Page 104 of Shellshock

His lips found hers—quiet and ardent. Real life didn’t feel quite… real, anymore.

“Lucca,” he whispered, kissing between her eyes.

“Should have broken onto my ship on day one,” she said.

He laughed breathlessly. His lavender eyes were open and genuine. “I don’t think you would have appreciated what I wanted to do with you. Not that early.”

“It would have been consensual,” she said. “I have no limits. Not with… you.”

He dotted another kiss on her face, then another on her chin. “You’re okay?”

She nodded. “Are you?”

“Yes.” His arms gathered around her shoulders and she took immense comfort in the closeness. She was in the most hazardous room on the Selkie and she felt no fear. Of course, once the sex high wore off and she left the room, she was sure the wariness would return.

She nudged her face into his neck. They remained locked in that spot until they began to cool.

When she could walk, they moved to her bedroom and he brought her water. She took the glass with faint amusement and drank when he pressured her to. He was the hydration police.

Her mind slowly began working as he cuddled and pet her. His thumbs stroked the skin between her thighs, fascinated by the mess he’d made in her.

Other thoughts returned. She stared at him with a lazy, albeit content glare.

“I can’t believe you ate my translator.”

He laughed, a genuine smile breaking out on his face. Not the cheerful but quietly strained persona he cast out, but something more tender. Something lighter than she’d ever seen on him before.

“You’re a freak, Cal.”

The broad smile on his lips made it hard to be irritated, but shewasirritated.

“I picked up a replacement just in case,” he said, “but it feels different like this. You know my language. Can we have this for the night?”

Nudging her with his head, he turned her and spooned her, tail coiling around her leg. He was so cuddly and affectionate that the remainder of her irritation vanished.

She was… happy.

Whatever game they’d been playing for months—all the little probing shots and battles, lies and admissions—had reached its conclusion. Their conflict was chemically neutralized. She clung to this fantasy that if she fucked him enough times, he’d stop blowing up spaceships. And maybe they would reach that portal in time. Maybe they could have this.

If it blew up in her face, she would stop at nothing to take matters into her own hands—even if that meant fighting the fleet and breaking some serious laws.

Lucca felt wildly, almost rabidly protective of him. Caligher belonged to her.

His breathing slowed and evened out, but her heart pounded faster as her thoughts reached a clarity that one didn’t come back from.

“I love you,” she whispered in English.

CHAPTER20

LUCCA

???

Strange words. A familiar voice. Lucca was lost to the blended unreality of dreams. Caligher was the shadow that emerged from the corners, the starlight that bled into her ship through the leaks, getting inside, and smothering out her breath.

She woke with a gasp to a pressure on her lungs, drenched in sweat under the heavy weight of darkness. She kicked blankets, feet striking something rough. A shock of pain went through her but she kept struggling.

Unknown words cut into her ear, sending a fearful trickle down her spine. Wherewasshe? This wasn’t familiar. This wasn’t anywhere. She jerked again.