Chapter Text
Tonight, a reception is held in honor of the successful joint Farspace Fleet–Hunters Association mission, and you are here as Caleb’s guest.
You and Caleb could have attended on your own merits. You’d both been on the front lines, your Evol and cat-like instincts helping stabilize a Protocore that should have torn itself apart.
But you arrived together, side by side, making it clear to everyone that whatever’s between you is no longer just professional.
You keep close to Caleb, your shoulder brushing his as you move further into the room. Warm light spills from chandeliers onto a sea of dark uniforms. Servers weave between officers with trays of drinks, while mission footage flickers across a large screen at the far wall, replaying the recent operation.
“Hey,” Caleb murmurs near your ear. “Are you okay?”
“You brought me to a room full of admirals and donors,” you say. “I’m trying not to embarrass your impeccable reputation.”
“Don't worry,” he says. “If anything, you improve it. I can handle a little gossip.”
Before you can answer, a pair of officers cuts across your path, already calling for Caleb. Another joins them, then someone from Command. Within minutes, a knot of people gathers around Caleb, overlapping congratulations and handshakes.
Caleb glances back at you, apology in his eyes. “I’m sorry. Give me a few minutes?”
You shake your head. “It's fine. Go do your job.”
“If anyone gives you trouble, find me," he says.
“I’ll be at the bar,” you say. “Or hiding under a table if someone starts talking about budget allocations.”
That earns you a smile. “Don’t drink anything you haven’t seen poured.”
You step away, letting the group close around him. It feels strange to put distance between you in a room like this, but you force your shoulders to loosen and head for the bar.
A server hands you a flute of champagne before you even reach the counter. You accept it with a thank you, the first sip sliding down quickly. A senior engineer from the diagnostics team recognizes you and draws you into a conversation about Protocore readings. You finish the glass without even noticing.
Not long after, another drink finds its way into your hand. You listen to a story about a docking mishap and take a deeper swallow than you intended. Gradually, your nerves begin to settle, your cheeks grow warm, and your thoughts turn languid—a welcome change, especially now that Caleb’s entire command structure isn’t within arm’s reach.
“I didn’t expect to see you down from the high table,” a male voice says nearby. “Thought they’d have you trapped in a circle of admirals all night.”
You turn and find a younger officer regarding you with curiosity, rank pins marking him as a lieutenant.
“Guess I slipped the net,” you say. “For now, at least.”
He smiles and steps closer, extending a hand. “Lieutenant Chen. I was on duty in the control room during your operation. I’ve been wanting to meet you properly.”
You take his hand. “Nice to meet you. I’m—”
“I know who you are,” Chen interjects, then catches himself. “Sorry—I mean, I read the report. They mentioned you by name.”
You nod. “Hopefully in a good way.”
“In a very good way,” he says. “Command doesn’t usually sound that impressive on a live channel. One of the captains actually stood up.”
You blink. “They… stood up?”
He leans an elbow on the bar. “When the Protocore stabilized? The whole room went from preparing condolence messages to cheering. You made a lot of people’s jobs easier that day.”
You nod again. “Guess it worked out, then.”
“That’s one way to put it. Are you with the Hunters full-time?”
“Pretty much,” you reply. “The Fleet stuff is… new.”
“Could’ve fooled me.” His gaze lingers on your face. “You look like you’ve been in these rooms for years.”
“I don’t feel like it,” you admit.
“That’s because you haven’t had enough to drink yet.” He tips his head toward the bar. “Can I get you something? Properly, I mean.”
You hesitate. You’re already warm from champagne and wine, and Caleb’s warning flashes through your mind.
But he’s been gone for over thirty minutes, and this is an official function anyway. Nothing can happen here that shouldn’t, right?
“Sure,” you say. “Nothing too strong.”
“Got it.” He turns to the bartender. “Another red for her, please. And I’ll take the same.”
The bartender nods and starts pouring. You rest your elbow on the bar, fingers absently tracing the condensation ring left by your last glass.
“So,” Chen says, turning back to you, “I’ve been going over the sensor logs from your approach vector. That last adjustment you made before the resonance spike—was that instinct, or did you see something in your readings that I missed?”
You search your memory. “A bit of both. The numbers didn’t look right. Moving in closer was the only thing that made sense.”
His eyes widen, a smile curving his mouth. “Wow. I’d be interested in hearing more about that. Maybe over coffee sometime, when there isn’t a risk of interruption every five minutes.”
You open your mouth to answer when, suddenly, the hairs on your arms lift. The bartender sets a glass of red wine in front of you, and a hand closes around the stem before you can reach for it.
“I’ll take that,” Caleb says.
You look over just in time to see Caleb bring the glass to his mouth and drain it in one long swallow. His throat works as he tips his head back, the tendons taut against the collar of his uniform. When he’s done, he sets the empty glass back on the bar.
Chen straightens instantly. “Colonel Caleb. Sir.”
Caleb’s eyes flick to him, then back to you. His hand finds the small of your back, sending a jolt through your pulse.
“Lieutenant Chen,” Caleb says. “I see you’ve met my partner from the operation.”
Chen clears his throat. “Yes, sir. I was just saying how impressive her maneuvering was. The control room hasn’t stopped talking about it.”
Caleb nods. “She was the difference between a successful engagement and a disaster. I’m glad the control room noticed.”
“I’d like to go over the logs with her sometime,” Chen says, still trying. “Purely for tactical understanding.”
Caleb shifts so he’s fully facing the lieutenant, tucking you behind the line of his arm. “Send a request through the proper channel. The Association filters her consultation hours. She’s been in back-to-back debriefs already, and I expect that to continue.”
“I didn’t mean right away, sir,” Chen says quickly. “Just whenever her schedule allows.”
“I’ll make a note,” Caleb replies. “In the meantime, you should speak to Commander Lee if you’re interested in resonance anomalies. She’s been collating the data since we docked. She’ll have more time to indulge your curiosity than my pilot does tonight.”
Chen glances at you, then back at Caleb.
“Understood, sir,” he says at last. “I didn’t mean to monopolize her time.”
“You didn’t,” Caleb says. “I just needed a minute.”
His eyes stay on Chen until the lieutenant excuses himself with a nod and retreats toward another cluster of officers.
You watch Chen disappear into the crowd, then glance down at the empty glass on the bar. “That was a little much, don’t you think?”
Caleb turns, but his eyes linger on the glass before meeting yours. “You’d already had two drinks. He ordered you a third.”
“That doesn't mean you had to make a show in front of him,” you say. “And you didn’t have to drink it like that. You could’ve just handed it to me, or told the bartender no.”
His jaw tenses. “He wasn’t going to stop at one more. You know that, right?”
You frown. “You got all that from one conversation?”
“I got it from everything he did in the last ten minutes. His eyes went straight to the bar.”
You try to replay the interaction, but the alcohol blurs your memory.
“I don't think he had bad intentions," you say.
“He was testing how far he could push,” Caleb says. “I’ve seen that pattern a hundred times. Officers who lean on their rank and want to ‘just talk tactics’ while they keep your glass full. I’m not going to stand by and let someone I don’t trust keep adding more.”
Annoyance sparks.
“I can decide that for myself,” you say. “I’m not a cadet on her first night off-base. And if you were that worried, you could’ve pulled me aside—not marched over and downed my drink in front of him like you were marking territory.”
He scoffs. “If I wanted to mark territory, Lieutenant Chen wouldn’t be standing up straight right now.”
“That’s not actually reassuring,” you say. “And it proves my point. I’ll just sober up. You don’t have to worry about it.”
Caleb exhales, shoulders dropping. “I’m not saying you did anything wrong. He was the one pushing. I stepped in. We can talk about it later. Right now, I’d rather get you hydrated and through this reception.”
You fold your arms, then let them fall. “You can’t keep doing this every time a guy talks to me, you know.”
His gaze flicks away, then back. “I know. I know.”
A silence settles between you, the two of you standing close as the reception buzzes around you. Servers walk past with more champagne, and you’re acutely aware of how easy it would be to grab another glass just to avoid this conversation.
Caleb is the first to break. “Look, I know I’ve been… off. Lately. You’ve probably noticed.”
You absolutely did notice.
It started with a tech at the hangar joking about taking you out for drinks, and Caleb appearing at your shoulder, his hand grazing your lower back.
Then, a systems analyst lingered at your station after a briefing, and suddenly Caleb needed your input from across the room.
You used to find it flattering when he inserted himself into conversations whenever someone’s interest in you became obvious—little signs he saw you as his, even if neither of you had said it out loud.
But the more time you spent together off-duty, the more that protectiveness turned into outright possessiveness.
Now, there’s a flash in his eyes when another pilot calls you by your first name as if you’ve known each other for years, or a tension between you when his messages go unanswered for a few hours because you’re buried in work. Sometimes, that possessiveness reassures you that he cares enough to be affected. Other times, it’s suffocating.
Tonight is closer to the latter.
“We’ll talk about all of it,” he says. “Just not here. I don’t want to have this conversation when either of us might say something we don’t mean.”
You’re still irritated, but you’re also aware of the loose feeling in your limbs, the way your temper spikes when you’re inebriated.
“Fine,” you say. “But we are going to talk about it. You don’t get to just decide what kind of attention is acceptable and what isn’t.”
“I’m not trying to decide that for you,” Caleb says. “I just want to keep you safe in a room full of people who haven’t earned the right to get you drunk. Let’s just circulate for a bit and get the hell out as soon as possible. After that, you can yell at me in private as much as you want.”
A corner of your mouth twitches despite yourself. “That sounded dangerously close to a plan.”
“It is a plan,” he says. “I happen to be good at those.”
You roll your eyes. “Just don’t disappear on me again for half an hour.”
“I won’t,” he says, and signals the bartender for water, not looking away from you until the glass is in your hand. “Drink.”
You take a long swallow, the water cooling the fuzz in your head.
“Later,” he goes on. “I’ll explain everything that was going through my mind tonight. Even the parts you’re going to hate.”
Then Caleb offers you his arm, and the two of you move back into the reception, waiting for the privacy of four walls and a door that actually locks.
When you reach Caleb’s apartment, the buzz from the reception has worn off. Caleb unlocks the door and steps aside to let you in first.
You’ve been here often enough that nothing feels new. You kick off your shoes, hang your coat in its usual place. There’s a mug on the counter from this morning, and a jacket draped over the back of a chair. It’s domestic, and it used to feel temporary, until it no longer did.
“Sit,” Caleb says. “I’ll get water.”
You nod and drop onto the end of the sofa, resting your elbows on your knees.
You knew this conversation was inevitable. The two of you stopped being casual the moment you started planning around each other’s schedules and acting like a couple in everything but name.
However, with jealousy simmering and boundaries blurring, it’s clear you can’t avoid defining what you are anymore.
The sound of glass on metal pulls you out of your head. Caleb comes in from the kitchen, jacket off now, sleeves rolled to his forearms. He hands you a glass and sets his own on the coffee table before sitting down beside you.
You take a sip of water. “Okay. This is the part where we talk.”
Caleb exhales slowly, as if bracing for impact. “Okay. First, you didn’t do anything wrong tonight.”
You lean back against the sofa. “That’s a dramatic opening.”
“I don’t want any of this to sound like I’m blaming you,” he says. “You were polite. You were social. You had a few drinks at a reception you earned. Everything I did was about me, not you.”
“So what was going on with you?” you ask. “Because I watched you drink an entire glass of wine you clearly didn’t want, just so some lieutenant couldn’t hand it to me.”
He hesitates, eyes fixed on the coffee table. “I don't know... I’ve been more jealous lately. It’s not a new feeling, but it’s worse with you. I keep thinking about how I’m supposed to act, and then suddenly I’m doing things I never thought I would.”
Your chest tightens.
“I saw men who thought wanting something meant they owned it,” he goes on. “I watched what that did to the people on the receiving end, and I swore I’d never be that person. Never make someone I cared about feel… boxed in. So I decided I’d be the one who always has control. Don’t ask for more than I’m given. Don’t push. Don’t get possessive." He pauses. "That worked fine until we stopped pretending we were just colleagues who happened to nearly die together twice a month.”
The conversation you’d simultaneously wanted and dreaded is here.
“When did that stop for you?” you ask. “Pretending.”
“Long before it stopped for you,” he says, without hesitation.
The air punches out of your lungs. You’re not sure you want to know the exact timeline, so you let him continue.
He turns more toward you. “When we started… whatever this is. I told myself I’d treat it like any other high-risk situation. If you wanted to keep things undefined, I’d let you. If you wanted distance, I’d give it to you. If you wanted to walk away, I wouldn’t fuss.”
“That’s a lot of planning for something you were supposedly casual about,” you say.
He huffs a breath. "Yeah. Then I watched an officer try to see how far he could push while you were on your way to being too drunk to fight him off if he decided to put his hands on you. Every rule I made for myself went out the airlock."
You swallow a knot in your throat, rolling your glass between your hands, then ask the question that’s been circling your head all night.
“Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” Caleb says.
“Do you trust me to know when I’m uncomfortable?” you press. “To draw a line if someone crosses it?”
“Yes,” he repeats.
“Then what is this?” You gesture, meaning the party, the last few weeks. “Because whatever you call it, it feels like you’re trying to manage the space around me. Who can be in it, and how long they can stay.”
He flinches. “I am trying not to do that. Clearly, I’m failing.”
You take a breath, sorting through the mess of your own feelings.
“Look, I’ll admit that sometimes it’s… nice when you step in and tell someone we have to go, or glare at a guy until he remembers I’m not available. It makes me feel like you actually want me—not just as your co-pilot or your mission asset. Sometimes I like it more than I should.”
You glance away, then back. “But other times, it feels like I can’t take a step in a room without you running threat assessments on everyone who looks at me. It’s exhausting.”
Caleb leans back, staring at the ceiling for a second like he’s counting to ten. “I don’t want you to feel suffocated. That’s the last thing I want.”
“Well, we’re close,” you say.
He sits forward, elbows on his knees. “You have to understand something. I spend most days looking at the universe as a list of ways it could kill you. That’s my job. When I’m in the cockpit, that mindset keeps us alive. When I’m in a room full of people, it doesn’t turn off. It just… recalibrates.”
“To what?”
His gaze drops back to you. “To the ways they could hurt you or take advantage of you. Or distract you when you’re not in a position to make the choices you’d make if you were fully yourself.”
His honesty makes it harder to stay angry, but it doesn’t erase the problem.
“I get that," you say. "I do. But I’m not a mission plan. I’m not something you can control for every variable. You have to leave room for me to decide who I talk to, who I trust, who I want in my space.”
“I know.” He looks down at his hands, then back at you. “Tonight, it wasn’t just the risk assessment. It was… selfish. I didn’t like the way he looked at you. I didn’t like the way you smiled at him, even if you were just being polite. I didn’t like that he got to stand there and listen to you talk about your instincts, when I’ve watched you build them for years.”
Your breath catches. “Caleb—”
“I wanted to be the one standing there. The only one. I wanted everyone in that room to understand that if they wanted your attention, they would have to go through me. And I know how that sounds. I know how controlling that is. That’s why I didn’t say any of this at the party. That’s why I settled for scaring off a lieutenant instead of starting a fight in the middle of a diplomatic event.”
You stare at him, heat threading under your skin that has nothing to do with anger now.
“So you were jealous,” you say. “Actually jealous.”
He holds your gaze. “Yes. Very.”
You swallow. “How long have you been that jealous?”
He considers. “Since before you realized you were allowed to look at me the way you look at me now.”
You sit back, heart thudding. You think of all the times you brushed off his stress as mission exhaustion, all the late nights of tension you chalked up to work. Maybe you’d underestimated him. Maybe you’d underestimated yourself.
“And you’ve just been… holding it?” you ask. “All this time?”
His mouth curves. “What was I supposed to do? Show up two years ago and tell you I’ve been in love with you? Tell you that every time some idiot made a comment about you in the hangar, I had to walk away so I didn’t break their jaw?”
Heat flares in your chest and low in your belly. “Say that again.”
He doesn’t look away. “I’ve been in love with you for a long time. Longer than you’d be comfortable with if we got out a timeline and started comparing notes.”
Your pulse kicks hard. Whatever argument you thought you were having melts beneath your feet.
You set your glass down and wipe your palms on your thighs. “You can’t drop that in the middle of a jealousy talk. That’s a dirty strategy.”
“I didn’t plan it that way,” he says. “You wanted honesty. That’s part of it.”
You lean back. It explains a lot. It doesn’t excuse everything, but it's an admission, at least.
“Okay,” you say. “You’re in love with me. You’re jealous. You’re trying not to be an overbearing ass, but you're not always succeeding. And I—”
“You’re mad," he says. "You’re mad at me.”
“No,” you say. “I’m pissed off. I’m overwhelmed. I wanted to throw that wine in your face. But…” You pause. “I’m not going anywhere. So you don’t have to keep acting like one wrong move from you means I’ll vanish.”
Caleb is very still for a few seconds, then his shoulders ease, and he says, “That helps.”
“Because if we’re doing this—whatever ‘this’ is—we need rules,” you go on. “I need to know you’re not going to treat every person who looks at me like an enemy combatant.”
“What are the rules?” he asks. “Spell them out.”
You think for a second. “You can warn me if you notice something I don’t. You can tell me if you’re uncomfortable with someone. You can pull me aside and talk to me. But you don’t get to make a scene on my behalf unless I’m actually in trouble. And you don’t get to decide who I’m allowed to talk to.”
You surprise yourself with how openly you’re admitting what you need from him.
He nods. “I can do that.”
“And you have to say when you’re jealous,” you add. “Out loud. Not just… sabotage a drink and glare at people until they make excuses.”
His brow lifts. “You want me to tell you when I’m jealous.”
“Yes, because otherwise I’m guessing and trying to figure out if you’re mad at them or at me. It’s exhausting.”
He absorbs that, then gives a laugh. “That’s going to be often, you realize that.”
You feel a flush creep up your neck. “That’s your problem. You’re the one who decided to fall in love with a girl other people also find attractive.”
“A very attractive one at that,” he says, and you flush deeper.
You’re suddenly aware of how close you’re sitting; his knee is inches from yours, his forearm resting along the back of the sofa behind you. You lick your lips without thinking.
Caleb’s gaze drops to your mouth, then back up. “What about you? Are you jealous?”
You frown, then think about the techs who light up when they see him, the pilots who joke with him like they’re waiting for him to look back, the people at the reception who kept orbiting him even when he was done with conversation.
“Yes,” you admit. “I hate how many people in a room like that want a piece of you.”
His eyes go warm. “Hm.”
“Don’t push it,” you say, but your heartbeat is picking up.
He moves closer by an inch, giving you plenty of time to move away if you want to, and you don’t.
“I hold back a lot,” he says. “More than you know. In briefings. In public. Even here. I’ve spent years convincing myself that if I let myself want you the way I actually do, I’d scare you off.”
You can feel the heat in your cheeks. “You’re not exactly calm right now.”
“No,” he agrees. “I’m not.”
His hand moves from the back of the couch to your shoulder. He watches your reaction, and when you don’t flinch, his thumb traces a line along the curve where your neck meets your collarbone.
“Watching him tonight,” Caleb says, “listening to him ask you out for coffee like he had any right to your time… I wanted to walk over, take your hand, and make it very clear to everyone that you’re with me. That when you leave a room, it’s my apartment you’re coming back to.”
“Caleb,” you warn, though you’re not sure what you’re warning him against.
He leans in. “I didn’t do that because that’s not the kind of man I want to be for you. I don’t want you to feel like I’m claiming you without your consent. But I thought about it. More than once.”
Your hand finds his wrist without thinking, and you feel his pulse jump under your touch.
“And now?” you ask. “What do you want to do now?”
“Now,” he replies, “I want to make sure there’s no doubt in your mind who you’re choosing. Because you’re sitting here, sober, looking at me like that, and you’re still not walking out the door.”
You want to pull him in and end this back-and-forth with a kiss, but you wait.
“Say what you want, then,” you tell him. “Without holding back.”
He studies you for a heartbeat, searching for any hesitation. When he doesn’t find it, his hand slides from your shoulder to the side of your neck, thumb skimming your jaw.
He tilts your face up. “I want you to be mine in a way that makes every idiot in a reception hall think twice before they even consider wasting your time. I want you in my bed at the end of nights like this. I want to be the one who gets to see you out of those clothes. I want to be the one who hears the sounds you make when you’re not thinking about propriety.”
Heat floods you. “That’s… a lot of wanting.”
His mouth curves, and then Caleb kisses you.
The first press of his lips tastes of wine. Your hand tightens on his wrist; his grip on your jaw firms. When you part your lips for him, the kiss deepens, years of restraint bleeding into every breath.
You move closer, knees brushing, your free hand coming up to brace against his chest. His heart is pounding under your palm, and knowing you’re the reason sends another surge of heat through you.
Caleb breaks the kiss to speak against your mouth. “Tell me to stop if any of this feels like too much. I’m serious.”
You hold his gaze, breathing hard. “I’ll tell you if it is. It’s not.”
Hunger and relief flash in his eyes. His hand leaves your jaw, sliding down to your waist, fingers spreading over the curve of your hip. He pulls you into his lap, settling your knees so they bracket his thighs.
Your pulse spikes.
“This,” he says, “is what I was thinking about when I watched him talk to you.”
Your stomach flips. You can feel him harden, even through the layers of fabric between you.
Then you thread your fingers into his hair and kiss him again. His hands slide up your back, tracing the lines of muscle, each pass dragging your clothes and reminding you how little separates his hands from your skin.
“Still feel suffocated?” he asks against your mouth.
“Ask me again when you’re not holding back,” you say.
Suddenly, Caleb lifts you off his lap and lays you back on the couch, his body pressing you into the cushions. His hands find your waistband, fingers working your zipper open.
You reach for him, but he catches your wrists in one hand, pinning them above your head. The look in his eyes leaves no doubt—he’s done holding back.
He leans in, his mouth grazing your ear. “You want me not to hold back? Don’t move.”
Your breath stutters as he slides your pants down. The anticipation is almost unbearable. His hands are everywhere, and you can’t help the desperate moan that escapes your throat.
“Still worried about suffocating?” he murmurs.
You swallow hard, pulse hammering. “I think I’m about to find out.”