Finders Keepers (6 page)

“A tile. Came loose.” Trilby repeated his words as if he’d uttered gibberish. She was breathing hard, but some of the glitter of anger was gone from her eyes. “A tile came loose and that gives you the right to stick your hand under my shirt?”

“I didn’t stick my hand under your shirt. I tried to pull you out of the way. We—”

An access hatchway slid open overhead. Dezi’s metallic face filled the small square. “Captain! We’re back online. Communications is back online. We can—oh. Pardon. Am I interrupting something?”

Trilby didn’t seem to hear the question. She glared at Rhis. “Don’t do me any more favors. Okay?” She glanced up at the ’droid. “I’ll meet you on the bridge, Dez. Now.” She shoved herself away and crawled hastily toward the tunnel’s exit.

Alone in the tunnel, Rhis closed his eyes and lay his head against the flooring. Something had happened . . . something
was
happening to him. He didn’t understand it. He was acting like Rafi, for the Gods’ sakes! He’d been in this female’s company less than one full day and here he was panting after her like some gelzrac in heat.

“Ridiculous,” he said. But his tone wasn’t overly convincing.

“Insolent, arrogant, insufferable, Imperial bastard!” Trilby’s hushed but angry litany echoed the slap of her boots on the decking. She could have added “brilliant” and “too damned good-looking for his own good,” but she was still working herself into a frenzy over his negatives. She didn’t intend to even touch on Rhis’s positives until they parted company at Port Rumor.

She stomped onto the bridge, then let herself collapse into her seat.

Communications were back online. A long list of messages waited for her, not the least of which was the confirmation of the availability of the Bagrond run. That made her feel better. She quickly sent off her acknowledgment. Then, boots resting on the bridge console, she leaned back in her chair and brought up the armrest screen to review just what everyone had to say to her this septi.

Neadi’s face appeared. Her skin was the color of deep golden coffee; her dark eyes sparkled. “Hey, Tril! Hope you get this.” There was the usual “working our butts off slingin’ beer and booze,” and then her friend’s jovial demeanor became serious.

“Something’s going on. Yeah, I know, business has dropped off in the past few months, but hell, when haven’t the Indys had their ups and downs?”

Neadi knew the deep-space transit business as well as Trilby did. She’d been raised on short-haulers, though ones larger than the
Venture
. But it was her and her husband’s pub adjacent to the spaceport that put them in a good position to hear what was going on in the traders’ lanes between Rumor, Bagrond, and Quivera.

“Talk is that someone’s in bed with the ’Sko. Yeah, I know, I know.” Neadi held up one hand as if she could hear Trilby’s disbelieving snort. “Who sleeps with the ’Sko? The Zafharin, maybe.”

Trilby’s mind flickered to a tall, dark-haired man one deck below. A small mental warning bell jangled softly.

“We’re hearing whispers of an under-the-table agreement with one of the Beffa cartels. It’s got people thinking about the ’Sko attacks recently. If the ’Sko stop the small trade, then only the big guys, like GGA or Norvind, will work Gensiira. Which is big profits for them.

“But it’s also big losses if the ’Sko’s real purpose isn’t to take out the small haulers but to entice the big traders into an area that’s been long known for its lack of patrols. The ’Sko will profit if Gensiira falls to them. But the Zafharin will profit even more if the ’Sko drive out you small operators and then the Empire moves in to annex us.

“We might just be the incentive for the Empire to stop harassing the ’Sko out by Szed.

“So be careful. Watch who your runs come through and what flight plans you file. It could be nothing more than jump-jockey gossip, but I know that you’ve been looking to spend some money on upgrades. Screw that, girl. Go for weapons. A new ion cannon’d be nice. A set of Lady-Fives even better. I’ve got contacts if you don’t.”

Trilby swiveled in her seat for a while, thinking. The Bagrond run had come through a reliable agent, an old friend. She stopped swiveling, pulled it up again on the comp, and tried to read between the lines. Nothing. At least, nothing that shouldn’t be there.

But there’d been other requests. Not to her. But before she’d left Rumor she’d seen a couple of the pricier bottles of gin being poured.

And then there was Rhis. The Zafharin pilot. A lieutenant. Off the
Razalka
, he said. Who just happened to be in possession of a ’Sko fighter. Captured years ago, he told her. Used now only in war games. Malfunctioned and landed in her front yard.

That fit, to a point. She’d seen no other craft, ’Sko or anything, in pursuit. If the Tark were stolen, the ’Sko would obviously have been on Rhis’s tail.

But maybe it wasn’t stolen. Maybe it was a gift. A thank-you. For that other rumor Neadi alluded to.

Who else but the Zafharin would be sleeping with the ’Sko?

4

She left the bridge, her mind more on Neadi’s warnings than where her feet were taking her. It wasn’t as if running trade in Gensiira was easy to begin with. But at least the enemy was known: the government, mostly in the form of customs inspectors. And generally visible in one place: dockside. But the ’Sko—and the Zafharin, for that matter—made their own rules. A little caution might be advisable at this point with her business. And her onboard guest as well.

Shame she had no inbred distrust of Zafharins. Port Rumor had always been indiscriminately eclectic in its populace. She knew several Zafharin freighter operators. And more than a dozen half-Zafharin merchants, including Neadi’s husband. Port Rumor was a busy place now, and had been even before the war ended.

But to have an Imperial military officer dumped in her lap, courtesy of a ’Sko Tark—a fully armed ’Sko Tark—wasn’t quite the same as sharing a beer with a half-Zafharin drive tech in Flyboy’s.

She stopped walking and stared at the door in front of her. Cargo Hold 3. She had intended to head for her cabin, one deck below the bridge. Not all the way down here.

Brilliant, Tril, just brilliant.
She resisted the urge to pound her head on the door.

She turned quickly instead, flinging her arms wide in a gesture of frustration. And smacked Rhis Vanur firmly in the chest with the back of her hand. “Damnation! Sorry.”

He grabbed her arm, steadying her as she looked up at him in surprise. And something flared, sparked again. Something primal. Intense. Urgent.

She shook off his hand, stepped away quickly. “You following me, Lieutenant?” She tried to add ice to her voice, her body needing it.

He hesitated. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“Down here?”

“I called the bridge. You didn’t answer. And your ship has no CLS.”

Trilby tamped down her newborn paranoia. He was right; she didn’t have a functioning crew locator on board. Dezi used his thermal grid to find her on the ship. When she wanted Dez, she used the comm. She belatedly realized she’d never told Vanur to do that. “What’s the problem?”

“Problem?”

“I don’t think you’re down here looking for a copy of my potato-and-cheese casserole recipe. So what’s the problem?”

“Oh, yes. Well, not a problem. Just a modification I thought you might consider for the booster.” He shrugged.

“I thought you finished that yesterday.” She fell in step with him as they headed toward the companionway.

“I did. At the time, I didn’t think it would work with your equipment, but I’ve been playing with the idea. I might be able to customize—”

“Wogs-and-weemlies?”

He turned at the bottom step, smiled down at her. “Ones you would like, I think. Our ships use it on border patrol. I guess you could call it an invasive filter.”

She followed him up to the next deck in silence, stopped just short of the open lounge hatchway. “You mean, you can grab messages that aren’t meant for you.”

He hesitated only a fraction of a second. “Yes.”

“Nice modification.” And one she could sell in Rumor for a pretty piece of change, once she unraveled the program and found how it worked. “How long will it take you?”

“An hour, perhaps less. I can work on it on the way to Rumor. Right now I want to finish calibrating the sensors with Dezi.”

“I want to see the program before you install and run it.”

“Of course.”

Of course. And this from a man who just yesterday had held her throat in the paralyzing
G’zhen Dai
grip used by thirty-second century warrior-monks on Dakrahl. Or was it the fatal
Tah Fral
hold employed by the Order of Despi Guild assassins?

She shook her head as he headed belowdecks to the drive room.

She stepped into the lounge. Her stomach had been rumbling for a while. She removed the large casserole of stew from storage and placed it in the processor. That’s what she was supposed to have done ten minutes ago. Instead, she’d been wandering on autopilot on the cargo deck. If she hadn’t bumped into Vanur—

A thought struck her with the same high-voltage intensity as his touch had by Cargo Hold 3.

What was Vanur doing down by the holds?

Looking for her, he’d said. She didn’t know what bothered her more: the fact that he was following her, or the fact that he was following her and she’d been blissfully unaware of the fact.

The processor chimed. She thumbed the door open, let the spicy aroma pour over her for a moment.

Maybe she was being paranoid. Or maybe she didn’t want to face the real reason she was so jumpy around him. She just didn’t know if it had more to do with his heritage or his gender.

He was terribly male. Terribly, wonderfully male. That might be something worth exploring if she weren’t still smarting over Jagan. And if Rhis weren’t also walking around her ship in a Zafharin uniform. Six months ago she wouldn’t have cared. Now she was doubly cautious.

She secured the stew in the server, then tabbed on the coffeemaker. When he came in for dinner she was still on her first cup. But it was cold. She stirred it halfheartedly and pretended to stare out the viewport at Avanar’s lengthening shadows. Two moons were rising. She could see Rhis’s reflection—dark-haired and dark-shirted—outlined on the viewport as he sat at the high counter that separated the galley area, a bowl of stew before him. The glint of one of her ship’s portable datapads was next to that. He was working on a sensor glitch that Dezi’s diagnostics couldn’t unravel.

Or so he said.

For all she knew, he was working on plans to help the ’Sko conquer all of Conclave space.

Neadi’s words haunted her, but her thoughts kept being sidetracked to the heat generated between them in the maintenance tunnel earlier. She was surprised the insulating plates hadn’t melted after falling on their bodies.

It exasperated her how he’d caught her off guard. But then, maybe what she thought had happened really hadn’t. Maybe they did only fall against each other by accident, her shirt riding up, his hands simply landing in a logical spot.

But that kiss, that kiss had been no accident.

So she watched him now without watching him. Tried to watch the “him” that was Zafharin Imperial Lieutenant and not the “him” that was broad-shouldered with strong arms. And night-black hair, the only soft thing on his body. Like the soft hair matting his chest—

She stood suddenly, irritated at her train of thought, forgotten coffee cup still in her hand. “We’ll be ready to go at 0600?”

“Absolutely. We could depart tonight, within the hour.”

Trilby shook her head. “No. I need some sleep, Dezi needs some downtime, and you’re still recovering from some good bumps and bruises.”

He glanced down at where his shirtsleeves were rolled up, exposing the faded purple gash on his arm.

“I know, I know,” she said with exasperation, seeing him start to reply. “You’ve got a hot date waiting for you back there across the zone. Well, even if we leave at sunrise tomorrow, we’re still ahead of schedule. We all need a good night’s sleep.”

She moved around him to place her cup in the sani-rack.

He handed her the empty casserole dish. “I could start—”

“Thanks, but no. I need you on the bridge at 0545. I want to run a complete systems check before we blow this pop stand.”

He pushed himself away from the counter, tucked the datapad under his arm. “Then 0545 it is.”

She let out the breath she’d been holding as she watched him leave, then hurriedly finished securing the galley. With Rhis in his cabin, she’d have some time to poke around in her ship’s systems undisturbed. Find out just what Mister Friendly Lieutenant had been doing near her cargo holds.

And while she worked on it, she’d try not to think about what it felt like to kiss him.

He saw it the minute the door to his small cabin slid open. His black jacket, cleaned and patched, draped across the back of the only chair. He picked up the jacket, caught the light scent of her perfume, then saw something else.

A long-sleeve white shirt, large enough for him. It felt new and didn’t smell of powdery flowers. He wondered where she’d gotten it. Replicator? But no, her ship didn’t have a hard-goods replicator on board.

Her consideration surprised him, yet it didn’t. He was learning she could be brash and flippant one minute, warm and beguiling the next. She made it clear she didn’t trust him. And, of course, that she didn’t particularly like him.

The last he was used to. Not many people did.

But then she’d patched his jacket, found him a shirt, and made sure there was always hot soup, or coffee, within his reach. Asked if he needed another blanket. If there were enough clean towels in his sani-fac.

And a couple of times had teased him in such a way that made him think maybe he was wrong. Maybe she might like him, even if only a little bit.

That worried him. Because he didn’t know what he’d do if she did.

He tossed the jacket back onto the chair, thrust all thoughts of her from his mind. He had to remember who he was, why he was here.

He set his alarm to wake him at 0130. He still had work to do.

The first thing Trilby did when she stepped through the door of her quarters was to set the alarm for 0530. The second was to pull the comp around on its swivel arm so that it faced her bed. She sat on the faded purple quilt, legs crossed, elbows on her knees, and put the
Venture
through a little-used series of paces. Little-used because she’d not had to deal with an intruder on board before.

The program was one she’d created with Shadow, one of their best. His young, lanky form floated into her mind. She could still see his unruly mop of muddy-brown hair, forever being pushed out of his eyes with long fingers. But his face blurred in her memory. It had been almost seventeen years since he was killed.

She’d just turned sixteen when it happened. Shadow was about two years her senior. He’d picked up a skim job on a Herkoid long-hauler. Three months later, Trilby followed. Herkoid knew where to find cheap labor.

Port Rumor. The junkyard of civilized space offered not only spare parts but spare bodies. Orphans, bastards, by-blows. Thousands of children, living in storage sheds, working illegally on transports and freighters. Jobs, food, clothing were snatched from discards and castoffs. First to see it owned it. Finders keepers.

That was Port Rumor in those days.

Now Shadow was gone. He’d been on the bridge when ’Sko lasers had sliced through the hulking freighter. Sliced first the bridge, then the drive room, aft.

But the cargo holds were spared. Sacred. The ’Sko never damaged the cargo. Didn’t shit where they ate, as Shadow used to say.

Trilby and three others had been in the holds. Two containers had unstrapped as they’d come out of jumpspace and shifted. Her stint on cleanup detail, and the arrival of a Conclave squadron, had saved her life.

Trilby pinched the bridge of her nose with two fingers. Tiredness washed over her as the memory receded. She shook her head, stared at the data on the screen. Saw the patches Dezi had made and the ones Rhis had made. Everything within acceptable parameters. No wogs. No weemlies.

She’d deliberately stopped staring over his shoulder just to see if he would try something. Because if he was going to, she wanted him to try it before they hit the lanes.

Her fears, however, appeared to be unfounded. Looked like Rhis was being a good boy.

She stripped off her green T-shirt and lay her utility belt, laser pistol attached, over the nightstand that jutted out from the wall. Her pants she balled up and tossed into the hamper in the corner. She’d have plenty of time to do laundry on the trike back to Rumor.

Or maybe she’d assign that duty to Mister Friendly Lieutenant. In spite of his obvious helpfulness, she could tell he had no experience in the domestic end of shipboard duties. That tagged him as a career officer in her book. Career officers, especially Imperial ones, didn’t do their own laundry.

Perhaps it was time someone filled in those gaps in his training.

She fell asleep, a smile still on her lips.

He woke a few minutes before the alarm chimed and lay in the darkness of the small cabin. It seemed unnatural to be on a ship and not moving, not feeling the thrumming of the drives through his body.

He pulled on his clothes, then slipped into his jacket. The new white shirt would shine like a beacon in the
Venture
’s dim corridors, and he needed to be part of the shadows for a while. To do what he had to do. To work his “wogs-and-weemlies.” He heard Trilby Elliot’s voice say that in his head, a voice wary yet laced with sarcasm.

Wogs-and-weemlies.

He retraced his steps to the auxiliary systems and communications backup panel recessed in a small storage closet just before the holds. He decoded the lock, careful of tripping any alarms. Then it was a good half hour’s worth of work, aided by the pilfered datalyzer, before he was into the ship’s primaries.

All her illegal customizations floated before him. Trilby Elliot’s handiwork. He didn’t know if he was more surprised by the sophistication of her methods or just her downright crazy creativity.