Behind the books
Aldric Would Like to Be Left Alone.
Tisha Made Him Lunch.
I love a grumpy hero. I do.
But the really good ones are never grumpy for fun.
Aldric has reasons. He lost someone a long time ago, and he decided the safest thing he could do for everybody else was keep them at arm’s length.
He’s had years of practice. He’s very good at it.
So when he lands on Libra Station with thirty days to reject a match he never wanted, he’s ready for a fight. He knows what to do with suspicion. With orders. With people who are afraid of him.
What does he do with Tisha?
No idea. None.
Tisha runs the busiest kitchen on the station, and she is not scared of him. Not even a little. She doesn’t ask him to explain himself. She doesn’t need him to be pleasant first. She looks at a scowling Dalgurian warrior, decides he looks hungry, and feeds him.
And then she calls him Eric.
On purpose. Every time.
Writing these two, I kept coming back to how nobody gets put back together by one big speech.
What gets through is the small stuff, over and over. The same table. Somebody remembering what you ate yesterday. A place that keeps setting out a plate for you even while you’re telling everyone you’re leaving.
That’s Tisha. She never tries to fix him. She keeps making room, and she lets him be mad about it.
And Aldric, who has spent years believing that not feeling anything is the same as being strong, has to figure out what to do when someone is kind to him and wants nothing for it. Does wanting that make him weak?
He’d say yes.
He’d be wrong.
Meanwhile there’s a rejection sitting there waiting on his signature. Thirty days. All he has to do is sign it.
So why hasn’t he?
The biggest thing standing between these two is a man who’s sure being happy is too dangerous to risk. If you like your heroes wounded and your heroines completely unbothered by it... Ward is for you.
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