Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 31116 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 124(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 31116 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 124(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
“I’d be mad if you didn’t,” she tells me with a tearful giggle. Naomi gets to her feet before I can and flings herself into my arms. She presses her lips to my face, giving me short, delighted smacking kisses. “You big ridiculous man. Next time you have questions about anything between us, come to me first, all right?”
It sounds logical. But already I have a question. “You say ‘us.’ What are we?”
That makes her pause. She cups my face in her hands, standing between my thighs and gazing down at me. “That’s an excellent question and one I’m not sure I have an answer for yet. Maybe we start with friends and see where that leads?”
This seems fair. But again, I have questions. “Do friends kiss?”
“These friends do,” she says with a chuckle, and presses her lips to mine. “These friends can go to my house and have sex again, if you’re so inclined.”
I bite back a groan, because I love that idea. But… “I must finish my shift first.”
She nips at my lower lip, using her teeth, and my body tightens with pleasure. “Then I’ll come to your place after you get off work. Tell me the time and your address and I’ll bring dinner. We’ll celebrate the baby.”
I like this idea. I like this idea a lot. “Done.”
Naomi pokes a finger in my chest. “If you stand me up again, yes we are.”
I do not care if corsairs invade the planet or a rogue asteroid hits—nothing is going to prevent me from meeting up with Naomi tonight.
Chapter
Ten
NAOMI
Several hours later, I’ve showered, fixed my hair, put on my prettiest tunic, and picked up a casserole from the woman in town who likes to cook for others in exchange for credits. I park my air-sled in front of the building that Ainar programmed into my vehicle and step out. While I know there are a lot of people that work on the utilitarian side of Port—cargo shippers, dock workers, the military custodians—I never thought much about where they lived until now. There’s a building close to the space port docks that looks more like a squat warehouse than an actual apartment building, but this is the place.
I let the door scan my palm and then step inside. To my surprise, there are stairs going down. Instead of a high-rise sort of building, this one goes into the ground. Huh. I lean over the railing, noticing doors lined up along the halls. Apartment doors. A szzt man in a dock worker uniform comes out of his apartment and I immediately tense, shivering, and press against the wall behind me. Szzt scare me with their casual cruelty. Their culture is a little sociopathic compared to humans, and a girl I was enslaved with used to joke that the only thing they taught szzt in school was how to pull the wings off flies.
My old master was szzt. I hope he’s burning in hell somewhere.
“Naomi?”
I give a little scream of horror as a hand touches my arm. Turning, I see Ainar and breathe a sigh of relief. “Holy shit. I nearly flung noodles down the stairs,” I tell him, holding up the disposable plas casserole dish. “Warn a girl, will you?”
The szzt male nods at Ainar as he passes us, heading out of the building, and Ainar stands close to me. Almost uncomfortably close, but I like it, because it makes me feel safe to have him pressed up against me. When the man is gone, Ainar turns back to me and gives me an assessing look. “Are you all right?”
I nod, swallowing. “Just…brought back some bad memories.”
“I won’t let anyone harm you,” he reassures me. “You’re safe.”
Nodding again, I hand him the casserole when he puts his hands out, and manage a smile. I’m moving forward, I remind myself. The past is past. That man just wants to get to his job, and I just want to see my friend’s—boyfriend’s?—apartment. He’s not the same man that bought me from the slave houses…and even if he was, I’m better at standing up for myself now. I know what I want and I’m not going to let anyone bully me anymore. I loop my arm in Ainar’s, tucking my hand into the crook of his elbow.
All future, no past, I tell myself, and feel better.
Ainar is on the third floor down. He opens the door and gestures that I should go inside first. It’s not just politeness—the apartment itself is very narrow, designed to be functional rather than a space where one would want to spend a great many hours lounging. There’s a sitting couch across from a comm panel, a tiny kitchen and lavatory, and in the back adjoining room, a mesakkah-sized bed. The front area is plain other than a local plant growing in a pot, but the back bedroom is fascinating. On one wall, there is an assortment of salvaged screens of all kinds, flipping through vids of exotic locations—a beach here, a jungle there, a grassy meadow elsewhere. At the end of the bed, there’s a very large screen and on it, it looks like a view from a farm here on Risda.