Tail, Dark and Handsome: Celestial Mates

Chapter 12-2

“We made up,” Marigold said.

“No. Keep trying.”

Marigold groaned. “What is this? I don’t even know,” she muttered. “Yesterday, he came into the cockpit talking about how he was upset at the people in a book he was reading. They had an argument. He wanted them to kiss and make up.”

“What book is this?”

“It’s not a book. He was talking about us.” Her tone implied that he was slow-witted for not seeing the obvious deception.

His ears twitched, half amused and half annoyed. “Us? Kiss?”

“Oh my stars, it’s so hard talking to you about this—and can you put on a shirt?”

He took a step closer. “No. I want to discuss this kiss.”

Her hands planted on his chest.

“Winter,” she breathed.

“Marigold,” he answered. He needed her to touch him, anywhere, everywhere, and touch her in return.

“Oh, screw it.” She stretched up, placing her hand on the back of his head, and pulled him down to her.

Soft and sweet, her lips met his. She opened to him, and he drank in the taste of her. Very carefully, he kept his hands at his side. His claws were out, and he did not want to injure her. The differences between them in their anatomy were numerous but he was completely willing to dedicate the time to study. He would learn the best way to please his human female and not injure her.

“Marigold,” he purred, taking pleasure in the feel of her name on his tongue. He pushed back a lock of hair and tucked it behind her round little human ear. Fingertips brushed the shell. “My regard for you grows day by day. You have seen my many failings. I am short-tempered and quick to judgment.”

“You have good qualities, too.” Her voice breathed and soft, like it might vanish in the vast expanse of dark space. He needed to capture her breath and carry that part of her with him, always.

“I judged you wrong and I am sorry for it. Tell me I have not damaged our relationship.”

“Nothing unforgivable. Just use your words next time and talk to me, okay? I hear that's what grownups do.”

He pressed his forehead to hers.

This female. She did it again, making him feel important, wanted, like he was not the unfavored son or the undesired mate.

He cleared his throat, suddenly nervous about what he needed to ask. “Would you allow me to rub my face—”

“Are you better?” Zero asked from the other side of the door.

Marigold stepped away at the interruption.

“We talked,” she said, which was a wise decision on her part because Winter wanted nothing more than to swear and vow punishment. His kit was clever, yes, but he did not think through his actions. Locking them in the cargo hold was irresponsible, and anything could have happened.

The lights flickered before the alarm blared. He squinted from the harsh, flashing lights.

“Oh s**t,” a muffled voice said.

MarigoldNot good.

“Open the door,” Winter growled.

“It’s stuck,” Zero said, worry squeaking in his voice.

So not good.

At the command panel next to the door, Mari verified the alert with the computer. The alarm fell silent yet her ears still rang.

“Proximity alert. I need to get to the helm and now,” she said. The computer was more than capable of flying in empty space but now it seemed convinced they were approaching obstacles.

“Proximity to what?” Winter asked.

“An asteroid belt.” Only the trickiest thing to fly through. Shields kept pebble-sized debris from punching a whole through the hull and tearing the ship to pieces, but shields drained power and fast. Also, she had to navigate through a shifting field of massive fluffing rocks.

Winter stilled, his ears back and his tail at his side. He understood the danger. “Why are we headed into an asteroid belt?”

“Well, it wasn’t part of my flight plan,” she said, snapping with irritation. Her flight plan kept them well away from trouble and safely in the empty space. She bristled that Winter suggested otherwise. “It must have been changed.”

“Why would anyone change the flight plan? How? Did you leave it unsecured?”

“Oh, I just left the command screen open, completely unprotected without a password,” she snapped. “I don’t know how it was changed.”

She and Winter turned to the door, as if they could see through it to the kit on the other side.

“Zero,” Winter said.

“Uncle Chase needs us on Corra. He said it was important. I saved us four days. Four!”

Mari groaned. “You saved us four days by flying directly through an asteroid belt. They are incredibly dangerous to navigate through. Did you think maybe I diverted our path around it for a reason?”

“Oh.” Silence. Then, “The door is stuck.”

Maybe, maybe if luck was on her side, she’d be able to turn the ship around. They’d lose days but get to keep everything unperforated, which was her preferred state of being.

“Stand back,” Winter said. He swung a wrench at the control panel. It sparked and the air smelled of burnt wiring, but the locked released. Using his claws, he dug into the seam and slowly worked the door open. When the gap was wide enough, Mari joined in. The door protested but rolled back on the track.

The entire time Zero babbled apologies. She shimmied through, ignoring him. There was no time if she wanted to keep the ship from being Swiss cheese. She actually had no idea what the “Swiss” part of Swiss cheese meant—apparently it had something to do with old Earth—but it was the mild cheese with holes in it. That was what she wanted to avoid.

“Visualize your goals,” she muttered, slinging herself into the pilot’s seat. Not being Swiss cheese. Goals. She called up the navigation screen and did calculations in her head.

“Ever fluffing mother fluff.”

“That is good?” Winter stood in the door, Zero crowding behind him. “Your face says that it is bad.”

“I could turn us around but we don’t have enough fuel for the journey.”

“The nearest station, then,” Winter said, as if she hadn’t set the computer to search for the nearest port of call and calculated the distance with available fuel.

“None that I can see, but the computer is calculating. We’ve got about ten minutes before staying the course is our only option.” She rolled her shoulders to ease the tension she carried. First, she needed to reduce speed. If they had to do it the hard way, she wanted to do it at a crawl.

The ship lurched with deceleration. Zero made a panicky whimper. Her heart was in her throat too.

“That was on purpose. Stopping fast is not elegant,” she said.

Zero seemed unconvinced. He pressed himself into his father’s side. Mari sometimes forgot exactly how young Zero really was. Fourteen was old enough to think you knew better than all the adults but still young enough to want your father to hug you when things got scary.

Not to say that particular feeling was exclusive to youth. She wouldn’t mind a squeeze from Valerian right now. Her mother had a way of talking about little things that made the big things seem less overwhelming. Better.

“You know what’s great about a ship like this?” she asked, barely pausing for an answer. “They’re designed for comfort, yeah, and frequent entries into planetary atmospheres. A ship like this is not nimble but it is sturdy, so a little shudder like that is nothing,” she said. Zero seemed to calm at her words. “I still don’t understand how you changed the route. It was locked.”

“I used the override code. They never changed it from the factory settings,” he said, peering up at her from Winter’s side.

That cheeky…

Mari wanted to share with Winter exactly what she thought of Zero’s behavior, but his own furious expression implied he was on the same wavelength.

The computer chirped, calculations finished.

“Luck is not on our side. We have to go through the asteroids,” she said. Panic threatened to swell up inside her. She took a deep breath and slowly released, letting it draw out the stress and anxiety. She could do this. She would do this.

“Zero, go to your cabin,” Winter said.

“But Dad—”

“No. We will discuss your punishment later.” If they survived, but he did not have to say the words. The unspoken words hung in the air.

“Fine. Fiiiiiiine,” Zero said with a surprising amount of attitude for a meddling child whose shenanigans might get them Swiss cheesed.

Winter watched his son retreat. “He carries my heart and nothing will change that, but he is a manipulative little s**t,” he said at length.

Mari hummed noncommittally, not wanting to say anything detrimental as she wasn’t Zero’s biggest supporter at the moment.

“I will change the codes when the crisis has passed,” he said.

“A little late, but good thinking. And I’ll start monitoring the flight plan. I never thought to check. Based on fuel usage, he changed course a week ago. I should have caught this immediately.”

“Are you able to traverse the field? We can turn around and send a distress signal.”

“And risk pirates showing up? No thanks.” Rich men were like chum in the water.

“I can message my cousin. Chase is not without resources. He can rescue if we have enough fuel to sit and wait.” He frowned as he spoke. Clearly this wasn’t an option he wanted to pursue, but it helped ease her stress simply knowing that it was an option.

“Let’s call that Plan B. I can do this. Top of my class, remember?” She kept her tone light but still kissed the crystal pendant around her neck. The universe gave her what she could handle.

Mari settled in and ran a diagnostic on the ship’s shields. They were going to take a pounding very soon. “The next hour is going to suck hard but I’ve flown through worse,” she said.

“Truly?”

“Winter,” she slowly turned toward him, “I’m trying to boost morale. Don’t question the boosting.”

“Allow me to help,” he said, still hanging in the doorway.

“Fetch me some water, please. How good are you at fiddling with machine bits?”

“Better with programming but I know which end of the wrench to use as a hammer.”

Marigold stared at him, blinking slowly while his terrible joke processed. His tail did this nervous dance behind him, thumping into the doorframe. He reached down, holding it still. A laugh tore out of her. “You have the worst comedic timing. That is a horrible joke.”

One ear twitched, almost like a shrug. “If you can’t laugh in the face of impending doom, then when can you?”

“Again. Morale.” She held both her hands out, palms up, and gestured upward. “Boost it. Okay.” She turned back to the helm. “I’m diverting power to the shields. We don’t need light or environmental functions in cargo or our cabins.”

“Except Zero’s.”

She chewed on her bottom lip. “I can do that. Just in case.” She opened a comm channel to Zero’s room. “Zero, my darling mathematical construct, I’m turning down life support but your room should be fine. If you get cold, come to the cockpit.”

Winter did that thing with his ear again.

“Stress makes me slap happy,” she said, barely restraining herself from spilling how she turned into a giggly mess the night before her final exams. “Water? Then you need to keep rerouting power to the shields. The computer wants to revert to the default.”

“I believe there is a manual override. On it.”

Alone, she took half a minute to calm her nerves. She needed a clear state of mind, peace, and complete spatial awareness. Unfortunately, her brain insisted on being a tool and supplied images of the ship being perforated just like the holey cheese.