things with your mouth?” he murmured, slipping an arm around her waist.
“Not when you’re magnificent and talented.”
Epilogue
After dinner, Ariston and Mick walked arm-in-arm toward the hotel on the twelfth level, toward the side of Talon Station that had a view of twin gas giants and the Leto Nebula no matter where in its orbit it was. Normally, he wouldn’t splurge for an opulent room, being content in one of the closet-like interior rooms, but his pay had been stacking up in his account, unneeded when he’d been on the salvage ship, so he felt he could splurge. Besides, he’d hoped against hope that Mick would come, and had wanted to please her if she did.
He grinned at her—he’d struggled not to do so throughout their entire meal—tickled at how the day had turned out. He’d believed she would be exonerated if she simply showed up to speak for herself, especially with him there to vouch for her, but he hadn’t known if she’d believed that. When he had flown through the wormhole gate first, he’d worried that she would turn around and head to the gate on the other side of the system, returning to her home world and disappearing forever.
Perhaps noticing his gaze, Mick looked over at him.
He kept himself from saying—again—that he was glad she’d come. She seemed the type to like a tough, independent man, not some needy fellow who would fall apart without a woman in his life. But he’d been the former for so many years, not letting himself
go out and seek a relationship with someone new, not believing there was anyone new that he wanted, that this was still novel.
“I told my scientists about the chip,” Mick said, touching her temple, “and they’re now dying to get one to study. I’ve been sleeping with my door locked because I caught Dr. Lee looking speculatively at my head while flipping a nail file that reminded me uncomfortably of a scalpel. I am open to having the chip removed, but I’d want an actual medical doctor to do the surgery.”
“That seems wise. The admiral sent everything I learned about the ruins and the civilization, most of it through your people, off to Headquarters. I believe the sack of skulls is also being sent to Dethocoles, to a research facility at one of the universities. Eventually, they should figure out what exactly happened to the original humans there. It seems the chips protected people from the sun’s effects and that they were supposed to be passed on from generation to generation. But for some reason, the inhabitants stopped passing them on. And then things got dicey.”
“Maybe they found the manner in which the chips passed themselves along a little creepy.”
“Possibly.”
“And then they started throwing the dead people into… what did you say it was?”
“A water reservoir with some tar or similar gunk that preserved the skulls.”
“The chips would have had a hard time transferring to new people from down there, I imagine.”
“Perhaps so.” Though Ariston found the mystery of the dead civilization interesting, he would prefer to talk about less gruesome topics tonight. He bumped her shoulder gently with his. “I spent a lot of time working out on the way here. To ensure I’d be fit in case we played Kapti again.”
“Already anticipating losing and having to do push-ups?”
“Those push-ups led to such an interesting place last time that I’m hoping for a repeat.”
“We could skip the game, and you could strip and do a handstand as soon as we get to your room. I have to admit, there are few times in my life when I’ve groped an upside-down man.”
“I had actually hoped you would grope more of me last time.”
“I might have, but you flipped upright and mashed me up against the table.”
“You’d think I would have learned more patience by my advanced, gray-haired age.” They reached the room, and he waved the door open, stepping back so she could go in first.
“Those grays are really bothering you, aren’t they?”
“No.”
Mick paused on the threshold and arched her eyebrows at him.
“Perhaps I’ll look into some hair mods.”
“I like your grays, but it’s up to you. I’ve dyed hair before and can help if you want.” She walked in, smiled at the huge window and the view, but then turned all her attention on him. She gave him a long, appreciative look up and down, one that excited him more than she could know. “Why don’t you come over here, and we’ll see if there are grays anywhere else that we have to dye.”
He had been halfway to her, his arms outstretched, but he faltered at this horrifying image.
Whatever the expression on his face was, she laughed at it. Since he hadn’t heard her laugh often—was this the first time?—he couldn’t mind being the butt of a joke.
“Didn’t your wife ever tease you?” Mick asked.
Ariston didn’t answer right away, considering if he wanted to discuss Zya with Mick, or if it was even appropriate. How would he feel if she brought up some past lover? He didn’t think he’d want to hear about it, or have cause to wonder if she was imagining that lover while they were in bed together. But she’d been the one to bring up Zya. It would be rude to brush off the question, and he didn’t want to make it seem that he had anything to hide.
“She did actually,” Ariston said, “but not about gray hairs, since there weren’t any of them then.”
“What did she tease you about?” Mick walked to the table instead of the bed, where the room attendant had left a bottle of sparkling white wine in a chiller, along with two glasses.
Ariston hadn’t ordered the alcohol and wasn’t sure if the hotel attendants had seen him walking in with a guest and acted promptly or if it would have come with the room, regardless. He imagined how depressed he would have been in here, drinking it by himself.
“Usually about my fighting skills, though they improved a lot during the time we served together. She thumped me regularly in the beginning, but I won two out of three in the end. She teased me about the one out of threes, about letting a girl win.”
“You’ve either come a long way since then, or she was an amazing fighter.”
“Both. She started out as space fleet security and trained troops in unarmed combat and marksmanship, but she had an analytical mind and ended up switching into the command track. Once she decided she was interested in it, she made it to the position of ship’s captain in record time.”
Mick nodded, opened the bottle, and poured wine into the glasses. Ariston hoped he hadn’t said, or wouldn’t say, the wrong thing in regard to his wife. Would Mick be upset if he praised Zya too often? Would she feel she had some high standard to live up to? She seemed strong enough and confident enough in herself not to be affected by such things, but Ariston had seen the confidence of great men—and women—rattled before, by seemingly small events.
He sat down in the chair next to hers, arranging it so they could both admire the view, the light pinks and purples of the nebula striking against the backdrop of space.
“There were a couple of times I wondered,” Mick said slowly, holding her glass in both hands and gazing into the wine, “if you were thinking of her.”
“When I was with you?”
“Yes. I’d understand if you were, but at the same time… that would be hard for me.”
“In the beginning, I did compare you to her a little,” Ariston said, wanting to be honest with her, though he feared offending her. “You’re strong and tough, as she was, and as others I’ve been attracted to in the past have been.”
She looked at him. “You must like women who tease you.”
“Well, I like a challenge.” Ariston was relieved she didn’t seem upset or angry. “I’ve always been more interested in having a partner for my adventures in life, rather than someone who would stay at home with a family.”
“I’ve got nothing against people who stay home and raise families, but it’s not really me,” Mick said.
“I gathered that from the fact that you left Gaia at the first chance, won a spaceship in a card game, learned how to fly it within months, and are now roaming the galaxy and getting into trouble.”
“You are very perceptive.” Mick sipped from her glass. “Are you going to drink some of that or will it mess up your all-suet diet?”
He snorted and picked up his glass. “It will, but I like to indulge a little between missions. Good drinks, good food. Good sex.”
“Me too.” She held his gaze as she drank again.
“Before we further explore… our drinks, I want to tell you that even though I made comparisons between you and Zya in the beginning, by the time we’d gone into battle together two or three times, you came to be your own person to me. A person I was interested in knowing better. When you were groping me in not quite the right places, I was definitely thinking of you.”
This time, he drank, a long swallow while holding her gaze over the rim of the glass.
She smirked. “What I’m hearing you say is that I was supposed to grab your penis when you were doing that handstand.”
“Was it not at the right height?”
“Quite conveniently placed, yes. But as I said, you stood up and kissed me before I could explore it.”
“Perhaps if I were given another chance, I could be more patient.”
“I’d be willing to give you another chance. I am amazingly magnanimous.”
“I’m a lucky man, then.”
“Absolutely. And Ariston? I’m glad… Tha
nks for being honest with me. I didn’t want to be some substitute and wonder if you were imagining someone else.”
“Never,” he whispered, surprised by how heartfelt and fierce the word came out.
Relief filled her eyes. Yes, even the most confident people could have doubts, moments when their confidence faltered. He was relieved she had given him the chance to explain his feelings.
“Even though we haven’t known each other long,” he said, “we’ve been through a lot together, and I—I don’t say this lightly, but I think I’m falling in love with you.”
“I think I could fall in love with you too. That won’t make it harder for you to be patient, will it?”
“It might.”
Ariston took another swallow from his wine, not enough to interfere with his athletic abilities, and stood up. Mick watched him as he unfastened his jacket and tossed it on the back of his chair.
Her eyes were keen, intensely interested. He used the theatrical skills he’d promised he had to make a show of removing the rest of his clothing, letting his fingers stray to highlight some muscle or other body part. He was turned on by the way her gaze followed his every movement.
By the time his boots and trousers came off, his cock had already grown stiff. He decided not to tell her how often on the way to Talon Station he’d kicked himself for not accepting Mick’s offer on her ship. But if he had, questions and uncertainties would have clouded their joining. Now, there was nothing for her to gain from sleeping with him. He knew she wanted to be here, wanted him.
“A hundred push-ups?” he asked, tugging off his underwear and tossing it onto the chair.
“You don’t want to play a few rounds of Kapti first?”
“I’m assuming I’ll lose and offering to go straight to fulfilling the loser’s role.”
“That’s noble of you. And convenient, since I didn’t bring any chocolate-covered coffee beans. I’ll be generous and only make you do fifty.” Mick eased out of her seat and slid a finger down the fastener of her top. “That’ll let you warm up and give me time to adjust my clothing.”
The sides of her top came apart, revealing a blue bra with a lacy bow in the center and the soft skin of her belly. He swallowed, tempted to step forward and grab her, forgetting notions of push-ups.
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