The air smelled like a meadow of wildflowers in July. It was crisp with the scent of fresh grass, sun baked dirt, and blossoming trees. She sucked as much of it into her lungs as she could hold before letting it go and finding herself a seat along the far wall.
The room was just large enough for the ten or so people already claiming the wooden benches nailed into the four walls. It was dimly lit to help the eyes adjust, but just bright enough to bath each figure with a soft, orange tint. Several, she noted, needed all the oxygen they could get what with the way they were sucking on each other’s mouths … and other body parts. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat, careful not to make eye contact with anyone.
She stayed for only a few minutes, the moaning and inappropriate displays of coupling finally driving her to her feet. She made it all the way to the compartment doors when they parted and a tall, broad figure stomped inside.
“Public displays of indecency is punishable by two nights in the pen.” That was all that needed to be said.
There was a mad scramble of bodies jerking apart and clothes being readjusted as couples darted out of the oxygen chamber, careful to make no eye contact with the figure standing in the doorway.
Scarlett and two girls remained, but they rose and scurried out as well, which made her wonder what they’d been doing to run off at the first sign of a marshal. She stayed, if only because she suddenly needed the air and because to leave would mean having him in her personal space.
Rolf watched the last person exit and turned those beautiful eyes on her. They drank her in as they always did and she felt a stab of frustration laced with the usual surge of desire. He had no right to look at her like that when he was so clearly taken. But like the coward she was, she never said a word about it. It was sick and twisted, but she liked it. God, she was a horrible person. There was a four letter word for people like her and it usually started with an S and ended with a T.
Shame and guilt had her dropping her gaze. She fidgeted with the skirt of her dress.
“You look beautiful.”
Scarlett forced herself to glance up, to meet his eyes. “Thank you. My grandmother gave it to me for my birthday.”
The door clicked closed behind him when he moved off the sensor and started towards her. His duty issued boots thudded with every purposeful stride. He looked gorgeous in his uniform. The dusky brown reminded her of the desert at dawn. It brought out the warmth in his eyes. The black band marshals wore was pinned to the bicep of his right arm. His enforcer hung against his right hip from the thick belt cinching his narrowed waist. Each large hand was encased in fingerless gloves. She had always wondered how the leather would feel against her skin. There was something about him in full uniform that made every sensitive inch of her tingle. The recycled and generated oxygen was suddenly not enough. Her lungs begged for more.
He stopped inches from her and raised a hand. She watched with wide, curious eyes as he stroked the curve of her cheek with just his fingertips, pushing aside a tendril of hair that had come free of its pins. Her heart slammed into her chest with an audible crack. Her knees buckled under the electric shock that bolted down her entire body. She nearly gasped.
“Will you meet me tonight?” His face hovered inches from hers.
She should say no. She should tell him to go back to his girlfriend, but again she couldn’t. She needed him as much as he needed her. There was no surviving the night without him. There may have been, but she wasn’t strong enough to risk it. Besides, it was harmless. They weren’t hurting anyone. She had no reason to feel so ashamed.
“Yes.”
His features softened. The tension in his shoulders loosened and she wondered if he really thought she was capable of turning him away. He clearly had no idea the affect he had on her.
With a will of their own, her gaze dropped to his mouth, full and firm and seemingly so unyielding. There was no denying she’d had more than one fantasy of that mouth on hers. Her own lips tingled just from the thought.
“I have to get back to patrol,” he murmured. “Be careful, please?”
She nodded. “You, too.”
With a last lingering look, he turned and walked out, leaving her dizzy and aching. She mentally kicked herself for being so weak, but she knew she would give him the same answer next year and the year after and the year after that, because the nightmares were worse than her guilt.
She left Hunter and Grams tucked away in their beds that night and dressed quickly in dark trousers and a black T-shirt. It really made no difference what she wore as most of the upper levels were brightly illuminated in case anyone was stupid enough to try and sabotage the ship. Marshals patrolled every square inch, but Rolf had told her the patrol routes so she knew when to move without being seen and questioned.
Not many people visited that part of the ship at that hour of the night.
Hair swept into a ponytail, Scarlett left the compartment. The corridors were dimly lit by emergency lights at every other interval. Her feet made no sound as she tiptoed her way to level nineteen—the control room, using the stairs rather than the closely monitored transporters.
It was a bit of a climb, six levels, and her lungs burned by the time she reached the top, but she slipped through the door and darted a quick glance up and down the curved corridor.
The stairway was tucked away in a corner, away from the enormous U that shaped the brightly lit corridor. From what Hunter had told her, the whole thing was one long oval. The hall connected all the way around with numerous doorways all along both sides, where even the novice operators were forbidden to hazard.
Scarlett had never ventured beyond the first set of doors on the left, but she knew from orientation that the operator center where the novices were trained was on the right. Further down that same hallway, behind heavily guarded doors, was the control room, the brains of the entire ship. No one but the captain and those cleared by the commanding officers were allowed through. The novices were given a tour on their first day, but they were watched at gunpoint. It was the one place mistakes were not allowed to be made.
Scarlett went left, staying on the balls of her feet as she kept along the wall. At the very end was an abrupt turn left and another set of doors, these ones unguarded. Inside was the observatory … and Rolf.
He’d opened the hatch and stood on the platform overlooking infinity. Stars glittered like a million diamonds against a backdrop of endless black. Swirls of colors bled together, creating a cyclone of light she was all too familiar with.
“I’m going to miss this when we reach the new planet,” she whispered.
Rolf turned. He’d changed into a pair of black cargo pants and a black sleeveless top that strained over the mouthwatering planes of his chest and back. His marshal’s sash was tied around the bicep of his right arm.
He placed his hands on the railing encircling the platform as she started up the steps towards him. She studied the unnamed galaxy, all too aware of him studying her. She stopped at his side, careful to avoid the lump of fabric on the ground.
“We’ll find somewhere else,” he told her.
She glanced at him, marveling at the spray of colors flickering over his handsome face. “It won’t be like this.”
“No.” He turned and crouched down to adjust the small pile of blankets at his feet, laying them out. “But it’ll be somewhere equally special.”
“Because it’ll be new?”
She lowered herself down next to him and sat with her back against the railings and watched the stars twinkle outside the dome.
“Because we’ll find it together.”
She didn’t know what to say to that, so she said nothing as they fell into their comfortable silence. They watched whole worlds get built. They watched stars die and get reborn. Time turned and beat around them and they continued to sit and watch, both lost in the memory of times that no longer existed. She knew he was thinking of his family, a family she had never heard about, as she thought of her own
parents and wondered how their silence could be such a comfort. They did this every year on that night. They sat there, watching the universe glitter around them, completely content in all the unspoken things. But it was different that night. Maybe it was the fact that it was their last night watching the stars together, but she wanted to shatter that silence with all the things they kept to themselves.
“Rolf?”
“Yeah?”
She studied the toe of his scuffed boot stretched so seemingly far from his lean body. It was almost amusing that there was a whole two feet from where her flats stopped and his legs continued.
“How was your day?”
The question must have surprised him as much as her, because he looked at her.
“It was fine,” he answered carefully, like he wasn’t sure where she was going with this. “How was yours?”
“I don’t know,” she murmured. “I think it was all right.”
“You think?” The amusement in his voice reflected in his warm eyes. “You’re not sure?”
She felt a hollowness form in the pit of her stomach. “I don’t … I try not to remember today, my birthdays, I mean. I think I’m cursed.”
He was quite for a moment.
“You’re not cursed,” he said at last.
“Did the world end on your birthday, too?” she only half teased.
He made a sound that could have passed for a chuckle. “But we also found a new home on your birthday.”
She didn’t know what to say to that.
“Tell me what you think about when we come here,” she whispered and instantly regretted it when he stiffened beside her. “Unless you don’t want to. I just thought … it’s our last night and…”
He pulled his knees up and folded his arms over top. “I wasn’t supposed to be here,” he began after a long stretch of silence. “My dad got the tickets from a friend as a wedding anniversary gift. He was supposed to be here with my mom.”
“What happened?” she asked when he stopped talking.
“He gave them to me, said it was time I explored the world, saw what was out there. Mom wouldn’t let Lauren go and Darryl, Kiera’s brother, had an internship at the World United Order so Dad suggested I take Kiera since we…” he trailed off, cleared his throat before continuing in a constricted tone. “He thought it would be best if we spent some time together since we were…”
“Dating?” she supplied, struggling to keep her tone neutral when the single word burned like hot ashes up her throat.
“Yes…” He squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger as he shook his head. “No.” He dropped his hand and turned his head towards Scarlett. She was grateful for the darkness concealing the pain clawing up her chest. “It’s complicated.”
For several long moments, she didn’t know what to say or what to think, or why she was even so surprised. She’d known he was taken. It was her own stupid fault for falling for an unavailable guy.
“Tell me about your family,” she said, changing the topic.
She thought she heard him sigh, but she kept her gaze fixed on the hands she’d knotted in her lap.
“There was the four of us - me, my parents, and Lauren. Lauren was seven when we left. She would have been ten this year. Biggest brat you would ever have met. She knew exactly what to do to get what she wanted and no one ever refused her. I think it was the smile. She had this…” He waved a hand in front of his own face. “Amazing smile that seemed to light up the whole room and when she laughed…”
“You sound like you were very fond of her,” Scarlett murmured.
“Aside from Darryl, she was my best friend. We did everything together. I think I miss her most.” He turned his head and peered at her. “What about you?”
She shook her head. “I didn’t have any siblings. It was just me and my parents. They wanted so badly for me to be on this cruise. They entered every contest and applied for every loan and scholarship to get me onboard. Then Grandma’s bakery was picked from amongst hundreds to be part of the vendor section. The spot came with two extra tickets and my parents begged and bribed her to let me go. I agreed, but only if Hunter could come, too. It was my birthday present, they said, even though my birthday wasn’t for another full month into the voyage.”
“So I’m guessing that Hunter’s not your brother?”
Scarlett chuckled. “No, but we grew up together, went to the same the Academy. He’s more than my best friend. I love him.”
He shifted and twisted his head around to stare at the stars. “I’m glad you’re not alone.”
No. Unlike many of the people onboard, she had two people still in her life that meant everything to her.
“You’re not alone,” she said, trying to sound optimistic. “You have Kiera and the other marshals and Jack and … I like to think we’re friends.” In an odd sort of way.
His fingers clenched and unclenched a few times before he let them drop into his lap. He glanced at her, his face bathed in shadows. She couldn’t see his eyes, but she could feel the warmth of his gaze caressing her face.
“If that’s what you would like,” he said at last.
Scarlett frowned into the darkness, her mind scrambling to decipher his cryptic response. There were so many possibilities in what he was saying, yet they contradicted with everything she knew to be true, so she had no idea what he was trying to tell her. Surely he wasn’t suggesting he would be more to her if she but asked. He couldn’t be. He had Kiera. He had no need for her. He had never given any indication that he would be more.
“Rolf?”
His boots scuffed as he repositioned himself by stretching out his long legs once more. “Yeah?”
“What do you think the new world will be like?”
He rested his head back against the railing. She heard him sigh. “I guess like earth before buildings and technology. We’ll have to start all over again.”
She moistened her lips. “Is it strange that I’m scared?”
“No.” He reached between them and took her hand. “I’m scared, too.”
His confession took her by surprise. “You are?”
“Sure,” he murmured. “But we’ll make it work and everything will be fine.” He gave her fingers a light squeeze that sent tingles throughout her body. “Don’t worry, okay? I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Hope and ridiculous delight speared through her. “You won’t?”
“Of course not. We’re friends, remember?”
Friends. Of course. How could she forget?
Chapter Four
Life resumed aboard Dawn Light as though the previous night had never happened. Scarlett woke up, showered and dressed for work, then walked with Hunter to the refectory for breakfast.
With the coffee shortage, the ship was a dangerous place first thing in the mornings so the whole affair was a somber one, mostly people shuffling around with their trays and the occasional mumble of greeting.
Scarlett caught sight of Rolf sitting with the other marshals, head bent over what looked like a bowl of oatmeal. He was nodding slowly to whatever Lance Crost was telling him. She watched as Lance pointed at something on his data link, his face scrunched in concentration and frustration. She wondered if there was news of the planet.
As a rule she left her data link back in her room when she was working. She’d learned after her first day that harvesting wasn’t just digging and planting. It was lifting and dragging and stomping. One of the girls from her row had dropped her link and the screen had shattered. The operators had refused to give her another one. After that, Scarlett just left hers at home.
“Is there news of the planet?” she asked, turning her head to Hunter.
Scarfing down eggs and bacon, Hunter looked up. “Not that I’m aware of. Why?”
She jerked a nod in the direction of the marshal’s table. “They seem very interested in their links. I was just curious.”
Frowning, Hunter
dug into his pocket and drew out his palm-sized device. With several skilled sweeps of his finger, he brought up the ship’s information page. Scarlett leaned into his shoulder and peered down at the screen as familiar images and information scrolled past.
“Nothing here,” he said after a moment of searching. “Must be marshal stuff.”
She glanced back over to the marshal’s table and stiffened when her gaze was caught by Rolf’s. Memories of their night together brought patches of heat cutting into her cheeks. Her lips bowed into a hesitant smile.
“Hey, you finished?” Hunter nudged her, unknowingly breaking the spell.
Scarlett jumped and turned to blink startled eyes up at Hunter.
“What?” he asked, frowning down at her from behind his glasses. “Is that a no?”
She glanced down at her barely touched plate and nodded. “Yeah, I’m done.”
Eyes wary, Hunter took their trays and headed for the compactor. Scarlett rose out of her seat and turned. She frowned when she found Rolf’s seat already empty and the marshal already gone from the refectory.
“Ready?” Hunter appeared at her side, dusting his hands.
She nodded and followed through the throng of people to the door. They walked in silence to the transporter and parted ways on their respective levels. Scarlett got off on deck four—harvesting level – agriculture. One level above her was livestock. Sometimes, she wondered why she hadn’t picked that career.
Originally, it was because of the smell. She was sure she wouldn’t have been able to handle it baking into her skin and hair, but since the manure was carted down to use as fertilizer in the fields, there was no escaping it anyway. Nevertheless, she wasn’t very good with animals. Truth be told, she was terrified of being attacked. There was a certain level of courage needed to venture into those pens and she did not have it. Plants were more her speed. They were very unlikely to attack.
When Night Falls (Regeneration Series Book 1) Page 4