The Lost Star Episode One (23 page)

At first she had no idea what he was
doing, then he pushed her towards the bathroom. “Look for anything
that can get those bolts off. Come on, hurry. Everyone's counting
on us.”

It was his tone that did it.

She finally found the strength to push
past the confusion.

She darted into her bathroom, her keen
gaze scanning over every surface.

Though she desperately searched for some
kind of tool, her gaze did return to her armlets once or
twice.

... If she could find some way to get them
off, she could end this. Right now.

“
Ava, come on,” Hunter called from the
other room, as if he could tell she was getting
distracted.

She sucked in a rattling breath and pushed
herself into the task again.

That's when she saw it. The light
fitting.

There should be a magnetic anchor lock
behind it. Her gaze jerked over to the control panel by the
bathroom door that adjusted water, humidity, and heat. If she was
right, she could pull out selected pieces of it, cobble them
together with the mag lock from the light, and produce a tool to
burn through the bolts.

“
Ava, come on,” Hunter called once more,
voice somehow pitching with even more desperation.

“
Hunter, get in here,” she
snapped.

He practically skidded as he threw himself
into the room. “What is it?"

“
I need to clamber up onto your shoulders
and reach the light.”

S
urprisingly, he didn't ask what she was thinking. He jerked
forward, skidded down to one knee, and brought his arms up. “Come
on.”

She nodded hard and pushed towards him,
clambering onto his back.

He wrapped his strong arms around her
legs, anchoring her in place.

She couldn’t allow herself to be
distracted by the hard press of his shoulder muscles and back
against her front. She pressed her lips together, locked her tongue
against the roof of her mouth, and reached towards the
roof.

He held her steady, showing his
considerable strength, especially for a human.

“
Hold steady,” she warned needlessly as she
pressed her fingers either side of the light switch.

“
And watch yourself,” he added immediately.
“Pull out the wrong wire, and you could electrocute
yourself.”

She ignored him, pushed one hand harder
into the wall to stabilize herself, sucked in a calming breath, and
started to unscrew the light fitting. The little grating scratch
the mechanism gave echoed through the room, the only sound apart
from Hunter's regulated, controlled breathing.

Finally the light fitting came undone in
her fingers. She cast it to the side, and it fell against the far
wall with a crack.

She gently pressed her fingers into the
hole it had left, careful not to brush up against any exposed
wires.

“
Slowly,” he warned.

The particular low pitch of his tone shook
up her legs and into her belly.

Finally she clasped the mag lock. She
yanked it out. “Got it.”

“
Atta girl.” He shifted back, walking to
the side until they reached a wall.

Ava pushed a hand into it for balance as
Hunter slowly crunched down to his knees.

She jumped off, legs tingling from where
there'd been in contact with his shoulders and arms.

She ignored the pleasant sensation as she
pushed towards the room controls.

H
unter got there first.

He clearly knew what she was
planning.

He used his superior strength to rip the
panel off the wall and root around in the controls
beneath.

Soon he pulled out exactly what they need.
He proffered a hand, and she gave him the mag lock.

She saw a peculiar kind of smile spread
across his stiff lips as he took it from her. Briefly he darted his
gaze up. “You're pretty smart, Ava.”

His words – or, more importantly, the way
he looked at her – sent a shiver darting through her
gut.

She didn't have time to consider it as she
watched Hunter work frantically. He walked back into the main room
and faced the doors, gaze darting up to check on the integrity of
the shields every few seconds. She could easily make out the beads
of sweat collecting over his brow and down the side of his
neck.

She waited in pressured silence until he
was done.

With a soft “Whoop,” he stood back and
revealed the makeshift tool, a true grin cutting his face in half.
“Come on.” He didn't waste any time in ducking down to his knees
and shifting towards her bed. “You keep the bed steady,” he said as
he started to burn a hole right through the bolts keeping it locked
against the hull.

“
Got it,” she said as she jumped onto the
bed, reasoning her weight would be a more significant force than
her strength.

She caught him grinning at her again.
Though it was nervous, it was also....

“
One down,” he said triumphantly as he
moved to the next leg. “We can do this,” he added softly under his
breath. “Come on, we can do this.”

She watched him as he worked. She couldn't
tear her eyes away.

His body was rigid with tension, his gaze
locked on the bed legs without blinking.

... He really was a determined man,
perhaps the most determined man she'd ever met. True, he had an
anger. And as his previous treatment of her evidenced, that anger
wasn't always justified.

But now he was doing the right thing – now
he was busting a gut trying to save this ship.

Trying to save her.

Something swelled in her gut. A prickly
kind of heat that climbed deep into the center of her
chest.

She brought a hand up and locked it on her
front.

He caught sight of her movement and jerked
his head up. “You okay?" he asked in a truly worried
tone.

She smiled. It was a genuine move, pushed
on by the warmth growing in her chest.

No one had ever sacrificed for her like
Hunter was now doing. The priestesses, though a close knit group,
were not tender.

Could not love.

As soon as that word sprang into her mind,
she pushed it away with a shiver. “Just nervous,” she
lied.

“
Don't worry, Ava,” he said as he darted
around on his hands and knees and scooted to the other side of the
bed, “We will do this. The ship can count on us.”

That statement caught her attention –
especially the expression that swamped his face as he said it.
Despite the fact his brow was covered in sweat and his head ducked
down at an angle as he concentrated, she could still see the way he
looked.

Confused, unsure.

... She suddenly realized there was more,
much more to the mysterious Hunter McClean than she'd once
thought.

Before she could delve too deeply into
that thought, he punched to his feet, an enormous grin spreading
over his face. He leaned a hand out to her, legs pushing into the
side of her bed.

She stared up into his eyes, pausing
before she reached out a hand and took his.

She didn't know why she paused.

Her stomach clenched and a tingly feeling
raced up her back.

She sucked in a breath, tucked her hand in
his, and let him pull her off the bed.

Instantly, he latched onto the bed and
shoved it forward, revealing the hatch.

He proffered a hand towards it. “After
you.”

“
No, after you. I'm small enough that I'll
be able to pull the bed back over the hatch. It might buy us a
couple of seconds before they realize how we escaped.”

He nodded hard. “Do it.” He got down to
his knees, latched a hand around the hatch, and pulled it
up.

Instantly cold vent air met
them.

She heard him groan quietly.

She smiled and waited for him to jump into
the vent, then she got down on her hands and knees and joined
him.

She maneuvered the bed as close to the
vent as she could. She reached an arm out, locked a hand on one of
the bed legs, and used whatever strength she had to yank the bed
back over the vent.

It hurt, especially with her fragile
wrists. But she ignored the pain and did what she could.

When she was done, she jumped from the
tiny ladder that led to the bottom of the shaft, and met Hunter's
gaze.

He nodded at her. “Okay. We've got to get
to engineering. We have to figure out what they've done to the coms
system. If we can get off a distress call, the Coalition will send
help.”

She nodded. “Got it.”

He turned, gaze locking on her wrists for
a single second before he let his shoulders deflate in a defeated
breath. “I'm sorry about this, Ava.”

“
It's okay.”

They pushed on.

In truth, it was easy to ignore the pain
radiating up from her wrists. It was easy, because her mind was at
war.

Every question she'd pushed back in her
room came spiraling into her consciousness like bullets from a
cruiser. They blasted away at her grey matter until a cracking
headache spread through her skull.

... She just couldn't understand how
things could have gotten so bad on her home world.

A few times Hunter glanced over his
shoulder as he looked at her. “It'll be okay, Ava. Everything will
work out.”

There he went again, trying to comfort
her. It seemed that Lieutenant Hunter McClane had many
faces.

... Then again, so did she. If he knew her
real identity, would he be treating her like this? Or would he be
justifiably angry that she'd let things get so far?

She should have raised her concerns about
Shera and Meva's behavior earlier. She should have called her
government.

Then again, perhaps they wouldn't have
responded.

That Aide Phar had clearly been working
with Shera. Which meant this issue was much, much larger than Ava
had assumed.

She let out a tortured sigh.

“
What is it?” he turned over his shoulder
and locked his searching gaze on her. “It's okay, Ava, you can tell
me. I won't tell a soul.”

His offer was tempting. God, what she
wouldn’t give for someone to unload on.

Though these five years in the Coalition
had been some of the most treasured of her life, she'd still felt
detached from her friends and the crew around her.

They would never truly understand her,
because she would never truly be able to tell them who she
was....

“
I understand it must be hard for you. But
you've got to tell me what you can. We need to understand why Shera
and Meva did this....”

She looked up. He'd twisted his head back
around, so she could no longer see his gaze. She could make out his
body language easily, though.

The defeat pushing through his tensed
shoulders, the lost angle to his neck and back.

She sucked in a sudden breath as she
realized something.

She'd heard from a few other crew members
that Hunter was involved with Meva.

... And she'd just tried to take over the
ship.

“
Hunter, I mean, lieutenant, I'm so sorry.
This must be so hard for you.”

“
You're right – I have to hold onto the
hope that Shera won't do anything to Harvey. She'll need his
codes.”

“
That's not what I meant. I meant... I
meant Meva. I don't mean to bring up your personal affairs, but
I....”

He turned right over his shoulder to look
at her, even drew to a slow pace. He swallowed. She watched his
Adam’s apple bob against the tight collar of his
uniform.

“
I'm sorry.” She repeated as she dropped
her gaze. She couldn't be sure, but she half felt that statement
pertained to more than his loss.

It pertained to hers as well.

H
owever subtly, she was starting to have feelings for Hunter
McClane. At least her body was. She wasn't a fool – she couldn't
ignore the tingles that raced across her flesh and deep into her
chest whenever they touched.

But the tingles were misplaced.

He suddenly laughed. It wasn't miserable
or tortured. “There's nothing to be sorry about,” he appeared to
speak honestly.

“
I... thought you were... ah, with...” she
couldn't push it out. Despite her burning curiosity, it was
extremely inappropriate to have this kind of conversation with a
superior.

“
With Meva? Yeah, for a while,” he answered
casually. “We broke up. Before she mutinied and tried to take over
the ship,” he added with a dark look. “So there's nothing you need
to be sorry about, Ava. In fact,” he darted his keen gaze back up
as he locked her in it, “The only person who should be sorry about
anything is me. I let Meva affect me. She convinced me you were a
monster. Said you belonged to a higher social strata, said your
people oppressed her people for years. I shouldn't have believed
her. I should have asked for your side of the story. Heck, if I'd
done that, we probably wouldn't be in this situation now,” he said
with a tortured laugh.