Wishing he could help his best friend, Maris picked up Darling's hand from the bed and studied the scar on his finger that showed where Syn had added the cybernetic replacement for the one they'd cut off.

He laced his fingers with Darling's scarred ones. Why couldn't I be what you need?

It was why he'd never been serious about anyone else. How could he? He was in love with his best friend and no one else measured up.

But Maris had long ago accepted the fact that they could never be lovers. Darling couldn't help being straight any more than he could help being gay. Having tried to live in each other's worlds, they knew that for a fact.

Even so, they were closer than most couples he'd known, straight or homosexual. Closer than any siblings. Maris took pride and pleasure in knowing that. He held a part of Darling that no one ever had. A special place that was reserved exclusively for him.

Still, it wasn't Darling's heart.

Only Zarya had ever held that. How could she have been so stupid?

She'd had Darling wrapped around her finger. He'd been his happiest when she was a part of his life. Maris could still see the light that had been in Darling's eyes when he spoke of her in ways he'd sell his soul to have Darling speak about him.

It wasn't meant to be.

It could never be.

But Zarya could heal him. He knew it.

And deep down, he suspected Darling knew it, too. Why else would he have kept her here tonight? He could have easily ordered one of his soldiers to take her away. Or he could have killed her.

Instead, he'd taken her to the kitchen to work where the entire staff was female.

That said it all.

Even in his drunken rage, Darling had made sure she went untouched by another man and that she'd been put some place safe. That wasn't the action of someone who didn't care.

In time, Darling would forgive her for being stupid, and Maris would do everything in his power to make sure that happened sooner rather than later.

Zarya sat in her new room, completely mortified. So this is how Darling felt in our hands...

After the kitchen staff had finished dinner and then cleaned up, they had turned on her with a passion.

Everything on her body had been stripped off and stolen while they'd laughed about it. Even the pins from her hair. They'd left her with nothing, not even her undergarments.

Take that back. She still wore her damnable slave collar. Who in their right mind would want that?

Then they'd locked her in a spartan, closet-size room with the promise that they'd bring her new clothes in the morning-something Clarion had failed to do for Darling when he'd been in their custody.

There was no window, not that it mattered. She wasn't about to try and escape with no clothes on. And while she sat on the floor with no light or blanket, all she could see was the way Darling had looked when Clarion and crew had been callously dragging him naked through the landing bay like some prized stag they'd shot in the wild.

Because of the tricom he'd made to protect her, Darling had been paralyzed. Completely unable to defend himself from them.

I spit in his face.

Tears blurred her vision. She was no better than the bitches who'd attacked her. True, his uncle had murdered her parents and sister. That her other sister and brother had been killed in the fight against his uncle.

But Darling had done nothing to deserve it. Over and over, she saw the images Maris had shown her of Darling's wounds. Heard him telling her about Darling's brutal past.

And that mask...

As scary as it was, it'd been nothing compared to the unreasoning hatred she'd seen in his eyes.

Eyes that were steel blue. All these years, she'd wondered what color Kere's eyes were. She'd imagined everything from exotic humanoid species to dark like Maris's.

Tonight that knowledge gave her no comfort at all.

It was a wonder Darling hadn't killed her on sight. She wasn't sure she could have held herself back if she'd been in his place.

"I'm so sorry," she breathed. No one deserved the indignity they'd put her through. Never mind what had been done to him. At least the women hadn't dragged her naked through public grounds.

Yet.

There's always tomorrow.

But that wasn't what she wanted to think about. Instead, she closed her eyes and remembered what it felt like to be held in the arms of someone who loved her.

"I want you to marry me, Zarya. I need you in my life. I know it sounds weird, but when I'm with you, I'm the man I always wanted to be. And when I'm not, it's like I'm lost to someone else, and I don't like him anymore. I can't keep living the lie that was forced on me."

Now she knew the lie.

And it broke her heart.

But tomorrow, no matter what it took or how hard it was, she was going to try and find that man he'd spoken about.

She'd found him once.

Now it was time to bring him home...

9.

Darling came awake to the worst pain in his skull imaginable. His head felt like it weighed five hundred pounds and that his uncle had bounced it off the marble floor a few dozen times.

Damn, it hurt.

He pressed his hand to his forehead and went cold as he felt skin on skin. What the hell? He hadn't removed his gloves since Syn had released him from the hospital.

Panic tore through him. How could he be in his bed without his mask and gloves?

What happened to me? He couldn't remember anything from the night before.

Who'd undressed him?

"It's all right, Darling." Maris came out of the shadows to stand next to him. "You passed out last night. I carried you in here and put you to bed."

Thank the gods for that.

But his relief was short lived. Frowning, which made his head throb even worse, Darling did his best to recall something from last night.

Everything was a fog. It was like trying to chase down a phantom wind.

How flagged had he gotten?

Yeah, okay so he'd started drinking on a stomach filled with nothing but painkillers around lunch, and hadn't stopped until he must have passed out. Still...

"I don't remember anything."

Maris snorted. "I believe it. You were pretty wasted. I haven't seen you like that in a very long time."

"How long was I out?"

Maris turned the clock to face him.

Darling cursed as he noted the time. "It's the middle of the afternoon?"

"You haven't slept in days, probably weeks," Maris said simply. "You were exhausted."

He'd lived his whole life exhausted. Sleep had always been a stranger to him. Peaceful sleep even more so.

Squinting against the faint light in the room that pierced his brain, he grimaced at Maris. "What about you? You look like shit, buddy."

"You keep sweet talking a girl like that and you're liable to get lucky."

Darling didn't comment on that. "You haven't slept, have you?"

"No. I kept watch for you while you slept."

Of course he did. Maris was the only one who fully understood his lunatic idiosyncrasies and paranoia...

And the fact that a sleeping governor was usually a dead one.

"I appreciate it. Thank you."

Maris inclined his head. "You know, you might want to think about showering at some point today."

"Why?"

He rolled his eyes. "You really don't remember anything from last night, do you?"

Darling tried to think through the throbbing haze. He saw images, but he wasn't sure if they were real or imagined or dreamed. One thing that he did vaguely recall was Maris holding and rocking him... at least he thought he might remember it. "Did you kiss me?"

"Only on the cheek."

Darling wasn't so sure about that given the evil light in Maris's dark eyes. It was a look he knew all too well. Maris had a secret he was hiding from him.

Something that would make him mad when he found out.

Gods, I hope I didn't respond to any official e-mails...

If he had, he might be on the brink of war today. Better check on that soon. If there was an armada coming, he might want to rally some troops before they arrived.

Then again, in his current mood, a war might not be such a bad thing. Yeah, he wouldn't mind tearing into a few of his enemies.

His thoughts drifted to the night before when he'd been in his office. Someone had been there dressed in white. It was a color Maris despised on himself for several reasons.

Maris would only wear it if he were dead...

Closing his eyes, Darling wasn't sure what his mind was trying to tell him. But one thing tugged at his memory...

The smell of a woman's skin. Something he hadn't been near in a long time. And then, he saw an image of someone standing behind Maris in his office.

He looked at Maris and scowled. "Did you bring me a woman?"

"I did." Now his expression and demeanor were completely unreadable.

Suddenly, Darling caught the scent that was still on his clothes from the night before. One that seemed to have permanently attached itself to his very skin. Unforgettable and as individual as the woman who bore it, he knew that scent better than any.

It hit like a kick in the crotch.

Still, he didn't want to believe it was what he thought. Surely, Maris had more sense than that.

"Zarya. She's here?"

Maris nodded.

Raw, unmitigated fury exploded through his entire being. Never had he wanted to kill anyone more than he wanted to kill Maris in that instant. "Goddamn you! How could you do that to me!" He winced as the pain in his head sharply intensified, but right now he had more important things that hurt him.

Things that cut a lot deeper.

Maris gave him a droll stare as if he couldn't care less that he stood one wrong answer away from death. "I've been up for more than forty hours, and I'm too tired to fight with you right now. I'm going to bed. You dumped her in the kitchen, and abandoned her there for the others to humiliate. Just so you know." And with that, he left the room.

Darling lay completely still as his emotions ripped him apart. Rage. Hatred. Revulsion. And an effing headache that rode him with spurs.

But underneath all that was a need so deep and compelling, he wanted to claw it out of his heart.

Zarya was in his home. She was here. Close enough to touch...

Don't be stupid. She's a lying whore who slapped you. Twice.