Author's Note: Continuation! Again I apologize for the long delay and hope this makes up for it.

Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars. Never have, never will. I simply play in their world.

Reviews: LOL yeah you don't need the reminder!

"I find my place

In between your arms

In between your tender kisses

And a soft whisper 'It will be alright',

In between the warmth of your embrace,

and the scent of your neck,

and the fierceness of your touch,

I find my place lost inside your soul."

-Hearts and Empires

Rey

His hand snapping the bands that hold my hair back until it spills into his waiting grip. His mouth stealing the breath from my lungs until all I can do is tremble and gasp in his arms.

It's been too long since I've felt this way.

"Rey."

"Ben."

Words tumbling free as we try to take in sips of air before our mouths meld back together.

"I heard you crying out for me..."

"I was drowning in the desert..."

His mouth scatters my thoughts like petals in the wind.

His fingers dig into my hips, pulling me harder against him as I ravage the cool strands of his silken hair.

I am never letting him go.

Never.

Again our mouths touch, desperate and burning and I feel lightheaded from the lack of oxygen.

My lungs constrict and I pull away, gulping air but I can't let him go.

He is shuddering in my arms and the feel of this strong, powerful man trembling to hold me goes straight to my head and I feel almost drunk with the sensation.

My fingers trace the plains of his face as he looks at me with those haunted eyes and I feel like I am falling into a sea of starlight.

Words collide between us.

"I thought...I thought I would never see you again..."

"I thought I had lost you...I was desperate to find you..."

I hear the ache in his voice, taste his fear as the words fall from his lips.

"Ben..."

His name spills out of me, can he hear how much I need him?

His beautiful, shattered eyes stare into me, stripping me bare before he leans in and our foreheads touch.

I can feel the chaotic beating of his heart.

My eyes close of their own volition.

"I've missed you Rey."

Quiet words that grip my soul to hear the sorrow, the longing in such a simple phrase.

I cup his face, refusing to open my eyes as the tears try to break free.

"I missed you too Ben."

A ragged confession torn from my lips.

I never meant to tell him that but how can I stop when he bares his soul to me?

His lips touching mine, sweet and coaxing, a gentle seduction that has me opening my mouth willingly to his.

His fingers find the edge of my tunic and I feel the brush of his skin against mine.

There is no sweeter torture he could inflict on me than what he is doing now.

"Ben...Ben...," his name a prayer on my lips as my fingers fumbling with the clasp to his cloak as he lazily strokes my skin, his mouth nibbling at mine.

I stroke my tongue over his as the cloak falls from his shoulder, an audible sound as it hits the floor.

A groaning laugh spilling into my mouth at my obvious need and once more I feel drunk with the taste of him.

"Rey we should..."

BEEP...BEEP...BEEP...

The sound of his comm going off is like a klaxon in my head and I startle badly. His arm around my waist is the only thing that keeps me from falling.

His hand slams into the nearby wall, silencing the incessant noise.

"What?"

A cutting growl in his response, annoyance and thwarted desire swirling together in a potent mix that tugs at low places in my body and I blush, of all things, to hear it.

"S-Supreme Leader...forgive the intrusion...b-but the Allegiant General is requesting your presence in the conference room."

I don't need to be a Jedi to know that the person on the other side of the comm was regretting having to talk directly to Ben.

He is rather growly at the moment and my lips twitch to think I might have something to do with that.

"I am," he turns his eyes to me and my breath halts at the scorching look, "interrogating the scavenger. General Pryde can wait."

I catch the bite of laughter between my teeth. Interrogation?

"Supreme Leader, my sincerest apologies but I'm afraid I must insist."

A new voice speaks over the comm and feelings of mirth die instantly.

Cold and refined, I shiver to hear the unbending steel in his words, the bleak of winter as death holds sway over the world.

This was no Hux.

"Explain yourself General. Now."

"I took the liberty of assembling the senior staff since we have the emperor's scavenger in hand. The Night Buzzard has left a transmission that only you may access."

Ben closes his eyes and I can see him visibly pulling himself together. His arm, holding onto me so tightly seconds ago now disengages from my waist.

My toes touch the floor and I grab the ledge to keep myself upright.

Once more the First Order has come between us and the reminder that I am a prisoner eases back some of the madness that we had been caught in.

"I'm on my way."

The room reverberates with taunt silence as the comm goes silent and it's only the two of us again.

But not as it was before.

I take in a shaking breath. My lips feel swollen from his kisses, my skin still burning from his touch.

That brief taste of him, the sensation of being held in his arms after so long...it wasn't enough and the words dance on my tongue, begging to be released.

Stay. Don't go.

But I don't.

I can't.

"You," I clear my throat, wondering why I'm finding it so hard to speak, "should go. They're waiting for you."

"We'll finish talking when I return."

A flash of dark humor as I recall the way I slammed my mouth on his, my hair spilling across his hand as he snapped the bands.

I can't help but arch my brow at him.

"Is that what we were doing just now? Talking?"

Desire darkens his eyes to obsidian and my pulse is a hammer in my blood, quickening beneath his ardent gaze.

"I will finish what we started Rey."

A red haze across my mind, the madness of desire once more trying to make me forget why I'm here.

"Is that how you speak to all your prisoners?"

A frown marring his face as he bends down and quickly recaptures his cloak, settling it once more across his broad shoulders.

"You are not my prisoner," his eyes gentle as he moves towards me, cupping my face in his palm, "you are my guest."

I am not going to be seduced by his words, by the fire between us licking through my veins.

"Does that mean I'm free to leave?"

He drops his hand from my face and I feel bereft of his warmth. He grabs his discarded gloves, tugging them back into place.

Refusing to meet my eyes.

"No."

I fold my arms over my chest and shake my head.

"A 'guest' is allowed to leave. I'm a prisoner," I turn away and look around his room, "even if my cage doesn't appear like one."

I feel his heat against my back, his hand on my shoulder.

"You are my permanent guest."

I look up to meet his gaze. His fingers lift to stroke my cheek. I want to be mad at him but the tenderness in his gaze undoes me.

"I...Ben?"

"I can feel exhaustion grinding your bones. You didn't truly believe you could hide it from me?"

Honestly I had forgotten just how worn out I was when he held me in his arms. My only thought, my only focus...had been him.

I close my eyes and try to quell my traitorous heart from fluttering in pleasure as he continues to caress my face.

"Get some rest. Don't leave this room."

I snap my eyes back open and pull out of his arms.

"Still trying to give me orders?"

"I prefer to think of it as sound advice. Unless you like feeling weak?"

I don't dignify that with an answer. The flash of his dark eyes, that slight tilt of his lips tells me it was rhetorical anyway.

He's reaching for his mask and my gaze snares the dagger lying peacefully on the table.

Just the memory of all those voices screaming inside my head has me backing away and turning from it.

I hear his mask click into place.

"I'm curious as to how you obtained a Sith dagger."

His voice is colder now, distorted through that hateful mask.

Reluctantly I turn back to face him and Kylo Ren is staring back at me, the light of this room catching the silver plating around his mask.

"I'm sure you are."

My hands settle on my hips and I refuse to speak anymore about the dagger.

"Remember what I said. Stay in this room."

He turns from me, his cloak swirling about his ankles as he heads for the door and my temper gets the better of me.

"I don't need you to remind-hey!"

The door has snapped shut in my face and refuses to open despite the fact that Ben literally just passed through it seconds ago.

"You did not just lock me in here!"

I slam my hand against the door and feel the sting of metal against my palm.

The door remains stubbornly closed.

I look for the key panel only to find that there isn't one.

"I'm not going to forget this Ben."

Strands of hair falling in my face and I snarl as I push the errant locks away from my eyes.

I take a minute to breath and step away from the door.

It doesn't matter if I can't leave now. I still haven't figured out what those runes mean and until I do, I'm not going anywhere.

I also want that information he taunted me with when we spoke in the deserts of Pasaana. He had information regarding my parents...of who I am.

My missing childhood memories. The ones that plague me like nightmares.

Until I get the answers I seek, all of them, I would bide my time.

I don't know how long that meeting is suppose to last and he didn't mention a timetable. It could be only a few minutes...or several hours.

Shoving my hair out of my eyes, again, I explore my cage.

Even if that cage is Ben's room.

It's sparse. Utilitarian and except for his workbench I see nothing of him here.

The workbench.

I move back to it and note that the dagger and the necklace are still there.

But not my saber. He must have taken that with him when my back was turned.

My lips twist at that bit of subterfuge.

It would seem that he doesn't trust me to stay put after all.

"Of course, I would have done the same thing had our positions been reversed."

Doesn't mean I like it and though I normally keep it strapped to my hip, I always had it within reach.

Being without it now...I feel naked. Exposed.

I shake off the disturbing sensation and look around to see if there is anything else that I missed before I became...distracted.

There was nothing up here that I haven't already seen and I descend the stairs to the lower level.

His living space.

My eyes are drawn to his bed, the pristine white sheets not even rumpled. His bed...it doesn't look like he's slept in it for days.

Another memory slips in, unbidden, as my eyes linger on the bed.

"Rey...I can't..."

"Oh gods Ben...please...don't stop!"

A blister of heat across my skin and I stumble away.

Gods of all the time to remember the night we made love...

That had the been the only time I had ever shared my bed with another.

I still wake up in the night, turning over and reaching for his warmth only to find empty space and the ache of missing him so painful I would curl up, tears spilling into my pillow.

Too many memories. Too many emotions.

I glance around his space, looking for anything to distract me from my thoughts and I spot something so unusual it completely diverts my attention.

A single pedestal in the middle of the room. A dark object that is resting upon it, a stark contrast to the rest of the area.

Something about it calls to me and my feet move of their own volition before I can complete the thought and I find myself staring down at the crumbling, warped mask of Dark Vader.

Luke and Leia's father.

Ben's grandfather.

My fingers hover over it but I don't touch it. There is a coldness emanating from it and I have the sudden image of being burned if I make contact.

"Ben," I murmur, morbid fascination stealing through me as I stare down, "why?"

The mask is silent, holding his secrets and I step away from it.

I've been able to catch up on my history since joining the Resistance and Leia has been open with me regarding her family.

Luke burned Darth Vader's body in order to free the spirit of Anakin Skywalker so that he could become one with the Force.

I understood that much but how had Ben come to possess his mask?

A wave of exhaustion hits me and black spots dance in my vision. My head is pounding as I stumble towards his bed.

My bones feel like lead and my stomach is hollow.

I can't remember the last time I ate. Maybe when I was still on Ajan Kloss?

That had been hours and hours ago.

Near starvation was nothing new to me. There had been days on Jakku where my only meal had been a hard biscuit and a sip of water to wash it down with.

But I had become used to regular meals and between the healing and the fight I was running on empty.

Another wave of fatigue slamming into me, making my head reel and I feel my knee's buckle.

Cool sheets on my skin, the scent of winter frost and cleansing rain.

I've landed partially on the bed, my face buried in his scent, faint as it is.

I inhale deeply and crawl all the way onto the bed.

His scent surrounds me as I collapse.

"Idiot," I mutter as I rub my face against his pillow, "stop being so weak and get up. You need to have a plan...find answers..."

But I don't move. Sparks of light dance in my vision and now that I've stopped moving I can't understand how I've stayed up in the first place.

Closing my eyes helps with my pounding head.

"Just for a minute...that's all I..."

Darkness beckons sweetly whispering of dreams and slumber.

I am on the enemies ship, surrounded by hostile forces and yet as I lay here in his bed, the scent of him surrounding me...I've never felt safer.

Sleep claims me and my last drifting thought is of Ben and the tenderness of his kiss.

I tumble into my dreams and in them, his waiting arms.