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Squaring his shoulders, he turned back to his controls and grew very busy with his piloting. Bria sat there watching him, never taking her eyes off him as he calculated their jump to hyperspace, and fed the coordinates he’d chosen into the navicomputer.

When the stars streaked by them, and they had safely made the jump, she swiveled her seat toward his and put a hand on his arm. “Yes?” she said. “Go on. You were saying?”

Han tried to look innocent, and failed. “Huh? What do you mean?”

“You were about to tell me something, when you got busy piloting. Well, we’re safely in hyperspace now, so there’s no reason you can’t tell me.” She smiled slightly. “I’m waiting.”

“Well, I was just thinking … that I’m hungry,” he finished in a rush. “Really hungry. Let’s go get some lunch.”

“We ate before we left, barely an hour ago,” she reminded him. Her expression gentle, she reached out and captured one of his hands and held it in both her own. “Tell me,” she said.

“Well …” He shrugged. “I’m telling you I’m hungry again.”

“Are you?” she asked quietly.

“I …” He shook his head, obviously ill at ease. “Uh, no. Hey … Bria, honey … I’m no good at this.”

“You’re good at some things,” she said, smiling impishly.

“Like what?” he challenged, grinning back.

“Like … piloting. And fighting. And rescuing people.”

“Yeah, I guess I am.” He looked at her again, and all the sudden rush of bravado faded. “Bria … what I was trying to say was that I …” He cleared his throat. “This is not easy.”

“I know,” she said. “I know.”

Raising his hand to her lips, she kissed it, then said, “Han … I love you, too.”

He looked both pleased and surprised. “You do?”

“Yes. For a long time, now. I think I fell in love with you that day in the refectory, when you wouldn’t go away, no matter how much I told you to.”

“Really? I didn’t know until … I don’t know when I knew. But when I figured it out … it scared me, Bria. Never happened to me before.”

“Loving someone? Or being loved?”

“Both. Except for Dewlanna. She loved me, I guess. But that was different.”

“Yes.” Her eyes were shining. “This is different. I just hope we can be together, Han.”

Now it was his turn to take her hands in his. “Of course we’ll be together,” he said. “I won’t let anything get in the way of that. Count on it, sweetheart.”

· · ·

Han set a course for the Talisman that took them far away from Hutt space and brought them in a leisurely three-day trip to the Corellian system. He was deliberately prolonging his and Bria’s time alone together. Inwardly, he was dreading having to go back to Corellia and meet her family. He knew almost nothing about how “citizens” lived, and he was pretty sure he would have trouble fitting in.

He also knew that once they reached Tralus, he’d have to get busy. Han was all ready to change identities as soon as they landed on Corellia. But Bria would be wanted by the t’landa Til and the Hutts, too, and they knew her real name. The first thing Han planned to do as soon as he had credits available was to equip Bria with a fake ID.

Besides, he was trying to give her as much time as he could to heal. He knew she still pined for the Exultation, though she no longer broke down in panic attacks or fits of sobbing. But several times he’d awakened in the night to find her gone.

When he searched for her, he usually found her in the control cabin, sitting in the copilot’s seat and staring out at the stars with such wistful longing in her eyes that Han felt a pang of jealousy.

Why can’t I be enough for her? Why isn’t our love enough? he wondered. He wanted to be enough for her, wanted her to be happy and content—but he could tell she wasn’t. It grieved Han, and it made him angry, too.

Once he tried to talk to her about it. “It’s been almost ten days! Why do you miss it so much, still?” he demanded, hearing the edge of anger in his voice and unable to stop it. “Tell me, Bria. Make me understand!”

She gazed at him, her blue-green eyes very sad, almost haunted. “I can’t explain it, Han. It’s like they took a piece of me … a piece of my spirit.