Page 25

CHAPTER 25

T he world ended in a scream of metal.

One moment, she was curled on the alien bed, fuming, muttering oaths under her breath. The next, the ship convulsed around her as if it had struck something immense and unforgiving at full speed.

The restraints clamped tighter.

Not crushing. Not painful. But firm—adaptively firm. Flexible enough to shift with her body as it jolted, hard enough to keep her in place while the room around her howled .

The lights strobed violently, red and white, flickering as the bed jerked with the force of the impact. Somewhere beyond the walls, she heard a deep, grinding sound, like something ancient being torn in half. The ceiling quaked above her, groaning. The air felt thick. Too thick.

She couldn’t see anything. Couldn’t do anything. She just lay there, bound, helpless, while the room shook around her.

Her heart was trying to claw its way out of her chest.

We’re crashing. This is a crash.

Her breath hitched. “ Shit! ”

She twisted against the restraints, instinct driving her even though part of her— damn it all —knew they were the only reason she wasn’t being flung across the room like a rag doll. The smooth alien harness flexed with her, held her tight, kept her spine aligned as the ship hit… something.

It slammed hard. She screamed.

It was deafening.

And then, all of a sudden, it stopped.

Not all at once. Not cleanly. The ship groaned to a halt like a dying beast, metal moaning, lights flickering out, and then…

Silence.

A silence so total, it made her ears ring.

Sylvia lay there, panting. Eyes wide, heart pounding hard enough to hurt.

Did we land?

Was this an accident? A system failure? An attack?

What the hell is happening out there?

She didn’t know. Couldn’t see. Couldn’t move .

Panic began to bloom.

He hasn’t come.

The armored brute. Her captor. Her silent, shadow-wrapped tormentor.

Is he alive?

A coldness sank into her limbs.

What if he wasn’t?

What if the ship had crash-landed on some hostile alien world and he —the only thing that could keep her alive out here—was dead? What if he’d been thrown from the ship? Or trapped somewhere? Or…

What if he abandoned her?

What if no one ever finds her?

Terror swelled like a tide. Her throat tightened. Her breath shortened, coming in erratic gasps. Too shallow. Too fast. Her chest heaved, lungs screaming.

“No,” she panted, writhing in the restraints, every instinct kicking into survival mode. “Let me out—let me out! ”

She thrashed. Screamed. The sounds bounced back at her from the metal walls, too small, too contained. She was suffocating.

She didn’t want to die here. Not like this . Not on some alien ship, locked in a cage, alone.

Her breath broke down into messy, primal sobs. Her hands clenched into fists. Her muscles trembled. Her skin flushed hot, then cold.

No one knows where I am.

No one is coming.

And just as her thoughts reached the ragged edge of total collapse…

He appeared.

The wall to her left rippled open as seamlessly as water. No sound, no warning.

Just there .

The alien.

Still armored. Still silent. Winged and as intimidating as ever.

And… alive.

She stared at him, trembling, her chest still rising and falling in short, panicked bursts.

And without a word…

The restraints released.

They hissed softly, folding away into the bed frame, leaving her flushed and shaking, her limbs too heavy to move.

She didn’t say anything.

She couldn’t .

She just looked at him: this silent, hulking shadow standing in the doorway of her prison.

And for the first time… her anger didn’t surface. Not straight away, anyway, even though she still thought he was an asshole.

Instead, what came before it was raw, unfiltered relief.

He was alive.

And for better or worse…

That meant she might survive too.