THE ship’s night had begun, with Geary sitting in his stateroom staring at nothing, his mind filled with memories of the hell mouth within the hypernet gate, when his hatch alert sounded. Expecting Captain Desjani, he was startled when Victoria Rione entered, her face betraying some deep emotion. I probably ought to be mad at her for making my life even more difficult since Sutrah, but compared to what Falco did, it’s nothing. Rione isn’t going to cause the loss of a lot of ships. So Geary stood and spoke politely. “Madam Co-President. I admit to being surprised by this visit. You haven’t been by here for some time.”

“Not unless you insisted, you mean?” Rione stated calmly.

“Yes. I hope you’re not planning to hand me the sort of problem I handed you at our last meeting here.”

“No.” She paused, apparently steeling herself to do something. “Captain Geary, I wish to apologize.”

That was a surprise. “Apologize?”

“Yes.” She indicated the star display floating above the table. “Since our argument at Sutrah I’ve done as I said I would. I ran simulations. I took this fleet along every possible path from Sutrah using the jump points we had planned on employing.” Rione hesitated, her jaw muscles tightening. “They all ended the same. Minor losses in system after system adding up while options kept being limited more and more by Syndic defensive moves, until the fleet ended up pinned between superior forces.”

Geary couldn’t help saying it. “So I was right.”

“You were right,” Rione agreed in a sharp voice. “I admit it.”

“What I told you that I’d worked out in my head was accurate enough to predict exactly what the simulations predicted.”

She nodded tightly, her expression hard. “You spoke the truth. I admit that as well. I apologize for questioning your motives.”

He shook his head, letting frustration show. “My motives? Hell, Madam Co-President, you all but called me a traitor to this fleet and the Alliance. You actually did use the word betray, didn’t you?”

“I did, and I admit I was wrong.” Rione’s eyes were flashing with resentment now. “Will you not accept my apology?”

“Yes. I will. Thank you.” Geary struggled not to lash out at her again, knowing he was actually angry at Falco and people like him. “The last several weeks have been difficult ones.”

“I know.” Rione shook her head. “It must have been very difficult to face Captain Falco’s betrayal.”

“It would’ve been easier if I’d had you to talk to.” Startled that he had actually said that, Geary looked to Rione, seeing her face composed again, carefully not betraying her feelings. “I’ve missed your counsel.”

“My counsel. I’m glad you find my counsel welcome.” Her voice was flat. “But you obviously don’t need it. Your judgment was superior to mine on where this fleet should go.”

Now what was she mad about? “Madam Co-President…” Geary struggled to find the right words. “I do need it. I don’t have many people to confide in. I don’t have many people I trust the way I trust you.”

Her expression was hard to read, but her eyes searched Geary’s face. “I can’t be the only person in this fleet you can trust.”

“No. It’s not just that. It’s…” Geary looked away, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. “I like having you around.”

Silence stretched for a few moments. He finally looked back at Rione, to see her still watching him. “Do you think I’m your friend, Captain Geary?”

He hadn’t gone there. Hadn’t been willing to consider it. “My last friend died a very long time ago.”

“Then accept new friends, Captain Geary!” Her renewed anger startled him.

“You don’t…Madam Co-President, if I…” Geary felt the words sticking in his throat, surprised to realize how hard it was to actually speak of his fears, of how it had felt to wake up from survival sleep and learn every friend, every acquaintance, everyone he had known, was long dead.

“Is this the man daring enough to take the Alliance fleet to Sancere?” Rione asked in a mocking voice. “The hero of the fleet? The man who stood facing the mouth of hell? And he cannot bring himself to risk accepting a friend for fear of the possibility of loss?”

“You have no idea what this is like,” Geary stated angrily. “When they revived me, every single person I’d known was dead. All of them.”

“Are you the first to ever lose someone they cared about? Or everything they cared about? Let yourself live again, Captain Geary!”

“You don’t know-”

Her face turned furious for a moment. “A man I loved more than life itself died, Captain Geary, one more victim of this endless, ugly war! It happened more than a decade ago, but I can still see him clearly if I close my eyes. I had to decide whether to let myself die inside or try to live again. I knew what he would’ve wanted. I won’t deny it was hard, but I have lived.”

Geary just stared at her for a moment. “I’m sorry. Very sorry.”

The fury faded, replaced by weariness. “Damn you, John Geary, no one else has ever been able to make me lose control. Not since he died.”

“Why do you care?” he asked, feeling bewildered now. “Why do you care what I think? Why do you care what happens to me?”

She took a moment to answer. “I do care. You’re a remarkable man, Captain Geary. Even at your most infuriating.”

“You hate me!”

“I have never hated you!” Rione shot back at him. Then she grimaced. “That’s not quite true. When I thought you’d betrayed the fleet, believed that you’d lied to me and used me, I did hate what I assumed you were doing.”

“You accused me of betraying you personally, as well as the fleet.”

Rione nodded. “I told you that I thought you’d deliberately manipulated me. It wasn’t just my pride that was hurt by that. I’d let myself believe in you. I’d let myself…grow to care for you.”

Geary shook his head, feeling baffled again. “Do you actually like me, Madam Co-President?”

Rione looked upward as if beseeching aid. “You are so wise in the movements of fleets and such a dolt in reading the feelings of others. I’ve liked you for some time, Captain Geary. I wouldn’t have been so angered by what I thought was your betrayal if I hadn’t become fond of you, despite my instincts that warn me away from someone like you. My instincts that tell me you are not to be trusted, that you cannot be sincere.”

Geary wondered if his puzzlement showed. “You don’t trust me but you like me?”

“Yes. I will never trust Black Jack Geary,” Rione explained. For some reason she was smiling wryly at him. “But I’ve come to like John Geary. When he isn’t driving me insane. Who are you?”

“John Geary, I hope, Madam Co-President.”

“Madam Co-President? Is that who you wish to be here? If you care for me at all, if you consider me a friend, call me Victoria, John Geary!”

He stared at her again. “Care for you? I do. I hadn’t realized how much I’d grown to enjoy your company until I was deprived of it for a while.”

“I’m waiting,” she stated.

“Victoria.”

“That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

Geary uttered a small laugh, then sat down again. “It was very hard.”

“Try saying it again. It may get easier.”

He watched her, trying to figure out what Rione was doing. “All right, Victoria.”

She sat down next to him, her face somber now. “You’re not the only lonely person in this fleet, John Geary. Not the only person in need of comfort with few places to turn.”

“I know that. But I only knew my feelings. I missed not seeing you and not talking to you.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me that?”

Geary shook his head, smiling ruefully. “You know the reason as well as I do. Aside from the fact that you were refusing to talk to me, I’m the commander of this fleet. I can’t do anything with anyone that isn’t professional and business-related, not unless I know they want it. I have too much power for it to be otherwise, even if every person under my command isn’t already off-limits for other reasons.”