Ever So Madly
Authors: J.R. Gray
E
VERNIGHT PUBLISHING ®
Copyright© 2016 J.R. Gray
ISBN: 978-1-77233-959-8
Cover Artist: Rebel Graphics
Editor: Karyn White
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
Patty, Loyalty is everything. I’m one lucky fuck.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Sal, Thanks for your lists and charts and pages and pages of notes.
This book would not have gotten here without you.
Karen, for always helping me make something one hundred times better than it started.
Kerry, this never would have been published had it not been for you helping me get it there a year after I wrote it.
Patty, for picking me up in the aftermath.
Nathan, for always being there.
EVER SO MADLY
J.R. Gray
Copyright © 2016
Chapter One
Madden
“Just fucking do it, you coward.” I ground my teeth together. “Jump,” I said with force, like the word could hurtle me over the edge. It was long after the last bell, and the mines were deserted. I was alone, utterly alone, and I wanted to jump.
I stood on the edge of one of the countless pits carved into the surface of Harden. The holes spanned a third of the way to the planet’s core and stretched as far the eye could see. Ore was the most precious metal in the known galaxy, and it was only found here.
The drop would be a few kilometers, and the chances were good my body would explode on impact.
I could taste oblivion, but it was still too far out of reach.
My hands shook. One step forward was all it would take to end it all. Years of battling with my mind could be ended that easily. I leaned forward, looking down at the blackness. Bile rose from my stomach, and my ears rang. The hard life on Harden had beaten most of the fear out of me, but heights still made me dizzy.
I closed my eyes, inhaling the stifling air which persisted even into the dead of night. I forced my foot up off the dusty ground and pushed it out to hover over the hole.
“Madden!”
Hearing my name startled me. I pulled my foot back quickly, turning around to face the only person I still cared about, Colton.
“The fuck are you doing, man?” Colton’s once dirty blond hair was nearly bleached from all the time he’d spent as a diver in the mines. His sunken eyes had bags under them, causing him to look about ten years older than he was, from the neck up. From the shoulders down he was sculpted, pure muscle. He had one of the most dangerous jobs on the planet, and his body showed it.
“Dicking around.” I stepped toward him, taking myself further away from the ledge. Like a switch, as soon as I was away from the drop, my breathing returned to normal, and the tightness in my chest loosened.
“You’ve got issues, Madden.” He took a tentative step closer, and I felt like he was appraising me.
“They don’t call me mad for nothing.” I grinned, putting on a mask. I had no desire to talk about the weight I carried.
Colton was a great guy, but he saw nothing beyond Harden. None of us were ever getting off of this hellhole, and no one seemed to care. I’d seen the rest of the universe. I knew what was out there. But I was pretty sure I’d botched my one chance for escape, hence the stronger-than-usual overwhelming urge to quit breathing.
“Got a race for me?” I prompted when he didn’t say more. I was short on credits, but sometimes he could swing something.
“Nah, I got news.”
My gut flipped, and I kicked at the dust. “I don’t want to know.”
“You’re gonna want to hear this.” There was disappointment in his voice.
A part of me knew why he was sad, but I couldn’t believe it. “Don’t fuck with me, Colt.” I searched his face, but he wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“Are you really sure you want to leave?” He lifted his gaze to mine. “Well not that you have much choice now, I guess.”
All the nerves I’d felt this morning came rushing back, and my breathing was choked off. “Colton.”
“Yeah, you got it, man.” I could see the misery written in his features. He’d told me more than once what he thought about what I was doing.
I pushed a hand into my sternum. “Fuck.”
“Why do you want to leave? Shit, you could have any job you want here.” He shook his head. “You know how they’ll treat you when you come back. Is it really worth it?”
He would never understand. He was content, so my boredom with the mind-numbing tasks of digging this forsaken planet went over his head.
“I’ll be back.”
“Yeah, probably, but as a jumper.” The disappointment dripped from him. “You know it won’t be the same.”
I rubbed a hand over the back of my neck. “It doesn’t change anything.”
“A’right, if you say so.” He turned, shoulders hunched forward. “You got to go, man. They’ve been looking for ya for hours.”
Hours? The test shouldn’t have been scored that fast. Days was the usual.
“No one could find ya.” He paused. “But I knew where you’d be."
“You always do.”
"I’m shocked you’re not out racing and trying to kill yourself.” He looked over his shoulder as I followed after him.
It hit me in the gut. We both liked to race, but I never knew he’d noticed.
“I’m outta credits after last weekend.” I shrugged. No “buy in” cash meant no one would race you. Colton sometimes hooked me up, but this was the first he’d spoken to me since I’d signed up for the damn test.
“If you’d hold down a steady job then you’d have plenty.” He swung a leg over his bike and put his foot on one pedal, helmet dangling from his fingertips.
“Looks like a job won’t matter for a while.”
He stared at the low lights of the city off in the distance. “You really gotta get back, man. You’re the first in over a century.”
“Has it really been that long?” I’d never heard of anyone who’d passed the test, but there had to be more.
“It’s been all over the vids for hours. You’re only the second person ever, bro. Big shit. It’s going to draw all sorts of attention.” With that he gripped his clutch and hit the starter, bringing his bike to a roaring start. “Unwanted attention.” He left the rest to me unsaid, but I knew what he meant. He’d used the cover of racing to conduct meetings or some sort for a long time. The engine would prevent anyone from listening so I could answer freely.
“It looks like I won’t be your problem now.”
“Don’t say it like that.” He sighed.
“I have my path, and you have yours.” It was harsh, but I couldn’t stay on this planet another fucking day.
“We could be on the same path. There are things I haven’t told you.”
“What?" He’d got my attention, even if I didn’t want to give it to him.
“Just don’t go, I didn’t want to tell you until I was sure.”
“It’s too late. I’m leaving.” I picked up my green helmet and shoved it down on my head. Getting on my bike, I quickly started her up, heading towards the start of a new life.
Chapter Two
Jocelynn
Jacob dragged me under broken boards and around barrels of what could only be toxic waste by the smell of it. I’d never been to this side of the city. Our destination was hidden in the ruins of the former grand palace. The floor beneath our feet was rotted, looking like it would give way under the slightest weight, but the tracks in the dirt told me we were not the first to traverse this path tonight.
“Are you sure this is safe?” I asked, sidestepping a sinkhole blocking most of the street. Looking down as we passed, I saw hundreds of tiny eyes staring back up at us. A shiver ran down my spine, and I moved closer to my brother.
“Not even remotely sure, and that’s half the fun, Jocelynn.” His blue eyes glistened with amusement in the low light. “But you said you wanted to get out and live a little while the Baron and Baroness were distracted.”
“Living, in case you are unclear, is the opposite of dying. More so, death by toxic chemicals left over from before the peace, is not an ideal way to go.” I shoved my shoulder into him, knocking him off balance.
He stumbled into a tower made of the rusted-out barrels, causing the ones toward the top of the stack to groan and wobble.
Jacob looked at me with the crooked half smile he wore when he knew he was in trouble.
“Oops.” He grabbed my hand, squeezing it before he took off running.
I was forced after him as the containers started to crash down in our wake. With every turn he whipped us around, the tide of debris we had disrupted came closer. We were both heavily trained, and I had no trouble keeping up. The only thing holding me back was the damn boots I’d chosen to wear for their style. They wouldn’t quit rubbing the back of my heels raw with every step.
Thundering crashes drove me forward, and I kept my gaze on the ground, avoiding the worst of the decaying floor. Jacob gasped, and I looked up to see the containers were starting to tip ahead of us. We were trapped. I froze as ice ran through my veins, rooting my feet to the floor. His name choked up in my throat as my stomach tried to claw its way out of my body. I tasted bile as Jacob yanked at my arm.
“Move your feet!” he barked.
My breathing came in heavy gasps as the first cylinder smashed to the floor a meter in front of us. “No.”
Everything slowed, and I saw a door half hidden by scrap. Jacob stood a foot taller than me and outweighed me by quite a bit, but I shoved at his larger body to get him moving. I got him to stumble in the right direction. I darted ahead of him, shoving years of disintegrated garbage out of the way, before we were swallowed in metal and chemicals. Understanding dawned in his eyes, and he kicked the larger pieces from our path. He wrenched the door open before diving through it, rolling to land gracefully on his feet like a cat, while I half cartwheeled in, ending up in a heap.
“Well, we’ll have to find a different way back home,” Jacob mused when we slowed to a stop, dust billowing up behind up as the avalanche settled.
He kicked the door closed and pushed his fingers into his hair, tousling it as he looked back at me.
“But it looks like we are right on time. I have some … er … people to talk to.” He flashed a grin and ducked into the crowd, which appeared not at all disturbed by the din we had kicked up. Talking was probably the last thing on his mind.
I looked down at my muck-covered fingers, sludge caked under my freshly painted nails and sighed. I would have to be up hours early to take care of all this before the Baron saw the state I was in. “Remember why you’re here,” I said to myself. This should be fun. I turned in a circle looking for a place to clean up before deciding I was going to wipe my hands on my leathers.
I stayed in the shadows, not ready to venture into the light like my brother. He did this a lot, and it showed in the familiar way he greeted the group, but this was my first time sneaking out of the palace grounds. A flash of red caught my eyes. The group Jacob stood with all bore red stars, stapled into place on their jackets. Most were tattered and faded, but the color was unmistakable. I found it odd as it was the exact color of the Baron’s house color.
As I lowered my hands to my thighs to wipe them clean, a figure stepped in front of me, blocking off my view of the group. I paused, looking into his well-worn face. He couldn’t have been more than three or four years older than I was, but he had the look of one of the desert people. The pigment was rubbed from his skin, a trait only obtained by working in a mine or growing up on one of the outlying planets where the thermal wind whipped the dust into the air, clouding out the sun and bleaching the people. He had to be a member of one of delegations here for the Worlds’ Fair. It would be the only reason a miner would come to Trenton.
His chin length dark hair was faded at the ends, the same bleached look as his skin, which told me I had been right about his age. The longer one lived on such a planet, the more bleached the hair and skin became, made worse by the mines. He wore what looked like two days of stubble on his jaw. The color had hints of red, and I wondered if it extended into his hair in the sunlight. He had the build of a man who’d earned every muscle with tireless hours of work. I knew he wasn’t an elite. People on this planet were soft. Most didn’t even bother with the health facilities, unless they had an obligation to the guard, like my brother and I did. But even with years of combat training, we didn’t look like this man did. There was something about back-breaking labor that changed a body. Realizing I was staring, I looked up into his eyes, large and nearly silver, all kindness there, which shocked me more than the rest of him. His eyes convinced me I wanted to know more.
“Let me,” he said, pulling a bandana from the pocket of his jeans. He grabbed my wrist, not unkindly, and cleaned off each of my fingers. It was an odd sensation to have someone not indebted to me like a servant was, perform the menial task. He moved to the second hand, taking care to get as much of the dirt off my nails as he could. When he was finished, he didn’t drop my hand. Instead he lifted it to his lips and brushed them over the back.
My mouth fell open. I was used to being treated with the utmost respect. Men weren’t allowed to touch me. A strange sensation came over me, and my chest grew tight with nervous energy. Hard life equaled hard attitude in my experience, but he was quite the opposite.
“Thank you,” I murmured, not really sure how I should react to him.
“I’m Mad, and your name is?”
He didn’t release my hand, and I scrambled for a name, as mine could give away too much.
“Or shall I just call you m’lady?” He leaned in before releasing my hand. “As that is clearly what you are.”
Was he mocking me? I looked down at myself. Even in plain clothes, he saw right through me. There was no hiding from him, that I was certain of. Another sensation I was not used to. I’d never had anyone look through the mask I wore—even my brother was easy to fool with a fake smile.
“Jocelynn,” I said before he could assume anything else about who I was. “I’m bad at this cloak and dagger shit.”
“Then how about Jo while you’re here?” His lips broke out into a knowing smile.
Where the hell had Jacob gone off to? I could strangle him for leaving me alone.
I wrinkled my nose and shook my head. “No. Do I look like a Jo to you?”
“That bad?” he asked.
“Names bring about a certain image in your head, and I don’t want mine to be Jo.” I grimaced. I’d never had a nickname. Everyone called me Jocelynn. In fact, those around me got yelled at for calling me anything else.
He stuck his tongue out, an entirely childish gesture, but it made his roguish charm rather cute.
“I am a lot of things, and Jo is not one of them.” I gave him a harsh look like I had been trained to give servants who did something unpleasant. I cringed inwardly. It was distasteful behavior, even if it was expected at home. I couldn’t treat real people like that, but the look had a whole different effect on him.
He grinned back at me, taking a step closer. “Fine, how about Lynn then?” The corners of his mouth turned up.
Now I knew he was mocking me.
“It’s like you insist on labeling me something so awful so no one else will give me a second look all night. Is that your design?”
“No, but damn good point. Shall we stick with Jo then?”
My attitude had the reverse effect on him, like he thought I was flirting.
“There is so much in a name, Mad. I can tell a lot about you just in your choice.” And I could.
“I think I am starting to get it. Your wit far exceeds Lynn. I see my dontopedalogy has addled me again.” He offered a wink with the sentiment.
I studied him, not answering. He couldn’t be a miner, or from out of the outlying worlds for that matter. It was impossible to expect this cultured intelligence of vocabulary from an uneducated world, yet his look said otherwise. He was a puzzle, one I wanted an answer to.
“You don’t know what it means?” he challenged my silence.
“I am quite aware of the meaning of dontopedalogy, and have witnessed your propensity to put your foot in your mouth.” I folded my hands, unable to keep a smirk from forming on my face.
He gave a low whistle. “And here I thought the only people who frequented underground parties were sex-crazed, drugged out delinquents.”
“You assumed you were the single individual here with an impressive vocabulary? That may be the case out on the rim planets, but here a good portion of the young are educated.” My mind filled with guesses. Maybe he was the son of a dignitary, forced to one of the rim planets to govern. The Baron usually reserved those positions for men he trusted as they were hard but sensitive tasks.
His intense eyes searched mine as he took the dig appropriately. “I’ve encountered quite a few on this planet with an affluent upbringing who can’t string a sentence together.”
“Touché, as I have myself.” I paused a second for effect. “It is I who should be shocked, as you come from the outlying worlds. Your accent and vocabulary are refined.”
He gave me a slow clap. “Nice save. I almost wrote you off as a bitch.”
My lips twitched up again. “I prefer assy.”
He made as if glancing around me. “I think I’m going to enjoy your assy.”
I burst out laughing in spite of myself.
He waited a moment before replying, “I thought these fringe things were avoided by the likes of you. You know since they are quite often put on by the Reds.”
I kept my face blank. Jacob hadn’t mentioned them, but I was smart enough to keep my annoyance off my face. Now the red made sense. “I followed my brother here for a promised good time. I stay out of politics.” I wanted to stay out of them at least until they were thrust upon me.
“And I followed some from my planet here for the same, but I educated myself a bit before I did.” The air between us was thick. “Now, are you going to give me something to call you? I wouldn’t want to give those around us the wrong impression of your character, whatever Jo might portray.”
I hesitated for a moment. “J, if you must.”
He stepped into my personal space, tilting his head to whisper in my ear. “I must.”
I shouldn’t have liked the feel of his hot breath trailing down my neck, but I did.
He pulled back, all charm once again. “My apologies, J. Can I buy you a drink to make up for the confusion with your name?”
Smooth. “I have no objections to a drink with an entertaining stranger.”
He linked his arm through mine and led me toward the shady-looking lean-to bar, staffed by people I wouldn’t have trusted with dishes, let alone something I would consume.
“What do you want?” He flipped his comm around so it could be scanned by the crude reader, which was at least three generations out of date.
What had Jacob said about the drinks? It had flown right out of my head. “Er…”
He chuckled and turned to the man waiting for our orders and mumbled something. My eyes scanned the room for my twin. I wanted to kick his ass right about now. He’d always had more freedom than I did, and he readily indulged. I spotted him surrounded by a group of half-naked and sweaty men. I blew out a breath. It wasn’t shocking. His secret was well kept from the Baron, but common knowledge among the lower classes.
Mad turned back around with two fizzy, neon blue drinks. There were small tabs in the bottom releasing bubbles that swirled around the liquid, creating a tornado-like effect in the glass.
“Thank you.” I took the drink but didn’t bring it to my lips, staring right at my brother.
“If you think I’m going to drug you and or try to poison you, you’re quite wrong. I prefer your dry wit to unconsciousness.” He took a long pull from his glass, and when he lowered it, his lips were stained blue at the seam. “I’m not attracted to unconscious.”
His tongue licked over them, which caused my hands to sweat, and I absentmindedly brought my drink up, taking a small sip. It was like a sunburst in a glass. A cosmic explosion bottled and subtly sweetened to perfection. I took another drink, holding the liquid in my mouth, letting the bubbles pop over my tongue.
“Good, eh?” I looked up at him, and he wore a coy smile.
It was nothing, and yet it was everything.