Zenith. Lindsay Cummings
growl rumbled up through her chest, but Dex simply shrugged and said, “I can replace it. The Marauder is mine again.” Then he stepped over the shattered glass and into the room. “Set up the Box.” He stepped aside as the guards brought in a thin silver box no longer than his forearm. The symbol of Arcardius, an exploding star, was engraved on the side. They set the Box on the table and lined up against the back wall of the room, hauling Andi with them.
“Please, do take a seat,” Dex said to Andi, sweeping his arm out in a grand gesture. “I am nothing if not a good host.”
Disgust flashed in her eyes. She did not sit. Instead, she stood with her back up against the wall, her gray eyes roving left and right.
Dex had taught her well.
“Suit yourself,” he said, walking to the opposite side of the conference table, where he plopped down into a chair.
The tension in the room was a living beast. Dex could practically feel it breathing down his neck. So he leaned back in his chair, propped his boots up on the glass table next to the Box and focused all his attention on Andi.
She glared at him, cold as the metal wall she leaned against. “What the hell do you want?”
Oh, this was good. Better than good. It was the best damned thing Dex had experienced in years.
For four years, Andi had been on the run from the fate that awaited her on Arcardius. High-ranking, war-hardened soldiers had been sent to track her down. Other criminals, capable of slinking through the shadows, had tried to find her. Even the general himself, and his personal Spectre guards, had gone out looking a time or two. But after every effort, every Krev spent to discover the fugitive, Dex had been the one to catch her.
Fate was a beautiful thing.
“Just a moment now,” he said, relishing this time, the feel of Andi’s eyes boring into his. “We have another guest joining us before we start.”
Dex waited for her onslaught of questions and was surprised when none came.
She simply stood there, hands balled into fists at her sides, stabbing at him with her cold, unfeeling stare.
“Relax, Andi,” Dex drawled. “You used to love spending time alone with me.”
He knew they were anything but alone, with four guards stationed around the room and two just outside the shattered door, but it felt as if they were. Just like that fateful day on the fire moon.
“You don’t know anything about what I used to love,” Andi said.
She narrowed her eyes, and he waited for her to serenade him with the list of colorful words she loved using—some that Dex had taught her himself—when the Box suddenly chimed. A funnel of light shone out of its side onto the blank wall at the front of the room.
This pulled their attention away from each other and toward the man whose face appeared across from them on the wall.
Andi went rigid.
For the first time today, despite everything Dex had thrown at her, she actually looked stricken. Shocked. Pained.
“Hello, Androma,” the man on the screen said. “I’ve been searching for you for a very, very long time.”
Dex smiled. This was worth more than all the Krevs in the galaxy.
ANDROMA
“GENERAL CORTAS,” ANDI GASPED.
She practically fell into a chair, her legs going weak beneath her.
The general’s face had haunted Andi for the past four years, sworn to destroy her in every dream—sometimes in her waking moments, too.
She was at a loss for words.
The last time she’d laid eyes on General Cyprian Cortas, she’d been a desperate girl in chains, seated alone at the trial where she was convicted for the death of his daughter.
Kalee.
All the tallies on her swords combined couldn’t cover up the pain of that first death.
Guilt brewed in her gut, and Andi was sucked back into her memories, back to that fateful night on Arcardius.
Wind in her hair, the kiss of freedom coating her skin as she sprinted through the hallways, Kalee beside her.
Laughter bubbling between them as they snuck onto the general’s personal transport ship.
The click of Kalee’s harness, buckled tight in the copilot’s seat, and Andi’s nervous laughter again as she looked at her charge, the girl she was sworn to protect.
“Are you sure about this?” Andi asked, her fingers curled over the throttle.
Kalee lifted a pale brow, a smile tugging at her lips. “As my best friend and personal Spectre, I command you to do this, Androma.”
The engine purred as Andi started it up. A feeling of excitement coursed through her at the sound.
Kalee smiled. “For once in your life, have some real fun.”
“I have to admit, you’ve looked better,” General Cortas said, yanking Andi back into the present, leaving her breathless beneath the man’s stare. The burn scars on her wrists ached beneath her cuffs.
Stars above.
All these years, she’d tried to suppress the memories, only to have them brought back with a sudden cruelty as sharp as a whip. The man in front of her was a victim of her foolishness. Beside her was the man who’d rejected her love.
The two of them, together? It was nearly enough to shatter Andi.
She forced her eyes up at the screen, grateful her crew wasn’t here to share this moment. She could feel them now, trying to reach her, but she denied them access each time a request pinged in to her com.
Some things a captain had to face alone.
The general had aged since she last saw him. His once-brown hair was now peppered with gray, and wrinkles creased his sun-worn skin. His body looked tired, though his brilliant blue eyes sparkled with the very same scrutiny he’d always had.
“You’re the one behind all of this?” Andi asked, forgetting the formal deference she’d been trained to show this man since birth.
“I’m a very powerful man, Androma.”
The general of Arcardius was seated at a silver desk. Behind him, a large window showed a spectacular view. The sight pained her, and yet she couldn’t look away.
Arcardius.
Waterfalls flowed over a floating gravarock into streams far below. A vast landscape of color stretched as far as the eye could see, dotted with glimmering glass structures that made up the capital city of Veronus. This was the planet she was no longer able to call home. Even from here, she could see the domed glass building in the center—the Academy, where she and thousands of other military students had trained. It was also the place where she’d learned to dance. Where she’d been introduced to the throttle of a ship after she’d chosen piloting as her military training path. It was there, at the Academy, that her greatest dreams were born. She’d been handpicked to become a personal Spectre for the general’s daughter, a status most Arcardians only dreamed of achieving.
She’d spent every second by Kalee’s side afterward.
Until the crash.
Until her very public death sentence, with millions of hateful eyes watching, deeming her a traitor.
“What do you want from me?” Andi asked now.
For a while, the general said nothing. He worked his stubbled jaw back and forth, as if chewing on a thought he wasn’t sure he should share. His chest was