Chapter 28

CHAPTER 28

Sarah

“ I t’s like when you felt sick,” Omen explained as she sat next to me on a large boulder near the swamp. “Will your injuries to heal.”

I concentrated as best I could, trying to ignore the pain—in my shoulder and calf, and also in the vicinity of my heart. After a minute, the agony I felt in the first two places faded away, but the one in my chest remained. I looked at my shoulder and saw the skin had closed up. Same on my leg.

“It’s better,” I mumbled, still trying to deal with the confusion and aftermath of my confrontation with Deacon. “Still sore, but better.”

“Good.” Omen smiled, then looked up, her eyes widening when she saw Jac approaching. “I’ll leave you two to talk.”

She left in a hurry, and I watched Jac walk to where I was still sitting on the boulder. I jumped up and walked to the swamp’s edge, giving him my back so he didn’t see the devastation I knew was still written all over my face.

“You shouldn’t be so hard on him,” he said, coming to a stop beside me.

“Go away,” I said, refusing to look at him.

“Not until you talk to me,” he persisted gently.

Tears stung my eyes, threatening to fall. “I want to be alone.”

“Why, so you can sulk?”

I whirled on him, my gaze narrowed on his too handsome face. “Watch yourself.”

He sighed, reaching out and gently taking hold of my arms in his hands, and I let him. “I know you’re upset because Deacon kept this from you, but do you even understand what any of this means to him?”

I brushed away the moisture that escaped my eyes and sniffled. “I can’t say I’m overly concerned with what it means to him.” No, I was much too hurt by how easily he’d dismissed me, and what I thought we’d shared. “He apologized and then talked about dissolving our union,” I choked the words out as my heart shattered. “I don’t know what else there is to say.”

He slowly and gently pulled me toward him, and I gave myself over to his embrace. His big, strong arms wrapped around me, and I burrowed my face against his torso, clinging to him. My world was falling apart and I needed something to keep me together.

“God, what am I going to do with you two?” he said, stroking his hand over my hair, his touch soothing my frayed emotions. “You’re both so damn stubborn.”

“I’m not stubborn,” I said…stubbornly, then exhaled a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Jac. I keep falling into your arms when he’s the one who fucked up. It’s not fair for you to have to clean up his messes.”

“We clean up after each other,” he said, his warm palm rubbing circles against my back. “That’s why we work.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to ignore yet another stab to my heart. “And by we , you mean you and Deacon, right?”

He huffed out a frustrated breath. “I meant the three of us, Sarah. We are a union—”

“Not if he wants to dissolve it,” I cut in, my voice thick with tears again.

“He’s upset. He’s not thinking clearly.” Jac sighed heavily. “Gods, you two are so much alike sometimes. You’re both reacting to a factual situation with emotions, instead of strategy or thoughtful retrospection—”

“You sound like him,” I muttered against Jac’s uniform.

“Actually, I think I sound like his father,” Jac said wryly. “I can’t help it. Valor practically raised me. And as annoying as it is, he’s almost always right.”

I pulled back, and Jac released me. I stared out at the murky swamp, trying to sort through my emotions. “How am I supposed to react, then? What would Valor say about all of this between Deacon and Rex?”

“To be honest, nothing good,” Jac said quietly. “But if he were in your shoes, he would try to give Deacon the benefit of the doubt.”

I glanced up at Jac. “Wait—why wouldn’t Valor react well, if he were to find out about Deacon and Rex?”

Jac braced his hands on his hips, hesitating for a few seconds before finally looking at me and answering. “Because when it happened, Deacon lied to him.”

I shook my head. “It didn’t just happen . He made a choice—”

“It was an impossible choice, Sarah,” he said, his voice defensive on Deacon’s behalf.

I hugged myself, thinking back to the memory I’d witnessed, trying to recall other details besides Deacon killing Rex. “I know what he did.”

“So do I,” Jac said quietly. “More than you do.”

“I saw it—”

“Not all of it. Not if you’re this upset by what happened,” Jac insisted. “There are things you need to know about that day, Sarah. You said you saw everything before Rex died, but how far back did the memory go?”

I closed my eyes and took a breath to clear my mind, but it didn’t work. The memory was planted firmly in there. The memory of the pain. The memory of dying. Sinking into the black…

“I saw Deacon standing in front of a little Ladrian girl and he refused to let Rex kill her. He fought him—hard. But Rex bested him. Rex apologized to him, and then the little girl before he aimed his weapon at her. She looked so scared, Jac.” I started to cry again, but this time, it was for her fear. “Deacon stabbed Rex in the back, right through his heart. Like he was trying to make it quick. Then he took the little girl and left. A half-dead woman on the floor gloated to Rex that he had failed. He agreed with her and then died.”

Jac slowly nodded. “So you did not see what had come before that?”

I shook my head.

With a heavy sigh, Jack began, “It was near the end of the war. Deacon and I had seen some combat, and it was hard on him. He is a soldier, a fighter, but the cost of war,” he paused, a sudden haunted look in his eyes. “Deacon is not the kind of man to relish in death. It’s just not in him. He asked his father to get us reassigned, and his father obliged. We were sent to some of the outer islands, where the last of the rebels were holed up. We were told to clear them out. We had thought they meant for us to chase them away, maybe shoo them to the last of the swamps on Orhon…”

My body felt light, like I was going to throw up as realization dawned. I lowered myself to a nearby tree stump. “That’s not what they meant, was it?”

“No,” Jac said in a soft tone. “We got to the first of the outer islands, and it was beautiful there. Almost like the best parts of Halla. Overgrown and heavy with, well, I guess the conduits would call them islandfolk. My CO, Hurried, and I had broken into a cottage, but it had already been cleared out. It was the neighbor to the one Deacon and Rex were supposed to clear. Hurried was ransacking the bedrooms, when I heard a hand cannon fire.”

I frowned at Jac. “The memory I saw, Rex never got a shot off.”

He shook his head. “I imagine even Rex blocked the memory of what he had done before his fight with Deacon. But I saw it. After he got the first shot off, I climbed out the window to go help them—I thought the rebels were attacking. I looked through the window to make sure it was safe to breach and I saw Deacon look around at the others in the room. They were cowering in the corner. Deacon asked Rex what he thought he was doing. Rex told him, he was doing their job and shot another Ladrian.”

I gasped in shock. “In cold blood?”

“Following orders, Rex told Deacon.” Jac sat on a tree stump opposite to me. “After going through the houses and seeing what was happening in them, in that moment, everything clicked. I was young and stupid—I should have realized it much sooner than I did. They had sent us to the outer islands where people were unarmed and helpless and poor. I found out later that Justice Bateen wanted to gift those islands to his loyalists, so he needed the residents gone. The people there weren’t rebels—their only crime was being too poor to be useful to Justice.”

Disgust and horror turned my stomach into knots. “And that was the easy job Valor set you up with?”

“Valor honestly didn’t know,” Jac said quietly. “The forged reports had said they were rebels. He didn’t know it was poor families until afterward.”

“That’s horrifying,” I rasped, my hand at my throat.

“That’s war.” Jac’s coloring was off, just talking about it. “I watched at the window as Rex shot the last adult in the house and was about to kill that little girl. I was frozen. Being unclassed, for me to go against a CO or someone classed…that would have been a death sentence for me and everyone I was related to, and I didn’t have enough experience to figure out another way around it all. But Deacon wouldn’t allow Rex to do it. You saw what happened next.”

Now knowing the entire truth, I could only imagine how terrifying all of that was for them. “Yeah.”

“Hurried asked Deacon what happened, and he told him one of the adults had fought him, got ahold of his knife, and killed Rex. It was obvious that Hurried didn’t believe him, but he didn’t want to go through the paperwork of a CO’s death by his cadet’s hand. After seeing the little girl, I think Hurried understood everything. He helped Deacon forge the report and never spoke of it again.”

“You should have told me,” I whispered, feeling devastated for both of them and the choices they’d been forced to make.

But Jac shook his head. “I couldn’t. Not without Deacon finding out that I knew.”

I jerked back in surprise. “Wait, what?”

“Deacon has no idea that I saw everything that happened.” Jac scrubbed a hand along his jaw. “You didn’t see him back then, Sarah. He was so deeply ashamed of what he had done—going against his training, disobeying orders, and, in his mind, murdering his CO, a man who he had been raised to respect without question. A man with a vicious reputation, who Valor had purposefully paired Deacon with to make him into a proper soldier.” Jac spit at the ground in anger.

My heart now ached for Deacon. “Why would Valor do that?”

“To toughen Deacon up.” Jac’s jaw clenched. “He knew the harshness of war was too much for him, but he tried to make his son into a soldier by pairing him with one of the strongest soldiers he had in his company. For Deacon to not only disobey orders, and then do what he did—for him, it felt like he had betrayed his own father.”

“Why didn’t you tell him you saw what happened?”

“He fell into a startling depression after all of that. People thought it was because his CO had died and he couldn’t save him, and he let them think that because, well, what else was he going to say?” Jac said angrily. “Had I told him that I saw it happen, I don’t know if we would still be friends, or if he would have sent me to work for another family. Without knowing how he would react, I wasn’t going to tell him that I knew. Not ever. It was his secret to keep, and his secret to tell.”

I stood and went over to Jac, situating myself on his lap. “I’m so sorry,” I whispered, touching my fingers to his face. He wrapped me in his arms, and we were quiet until I finally said, “I need to talk to Deacon. I need to tell him I’m sorry.”

“There’s one more thing,” Jac said. “The girl.”

The girl that Deacon had saved. Right. “What happened to her?”

“In the memory you saw, did she look familiar?”

I closed my eyes and recalled the image of her. “Short. Skin like black oil—pretty. Blue hair.” But I shook my head and looked at him. “I don’t recognize her though. Who is she?”

“Deacon wanted to make sure the girl was taken care of and Hurried didn’t object to taking her back with us. He understood enough to keep her off the log books. When we returned, Deacon told his father that the rebels had taken her prisoner after they had killed her family. She was sent to the academy—Deacon and I visited her now and then to check her progress.” His lips tightened, like he wasn’t sure how I would take the news. “She excelled at everything medical and had a strong interest in human biology…”

My eyes widened in realization. “Are you telling me, the little girl Deacon rescued…that’s Ode Hrimp? Your ship’s doctor?”

He slowly nodded. “That’s why she didn’t want to come with us to Faithless. Rex slaughtered her family in front of her and almost killed her.”

“Oh my god,” I gasped.

“Now, she saves lives. She tries to repair the damage people do to each other. We’re lucky that she didn’t go the other way.”

I was still trying to process it all. Rex’s memories and what had happened to both Deacon and Jac. “Now that I know…I have to talk to him.”

Jac gave me a soft kiss and smiled. “I want nothing more than my two stubborn companions to work through this.”

The walk back to Allegiant felt twice as long. When we arrived, I parted ways with Jac and scooted beneath the ship where Deacon was still working. There was a surprising amount of room under there, but then I remembered it hadn’t been built with humans in mind, but giant Ladrians. Deacon had just enough room to work above himself and he frowned at me when I joined him.

“Hi,” I said tentatively.

“What is it?” He quietly asked, his hands busy with some kind of control panel.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, hoping he’d accept my apology.

He set his tools down and rolled off his creeper onto the ground beside me, so he could look at me. His eyes were tormented as they met mine, and now I knew why.

“You have nothing to be sorry for, Sarah.”

My heart ached at the sad tone of his voice, and I tried my best to bridge the gap between us. “I like it better when you call me consort.”

Something hopeful flickered in his gaze. “I didn’t know I was still allowed to,” he said gruffly.

I gave him a soft smile. “Always.”

He swallowed hard, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You want to stay united with me, even after knowing what I am, and what I did?”

I reached up and threaded my fingers through his soft, gray hair. “You saved Ode Hrimp.”

Deacon sucked in a breath. “Jac told you?”

“Yes, I—”

“You can never tell where she came from,” he said, suddenly panicked. “We forged her documents—”

“I never would. I swear it,” I reassured him. I dropped my hand to touch his arm, but I didn’t need to feel him to know his whole body was tense. “Deacon, Jac saw what you did that day,” I said, seeing the shock in his eyes. “He told me everything, and you are an honorable man for making the choice that you did. I’m sorry I ever doubted you.”

His eyes shut tightly. “I’m not. I’m a murderer—”

“Slaying a monster does not make you a murderer,” I said, now that I understood everything so much better now. “You’re a hero.”

He shook his head in self-recrimination. “I wish I could believe that.”

I scooted closer to him. “You’re my hero.”

He finally opened his eyes, staring into mine. “You hated me before, what—”

I pressed my fingers to his lips so I could talk. “All I want from you is the truth, and trust, Deacon. I want you to trust me to know your secrets, and to keep them safe, which I will always do. Don’t ever doubt that. And I could never hate you, companion. Not ever.”

Hope flickered across his handsome features. “You mean that?”

“I love you, Deacon,” I said, meaning every word. “I hope you can forgive me for jumping to wrong conclusions and not understanding your side of things.”

“How could you have understood? You are not a soldier—you do not know war. How it warps your sense of self…how priorities shift. I will always be conflicted about what I did, Consort.”

“I know this secret weighs on you. I need you to know that I am strong enough to handle your secrets, whatever they are,” I implored softly. “Let me be here for you, in all ways. I am your consort. I won’t break.”

He reached out and ran his fingers along my cheek. “Rex said you are not fragile—that you might even understand why I did it.”

“He’s right. I do.” I leaned over and kissed him. I was grateful that he let me. “But let me be clear—that is one of the few things he’s right about.”

Deacon grinned, but it quickly fell away as he grew serious once more. “There are more people that I killed in the war,” he told me. “We could come across them here. I do not know all their names, but it is possible they wish me harm.”

I grabbed his large hand in mine. “Then we will fight them together.”

“And I am sorry, too, for doubting your reasons for allowing Rex to possess you,” he said, his voice gruff with undertones of jealousy. “I do not like the thought, but I understand that you, too, had no choice. I am grateful that you are alive and well after the battle with the conduits, and as much as I hate to admit it, I have Rex to thank for that.”

“How about we leave Rex out of things,” I said, grinning as I climbed on top of Deacon, ready to move on to more pleasurable pursuits. Like make up sex.

There wasn’t much room beneath the ship for me to maneuver, but I managed. Our mouths met as he held me close. It was seconds before he hardened under me. I reached into his uniform and stroked his cock, until he was long and thick in my palm and groaning against my lips. As we kissed, the slickness between my legs grew. I jerked up my tunic and arched myself against him.

She swore beneath his breath. “The others—they could see—”

“I don’t care.” I wriggled around on top of him until the tip of his cock pressed against my pussy. I desperately needed to give him this, and take it for myself, as well.

The thrust of his hips pushed him in, even as he deviously said, “This is so wrong.”

I bit my lip and nodded, while I sank onto him, savoring the stretch of him filling me full. When he was buried to the hilt, we both gasped loudly.

“Fuck, we need to be quiet,” he said in a harsh whisper.

“Is that what you want?” I asked as I worked myself on his shaft, still amazed at how deeply I could take him now.

“No,” he said, before he rolled us onto my back. “I want you to writhe, Consort.” He plunged into me again, hitting all those sensitive spots inside of me. “And whimper and moan.”

He didn’t have much space to move and the dirt beneath me had no give, but we made it work. Deacon made little gyrating thrusts into me and each one set me alight. He growled above me, his hands pressing into the dirt. Tiny pebbles dug into my low back, as he fucked me harder.

Each scratch was proof of our love, of our fight against the odds. I wanted every one of them. The pain turned me on, tapping into the same primal part of me that responded to the rough treatment he had given me the first night at Rex’s.

It wasn’t long before the pain and the pleasure sent me over the edge, and he held his hand over my mouth as I orgasmed, so only he could hear my whimpers and moans. A moment later, he pulled out and his hot seed spurted as he came in the dirt.

He laid back and we gasped in the hot air together. He stared intently at something on the ship’s underbelly above us. “Oh shit, there it is,” he said as he yanked an electrical cord and connected it to another by pinching them together, then soldering the wires.

Allegiant powered up over us, engines roaring. Loudly, he said in my ear, “Thanks for making my brain work again.”

I giggled. “You’re welcome.”