He carefully placed it on the railing as the four men surrounded him to examine the controls.
“I’ve checked the cooling system. Everything is set. You shouldn’t have to do anything, but there is a manual tucked into this little compartment here. If for any reason the battery runs out, there is a back-up battery. You can engage it by flipping this switch here.”
Forrest opened another little compartment to reveal a secret little red lever.
“If you have any questions, call up to Reese and I’ll get on the communicator and talk you through fixing it, but really, you shouldn’t have any issues. Oooh, one last thing… this thing is fragile. It’s not meant to be jostled about. Be gentle.”
The four men about to leave the safety of the ship exchanged glances. Gentle was not their strong suit.
“We will,” Calen said at last as he held out an empty backpack.
Forrest rolled his eyes as he carefully lowered the electronic box into the backpack. Calen zipped it up and slung it gently onto his shoulders, tightening the straps and clicking the horizontal straps into place. The four men moved into the airlock and Forrest shut the door behind them. At last, the small room pressurized and they stepped out into the port.
Jack took a deep breath. The embryos were no longer within the safety of the ship, and it was up to four unarmed men to keep them safe for forty-eight hours. What could possibly go wrong?
Chapter Fifteen
Bit paced up and down the short length of their room, getting in Oden’s way as he slouched on the couch, watching the faded image on the outdated T.V. Though she had taken half a pain killer and it had taken the edge off the stabbing pain in her ribs, she didn’t want to relax on the sinking couch. She was too anxious to simply sit and watch T.V., even if it was still a special treat to her. As an indentured servant she was never allowed the luxury of just sitting and watching.
“Oh my gosh, Bit,” Oden snapped as she once again paced in between him and the screen. “Just sit down.”
“How can you just watch television?” she demanded, turning back to look at him, his long legs stretching into her walkway.
Oden switched off the T.V. and turned to look at her. “I know it sucks to just sit and do nothing, but sadly that’s the card we drew in this game. All we get to do until we go back to the ship is ‘sit and do absolutely nothing’. And if watching inane sit-coms is what I have to do to keep you safe, than that’s what I’m going to do.”
Oden flicked the T.V. back on and slumped into the deep couch, a glare etched into his features.
Bit threw up her arms, instantly regretting the gesture. She hissed as she carefully pulled one arm down and wrapped it around her ribs. Oden was up in an instant, his hands outstretched as though he wanted to comfort her but didn’t know how.
She pulled away before he could touch her and glared up at him. “We can’t just sit here for two days.”
“That is exactly what we’re going to do. Besides, it’s not like my contact would say anything to me, even if she knows something.”
Oden froze, his lips thinning as he stared down at Bit.
“Your contact? You have contacts?” she asked.
“One… maybe two. They won’t say anything. They won’t risk their jobs.”
“How do you know unless we ask? What do they know? Who are they? Why didn’t you mention this to Jack?”
Oden tried to wave her off. “They’re just some friends of mine from my school days. They… um… come in contact with some of the higher-up guys in Mars Genetics Consortium, but they won’t say anything if it risks their jobs.”
“They work for the consortium? Maybe they could get someone to receive the embryos early!”
“No. They don’t work for MGC.”
“But you said…”
“I said they come in contact with leaders of MGC. They don’t work for them. They work for a different company.”
“Who do they work for?” asked Bit, feeling confused.
“They work for… they work for a different company. It doesn’t matter. Trust me. They won’t risk their position.”
“I don’t understand. How could they know something if they don’t work for MGC.”
Oden let out a long-suffering sigh. “Bit, just drop it.”
“No. If we can find something out… figure out why these guys are hunting our crew… then we have to do it. Or at the very least tell Jack about it. Maybe he could go talk to these friends of yours.”
“They wouldn’t talk to Jack.”
“Then we need to go to them and see what they know.”
“I told you before,” Oden growled, “I’m not risking your life. Our job is to lay low and keep you safe to see if our enemies are going after you or the embryos.”
“We can test that theory so long as we stay away from Jack. Are your contacts near where Jack and the others will be?”
“No, they work in the pleasure district.”
Light twinkled in Bit’s eyes. She worked to hide her excitement, afraid Oden would see it. He eyed her.
“Okay, so what’s the harm in just going and asking them? If they say no,” she shrugged, “then we just come back here and wait it out, just like you said.”
“Bit, the pleasure distract is all the way across town. It takes at least an hour on the train just to get there, plus finding The Carnal Cave strip club, then the ride back…”
“What’s a strip club?”
“Um…” Oden glanced at the door, as though someone might interrupt their conversation. “It’s not important. The point is we would be out half the night just to do this, and the night isn’t safe, especially getting back into this neighborhood late. We’re staying put.”
“Then we’ll go in the morning.”
“They work nights.”
Bit shrugged. “We can’t just do nothing.”
“Nothing is exactly what we’re going to do.”
Bit looked around the room, trying her best to not look as though she was giving up too easily. “Couldn’t we just…”
“No!”
“Fine,” she snapped back before stomping over to the couch and sitting down.
Oden joined her and turned the sound up on the T.V. Bit glared at him, even if she did want to smile. She couldn’t let him know a plan was forming in her mind. A few minutes passed without either of them speaking, the noise of the T.V. drowning out the continual thrum of the music coming from the club.
“We need to go to a comm.-for-hire and contact the ship.”
“Can’t I just stay here?” she asked, her chance presenting itself earlier than she was expecting.
“Nice try. No. Not leaving you here with Logan and his guys.”
“I thought you said this place was safe.”
“It is. They won’t do anything, but they’ll flirt like crazy if they know you’re alone.”
Bit cringed at the thought and climbed to her feet. They left the privacy of the staff housing and emerged back into the enormous warehouse, the music blaring over the sounds of the crowd as they cheered on another set of fighters. Oden took her arm and led her through the crowd. Bit wrapped her free arm around her throbbing ribs and worked to keep her breathing even.
Her panic was just about to send her over the edge when they emerged from the throng out onto the cooler street. The crowd was hardly lighter, but the bodies shifted as they worked their way to their destination and no one shouted for someone to punch another crowd member. Over all, the atmosphere of the mob on the street held no comparison to that within the club.
Oden led her down the street, cutting across to angle down a main thoroughfare. Finally, he saw what he was looking for. They dodged through the night-time traffic, crossing four lanes of traffic, and stopped at a tall, blue box with a door. He opened the door and ushered her in. With him inside too, there was barely enough space for both their bodies. Bit pressed herself against the far wall, cringing at the pain in her ribs. Oden smiled at her effort to avoid him an
d tried to leave her as much space as he could as he worked the controls on the communicator.
After a few seconds, Bit eased off the wall, unable to stand the pain. Her chest pressed against Oden’s arm. He glanced at her as they waited for the connection and wrapped his arm around her shoulder, freeing more space in their cramped quarters.
The screen on the communicator snapped into haze before an image came into focus. Reese sat in the pilot’s chair grinning at them.
“Better not get too comfortable,” Oden said with a mock growl.
“You too,” replied Reese, his eyes going to Oden’s arm.
“Is Blaine okay? Did he freak out when he woke up and I was gone?” asked Bit.
“Strangely enough, he didn’t. Cap told him you left with Oden and he was totally chill about it. Like, sad that he couldn’t be the one to go down to the surface with you, but all like ‘I get your logic’. It was like he was the old Blaine again. Super freaky.”
Bit glanced up at Oden with a frown. He returned the expression and she noticed how light his hazel eyes were in the dim light. The discovery unnerved her and so she turned her attention back on Reese. The security officer was grinning at them, his smile spreading from ear to ear.
“Right, well we’re checking in, as ordered,” Oden said, breaking the awkward silence.
“Noted.”
“And don’t get too comfortable in that chair,” Oden added.
“I’m just keeping it warm for Calen,” Reese replied, reminding Oden that he was technically the ship’s secondary pilot.
Oden gave him a playful glare before switching off the comm. and pulling out his payment card. “Let’s get out of here.”
They returned to the club just as the rain began to fall, slipping into the staff quarters without anyone the wiser. Upon their return they found a neatly folded stack of sheets and blankets, along with two pillows, placed at the end of the couch. Oden immediately went to work transforming the drooping couch into a make-shift bed. Bit glanced around, wondering where she was going to sleep. The floor didn’t exactly look clean, but she had made worse beds before. She grabbed one of the pillows, certain Oden wouldn’t insist upon using them both and went to the corner.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Oden asked.
“I… uh…”
Oden grabbed her arm and gently forced her to turn to look at him. “Do you trust me?”
“What? Yes. Of course.”
“Do you trust that I’m not trying to get into your pants?”
“Huh?”
“Do you trust that…”
She waved him off. “Yes, of course.”
“I know this will make you uncomfortable, but come share the couch and get a good night’s sleep.”
Bit’s eyes shifted to the couch of their own accord. The very idea of sharing the space made her heart race, but Oden was right. With her broken ribs she might be more comfortable on the couch than on the cold, hard floor. Finally, she nodded.
“C’mon. You in first,” he said, nudging her gently toward the couch.
“Me first?” she asked, trying her best to hide her shock and disappointment.
“I have an idea. I think it will be more comfortable on your ribs. Just try it. Lay on your side.”
Oden took her pillow and plopped it down next to his. She stripped out of her jacket and boots, collapsed on her side with a grimace. Oden found her pills and gave her another one. Silently, Bit calculated the hours to when she wanted to wake up. It wasn’t that long, but she couldn’t think of an excuse not to take the pain med, not the mention the fact her ribs were on fire. She took the pill and the water bottle he offered, taking it quickly and settling back into the thin cushions of the couch.
The pilot sat down next to her, removing his own boots. He reached for his shirt, as though he intended to take it off, and stopped. He glanced back at her before slowly lowering himself onto the couch, pulling the blankets over them and scooting to the edge of their confined space.
“You can use my back to support your ribs,” he said into his pillow as he reached up to turn off the light.
Bit squeezed her eyes shut, willing herself not to panic.
It’s Oden, she told herself over and over again. Of all the crew members, she trusted and respected Oden the most, maybe even more than the captain.
Why, then, am I so scared? she wondered as she forced her body to relax against his back.
His body was warm and firm, and the more she relaxed against his solid back, the more it supported her battered frame. He was right. His warmth spread across her body, along with the medication, and she drifted away into dreamland, determined to wake up early in the morning.
How she was going to get past his blockade she would worry about later.
Chapter Sixteen
Calen adjusted the straps of the pack once again. At first the weight of the portable embryo freezer hadn’t seemed overly heavy, but as the hours dragged on, and the corners jabbed into his kidneys, the worse it seemed. Thus far, no one had seemed inclined to take the precious pack. Calen wasn’t certain if it was caused by fear of the prized item or exhaustion on their own part. He had to remind himself that the other three men were carrying his own gear spread out among their three backpacks.
But their backpacks don’t have sharp corners, he grumbled to himself as he waited with Blaine out in the alley behind the hotel, the gray clouds beginning to dump their load on the waiting city, washing away the worst of the fish smell. It had been a long evening of wandering the dark streets of the city. Randal and Blaine had gone on high alert when they had thought they were being followed. It had turned out to be a worker from the port just taking the same transport and train, living in a similar neighborhood as the hotel they had intended on staying at. All the same, Randal and Blaine had insisted on using their secondary hotel choice and weaving through half the city just to be extra safe.
Calen’s feet ached as they waited in the redolent alley. What is taking so long? The whole district smelled of fish and salt water. Why couldn’t Jack and Randal pick something other than the fishing district?
A minute or two later, Jack and Randal appeared, gesturing for them to approach. They left the alley and headed up the exterior stairs of the hotel, slipping in through a backdoor by way of their new keycard.
“They had one room left with two queen beds,” Randal said in a hushed tone as Jack led them down a gloomy hallway, stopping at a door and inserting the card into the lock.
It clicked and he swung the door open, quickly flicking on the lights. Blaine and Randal moved first, entering the room cautiously, as though a maid might be waiting to attack them with window cleaner.
Calen rolled his eyes as he waited outside in the deserted hallway. At last, Randal motioned for him and Jack to enter. He obeyed and shut the door. Blaine was already at the window, examining their view.
“We have a clear view of the entire parking lot,” Blaine announced.
“But only one exit,” Randal countered.
“Always the case in a hotel,” agreed Blaine.
Calen ignored them and went to work on the straps of the pack. He turned around, resting the weight on the table before he slipped out of the straps, heaving a sigh of relief at the release.
“Now what?” asked Calen.
The men glanced around the snug quarters before their eyes drifted to Jack.
“We wait here until it’s time to make the delivery on Tuesday,” he said.
“Forty-eight hours in a hotel with three men,” Calen said with another sigh as he sat on the edge of the bed.
“Kinda wish I was Oden right about now,” Randal said, surprising them all.
“Me too,” they all said with a smirk, including a perfectly lucid Blaine.
“Lucky bastard,” grumbled Jack.
They sat in grumpy silence for a few minutes before Jack removed his pack and heaved himself back to his feet. “I better go make my check-in call with the ship.”
“Want me to come?” offered Blaine.
“Better take one of us,” said Randal.
Jack took Blaine and Randal confiscated the only shower.
Within just a few minutes they returned, a wide smile spread across Jack’s lips.
Calen glanced at Blaine. The security officer did not seem to share his captain’s mirth.
“What happened?” the pilot asked.
“Oh, Reese just said Bit and Oden were getting along quite well,” Jack said with a little chuckle.
“It doesn’t matter,” Blaine replied with a normal level of annoyance. “I have faith I will win her over in the end.”
Calen’s eyes rose on his face. “You didn’t see your last freak out.”
“True, but I’m sure she will forgive me for whatever I did.”
Calen and Jack didn’t respond.
Nathyn took a deep breath, willing himself not to smack Debby in the face. He had never hit a woman before, and he intended to keep his reputation intact, but Debby was pushing his patience to the breaking point. Every step of the way she had complained—about how he carried her luggage, about where they stopped for a bite of food on the surface, about the dingy motel they stopped at in the agriculture district, about how he could never live up to Jack’s reputation, about how he didn’t talk enough, about how he talked too much, and the list went on.
“We can’t stay here. Why can’t we go to my mother’s place?” she demanded.
“If those men come after us, do you really want to lead them right to your mother?” he asked her without inflection.
If he allowed any emotion into his voice, he would start to scream, and if he screamed he would slap her right across the cheek.
Debby hesitated a second before waltzing into the small motel room. She glanced around, finally taking in the one bed and the fact he had not left her room.
“And where is your room?”
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