just wanted to wear your shirt. It smells like you.” I kissed his chin. “Which I like.”
He seemed about ready to say something that I really, really wanted to hear, but an alarm sounded, and instead of picking up from where we left off the night before, Torrin jumped from the bed. My heart raced, and I clutched my neck. Okay. Okay. I was okay. It would calm. What was happening?
“Torrin?”
He threw his shirt on followed by his shorts. “Reamers.”
The door flew open, and in rushed a shirtless Nox. He breathed hard but looked better than the last time I’d seen him. “Orders?”
“I don’t know yet. Keep her safe, Nox.”
Dressed, Torrin ran from the room. Nox put out his hand. “Come.”
But I didn’t take his hand right away.
“Do you plan to take me deep underground again, like to the cavern with the pools and the stalactites?” I said evenly, like I did this all the time. Like I wasn’t seeing Cannon’s traumatized face in my memory. Like I wasn’t thinking about the Reamer atrocities Nox had hinted at when we first met. None of that. Fear and timidity didn’t seem right for a woman with four numbers on her arm.
Which was me. I was that woman. Their woman. For some reason, the knowledge made me instantly strong.
Nox narrowed his eyes, clearly confused, but he nodded and didn’t hurry me when I pawed through the dresser drawer and quickly drew out serviceable clothes. Torrin hadn’t asked me what I liked in terms of clothing. He’d just guessed, or he’d had someone else do it. Whoever had chosen sure liked green a lot. I thought of the green cloth Nox had put over my face to keep the dust out. Soft, protective. I dressed faster than I ever had, and Nox watched the whole time.
Odd. I wasn’t used to being seen, to being so vulnerable and beneath a person’s gaze, but he made it seem…I don’t know, not awkward. He made it seem like his watch was protective, like as long as one of my men was observing me, no harm could come to me.
And he wasn’t wrong. His presence made even the war sounds endurable. Torrin’s throne room was close enough to the surface that we could hear everything. Activity out in the tunnels, up on the paths above ground. In the distance, shouting and thuds like giant projectiles skidding through the air and slamming into the ground. In elder times, our planet-bound ancestors had used cannons and guns, and this world wasn’t too far off from that level of technology. It sounded horrible, but it was death on a small scale. They didn’t have the capacity to scour a city from orbit.
Thank all the holies for that. It meant our enemies hadn’t found the worst of what could have been in my ship’s wreckage. However, those things were probably even now either in the wreckage or being examined by the Reamers. Eventually they’d figure out how to use everything they’d scavenged.
I disguised a deep shudder by pulling on an extra robe-like garment. Torrin had said the weather would change soon, but this world was already growing colder by the second.
Chapter Fourteen
“Okay,” I said to Nox. “Now the books.”
Poor Nox, his frown and accompanying confusion just got deeper.
It was hard not to smile. “Torrin has collected a bunch of old books, and they contain secrets that may help us defeat the Reamers and everyone else long term. If I’m going to be taken to a safe place, so are those books. Oh, and Astor. We should bring him, too. I’ve taught him a little, enough to help.” Actually, he probably didn’t know enough to read, but he would be relieved to be away from the fighting, putting his clever mind to the task instead of dodging bullets.
The truth was I wanted him with me. I wanted them all with me.
Nox still looked confused, so I stepped close to him and put my hands on either side of his face. He flushed at the intimate contact, but he couldn’t look away without shrugging me off.
“How are you, really?” I asked him.
He took a breath, opened his mouth, and appeared to consider his words. “My wounds are much better, if that’s what you mean. I feel like I slept forever, yet I am still not fully rested.”
“Recovery can take some time.” I stroked the pad of my thumb over the sharp line of his jaw. “What else could I have meant?”
“Well, you could