Snowburn
Page 30
in Tyng’s good graces, you might mention
that to him.”
Her eyes are so intent, they should burn
like a laser. “Who are you?”
“No one you’d wanna know. And
definitely no one you’d wanna fuck. Strap in.
Gonna be a bumpy flight.” I knock the trip
plate with my elbow and slide through the
door when it opens. Lock it behind me. Erin-
the-Assassin does not get to go roaming
around my ship while we’re in flight.
I shake myself. Feel the stress of her
regard fall away. Then I go to tell my one in
a billion what I’ve learned.
Chapter 18
Kez has the ship warmed up and ready
for a vertical lift off. I check her settings,
which are perfect, and ignore her twitchy
curiosity for several minutes. Let the tension
build.
“Your sister needs to be in the
Cloudlands by midnight so she can kill
Kimpler,” I finally tell her when she looks
like she’s about to vibrate out of her chair.
“Wha-what?”
Too much. Too fast. I should have teased
her with it a little, fed it to her in bits and
pieces until she got there on her own. Guess
she wasn’t listening after all. “You were
right about Tyng testing his top dogs. Guess
Kincaid passed.” Must not have been an
asshole test. It’s only a temporary reprieve,
though, he’s dead the first chance I get.
“Erin’s going to the Cloudlands to take out
Kimpler.”
“She kills for him,” Kez says flatly.
“Erin-the-Assassin. You never heard of
her?”
“I have.” Kez hangs her head. “I just
didn’t put it together.”
Didn’t want to put it together is more like
it. Kez knows Kuseros’s underground too
well not to have heard of Erin. She just
didn’t want to admit that Tyng’s favorite hit-
girl is her sister.
“She says it’s a test. She’s got to prove
herself again. Tyng’s one angry bastard.”
Kez fiddles with a couple of controls that
don’t need fiddling with. “Because of Chiara
and Ape. We’re all going to end up paying
for his dick, aren’t we?”
Looks that way. “I gave her a warning to
give to Tyng.”
Kez looks up at me, blue eyes wide with
surprise. “You did what?”
“I told her to tell him I’d kill anyone to
keep you.”
“You threatened Tyng?”
“It’s not a threat.”
She shakes her head. “I thought we
agreed you weren’t going to kill Tyng.”
“No, we agreed you weren’t askin’ me to
kill Tyng. Different thing. If I decide to kill
Tyng because he’s threatened you, or ‘cause
he sent me that list, or ‘cause I just don’t
think much of his parenting skills, that’s my
call.”
Kez crosses her arms over her chest. I
don’t think she’s aware of it, but the gesture
pushes her breasts together and makes for a
nice view. Much nicer than Erin’s blatant
display. I have to keep a smile off my face.
“Do I get a say in this?” she asks. “It’s
my brother who’s made this mess, and it’s
my bargain with Tyng that put our asses on
the line.”
“Thought you understood when I showed
you that list.”
“I did. I do. This isn’t about that list. I
don’t want you to kill Tyng because of me. If
he threatens you – if he sent you that list and
he’s threatening you, okay, then, I understand
that. But I don’t want you to kill Tyng
because my brother has no common sense
when it comes to his dick. I don’t - I don’t
want you to have Tyng’s blood on your
hands. Not because of me.”
I hold up my hands, show her my palms.
“So much on here already, bit more won’t
make any difference.”
“It does to me.” She starts messing with
the controls again. “The whole time I’ve
been watching you, you haven’t killed
anyone. You’ve only had to kill since you
hooked up with me. I don’t want that. I want
there to be more between us.”
I flick the master plate so her control
panel goes dead. “Stop fucking with that. It
was perfect the way it was.” And so is she.
Has any other woman wanted there to be
more between us? If Marin had survived,
would she have wanted more? Don’t think
so. She’d have dumped me at the first
waystation and gotten back to her normal
life. Maybe I’d have gotten a farewell fuck.
Or maybe she’d have just strung me along
until we got some place she could disappear.
Either way, she would not have wanted
more. “You don’t have to convince me about
your motives, kitten. I know they’re pure.”
She scratches at her dreads. Looks
sweetly uncertain. “You do?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“But you said—”
“I know what I said. Your hysterics
convinced me otherwise.”
Her little jaw juts. “I did not have
hysterics.”
“Tears. Snot. Seemed like hysterics to
me.” I chuckle at her huff. Switch her
console back on. “Impress me, kitten. You do
the takeoff. If you can do it without any help,
I’ll spend the rest of the flight thinkin’ of a
way to resolve this that don’t involve my
blade and Tyng’s throat.”
“Swear?”
She doesn’t hold out her pinkie, so I offer
her mine, which she hooks and shakes. And
then she does a perfect vertical lift off
without even looking at me for reassurance.
Guess I’d better come up with a way to
fix this without killing Tyng.
She lets me think. I check her course from
time to time. Correct a couple of mistakes
that are more a result of inexperience than
anything else. But the rest of the time I let her
fly on her own. She’s a natural, and she
clearly loves flying. Her eyes are alight;
she’s smiling; she doesn’t mention Erin once.
I factor making her my co-pilot permanently
into my equations. Running’s given her a
great ass and nice legs, but it’s also gotten
her the scars on her back and thigh, and
Kincaid’s dick in her mouth. Time for her to
do something else. Something safer.
An hour of thinking doesn’t get me any
closer to a plan that doesn’t involve killing
Tyng. Part of the problem is that I don’t
know much about the man himself, although I
know a decent amount about his organization.
None of it immediately useful. Another part
of the problem is that, deep down, I want to
kill him. Anyone that threatens what’s mine
dies. It should be that simple
. But this time
it’s not, and that’s knotting my brain.
“Other than being a scary bastard, what’s
Tyng like?” I ask Kez.
She starts. We’ve both been silent for a
long time. One of the many things I like about
Kez is that she can just share silence with
me.
“Um, Chiara doesn’t talk about him much.
I gather he wasn’t around a lot when she was
little. She was raised by nanny-bots.”
“Too busy building his empire to spend
any time with his kids, huh?”
“Uh-huh. And then for the last few years
he’s been sick, so she hasn’t seen much of
him.”
If I had any hair on the back of my neck, it
would stand up. “Sick with what?”
“I’m not really sure. I never heard
anything about it. Chi just mentioned that he
was always off to Metphos.”
Metphos. One of the Vespers’ very
exclusive medical orbitals. “Think she
knows what he has?”
“She’s never said if she does. Like I said,
they aren’t close.”
“An’ he may have been keepin’ it a
secret.” I would in his position. Any illness
would make him look weak.
Kez nods.
I unstrap myself from the pilot’s chair.
“You want some yokan?”
“Yes.” Kez tears her attention away from
the flight console long enough to raise a
suspicious eyebrow. “Are you going to ask
my sister about Tyng?”
“Could be. But I’m also gonna get some
yokan. The recycler shoulda restocked itself
by now.”
Kez grimaces. “Don’t let her get her
claws into you. She’s fucking toxic.”
I lean over and press a kiss onto her fuzzy
crown. “I got that. Don’t worry about me,
kitten. Keep your mind on flying the plane.”
Kez rolls her eyes. I chuckle and slip out
of the cockpit.
Erin’s working on a palmtop when I enter
the lounge. I ignore her and head straight to
the recycler. Let my back pique her interest.
The ploy works and after a moment, she
joins me at the recycler. “Is that real
pineapple?” she asks.
Guess she shares her sister’s sweet tooth.
“Flashed, but, yeah, it’s real.” I tap the
panel and hold out my palm for the packet.
Hand it to her. She curls her fingertips across
the back of my hand as she takes the packet
with thumb and first finger. She doesn’t miss
an opportunity for a come-on.
I get myself some protein jerky and four
packets of yokan, two of which I slide into a
pocket for Kez. Then I sit down in an empty
flight cradle across from Erin. Same one Ape
was snoring in not so long ago. I tear open a
packet and chew a strip of jerky while I
watch Erin.
She doesn’t like being watched.
Predators don’t. She gets twitchy after just a
few seconds. Begins shifting around in her
cradle. Crossing and uncrossing her legs.
Fiddling with her hair and bustier. Finally,
she starts talking.
“So you and Kez had a long heart-to-
heart. Did she tell you all about me?”
“Nope. Didn’t talk about you much at
all.” I let that sink in for a moment; burst her
ego-bubble. “Whatever’s between you and
your sister’s got nothing to do with me.”
Although I imagine I’ll be hearing about it
later, if Kez and I survive this. “Somethin’ I
wanted to ask you. You said one way or the
other, Kez is Tyng’s. I figure one way he gets
his revenge is he ganks her. What’s the
other?”
Erin chews her pineapple slowly. Lets
the tip of her tongue peek between those red,
red lips after she swallows. “Why should I
tell you?”
“Why not?” I shrug like it doesn’t matter.
“Oh, no, not this time. You want
information from me, this time we deal.”
Yeah, I figured this was coming. “Okay.
You tell me what I want to know and I’ll
give you that fuck you’ve been angling for.”
Erin lifts one finely-arched eyebrow.
“Really?”
“No, not really.” I grin at her expression.
“C’mon, you know I’m with Kez, and you’re
not really interested. You’re just trying to
piss your sister off by comin’ on to me.
Move on to the next thing. What d’you
want?”
“You’re very observant, Mister
Whatever-your-real-name-is.”
“That what you want? My real name?
Your boss already knows. Why don’t you ask
him?”
“Kison isn’t speaking to me at the
moment. As I already told you. Try to keep
up.” Now that she’s not trying to play me, the
teeth and claws appear.
And she didn’t tell me Tyng wasn’t
speaking to her. Just that she had to prove
herself to him again. Interesting. “You’re
still stallin’. What do you want?”
“Maybe I want that fuck. What would you
say to that?”
I chuckle. “I’d say ‘no.’ You’d be doin’ it
to hurt your sister, not ‘cause you want to be
with me, so I wouldn’t enjoy it. And no
matter what my reasons, doin’ it would hurt
your sister, so I wouldn’t enjoy it. Either
way, I wouldn’t enjoy it.”
“I think I could promise you that you
would.” But she’s not pouting, or simpering,
or flopping out her tits. She’s just saying it to
salve her ego. “At any rate, you do have
other things to offer.” She stretches and runs
her hands across the padding of the cradles
on either side of her. “This nice little ship,
for example.”
I shrug. “It’s yours.” I can steal another
one. Or buy one legitimately through Kez. I
like that idea; it would sever the last
connection between me and the original
Sandringham Snow, and make Kez feel even
more like my partner. “I’ll give you the
master key when we get to the Cloudlands.”
“And register the transfer with the
I.O.R.?”
I snort. “This is a smuggler’s ship. You
think I registered her with an interplanetary
authority?”
“Ah, that’s a shame.” She lifts one well-
toned shoulder. “Not as valuable as I
thought. And you were willing to give it up
without an argument. Maybe it’s not very
valuable at all.”
“She. If you’re gonna own a spaceship,
you gotta talk the talk,” I say, spacing out my
words so she feels the insult. She knows as
little about ships as her sister, and I make
sure she knows it. “‘Course there’s another
she to consider here. Your sister. I already
told you, I’ll kill anyone to keep her. You
think
givin’ up my ship compares to that?
Who’s not keepin’ up?”
Erin’s eyes narrow and go almost as feral
as her smile. “I think you were right about
something, Sandringham. You wouldn’t
enjoy it. Not for very long at any rate.” She
taps her fingernails against the cradle
padding. White on white. “Okay, you have a
deal. I’ll answer your question and you give
me your ship.”
“Get real, sister. You’ll tell me
everything I want to know. About Tyng.
About his operations. About where you took
your last dump if I ask. You answer every
question completely. You hold not one
fuckin’ thing back. And then you can have my
ship.”
She sniggers. “Or what?”
“Or we play who’s the better assassin.” I
flick the throwing knife I’ve been working
out of my wrist sheath while I’ve been
talking at her. It sinks into the cradle’s
padding between her middle and ring fingers
with a satisfying thock.
She doesn’t jerk her hand away. Doesn’t
jump or scream. She goes very still, and
stares at me very hard. I’ve gotten her full
attention again. “I want your real name.”
I shake my head. “Not part of the bargain.
Ask Tyng, if he starts speaking to you again.”
“Does Kez know it?”
I don’t see any reason not to tell her the
truth. “Yeah.”
“Then I want to know. Or I won’t tell you
dick.”
“You can call me Manny.” One of my
many nicknames in S.A.W.L. She won’t
figure out shit from that. “That’s as much as
you’re gettin’. Talk.”
“Manny. Hmm.” She sits back in the
cradle, pulls my shiv out of the cushion, and
starts cleaning her nails with it. “Kison hates
waste. Killing Kez would give him his
revenge, but it would be a waste of talent.
Everyone knows she’s the best runner on
Kuseros.”
Is she? I didn’t know that; I hadn’t heard
of her. But I haven’t been on Kuseros all that
long, and my business is pretty strictly air. I
don’t cross paths with runners often. That
encounter a couple of months back which
made such an impression on Kez must be one
of a handful of times I’ve even met one. “So
maiming her is outta the question.”
I don’t know how much of a sadist Tyng
is, but in some ways, crippling Kez would be
worse than killing her. Both Ape and Kez
would have to live with it if she were
crippled.
Erin twists the tip of my shiv around