Jack Campbell - Victorious

She shook her head. “I think you are greatly overstating my importance to you, Captain Geary.”

“It is impossible to overstate your importance to me,” he replied in a low but forceful tone. “You don’t stand between me and my duty, you stand beside me, a strong and remarkable individual, and I swear everyone will know that.”

“You’re hopeless. Do you actually think anyone will listen?”

“I’ll keep saying it until everyone does. I’m sort of stubborn when I have to be, you know.”

“You don’t have to tell me that.” Desjani almost smiled, then turned serious again. “But there was much we couldn’t say, much we couldn’t tell each other.”

“I know. We can say it now. With honor. We can say the truth to each other.”

“And what is that, Captain Geary?”

“That I love you. I am certain of that.”

“You sought comfort during a difficult time,” she said.

“If all I’d wanted was comfort, there were easier ways of finding it.”

“I’m well aware of that. For a while, you did find it, in another woman’s arms.” Desjani’s eyes flashed with anger this time as she brought up Geary’s brief physical relationship with Rione.

He couldn’t very well deny it. “Yes, I did. It was a mistake. I never loved her. She never loved me.”

“And that’s supposed to make it all right that she shared your bed?”

“No. It doesn’t excuse it at all. I’m sorry I did that. The only excuse I can offer is that I had not yet realized how I felt about you. When I did so, it ended. I swear it.”

She gave him another aggravated look. “It would be easier to stay angry with you if you were less repentant and less honest. I’m not perfect, either. But it hurt me.”

“I know. I will never hurt you again.”

“Don’t make promises that no man, or woman, can hope to keep, Captain Geary.” Desjani shook her head. “I know who I am, and I have a pretty good idea of who you are. Even if we resolve every other issue, a relationship of you with me would be … Let’s just say it would be challenging.”

“I know it will be difficult at times,” Geary replied. “It already has been. Being in love with you, and unable to do or say a thing about it, was very hard. You may not believe this, but I don’t go seeking out ways to make my life miserable.”

Desjani’s gaze on him sharpened, her mouth set in tight lines. “Loving me makes you miserable?”

“It did when I couldn’t do anything or say anything.” Geary waved his hands in frustration. “I can’t say this right. I’m bad at this sort of thing. I’m pretty good at commanding a fleet, I guess, but I’m not nearly as good with women.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.” Was she still angry, or was she actually making fun of him?

“Have you thought it through?” she demanded. “Believe me, I have. For the moment, we are both captains, but only for the moment. You know the Alliance will promote you back to admiral immediately. The message alerting you to your promotion has probably already been sent.”

“Probably. I haven’t read it though.”

“How long do you think you can go without reading your message traffic? Captains can date each other. Captains can be involved with each other, as long as they’re not in the same chain of command. Admirals and captains cannot engage in personal relationships.” Desjani closed her eyes, her expression hardening. “I will not be your secret, or not-so-secret, mistress.”

“I would never ask that of you. I didn’t and I won’t.”

“But what alternative is there?” she demanded, fixing her eyes on Geary again. “You’re probably already an admiral again.”

He couldn’t argue with that. “I guess that means we’ll have to work quickly, before I have to read any messages or talk to anyone who knows. There’s one way I can prove that I want to be with you and only you, and one way an admiral and a captain can have a personal relationship, and that’s if we’re married before I’m promoted. Before I know I’ve been promoted.”

Desjani seemed to stiffen, then spoke slowly. “Married?”

“Yes. Will you? I mean it. I swear I’ve never meant anything as much as I do this.”

“You’re proposing to me? On a public passenger dock?”

“Um … yes. I’m sorry I couldn’t arrange a better location.”

Desjani looked away, uncharacteristically flustered, her expression once again very hard for Geary to read. “And if I say no? If I tell you firmly, captain to captain, woman to man, that I do not want that, and I do not want you that way, what will you do?”

It was Geary’s turn to just look at her for a long moment. Had he misread every emotion he had thought he had seen in her? “Then I will ask you to reconsider, I will ask you to listen to how I feel, but if you are indeed firm in those feelings, then I must respect them. I’ll treat you from then on as a fellow professional and never raise the subject again.”

“I’m about to leave on that ship. We have only minutes left. You wouldn’t order me to stay? Order me to listen?”

He felt a vacant sensation inside, as if a tiny black hole had appeared at the core of his being and was devouring everything, but he shook his head. It might cost him the most important thing he had left in this universe, but he had to say the truth, had to answer the question without any pretense or shadings. He could not lie to her. “No, Tanya. If you truly wish to go, then go. I have no authority over your person, over your choices, nor would I ever have such authority. If you don’t believe that I’ve given you back your honor yet, I do so now, with no strings attached. You’re the captain of your soul as much as you are captain of Dauntless , but they’re different things. I can give orders to one but never to the other. I know that.”

One corner of her mouth twitched, then Desjani smiled, then she crossed the space between them in one step. Her arms went about him, and her lips sought his in a hard and hungry kiss.

When she finally broke the kiss, Desjani paused to breathe, then smiled. “I’ve been waiting a long time to do that. That was the right answer, by the way.”

Geary, feeling slightly dazed from that kiss, stared at her. “Is that your answer to me?”

“Wasn’t it clear enough? Yes. Yes to everything. Your behavior toward me, your refusal to take advantage of my feelings, gave me my honor back a long time ago. How are we going to get married before that promotion catches up to you? Even if we get out of this star system without the authorities finding you, the promotion will probably be sent by a fast courier ship and will be waiting by the time we get to Kosatka. That means we’ll have to get married on the passenger ship as quickly as we can arrange it.”

“On the ship?”

Something in his tone must have sounded like hesitation, because Desjani narrowed her eyes at him. “Yes. Are you getting cold feet already? You don’t get to back out of this now. I already gave you every opportunity.”

He briefly imagined trying to run away from a vengeful Tanya Desjani. It would probably be an eventful and a short existence. “No. I mean, yes. That is, getting married on the ship is a great idea. Appropriate, I guess.”

“She’s not a warship,” Desjani noted wistfully, “but she’ll do. You do realize that current fleet regulations discourage assigning married couples to the same ship?”

Actually, he’d forgotten to look up that particular thing. “If I’m an admiral again, I won’t actually be assigned to your ship as part of the crew.”

“Space lawyer,” Desjani snorted. “But you’re right. If we’re to work together, though, we can’t be a married couple aboard ship. We have to have the same kind of working relationship we did before.”