turned out to be your daughter, perhaps the three of us—”
“You seduced me so that could keep my daughter?”
His guilt made him hesitate a fraction too long. “No! I told you. I care—”
“If you really cared for me, you would have told me.”
She snatched up his shirt, then angrily discarded it and picked up one of her own outfits before disappearing into the sanitary unit.
He forced himself not to go after her, remaining frozen on the bed. His chest ached and he rubbed it absently, knowing that he only had himself to blame. For one fleeting moment, he had thought he had everything. Now he was going to lose it all.
Jade headed for the bathroom and stepped under the shower, determined to wash away Inzen’s traitorous touch. Why hadn’t he told her that “his” daughter was human? He knew how worried she was about Hana.
He had seemed so sweet and caring and it had all been an act. How many times would it take before she learned? From her first boyfriend in college, who had wanted the reputation of popping the rich girl’s cherry, to her husband, who had seen her as a rung on the ladder of success, everyone seemed to have an ulterior motive. But this one hurt most of all.
When Inzen touched her, she truly believed that he cared. She cranked up the heat until the water almost burned her skin, but she could still feel his hands and that tantalizing tail caressing her skin. A tear threatened to escape, but she refused to let it fall. Her grandmother had never believed in giving into sorrow and neither did Jade. By the time she finally stepped out of the shower, her armor was firmly in place.
At least that’s what she thought until she stepped out of the bathroom and saw Inzen watching her, sorrow in every line of his big body, but she refused to acknowledge him. Instead, she picked up her sewing supplies and set to work.
He didn’t attempt to speak to her, although he silently presented her with food when dinnertime came. Her inclination was to ignore it, but starving herself wouldn’t prove anything. After choking down a few reluctant bites, she buried herself in her work again. When the lights dimmed, she crawled into her bunk—wearing the nightgown she had made for herself rather than his shirt—and resolutely closed her eyes. She heard him prepare for bed, heard him pause next to her bunk.
“Good night, my—good night, Jade,” he said softly but she didn’t respond. As he climbed into the upper bunk, a single tear escaped and trickled down her cheek.
Chapter Thirteen
The silence between them stretched on the next morning after Jade awoke. Inzen moved stiffly, his face set in a stern mask but his tail drooped despondently. It flicked towards her whenever she moved, but he always pulled it back, and she was startled to realize how much she had come to enjoy that connection between them.
“We will be landing shortly,” he said finally, breaking the silence. “Please take your position and fasten your harness.”
As soon as she was seated, he checked the harness, but there was no slow, teasing touch this time. He simply slid his finger beneath the belt strap—but even that sent a wave of unwanted desire through her body. Her breath caught, and she inhaled more of his enticing scent. Their eyes met then, and she could see the regret in his, but the rawness of his betrayal was still too close. She deliberately turned her head away. The merest whisper of breath, too slight to be called a sigh, escaped from his lips as he made a small adjustment to the buckle and withdrew.
He returned to the pilot’s chair without speaking but they were so close in the small cockpit that she couldn’t ignore his presence as completely as she wanted. She made herself focus on the planet appearing before them.
Like the pictures she had seen of Earth from space, the surface was covered in swirls of blue and green, but the shades looked very different—the blues edging into purple and the greens ranging from lime to emerald. The planet didn’t seem to have any large oceans, but rather many smaller bodies of water interspersed with the land. At least from this distance, it looked beautiful and peaceful, and she could only hope that her daughter had been happy here.
If her daughter was here…
No.
She refused to consider the possibility that this was yet another dead end and focused