Chapter 1

ONE

"He's back!"Hannah slips past me, scooting close to the mirror to check her flawlessly winged eyeliner.

The redhead looks at me in the reflection with a smile that tells me it's not one of her regulars.

The date is wrong for it to be mine, but she wouldn't be acting like this for nothing.

"Who?" I ask, pretending at cluelessness as she rolls her eyes at me.

I know who she's talking about… even if I don't actually know who she's talking about.

"Big D." Hannah sticks her tongue out at me.

At Margot's, the clients don't have to use their real names with us. Margot knows exactly who they are. We don't need to.

The women who work here call them whatever they ask to be called. Hannah and the others are the ones who added "big" to his "D".

I wouldn't know.

That's not a service I provide.

Of all the women on Margot's payroll, I'm the only one who couldn't. Even when my resolve falters and I let myself follow that temptation my imagination has played with too many times, D's big D isn't for me… even if we both want it.

And I'm not even certain he does.

I hum, smoothing a brush over my cheekbone and continue to feign innocence. "Who do you think he's going to ask for tonight?"

Rolling her eyes, Hannah gives me a shove. If I hadn't been braced for it, I'd have fallen out of my chair—she's used to Sian men, and she can throw her whole weight into them.

"You're such a tease." She laughs as she says it, sweeping her gorgeous red hair up into a ponytail. "Save that for him."

I almost mention the bite mark on her neck. If that's not gone by the time her favorite regular comes in, the man might hunt down the biter and remove all his teeth for bruising her.

Hazard isn't her bondmate, but he certainly acts like it. He doesn't mind sharing her—in fact, he seems to relish it—but he won't tolerate anyone hurting her.

D hasn't said as much, but I imagine a bite mark like that wouldn't end well for whoever gave it to me.

The door to the back hall opens and lets in the heavy beat of the club's music. We use them to wind our way through the club without being seen or distracted by patrons. On this level, the electronic beat is fairly subdued, but it still rushes in in a wave that ebbs as soon as the door closes behind Margot.

She doesn't yell for me across the room. She walks casually to me through the empty sofas of the lounge area where the girls take their breaks, over to the makeup tables, where we do our quick changes after cleaning up.

"Your biggest fan is here," Margot says, when she stops beside me, glancing at Hannah, "but I imagine someone beat me to that announcement."

"You move fast, but the whispers move faster." Hannah winks at her and then looks at me with an apologetic smile. "The other girls are waiting for you to give in, so they can hear all about that big D."

Her smile goes a little tight, but she doesn't reveal what she knows.

She, Margot and D are the only ones at the club who know why I can't fall into the temptation he poses.

Because you have to be bonded to work here, and I'm not.

They can't send widows back to Earth—it would make the Agency look bad—and bonding again… that comes with risks most women in this building have never considered.

But I like D, and he's never crossed a single boundary, even if he makes me want to break the rules.

I twist and the shimmer of my bra reflects in the mirror.

I love that vibrant blue, but if he'd warned me he was coming, I would have changed from my post-dance outfit into something more appropriate, something black and soft.

Something that wouldn't hurt his eyes.

Changing now would take too much time, and that's something I never want to waste with him.

Margot drags my robe off the back of my chair as I stand.

"Why are you scowling," she asks. "This is your favorite part of the job."

That's not exactly true, but I'm not going to argue.

Margot helps me slip the robe on and skims her hands over the soft velvet flowers on my shoulders.

"Everything still hunky dory with him?" She asks, meeting my eyes in the mirror.

"Completely."

Because Margot's not here to make money. She's here to keep us safe… and also make money.

If I wasn't sure I wanted to step into that room, she wouldn't let me.

But she knows who he really is. She's the one who told me I'd be safe.

I trusted her then.

I trust him now.

"You," Hannah says as she hands me the clasp that holds the robe closed, "are the only one in this place with a client who asks you to put clothes back on."

"I'm the only one who can't take them off." I remind her.

"You could give him a blowjob and at least sate the others' curiosity."

"You mean I could sate your curiosity?"

The women who work here love to share notes on the men they sleep with—the men they are essentially training until they are given a mate by the Agency.

I lean forward and kiss her forehead. "The stage is the only place I take my clothes off for them, love. And it has to stay that way."

"I think he could make you happy." Hannah says it quietly… like she knows she shouldn't say it at all.

I turn away from the mirror so she doesn't see my face. Maybe she's right, but, "That assumes I'm not happy already."

"Are you?" Margot hasn't asked me that question for a very long time, but the lie comes easily enough.

"Of course." I squeeze her hand. She's my friend, even if she's also my boss. "How could I be sad when the two of you do everything in your power to make sure I'm not?"

I kiss her on the cheek and leave before they can poke holes through that logic.

I leave so the dim hallways hide the tears pricking at my eyes.

Happiness died with Edan. Finding it again… that feels like betrayal.

D gets me close—I'll never deny that—but contentment is the best I can hope for.

Pushing through the doors and into the dark, pulsating beat of the club's public play room on this level, I feel a dozen eyes track me.

Margot stopped telling me about the requests for my company in specific numbers, but they never stop coming.

Men—even on this planet—are more inclined to lust after what they can't have.

I don't normally venture into these rooms.

The only time I use them is on nights like this, when I want to get to D faster—the back halls take twice as long.

The stage is where I work.

These spaces are meant for getting ready to disappear into the private rooms… or the men who like to be watched and the women who love performing with an audience.

I don't need to weave through the chairs and tables looking for a man who catches my eye and vice versa.

The faces that turn my way are immediately turned back by a finger of the woman on their laps.

Everyone who works here knows me. They can guess where I'm headed, if they don't actually know. And they know Margot will give them hell if they let someone accidentally get in my way.

I have to walk all the way through to get to the elevator that will take me to the right level. It's a gauntlet, but the rules are strict here. If a man was to approach me on his own, he'd be banned. And no one's willing to risk that.

In the neon glow of the descending lift, I take deep breaths, settling myself. And when the doors open again, those threatening tears and anxious fidgets are gone.

I can be sad at home. No one's paying me to cry here.

The third floor is the quietest, which is why he always comes here.

The path into the neon arches of the mirrored hallway is a familiar one.

A woman slips out of a door ringed in orange and offers me a little smile and wave. She doesn't know the private rooms that line these walls are the last place I should be.

Everyone else who works here is bonded. Their mates consent to their choice and men who aren't bonded—either because they haven't done their year's membership or they're waiting for their match—get the chance to learn how to treat their mates when they finally get them… or find out they don't want a permanent partner, after all.

Only a few of the doorways are ringed in red—currently in use. Fewer still are lined in orange—waiting for the cleaners to slip in and finish up with what the automated systems can't manage.

Other floors will be completely full at this time of night. The louder, more boisterous crowd likes to fill the public play rooms and then migrate off on their own when they've had enough of just watching.

The Agency pays Margot a lot of money to keep Sian men interested in finding their bondmate—it's not a bad return on investment. I've seen the numbers.

I pull open a door marked with a black light number seven and slip inside, swiping my hand over the lock before I turn to him.

Unbonded men who come to Margot's are eighty-three percent more likely to pay the Agency to find them a bondmate. They have to be a member of a city's club for at least a year before they can even apply, though. This is a place to figure out what they liked—so they can fill out the questionnaire honestly, so their matches are approved.

But D's not here for that.

He's never asked for anyone else.

He's never asked me to do anything the others would do as standard.

D knows I'm not bonded anymore.

He knows what happened when Edan died—in theory.

That's why I keep coming back to this room. Because he understands I can't be the lover—the bondmate—anyone else in his position would want me to be.

And I'll keep telling myself that until it's the truth.

It takes me a moment to find him in the darkness of the room, and it's the sound of water that helps me get there in the end.

He stands at the vanity across the room, his back to me as he washes his hands.

I don't need more light to know it's him.

They're all tall. Impossibly so, it seems at times, but D is big.

I've been around so many Sian men, I know that there's actually an inch of leeway in either direction—only one man who comes into this club defies that norm.

D is at the high end of the spectrum, but he's broader than most, and his eyes…

They're a faint glow in the mirror when he looks up at me. Like a zurgle's caught by headlights.

"It's been a few days," I tease. He's early. "I thought maybe something had happened to you."

He smiles. It's a flash of bright teeth that disappears quickly. "Something did, but I survived it."

The words are tense. But then… D's always tense.

He barely relaxes in his sleep.

I watch him as he moves into the center of the room, shrugging out of his coat and shirt and tossing them onto the chair I can't see, but I know is there.

My eyes have adjusted to the dim light that rings the floor, just enough to see the long scars turned shiny with age. They cross over the dark skin and banded muscles of his chest, extending up his arms and down his back.

I assume his legs are riddled with the same, but he's never taken his pants off.

There are only two professions that would leave a person with that many marks.

And I can't ask if it's one… because I don't want to know it's the other.

There are a dozen questions I've kept tight to my chest because I'm afraid of the answers.

"Did you dance tonight?" he asks, trailing his hand down the sleeve of my robe and then lacing his fingers in mine.

"I did." I look down at the bright blue bra designed to catch the light and wince at the way it glitters, even in the dimness, even under the robe's flowers. "If I'd known you were coming, I would have changed."

"It's my fault. I should have sent the reservation on my way here, but I was distracted."

I'm easily able to track his glowing gaze as it travels down to the offending fabric. I see them narrow and can imagine him wincing.

"I'm sorry I missed your show," he says.

That's the usual routine. I dance, he watches from the back of the room with his dark glasses on, and then I change and come to him.

"I could dance for you now." I offer it, even if he never takes me up on it.

There's space and equipment in the room for it.

"I'm not here to make you work." He toes off his boots and goes to the bed, leaving me standing there—making me make the decision—again. Always.

D is here for one thing and one thing only.

He's here to sleep. And for whatever reason, he wants me with him.

The first time we did this, I'd spent hours laying beside him with my eyes wide open, watching for any shift in the mirror over us.

There are people—on Earth, if not here as well—who get off on that sort of thing, and I didn't know him then.

But now…

Turning away from him, I do the quick gymnastics required to wiggle my bra off and I stuff it under his coat—after a series of fumbling pats at the chair and fabric.

It would have reflected back at him, and I don't want to do anything that might disturb his sleep.

The bed is enormous—custom made for four—and he's settled at the center of it, dragging pillows down the way I like them.

He doesn't say anything about my barely veiled breasts as I crawl next to him—he's seen them dozens, if not hundreds, of times before.

When I settle down next to him, his arm wraps around me and he holds me close.

The room is silent, but even as we lay in the darkness, his silver-white eyes reflect back to me from the dark mirror above.

"Do you want to tell me about it?"

There's a long pause and I feel his breathing change.

But he doesn't tell me.

He pulls me closer, pressing his lips to my forehead. "Go to sleep Kimba. Everything will be better when we wake."

I put my head on his shoulder and wrap my arm around his chest—as far as I can anyway—and with a deep breath, I close my eyes and try to do what he needs me to.

Someday he'll answer the questions I'm willing to ask…

Maybe someday, I'll be brave enough to ask the ones I'm not.

Kimba babbles in a fitful slumber, only stilling when I murmur her name and tell her I'm here. A faint little sigh slips from her lips and she hugs me closer as I wrap my arms more tightly around her, always wanting her near.

She falls asleep so easily now, and that trust does more for my peace than anything else ever could.

I watch her and remind myself she's mine for the next few hours.

I got here late enough that she's taken out the extensions she weaves into her chin-length black hair. She told me once that the tips are higher when she wears them. The tips are higher when she wears more clothes.

Clothes like the glittering blue top she hid away in deference to my eyes. She's always so careful about that… which is why I know she's unaware of the way her makeup sparkles for me.

I draw my finger along her cheek and her dark lashes flutter, but she doesn't wake.

These nights I steal with her are secret and sacred.

And I know more than one of the brotherhood would tell me I'm an absolute fool for falling in love with her.

I'd give her everything, but Kimba doesn't want anything from me, not even my name.

If Margot wasn't in charge of the monetary side of this exchange, I don't know that she'd even take my money.

After all, with or without her fake hair, the tips for each dance are high. Kimba commands attention. There are a few women who work here who get requests because they vaguely resemble her.

But Kimba doesn't fuck anyone.

It's one of the secrets a very few of us know, hidden away like her real name.

She's a soft weight in my arms. Breath fluttering across my chest, I tuck my chin against her hair, using the gentle thump of her heartbeat to ground me.

Her robe is sheer where it isn't covered by soft, velvety flowers, and her body heat seeps through it, leaching into my skin.

Usually, I can sleep here, like this.

As long as I have her.

But tonight…

Tonight I have too many questions and too few answers.

Tonight, a man was killed by a monster that should never have made it into the city. A monster I should have stopped.

That monster is why I'm here when I shouldn't be. I've spent years keeping the people in this city—the women and children, specifically—safe.

Shewas safe here as long as the brotherhood and I kept the cavrinskh inside the caldera walls. But if one can slip through… how many more could?

I've been content with these stolen nights because I thought she was safer here than she would be with me.

And bringing her into my home—into my life—means bonding her.

That's the secret she keeps almost as well as her real name. Her bondmate died five years ago.

It's a secret I assume she keeps to ward off the unending offers she'd receive from unbonded men, but also, I suspect, so that she doesn't have to hear misguided opinions.

There is a cruel idea that surviving your bondmate's death somehow means you didn't love them enough.

I know for a fact that isn't true.

Kimba has told me dozens of stories while sitting cross-legged on this bed. It's why I know that she misses Earth wine and that she broke her toe when she was seven years old, kicking a ballerina who was picking on another kid in their class. It's why I know that she's always loved to dance and has always hated bullies.

She's told me half her life's story in the two years that I've been coming to her and every time she says her late bondmate's name, her voice still cracks. Tears still shimmer in her eyes, even though she tries to hide it.

I would give anything to be loved the way she loved him.

And I have no intention of competing with Edan. She loves him still and I would never ask her to stop. But love isn't finite. I believe with my whole being that she could love me too if I give her enough of a chance to get used to the idea.

There may not be time for that anymore.

With three of the brotherhood bonded—and all three of their mates pregnant—even ignoring the anomaly of the cavrinskh I had to kill tonight, the monsters are getting bolder. They're making their way out of the inner caldera more and more, and it is only going to get worse.

But being here with Kimba, knowing she's safe… helps calm me.

The ceiling is a dark abyss, reflecting the low lights back at me.

Darkness suddenly broken by scrolling blue from the lenses that sting at my eyes. The lenses that are the only way I can function without the opaque shields others think are darkly tinted glass.

There's a perimeter warning, but Trench has already flagged it and is on his way out to deal with the problem.

Before tonight, I would have said Kimba was safer here, miles from the icy caldera, far beyond the cavrinskhs' reach… even if she's also far beyond mine.

"You're not asleep." She says from beside me before burying her face against my side to yawn. "Tell me why you came tonight?"

"I'm here to be with you."

"Your schedule doesn't change." Her words are sleepy. "Tonight it did."

"A friend was in trouble…" The Continental Security Service asked me to keep the details to myself. "It reminded me that we're all living on borrowed time, and all my best memories are with you, here in this bed."

I see a flicker of panic in her eyes and I know, before she even opens her mouth, that she's going to deflect with a joke.

"Said by a man who won't even let me suck his cock."

"You're not ready for that yet."

She chuckles, "I think I'm more than capable of determining what I'm ready for."

"Fine, you're not ready for what it would mean for me."

She swallows, the delicate lines of her throat moving in a nervous flicker, and she doesn't say anything else.

"Do you need to go?" I ask, loosening my hold on her.

I shouldn't have said it.

But I can't even kiss her until I know she's mine.

She's never left me early before, but I've never let something like that slip before either…

"No." She shakes her head and then drops it back to my shoulder. "I'll stay."

The relief that washes through me escapes in a shaky breath.

I can't keep her yet, but I won't let her go, either.