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Her inner muscles clamped around him, and she cried out, poised on the exquisite threshold of pleasure-pain. She imagined that her heart stopped in that fraction of a second before she came apart, clutching at him, clawing at him, not knowing how to direct the wild passion exploding inside her.

Distantly, she heard him groan. He pulled her down to his chest as he thrust into her. His powerful body went rigid; his mouth opened against her damp and tousled hair. Then his hands convulsed over her shoulders, all gentleness forgotten as he exploded deep inside her in a prolonged, white-hot rush of heat.

His body went slack, but his arms curled around her and she sagged, boneless, across his sweating body.

They must have dozed, for when awareness returned, Jordan saw that they were sprawled on the carpeted floor. They lay side by side, she with one tired, aching thigh hooked over his legs, Kào with his fingers tangled in her hair.

Guilt pushed at the edges of her mind.
Roberta
. Her daughter was dead. How could she justify making love with wild abandon? Using joy to blot out the sorrow? Even if temporary, it seemed an insult to Boo’s memory. Maybe others felt this way after the loss of a child. Maybe over time the guilt would fade, just as she imagined her grief would become easier to bear.

Look to the future and not the past
.

Try.

Drained emotionally and physically, she kept her eyes closed and floated in semi-aroused bliss. Kào woke, smoothing his hands over her body. Sighing, she snuggled into his warmth. His hand slid down her thigh. He found where she still ached in the wake of their violently passionate lovemaking, and her body gave an involuntary start.

“You’re sore, Jordan,” he stated worriedly.

She lowered her head to his chest. “It was worth it.”

A darkly amused, male chuckle rumbled beneath her ear. Speaking Key was getting easier with each passing hour. Spicy banter was still a ways off, but at least Kào understood her jokes.

She raised herself on one elbow and looked down at him. The muted overhead light played across his chest, blurring the scars there and shadowing his flat stomach. “It was a long time for me.” She traced her fingertip across his lips. “You are first . . . since my husband.”

His surprise—and gladness—at that remark was tangible. “How long, Jordan?”

“Six years. In Earth time.”

Kào’s brows drew together as he calculated the converted number. “For me, it has been somewhat less than half that.”

“Before prison?”

“Yes. And none since. I hadn’t the interest, physically.” His hand slid behind her head, cradling her skull. “Until you.” He pulled her down to his mouth and kissed her. Her eyes closed and her lips opened under the soft, warm pressure.

Lovingly his tongue stroked hers. Kào’s embrace reassured her in the most primal of ways, muting the pain of the gaping wound torn in her heart.

Other than her father and brother, he was the only man who hadn’t run when she’d needed him, the only man who had the balls to admit his weaknesses and the strength of will to override them. In only weeks, Kào had become her
rock, her anchor, a man who was there for
her
. It was a new experience, one she sensed she’d waited for all her life. Exist independently, she could. But she didn’t want to lose Kào, not now; not ever.

She willed her lips to remember this moment, and for his to remember it, too. She wasn’t naïve; there would come a day—soon, in fact—when they’d have to say goodbye. But for now, she’d try not to think about it.

When they finally moved apart, she smiled down at him, her fingers playing in his damp hair. “Since we speak of years, how is your age?”

“How old am I? Twenty-seven.”

“In Earth years.”

“That
is
in Earth years.”

“You are not twenty-seven.”

“Why, do I look younger?” He lifted a dark brow. “Or older?”

“Older,” she blurted out. “Much older.” She covered her eyes. “I did not know I rob cradle.”

“Cradle? In which babies sleep?”

“Yes!” She dropped her hand, poking her finger into his chest. “I have five years older. Almost six!”

“You
are
five years older,” he corrected patiently. “Then you are thirty-two, almost thirty-three.”

She laughed. “Yes. See? I rob cradle.”

He flipped her onto her back. Holding her in place, he fitted himself between her thighs. Already he was hard. “Do I feel like a boy?”

She gave a husky laugh and shook her head. Then she frowned. “Do I look like old woman?”

As he shook his head, he pulled back to gaze at her. He took in every feature of her face and then the rest of her body before returning his eyes to hers. His hand shook as he smoothed her hair away from her forehead. He placed a kiss there and at each temple before pulling back. “You
are beautiful, Jordan,” he whispered huskily. “A beautiful woman.”

She couldn’t help sighing. No one had ever said those words as he’d said them, or looked at her the way he looked at her now. She was a freckle-nosed tomboy, not the type of woman who ignited men’s passions. Exposed to his frank appraisal, she felt her body responding—tightening, warming. Her thighs opened, and his rigid shaft glided over her moist folds. She inhaled sharply at the sudden heat, and her pelvis tipped up. She was so wet that he entered her. Groaning, he jerked his hips and thrust into her the rest of the way.

He was buried inside her, but he didn’t move. “Does it hurt?” he asked low in her ear.

“No,” she whispered on a sigh.

His strong arms tightened around her, molding her to his warm body. He began to rock his hips slowly, moving inside her easy and deep, rekindling the heat that had subsided to a slow burn.

She murmured to him, caressed him, slow and cherishing. Everywhere she could reach, she placed tender, loving kisses. Eyes shut, he let his head fall forward, soaking in her affection thirstily, as if he’d craved this all his life. She could almost feel his harsher edges melting away.

From within his chest came a deep sound of contentment as she dragged her mouth to his chin, his eyelids, his jaw. There the stubble pricked her tender lips, before their mouths came together again.

Their first time together had been a Class-Five hurricane. This was morning mist. The first time, she took and took; this time, she gave it all back, caressing his battered, beautiful body, doing everything in her power to convey what she felt for him, how she treasured him, savored him, admired him.

It was clear that he’d needed this, needed
her
, as much
as she did him. Maybe even more. Two halves of the same whole, brought together by the most horrible tragedy imaginable.

His hips rolled, slow and sure, the thrusts deepening. “Jordan . . . my Jordan . . .” he whispered over and over. She wrapped her legs high over his back to take him in as far as he would go, until she imagined he’d become part of her and she of him. She held him tight, unwilling to let him go, until he at last found his release. If only for now, she thought, she’d found her peace.

Morning was coming fast. But they had some time left together before the first third began and the corridors would fill with the day shift. As Kào lay sleeping, Jordan smiled at the ceiling, her arms flung over her head, her body sated, lethargic.
My Jordan
. That’s what he’d called her. “My” Jordan. Without hesitation, she’d be this man’s anything.

Little aftershocks of pleasure still rocked her; every nerve ending sang with heightened sensitivity. She snuggled into Kào’s warmth, and the movement woke him. “You’re smiling,” he said in a sleepy voice.

“Of course I smile.” She winked at him. His sweat-dampened hair had dried spiky. She mussed it with her fingers. “Why should I not?”

Disquiet flickered in his face before he managed to hide it. “Ah, Jordan. Everything has changed.”

“Yes, make love and everything changes,” she said dryly, wishing she had the ability to formulate a properly sarcastic comeback in Key. “It always does.”

He came up on one elbow and gave her a withering look. “You should know me better than to think I would regret,”—he lowered his voice a fraction—“making love to you.” His cool gaze returned to the viewing room’s hatch, as if he expected it to open at any minute. “There are other matters on my mind. Last evening at dinner, the commodore
informed me that your people are to be settled in the Rim.”

In her gut a wave of unease matched what she’d seen in his eyes only a few seconds before. “No one lives there,” she said.

“A few do. But mostly the region’s habitable planets consist of wild, unsettled worlds.”

She rolled away from him and dug through the pile of discarded clothing until she found her translator and Kào’s. This wasn’t love talk; she couldn’t risk misunderstanding anything that had to do with the people for whom she was responsible. “Why there? Why not a city?”

He sat up and let out a tired sigh. “In the aftermath of the war, our government fears that the Talagars might seek to rebuild their empire. The Rim would be the perfect place to do it. What few people live there have little protection. They are spread among many worlds, in isolated pockets, most living rural lives with minimum, if any, technology to assist them. It would be easy for the Talagars to absorb them into their society as slaves. They would need slaves . . . to re-form their empire. It is how their society is structured. They know no other way.”

“This is not reassuring news, Kào.” Her head started aching, and the tight knot of stress that had lived in her stomach for weeks now returned. “It sounds like we’re going to be left as slave bait on some isolated planet.”

“You won’t be without protection.”

“What kind of protection? An army? Or a cache of ray guns we don’t know how to use?”

In profile, his frown deepened as he read her question on his translator. “You won’t be alone, your people. You’re to be joined by a massive wave of new immigrants from the more populated regions.”

“Volunteers?” Unlike Flight 58.

He glared straight ahead. Obviously, the subject was a
sore point with him. “It is not what I thought would happen to you and your people, or I would have protested the decision. But now it’s too late. The plan has been approved by the seat of the Alliance government on the planet Sofu, our capital world.”

He swallowed thickly. Eyes narrowed, he stared across the room. Seeing what? Thinking what?

She rose to her knees and positioned herself behind him. Unlike when they were on the observation deck, this time she knew him well enough to comfort him physically. Her hands worked the tension out of his knotted shoulders, and she pressed her lips to the flexing sinews on the side of his neck and jaw. “We’ll be fine. You don’t have to worry. So the relocation port isn’t going to be paradise; no one ever said it would be. None of us really thought it, either.”

She pressed her fingers into his muscles. He tipped his head back, leaning into her kneading hands. “It’d be selfish to complain,” she reasoned. “How can we, any of us? We’re
alive
. I know about five billion other people who’d like to be in our place.”

At that, he glanced over his shoulder, his eyes soulful. She knew she’d reminded him of her inconsolable weeping for Boo. “Thanks for giving me a heads up, though,” she said with a lightness she didn’t feel. “Now I can brief the passengers and crew to expect less-than-ideal conditions. It’ll be the best thing for them. Everyone’s been getting soft lately—three square meals a day, comfy beds. Now maybe they’ll do more exercise and be better about practicing their Key without me having to bully them all the time.”

After he read the translation, his face looked bleaker than ever. He was only twenty-seven. He looked sixty.

She plopped down next to him. Her small breasts bounced as she drew her knees to her chest. Curving an arm around her bare calves, she flexed her toes, studying the tendons on the tops of her bare feet and the frosted pink
nail polish Natalie had used to paint her toenails.
Even captains need pedicures
, the woman had insisted.

“If it’s the remoteness of the Rim that bothers you, don’t let it.” Jordan forced a can-do smile. She refused to let a minor item like this little detour shake her resolve to face the future head on. “I don’t mind isolation. In fact, I prefer it.”
Sunny pastures, mountain pines, a sweeping blue sky
.

Her mind filled with a hundred memories of happier times. How much more she would have appreciated them if she’d only known they’d never be repeated. “My family owned land in a place called Colorado. Now,
that
was paradise.” She told him about her plans, how she’d wanted to move there with Roberta. “We’d build a home and raise horses.”

“Horses.” His brows drew together, and he peered into her eyes, into her soul.

The unwavering scrutiny sent a shiver careening down her spine. “What is it, Kào?” she asked worriedly, scrolling back to see what she’d said to so unbalance him.

He let out a breath and shook his head. “Sometimes I think there were higher forces at work when they brought you to me.”

“What do you mean?”

“My ancestors were equestrians.”

“Horsemen? That’s what you would have been if you hadn’t lost your family?”

“I believe so. They were rural people, proud and hardworking. I’d have lived my life outdoors, as you wished to, Jordan, working the land, raising food, toiling long hours, and riding. Riding horses.”

No wonder he resembled the Marlboro Man, she thought.

“Swift, four-legged creatures,” he went on. “With long, tufted coats.”

“Long and tufted? Ours were short and glossy!”

“Making them swifter animals, I imagine. Perhaps the
Seeders had perfected the species by the time they reached your planet.”

She couldn’t resist the opportunity his remark presented. “They perfected the humans there, too.”

His mouth quirked. “Did they?”

“They did.” She struck a pose. “Can’t you tell?”

Amusement warmed his harsh features as he read the translation. “A superior race? Perhaps that explains my attraction to you.” He drew her close and rested his chin on her head.