Page 167 of Star Claimed Omega
He backed away like prey, hands up, face drained of every drop of color.
Soleil turned her back on him with the kind of grace reserved for queens and killers, and returned to the counter with a new stride in the step.
For the first time in weeks, her heart didn’t feel as broken.
It felt honed, expectant, ready, and waiting.
MIRAL
Days later, Miral didn’t say it aloud, but she mourned Santi’s personality, his rakish smile, and his fierce self-belief.
She didn’t breathe a word of it, knowing he would have mocked her sentiment.
Still, she craved his relentless teasing, his razor-sharp wit, and the silent command he wielded in any room.
Seeing him so ghost-like, empty, and wounded was fundamentally wrong.
This wasn’t the man she knew.
The Santi she was fond of was kinetic, flame-bright, a man who moved like a force of nature and spoke with intoxicating charm.
Now he was an echo of his former self.
Miral refused to let it stand.
It took a few holo calls, delicate maneuvering, a few well-placed nudges, and a handful of hard-won favors.
At last, Miral believed she found the hook to wrench Santi out of the bleak spiral that was consuming him.
She cooked up a plan of action and took it to Xander in his office for his consent.
He listened, head tilted.
‘Two birds,’ she announced as she outlined the sensitive strategy required to shift bureaucracies and shaky interstellar alliances.
‘We’d be doing Santi a favor, while at the same time stopping a diplomatic shit storm before it implodes.’
Xander gave her a grunt of approval, following it with a lazy two-fingered salute. ‘Have at it.’
Seconds later, Miral re-materialized on the terrace of Santi’s cabin.
He sat overlooking the lake, slouched on his divan.
He was a shadow of himself, stripped of all swagger and fight.
Slumped in a ratty vest and loose shorts, his bare feet cross-legged.
He was strumming an old-world guitar with metal strings, its varnish worn away by time.
The melody he played was haunting.
Miral winced.
His beard was feral, his once-glorious shoulder-length hair, amethyst-flecked and envied across the fleet, now hung matted in greasy locks over his temple.
Even his sapphire-amethyst irises were dull.
Miral grimaced, then steeled herself.
