10. Ozadus

Ismile as I make my way to the fuel depot, already eager to get this over with and get back to Lisa. Things with her feel so easy. I know it isn’t just the mate bond, though I’m sure that helps. Lisa is fun. We enjoy the same things and have thrilling conversations.

I could get used to spending a lifetime with her.

She’s beautiful, sure, but she’s also whip-smart and competent. I’d been so wrong to dismiss her abilities as a mechanic. She’s shown more than once she understands how a ship works. And on top of that, she can handle a little verbal back and forth with ease. Hell, sometimes she initiates it.

And in the bedroom? I sigh, thinking of how lucky I am. My fated mate is a ferocious lover and eager to indulge. She’s the entire package, and much more valuable than the one I intended to steal when all of this began.

I’m not sure how my life with Lisa is going to shake out, but I know for a fact I want it. I want her.

I’m so thoroughly walking on air just thinking about her, I almost screw up completely.

“Would you like that charged to your ship’s account, Captain?” the bored attendant asks without even looking up at me.

It’s tempting to do so. Steal a man’s ship and charge him the cost of the fuel while I’m at it? Talk about kicking a canitor when it’s down. But no, that would leave a data trail easily accessible to Derchus and his crew.

“Not today. This is going on the company’s credit line.” I pull up my comm pad and hand over the charge information for a dummy account setup by the syndicate. From the outside, it’s a normal shipping and logistics company. Truthfully, it’s a shell corporation. One of many used to launder the syndicate’s money.

Of course, by using it, I’ve now flagged the syndicate to my own location. That could complicate things, but it”s doubtful. So long as I pull through, no one will audit my expenses too carefully.

“And give the viewing ports a good scrub, would you? Your planet has quite the flying insect problem.” I make a show of adding a sizable tip, one the attendant doesn’t seem to notice.

He shrugs. “Mating season.”

While the young adult goes about his business, I take care of my own. I take in a few practiced stretches and body weight exercises. Engineers claim onboard artificial gravity is exactly the same as any industrialized planet’s, but I know they’re lying. I can feel my muscles slowly degrading every day I’m in space.

I’m finished by the time the attendant returns. He finalizes and pushes a digital receipt to my comm pad before going back to staring at nothing.

I cannot begin to imagine wasting away the best years of my youth in such boring mediocrity. Every time I wonder if I chose the right path, I remind myself what could have been. Locked in a cycle of decay, mind and body slowly decomposing in order to make someone else’s bank account slightly increase.

No thanks. I’d rather have a few thrills, even at the risk of my own safety.

But it’s not my own safety anymore, is it? I have Lisa now. And the idea of something happening to her fills me with a sense of dread I’ve never known before.

It lingers with me as I come to our designated meeting spot, and she’s not there. I check the time. There are still about twenty minutes left until our agreed meeting time. I try to let that feeling go, but it stays, simmering in my blood.

Something’s wrong.

I walk around the port, trying to catch any glimpse of her long red hair or chunky toolbelt, but come up empty.

I have to remain calm. Panicking is beneath me and certainly wouldn’t do any good. Instead, I find a Kraaj family having a picnic at one of the public benches.

“Um, excuse me,” I start. A small child cowers into his mother’s side. The father looks up at me with suspicion, but he easily assesses he’s out of his depth here.

“Can I help you?” he asks.

“Yes, I’m looking for a human woman. Lisa. She has red hair and–”

“Oh, her!” the woman says cheerfully. “Yeah, she really sticks out, doesn’t she? I saw her get on a cargo ship about ten minutes ago.”

I blink. “Sorry. Did you say she got on a ship?”

“Yeah. It took off soon after,” the man replies.

I shake my head. That can’t be right. “Was she in danger? Were they kidnapping her?” That’s the only explanation, and I want to throttle these people for standing by and letting it happen.

The woman shakes her head. “No, she approached them. Then she followed them on board. No struggle.”

“Why are you blue?” the kid asks. The mother slaps her hand over his mouth, eyes blown wide.

I scoff, turning away without another word.

No struggle? None at all? She just…

Of course. She never chose to get on that ship with me. She had stated, several times, that she wanted to go back home. Why wouldn’t she take the first opportunity to do so?

It was my own fault for assuming we had gotten to a point where I wasn’t still the bad guy she was going to sneak away from at the first opportunity.

Still, the realization stings. All that time together, the stories, the intimacy. We had sex. What did any of that mean to her?

Was it anything at all?

I glance over at the depot. There’s a terminal inside, just as there is in every depot, that logs the comings and goings of every ship. I could easily pull up which one took off ten minutes ago and track it down. Board them. Talk sense into my mate and bring her back but…

Why bother? If she wanted to stay with me, she would have. Doing something so drastic, when she made it clear she doesn’t think of me like that, would simply be pathetic. And what’s my alternative? Kidnap her for real this time?

No. I’m not that sort of man. In fact, with Lisa, I found myself becoming a different man entirely. Even just now, before this horrid discovery, I was toying with the idea of leaving the syndicate. Easier said than done, of course. But that’s what love does to a person. Makes them rethink their priorities.

I suppose Lisa considered hers and chose the way that worked for her.

And where does that leave me? To be honest, exactly where I started. I tasted romance, a real love fated in the stars. And it was delicious. But it’s over now.

If she doesn’t want this life, if she doesn’t want me, then I can”t force it. Even if I could, I refuse to stoop to that.

I nod my head towards the sky, a solemn farewell of sorts towards Lisa. Then I board my ship and return to my job.

It’s all I have.

Days after handing the shipment over, I receive my next assignment. Hired muscle for a real piece of work.

“He’s been accused of all sorts of low-life shit that makes us look like angels,” Wrex, the boss’ assistant, says. “I’m talking ‘sabotaging charities to reduce competition for his businesses’ kind of evil. But he’s got money and a lot of it. So you’re going to make sure he doesn’t have to face the consequences for his actions.”

I nod. This is nothing compared to other jobs I”ve taken. I’ve pulled off huge heists, kidnapped rich kids for their parent’s money, and extorted protection money from businesses on our turf. I’ve killed a man, like I admitted to Lisa. Protecting one guy from prying reporters or cops with a hero complex may as well be honest work itself.

So why does the thought of it make me sick to my stomach?

I accept the job details on my comm pad and nod to Wrex. I can’t let a stomach bug get in the way of my work. But still, as the day moves on, the feeling doesn’t go away. As I get dressed and make my way to rendezvous with the client, the twisting sensation turns into a full-blown warning bell.

“You don’t have to do this,” the Lisa in my head whispers. “Let him answer the hard questions. Let him get arrested. He deserves to face justice for his crimes.”

I swallow the sentiment down. I don’t need a little bird on my shoulder whispering moral lessons in my ear. Especially not in the form of a woman who rejected me.

Still, what if I did? What if I walked away from this, let this one bad guy get what’s obviously coming for him? What if I, for once in my life, did the right thing?

What would Lisa think of me then?

The fact that I’m even entertaining the idea is laughable. Look at what she’s done to me. A month ago, I would’ve taken this job and shown up without a second thought. His crimes would mean nothing to me. His payout to the syndicate would be the only thing that mattered.

But now…

I look at myself in the mirror and imagine my reflection as a different man. Someone who escaped the syndicate and lived. Someone who made it work. A man who chose instead to take an honest day’s wage, without anyone getting hurt. Without any injustice or violence.

A changed man.

And then I think about Lisa and how she might look at that man.

I smirk. “Bet you’d regret walking away then, wouldn’t you?” There’s no cruelty or malice in the words. Just a statement of fact. One that unsettles me.

I shake my head, ridding myself of the fantasy and blinking away the imaginary version of Lisa haunting my mind.

She’s gone. I don’t need to do anything to convince her she was wrong. But still, the fantasy lingers. Even as I finish dressing and step into the hover cab, I think of her.

Maybe time will set me free. It can’t be easy to break off a fated mate bond, I’m sure. I know stories about such things exist, though I never studied them myself. Never thought I’d have to.

I can walk away from her just as easily as she did to me. But it’ll take some time. And maybe, if I accidentally let one reporter ambush Mr. Sparchs with a camera in his face, it’ll go away a little bit easier.