Crux: A Sci-Fi Romance (The Jekh Saga Book 2)

by H. E. Trent

  Esteben folded his arms over his chest and leaned his fine backside against the edge of the cold oven. “You could sell off the excess dough today. Clear out your inventory until your ovens are functional. Use the standard oven in the kitchen for smaller batches if you must, but I suspect either Trigrian or Courtney will shoo you out rather quickly.”

  Headron swatted some loose hair back from his sweaty brow and scoffed. He probably looked a frazzled mess, and didn’t care a whit. “That much dough tonight? There’s got to be twenty kilos.”

  “I could sell it.”

  “Really?”

  “You doubt me?”

  Headron didn’t want to. After all, Esteben was a Beshni. He’d heard of their family’s slick deals and transactions in Buinet, long before he’d ever set his sights on one of the men. Headron might have been an optimist, but he was also a realist.

  “Hmm?” Esteben’s lips quirked up at one corner and he gave Headron’s untidy hair bun a flick.

  Instinctively, Headron patted it down. He knew for sure then that he looked a mess.

  Esteben grabbed his wrists, hissing, and slowly pushed down Headron’s hands. “You’ll get flour in your hair, and I like the black.”

  “Oh.” Headron dropped his hands. He couldn’t recall a man ever saying such a thing to him. Men touched, not talked, to connect, but Headron liked Esteben’s words.

  “You believe I’d let you fret over bread?” Esteben asked.

  “I suppose I just don’t see why you wouldn’t. You don’t have to concern yourself with this mess. This is due to my own lunacy. You shouldn’t trouble yourself over it. I’m sure you have more productive things to be doing. More connections to make, more engineers to find.”

  They needed to be found. Jekh needed its infrastructure back. That was far more important than bread.

  Esteben set his tube of paper in the corner and then put his back to the outer door. “You’re as misguided as our flighty lover. I suppose it’s my fault you’re both that way, but I’ll fix things now. I’ll get Trigrian to bring the flyer around and will get a farmhand to help us load.”

  “Esteben, no.” Instinctively, Headron reached for his arm, barring his exit. At Esteben’s raised eyebrow, he took a step back. “You don’t have to—”

  “Waste my time?”

  “Yes. That.”

  “Time is the most important currency I have right now, and I choose wisely how I spend it. Right now, I’m choosing to fix your problem. Would you prefer that I didn’t interfere? You don’t want my thumbprint on the solution?”

  “I really don’t care about who gets credit. I just believe I can deal with this on my own.”

  “Perhaps.” Esteben nodded slowly. “And you’ll take longer, and you’ll get paid less if you do.”

  He was right, of course.

  Prior to the storm, Headron might have received the words as an insult, but Esteben was telling the truth in the practical way he always did. Headron knew he undercharged. He knew he wasn’t aggressive enough, but he still had pride. He’d never asked anyone to handle his business for him before.

  “People are getting ready to prepare supper, and others will want bread ready for the morning,” Esteben said. “If they can’t have one of your hot loaves, I’m certain they’ll pay for the dough.”

  “I’ve never sold that much dough at the cafe back in Buinet, nor out of the meet-shop.”

  “I guarantee you, I will.”

  “I like the sound of guarantees, but…” Headron drew in a long, deep breath and tamped down his hair again.

  Then he paced.

  Esteben got out of his way and let him.

  There was no way he’d be able to refrigerate all the dough, and the thought of so much food going to waste made his stomach turn. Too many people were starving on the planet for him to accept that all his hard work would get tossed into the garbage.

  “Trust me.” Esteben’s deep voice held an impatient edge. “I can sell it, and tomorrow, you’ll take the day off. You need to.”

  Headron stopped pacing.

  Esteben was leaning against the doorway, arms folded over his chest, expression neutral.

  “Bakers don’t take days off,” Headron said. “Not really.”

  “You will. You’ll rest.”

  “Because you say so?”

  Esteben pushed away from the door and stepped outside onto the path. “Yes. Prepare your wares. I’ll ask Trigrian to drive us.”

  He was gone before Headron could beg off, which was a good thing because he didn’t really want to. He was done with being overwhelmed all the time.

  And he was done with trying to wrest up any indignation over Esteben being far more dominant.

  Esteben had been right. Headron could lead if he found a more passive male to be his lover, but that wasn’t what Erin needed. Wasn’t what Headron needed, either. Being a strong second was better than being a first who was too often wary of offending people. He wouldn’t have Erin all to himself like he’d wanted, but at least she’d be well taken care of.

  Headron would be stupid to stymie a mate like Esteben on a planet where weakness was the norm. Headron had never let anyone call him stupid.

  ___

  “Park here,” Headron said to Trigrian. He pointed over the flyer’s pilot seat at the awning in front of the meet-shop. “I’ll run in.”

  Esteben immediately tapped the door release. “No. Stay here,” he said. “If there’s anyone around who’s hostile to Jekhans, I’ll be able to pass more easily in this low light. You’re darker.” He didn’t wait for an argument. He got out and jogged, not to the meet-shop like Headron had expected, but to the only restaurant in Little Gitano. The casual dive served an odd menu of Earth-style foods made of whatever meat and produce could be sourced locally. Sheep-goat cheese was apparently a crowd favorite.

  “What is he doing?” Headron mused quietly.

  He hadn’t meant for Trigrian to answer, but he did, anyway, as he tapped the window darkeners. “He’s always been one of the fastest thinkers I know. He’s like Murk that way. They know a lot about a lot of things. Occupational hazard, I suppose. Traders have to be intelligent about the worth of things, and if not the specific items, the materials they’re made of. Being good at what they do takes constant education.”

  And intensity.

  Headron couldn’t help his curiosity. If he were going to accede that Esteben was leading male, he wanted final assuagement he was doing so for the right reasons. “Does Murki not intimidate you?”

  “Intimidate?” Trigrian smiled and chuckled. “No. Perhaps I’ve known him too long. Do I feel stupid in his company occasionally? Yes, but he always does his best to remind me that we simply have educations in different things. I’m teaching him about farming, and he’s teaching me about art and economics. Personally, I find the art more stimulating.”

  “And…what about Courtney?”

  “What about her?”

  “I suppose I’m trying to understand the dynamics because your trio is atypical in so many ways.”

  “Are you asking for personal reasons?”

  Shall I lie?

  Headron peered into the dark toward the restaurant’s corner, not really expecting to catch a glimpse of Esteben, but staring anyway.

  The only people Headron had ever asked for advice about relationships were his uncle and Amy. He shouldn’t have been ashamed of needing guidance about being the subordinate male. Not everyone could be a leading male, but for too long, he’d assumed that he would be one.

  He swallowed and met Trigrian’s gaze. “Yes. For personal reasons. I imagine you’ve caught hints that there’s something happening between Erin, Esteben, and me. I’m just trying to understand what my role is so I don’t disappoint anyone.”

  “I heard. I wondered what would happen with you three, if anything.” Trigrian faced forward. “There’s no right or wrong. Not anymore.”

  “Is that good?”

  Trigrian winced
and drummed on the armrest situated at his right side. “Good for me and Murk, that’s all I can say. And Courtney? She just lets us ramble on and on. She’s developed the ability to sleep through most of our chatter. We don’t get offended, though we did at first. We didn’t know that human pregnant women have a tendency to nod off if they sit still for too long. She keeps saying she’ll be through with two children, but I doubt she’ll make good on the threat.”

  “Two is nowhere near enough.”

  “Especially not when you get to be my or Murk’s ages. If things had been as they were before the invasion, we might have already had two each.”

  “Assuming your woman hadn’t already left.”

  Trigrian grunted in obvious concession. “Courtney will stick. She’d never get any sleep, otherwise, without us there to drone on and on in bed.”

  “And she…loves you?” Headron hadn’t meant to make the words sound like a question, but confirmation couldn’t hurt. Assumptions could, though.

  “Courtney says she does, and I choose to believe her.”

  “How does that feel?”

  “How does what feel?”

  “Being in love with a woman.”

  “That’s an odd question.”

  Headron picked at the scab of a healing oven burn on his forearm and regretted even bringing up the subject. In hindsight, the question seemed infantile. Of course loving a woman was the same as loving a man. Erin was a person, not a pet, but Jekhans had become accustomed to accepting emotional detachment from their women. After all, his mother hadn’t loved him enough to keep him, and she wasn’t even so unique in what she’d done.

  When Headron was a teenager, he’d wondered if she’d regretted leaving. Some traveler had passed through Zone Seven in Buinet and stopped for a while at Spilled Milk. He’d met his mother and, learning the traveler was heading to Buinet, she’d told him many things about her son. The traveler told Headron that she wondered if he’d survived the flu that so often struck the zone, and also if looked more Jiro or Markel. She’d hoped Markel, because dark-eyed Markels looked less sad.

  Those tender queries weren’t the kinds of things women who didn’t care would share with a near stranger. They seemed more like what a woman who’d done the best she could at the time would speak. Headron hadn’t let himself dwell on wishful thinking, though. He’d let himself forget.

  He raked back a bit of hair over his right ear that always came loose from his knot, and forced a breath through his teeth. “Maybe it’s that way because we let it be.”

  “What is?” Trigrian asked.

  “Jekhan women. What if they behave the way they do because of custom and not necessarily because of biology? Not just as lovers, but mothers.”

  “Hmm. That’s been a theory of mine for ages. My mother adored my fathers. She didn’t live separately, and none of the women in the desert clans do, either.” Trigrian swiveled his seat around and raised an eyebrow at him. “You haven’t suddenly developed a fondness for native women over the Terran one you’ve been courting, have you?”

  “Erin’s mine.” Headron must have spoken the words with more venom than he’d intended, because Trigrian’s gentle smile fell away.

  Shit. He rubbed his eyes and slumped lower on the wide backseat.

  “You’ll have to pardon me.” What the hell is taking Esteben so long?

  Trigrian made a dismissive flicking gesture. “The reaction is expected when in discourse about one’s mate. I’m not offended.”

  “My mate. Yes,” Headron said. “She can’t not be that, can she? I’m already attached. I’m overly curious, I suppose. Perhaps I’ve been doing too much thinking about Jekh and the mess on it.”

  “Perhaps we all have. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. If women like Amy can find human mates they like enough, the couplings would help the gene pool, although I’m sure some unattached Jekhan males would disagree.”

  “Can we not play at the same game as the Terran men, though? They would sell our women off-planet on the premise that they’re exotic and desirable, so why can’t we bring theirs here for whatever men would want them? The only other option would be for them to attempt another trip to Earth to seek out mates for themselves.”

  “Which is less than prudent. Probably even less prudent than seeking out the other Tynealian hybrids to couple with. I doubt any of them would be as alluring as what we’re familiar with.”

  “Would they come?”

  “Who?”

  “Women from Earth. I think about people like my uncle, assuming he’s still alive. He doesn’t have anyone.”

  “He never had a trio?”

  “He did, shortly. The woman left, and his male partner was lost in the upheaval. They had no children, but he was content enough with me. He could make a home with some woman and be happy with her companionship, I think. Assuming that most Terran women are like those at the farm.”

  “I believe they are more so than not.”

  “He would be pleased to know there’s still some hope of happiness for him, then. Of course, there’s just the small matter of me finding him and then of managing to get women here from Earth.”

  “I don’t think the latter would be so difficult. I truly believe that given choice and incentive, many women would move to Jekh in search of new horizons, assuming the place was safe enough for them to do so.”

  “But how do we do that? How do we make that possible?”

  “As Court might say, worry about one problem at a time.” Trigrian turned to face the dashboard. He hit the climate control button and navigated through some menus until cool air hissed from the all-around vents. “Right now, your most pressing concern is solidifying your trio. Second—”

  “Finding my uncle.”

  “Precisely. If there’s any hope he’s alive, you should find him. Family is such an important part of a community, and that’s why I’ll never give up on my inquiries about my sisters. I want my children to know them. I think if your uncle fled with the group that left Buinet, he may be south of the city in that wilderness and out of the realm of communication. If you’re going to look anywhere, I suggest you start there once you’ve gathered enough intelligence about how the Terrans are policing that part of the region.”

  “I think Esteben would be able to find out. I don’t understand how he does what he does, but he’s worked with Owen to target messages to people who aren’t so easy to find, and they’ve actually responded.”

  Trigrian grunted. “Say what you will about the man, he does seem to have a deftness for getting what he wants.”

  “I hear that’s typical of Beshnis.”

  “At least the ones I know and knew. And speaking of Beshnis, here one comes.”

  “Finally,” Headron said, not bothering to disguise the hope in his voice. There was no point of pretending around Trigrian. The man knew too much about Beshnis and their addictive appeal.

  Headron craned his head and neck forward to see past the bit of window frame that blocked easy view of the restaurant.

  Esteben ran quickly across the boulevard, making a rolling gesture as he went.

  “What the hell happened?” Trigrian popped the door open, ostensibly so Esteben could enter quickly and so they could leave, but he didn’t get in.

  He leaned into the vehicle, and said, “Pull around to the back of the restaurant so we can unload quickly. They’re going to take all of it.”

  “All of it? Are you joking? Why?” Headron asked.

  Esteben scoffed and, before shutting the flap, said, “Because I told them they should.” He hurried back to the restaurant and Headron stared at the back of Trigrian’s head, dumbly, as Trigrian engaged the hover turbines.

  “I brought a lot of dough,” Headron muttered.

  “He’s a Beshni. He could probably sell a flower its own pollen.”

  “They’re truly all like that?”

  Trigrian didn’t answer immediately. He was concentrating on navigating the flyer around the corner
into the narrow alley behind the restaurant.

  Esteben waited at the back door along with the man who probably ran the place.

  “All of the Beshnis?” Trigrian set the flyer down and opened the back hatch. “All of the males of Murk and Esteben’s paternal line, yes. I gave up on trying to get my way with them. Clinging to Murk and letting him make decisions was just easier in the long run.”

  “You never resented him for that?”

  “Never.”

  “I never thought I’d be in this position.”

  That was all Headron could say until Esteben and the Terran man disappeared into the restaurant with their hand trucks full of vats of dough. They would only need a couple of minutes to unload, so Headron decided to get out all the words he could before they came back. He didn’t think he’d have another chance to seek Trigrian’s counsel on what bothered him.

  “As the subordinate male, I mean. Perhaps I never let myself believe this was an option. I never imagined I could be here.”

  “There’s a good chance that if you were considering anyone but Esteben, you wouldn’t be the subordinate.”

  “He said that. Amy believes the same. Should I be pacified by knowing that? I am not so sure, and Esteben didn’t seem to think I had the mettle to be leading male.”

  “Sometimes, you’ve got to listen to what a man is really saying through the pride in his words.”

  “I don’t know him as well as that.”

  “You will in time, if you want to. What are you so worried about? What other people think? The only person with an opinion that matters at all should be Erin.”

  Esteben and the Terran returned for more dough.

  Headron turned and peered into the cargo bay. Two more vats.

  “You made this?” The Terran man asked. “He said this is just a day’s work.”

  Headron rolled his eyes. “It’s something of a mania. Once I start, I figure what’s a little more?”

  “You make that sound like a bad thing.” The restaurateur carted off his load.

  Esteben hanged back, stacking the last of the trays more slowly, and smiling like a viper.

  “How much did you get?” Trigrian called back.

  “Same price I would have gotten had it been baked.”