Every night she dreamed about him. And in her dreams, he felt too real. He would hold her hand and lead her to magical, unknown places— sunset beaches, starlit mountains, endless flower fields. During the night, they loved each other completely freely. The entire universe was theirs to explore in her dreams. Until she woke up. She would wake up to a distorted reality. She would turn over in bed and expect him to be lying beside her, but truth was cruel to her. She reached over to the spot where he should have lay and felt only empty icy sheets. Then she would remember what really happened, how he left her. She didn’t even get to say goodbye.

At first, getting to see him, even if only in her dreams, proved a relief to the constant emptiness that had overtaken her heart. She longed for him with every hour she was awake. But eventually, her dreams ironically became nightmares. Hale was all she wanted, yet the Hale in her dreams wasn’t real, which was the reality she had to face every single morning. Over and over, the person she loved most was taken from her. It almost tortured her soul as much as the way he had left her.

The whole future she planned with him was crushed, along with most of her hope. When he left, he had taken her heart with him. She turned around to answer the pounding door holding back the palace guards, and when she looked back, he already left. She wasn’t angry with him; he did have to leave as soon as possible. It was probably a move for self-preservation. But she still cried when she thought of the moment she turned back to her window and didn’t see him there.

The worst part was that Hale told her he loved her, and she didn’t get to say it back. He said it twice. And twice she was silent, too stunned to say anything. He wasn’t taken aback when she didn’t return the favor. He hardly seemed phased… probably because he just wanted her to know how he felt. Even if he had waited a few minutes more before leaving, she still would have been silent, stunned that he actually said those three words. She hadn’t been ready to accept that or say it back. Now, she was.

Two months had passed since he left her. Every night since then she figured the dreams would stop and that she would forget about him a little more each morning. Yet as time did pass, her memory was perfectly clear and she thought about him almost every moment. She hadn’t moved on from him. She now found herself sitting at her window and waiting for him to come back as she did nearly every morning since he left.

“Pandora,” a deep voice softly called to her from behind.

She turned away from the window. Her father stood in the threshold of the door. “Yes?”

“You said you were coming to breakfast. I’ve been waiting almost an hour.”

She gasped. Had she really been sitting at her window that long? “I’m sorry. I got distracted.”

Her father held a loving smile on his face. “I see that.” He offered his arm to her. “You still need to eat.”

“Of course.”

She left the solitude of her bedroom with her father. Although she was reluctant, it was best to get out of her room for a while. Hale was all she could think about there.

“You should stop consuming your time with waiting for him. If he were to come back, don’t you think he would have already?”

Pandora nodded and pretended as though his comment didn’t make her blood boil. She clenched her jaw shut so that she wouldn’t say a word. She despised the way her father acted as though he himself was innocent in the matter. He was the one who made Hale leave.

“I know it’s difficult,” he continued. “But you really do have your whole life ahead of you. You’re barely twenty. Heartbreak is a part of life.”

“Of course,” she repeated through her teeth.

“Besides, if you really wanted to, you could be married next week. You’re the one set to inherit my kingdom. You will be queen one day.”

“I don’t care about being married right now. I want to be in love. But instead I find myself in sorrow every moment of the day because the man I love is somewhere else in the universe, too far out of my reach.”

Her father immediately stopped walking and stopped her along with himself. “Don’t ever say that you love him ever again. He’s not the man you should want for your husband or the father of your children.”

She looked down at the ground and closed her eyes. “I know. I know.”

“You miss him.” Her father gave her a gentle squeeze. “I understand, but you must move on. You have such an important life to live. You will find love again, my dear.”

She clutched her father’s robe as she began to cry, although not over Hale this time. The thought of falling in love with someone else was too much for her to bear. Her heart was no longer her own to give.

* * * *

Zaya knew she had to call him. As much as she dreaded even the thought of that, he was the only one who was as qualified as she was, well almost, that was within her reach. They might not work well together, but he could suck it up this time. The job she was just hired for would be too good for even Hale to pass up. Far too good.

One of her old contacts managed to score a job for her that had the opportunity to turn her life around if she succeeded. Only if she succeeded. Her client was apparently someone who belonged in one society’s highest classes, and they wanted to hire the very best for this particular job of grand theft and possibly an assassination. This was quite literally an opportunity of a lifetime. A very risky opportunity. But Zaya didn’t have much else do to at the moment. And the money was too great for her desperate pockets to ignore. She barely had enough money to fill up her ship with fuel the next time it ran out.

She needed Hale’s help. But would he answer her call? She had a better chance than she would have usually. Something different had happened when they parted ways. They didn’t try to kill each other or even fight. That was the first time she remembered that happening. They usually were always angry with each other, and she always hated him after he betrayed her. Hale cheated on her so many times, until she finally had enough. But now, she wasn’t brewing in her resentment towards him. What difference did the past make? She wasn’t calling him because she cared for him. She needed his help with a job and that’s it. Hale loved Pandora, not her.

Besides, Hale said that he owed her. After all the mental turmoil he caused her over the years, she had to agree. Although he was the first man she thought she loved and still thought about his abs often, she didn’t want to see him… of course. Not at all. As she dialed his number into her ship’s computer, her heart fluttered. It couldn’t be from nervous excitement about hearing his voice. Of course not. She was just nervous about what to say, and not about him at all. She gasped when the call went through, and Hale actually picked up. A small projection of him sitting in his ship appeared before her. The next thing she would hear would be his voice.

“Yeah?”

“This isn’t a bad time, is it?” Zaya asked. Hale looked exhausted, as though he hadn’t slept for days, and the skin under his eyes was a deep pink. He was either hungover or had been crying. Maybe both.

“Is it ever a good time when you call?” He almost smiled.

“I wouldn’t know. But I need to ask you something.”

“Well, I happen to have time right now. What do you need?”

“You owe me. Correct?”

He flashed his white teeth with a grin. “That’s what we agreed on. I believe.”

“Good.” She tried to regain her cool. It was just Hale. Although as much as she wished it could be, he would never be just Hale. He was so much more to her. “Are you alone?”

“I’m in my ship. So… yes.”

“Your girlfriend isn’t there?” She knew her voice was filled with jealousy, but she couldn’t help it.

“I don’t have girlfriends,” Hale replied, suddenly bitter about something.

Her curiosity rose by his reaction. “That princess isn’t with you?”

He glared at her. “No. And to answer your next question, we aren’t together, okay.”

“Sorry, I just wanted to make sure that no one else would hear what I’m about to tell you.”

“Whatever. Just go on.”

“I was just hired for a job. And I need your help. I can’t really tell you any of the specifics over this transmission because—”

“I know. It’s not secure. How much money though?”

She smiled. “Oh, just forty million.”

“So, if we split it, twenty million a piece. Not bad.”

“I meant forty a piece, Hale.”

His eyes went wide. “Uh, wow. Not bad at all.”

Zaya was thankful he seemed interested. “I should probably tell you how risky this is though. Might very well be the riskiest job I’ve done in years.”

“Why would I care about that? I’ve risked my life for way less.”

“You’re coming then?” Zaya asked. She hoped he would, only because she needed his help. No other reason….

“I guess so. I doubt you’ll give me a choice. I need to get rid of my debt to you.”

“You definitely do. I’ll send you the coordinates to my ship. Be here within the next day or so.”

Hale gave a short wave and ended the transmission. Zaya quickly sent him her location. She doubted he would come on time, but she could hope. She still had to explain the entire job to Hale and didn’t want to upset their client by being late. Although, Hale was never concerned with his clients feelings because he felt all that mattered was that the job got done well. That might work for him, but Zaya prided herself on being more professional than he. If they weren’t both so headstrong, she figured they might actually make a good team.

Perhaps if she could keep her mind focused on the job and not on Hale, working together this time might be different. It might just be.