Fated Blades (Kinsmen #3)(42)

And he had settled for that calm. He saw that clearly now.

“Occasionally we had dinner together, sometimes we slept together, I made sure to make time for the invitations she wanted us to attend, and she stopped her unrelenting assault on the way I lived my life. We were cordial. I was . . . busy. Very, very busy. I knew Drewery would become an issue eventually, so I took the necessary steps, but getting the seco generator up and running mattered more at the time. I thought everything was settled until the morning you walked into my office.”

Ramona smiled at him. “You are a good man, Matias Baena.”

“But a terrible husband,” he said, his words half self-deprecation, half confession.

She shook her head. “No. Everything I’ve learned about the Drewerys so far tells me they’re a family that plans long term. Kinsmen command respect, but we don’t usually get involved in politics. Drewery’s family has been on the planet for only four generations. He thinks his roots are shallow. He was born and raised here, yet he doesn’t understand that it’s not how long you have been in the province—it’s how you conduct yourself that makes you a Dahlian. He wanted the authenticity of the old Dahlia family, and the only way to get it was to marry his daughter to a kinsman.”

“True,” he agreed.

“Unmarried kinsmen who are heads of their families are in short supply,” she said. “Most of us are engaged by the time we hit our late teens in the name of some family alliance. My grandparents even went to another planet to find a secare for my father to marry. And here you were, twenty-eight, at the head of your family, with a solid financial foundation and very few dirty secrets. You were a prize catch. I’ll bet you anything that you were discussed at their dinner table long before Drewery decided to suddenly care about tech-sector imports. You were weighed, measured, dissected, and found worthy, and then you were baited and trapped.”

He’d considered this possibility before but dismissed it. “Seems like too much trouble to catch me.”

The twin moons had climbed high into the sky, the large disk of Ganimede glowing with green and the smaller, brighter Silver Sister spilling pale light onto the woods.

Ramona leaned forward, her eyes open wide.

All around them star flowers bloomed, glowing with delicate white. Their petals curled outward, opening the large bell-shaped blossoms wider and wider. Across from them the largest flower shook once, and a fountain of glittering golden spores rose into the air, floating on the gentle night breeze.

Another flower released its spores, then another. The woods shone with gold. A single shiny spark landed on Ramona’s hair.

“You said it would be too much trouble.” Ramona’s voice was soft and wistful. “I would go through a lot more trouble to catch you. You have no idea how rare you are, Matias. A man who is competent, smart, considerate, loyal . . . a man who blocks a sonic blast so you can escape and throws his arm to shield you during a crash. What woman wouldn’t want you, Matias?”

All this time he’d told himself she was off limits. The chain he’d put himself on just broke. He wanted her more than anything, and he desperately hoped he didn’t screw this up.

Matias braced himself and went for it. “Do you?”

She raised her head to look at him, and he saw the answer.

Matias cleared the distance between them in a heartbeat. He wrapped his arms around her, crushing her to him. Her body felt amazing, strong, flexible yet soft, the same way it felt when they danced. The mere touch of her skin overwhelmed him, cutting through logic and reason. Nothing else mattered except her. He buried his right hand in her hair, breathed in her scent, and kissed her.

The connection between them flared, bursting through him like an explosion. His senses shot into overdrive. He felt her melt against him, the warmth of her, the taste of her tongue, the fragrance of her hair . . . it felt like he had waited for her all his life without realizing it, and now that he’d found her, he’d never let go.

She pushed away from him. It was a small, gentle movement, but it cut him like a knife. He looked at her face and saw tears in her eyes.

“I can’t,” she whispered. “We can’t. We’re still married.”

He didn’t care.

“Let go, Matias.”

He did. It almost killed him, but he opened his arms and watched her rise and walk away into the shimmering woods.





CHAPTER 9


The city of Adra glittered like a jewel held near a flame. The sky above it turned the deep purple of late evening, the estates surrounding it surrendering to the twilight, but the city itself was bright as day. Countless lamps, simulated torches, and lanterns held the darkness at bay as the happy crowds flowed through its streets, munching on food from the vendors, flying glowing kites, and throwing brightly colored glitter that would melt into nothing by morning.

Ramona moved with the current, acutely aware of Matias beside her. She wore a translucent skirt that shifted colors like an opal, pale at her waist, flashing with green and red as it reflected the light, then darkening to a deep crimson at the hem. Her top, a matching white, left her arms and her midriff bare. Her hair streamed loose over her shoulders, held back from her face by a delicate diadem attached to a diaphanous crimson veil that overlaid her hair. She would have preferred a combat suit, but they needed the element of surprise. The city had assigned the kruga to Kamen Plaza. And the kruga called for veils, gradient skirts, and naked waists.