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visibly cycling through emotions—anger, disappointment, incredulity, and then anger again. When he finally spoke, his voice was soft with fury. “Someone else? What the hell does that mean?”
    “Clay—”
    “Someone else?” He seemed almost to choke on the phrase. “As in, another boyfriend? Are you freaking kidding me? When the hell do you have time for another boyfriend? You’re with me every freaking night! I’ve got news for you, Sara. I’m your boyfriend now. I don’t know what you and he had—”
    “He’s my husband,” Sara blurted, desperate to get through to this incorrigible suitor before Ga’rag decided to do it for her. “I’m married, Clay. Separated, obviously, but it’s just a trial separation. He’s still my husband.”
    Clay was staring at her as though she were speaking Ra-ahlian instead of English, but she continued stubbornly. “He and I have been having problems. So we took a break from each other. Or rather, I took a break. I got this place and decided to just try to—well, to have a little fun. Things were so rocky with him that I needed to clear my head. But I still love him. And even if I didn’t—” She took a deep breath, then dared to say, “We have children to think of. I need to put them first now. Now that my fling with you is over.”
    “Fling?” He stared for a moment, then strode back to the window. But this time, she knew he wasn’t looking at pink-blossomed trees. He was too busy hearing her cruel words: husband, children, fling . . .
    “How many kids do you have?” he asked abruptly.
    “Three little girls.”
    “Well then . . .” He turned, looked briefly at her, then headed for the door. “That’s that.”
    “Clay, wait.” She hurried to the dryer and pulled out the towel, which was now spotless. Folding it as she walked over to him, she proffered it in halfhearted apology.
    “You’ve gotta be effing kidding me,” he muttered. “Keep it as a goddammed souvenir. Or better still, give it to your effing husband.”
    He was gone in an instant, slamming the door so roughly that the frame vibrated the way Ga’rag’s gills had done. Sara stared after him, feeling more lost and alone than at any time since the night—fifteen years ago—when Ga’rag had murdered her father. More lost even than she had felt when Daniel Arroyo had been killed.
    Don’t cry, she ordered herself harshly. If you cry, you sign Clay’s death warrant. So suck it up.
    Turning back toward the bedroom, she wasn’t surprised to see Ga’rag standing in the doorway, his black eyes devoid of emotion. She had a feeling he was simply gathering data. If so, she should give him some quickly.
    “He won’t be back, Overlord. I promise. Can I see the girls now?”
    “Perhaps another time when your behavior hasn’t been so troublesome.”
    He was goading her. Trying to break her. But she wasn’t going to let that happen. Not now. Not ever again.
    So she just shrugged. “Maybe I’ll go for a walk then. It’s such a beautiful day, and such a huge relief to have this sex experiment behind me.”
    “You won’t miss him?”
    “I’ll miss it , but not him,” she said philosophically.
    “And if I asked you to take another lover?”
    “I’d do it in a minute.” Draping the clean towel over the chair in which Clay had been sitting a few minutes earlier, she stepped right up to Ga’rag and stared into his bottomless eyes. “I keep telling you, nothing matters to me except my babies.”
    The Ra-ahli gave an approving nod. “You’ve done well today, Sara. Try to get some rest. Forget about this unpleasantness. Tomorrow, I’ll have a new assignment for you.”
    “Bring it on,” she told him quietly. Then for his benefit, she walked back to Clay’s towel, scooped it up, and stuffed it into the trash can next to her desk as casually—and as finally—as if she were disposing of a handful of junk mail.
     
    * * * *
     
    The city streets were coming alive with the morning