Liberation's Vow (Robotics Faction #3)

by Wendy Lynn Clark

  Darvin looked at his brother’s empty chair. He whipped to his associates, who were forced to reveal themselves as they shifted uncomfortably, reluctantly, and finally faltered, coughed, and half offered to second the accusation. Aris studied each one hard. Their allegiances weren’t unknown to him; although his position had been illegally appointed, he had earned the respect of his family and governed popularly. They were elected and would already be composing justifications to their constituents. Popular opinions mattered.

  He held up his hands. “While all districts revise their data for an independent review, I will submit to a skin sample test.”

  “Why should we take orders from an imposter?” his cousin demanded, derisive.

  “Because—”

  “Get down, fake!” Darvin strutted across the wide table, all too eager to assume control. He pointed at the department heads nearest Aris. “You there, grab him. Shut him up. He’s insulting our proceedings.”

  Aris gripped Darvin’s supporters in his iron gaze. Their halfhearted rising immediately wilted, and the resulting chaos abated.

  “I said because, Cousin Darvin, the truth must be investigated until no doubt shadows these proceedings and the worthy candidates gathered here. As I submit to my review,” he rolled up his sleeve and flexed, “so will the rest of the districts undergo their own.”

  The besmeared data reporters hurriedly called back to their offices, summoning data and organizing presentations, while a medical team assembled to test his genetics.

  Perhaps, if everyone worked quickly and in tandem to the truth, he could still promote candidates today—

  “You can’t take the sample from his arm.” Darvin climbed down from the table, coolly reorganized. “He could be wearing a false identification patch.”

  The med-tech paused, swab in hand.

  Fuck.

  Darvin grabbed the med tech’s swab. “You need a fresh sample. One that can’t be faked or implanted.”

  “Sir,” the med-tech reasoned, “I think a saliva sample—”

  “Could be faked.” Darvin sneered down at Aris’ belt. “Give us a fresh sample of genetic material, right here, in front of everyone. Or we’ll know you’re an imposter.”

  Out of all of the hundreds of thousands of methods his cousin had attempted to unman him, this reached a new low.

  The other department heads whitened. The med-techs looked at each other. The audience waited, awed silent.

  Aris had given a lot to this position over the years. His body, his first choice of career, his trust in the innate goodness of others. His cousin’s cruel challenge left him only one choice.

  A large smile broke across his face. He clapped his cousin on the shoulder.

  The other man flinched and oozed away from the contact, his disgusted face indicating his soon attempt to get away. “I’m not jok—”

  “I regret that, although we are cousins, you are one of the few in this room who have not been gifted with a view of my magnificence.”

  The department heads froze, some eyes wide, others disapproving. The audience tittered.

  Darvin felt the popular vote slipping away from him. He grasped for it. “Because of your poor upbringing.”

  Aris and his audience ignored the weasel. “Let’s rectify that right now.”

  He undid his belt. His new robes, recognizing his actions as disrobing, loosened and slipped off his shoulders, baring his well-maintained chest to an avidly interested audience.

  “Of course, you will join me,” he told Darvin. “Since it was your idea.”

  Darvin’s eyes narrowed. His audience had fully turned away from his machinations. They were now caught up in the spirit of the scheme he had introduced.

  “Of course.” He also disrobed, displaying the similar confidence of a man who had devoted time and resources into beautifying his body.

  Aris opened his arms to their audience. “Will anyone else show their support for my leadership by disrobing and providing a public DNA sample?”

  Chapter Seven

  The performance reviews devolved from an official ceremony that decided people’s lives to a hedonistic spectacle of nakedness and orgy.

  With Aris, of course, right in the center.

  Her secretary cohort correctly and efficiently recorded the writhing for posterity. Discussion of the forged statistics stopped, promotions paused, and they tabled the topic for a week to investigate all charges. It was a disaster, an outcome Aris had expressly wished to avoid, and yet no expression of regret crossed his sloppily satisfied face as they returned to the governor’s mansion.

  Although his behavior disgusted her, she couldn’t entirely hate him. He risked everything to stop an unfair practice. And that made him just a little bit honorable.

  “Now,” he ushered her into his private apartments and stretched, “I must prepare for the next attempt to kill me.”

  She did not look at his powerful outline straining the fabric of his robes. The wide shoulders and rippling biceps, strong enough to lift her in his arms. The narrow hips, perfect for fitting between her legs while she held on to him. The thick muscled thighs, giving him the stamina to last until the sweat dripped from their skin and slicked between them. She didn’t have to look. The image burned into her memory, hot and sweet.

  “How do you prepare?”

  “I wait for them to strike.”

  “So, nothing different from before.”

  “The difference,” he lifted a glass to fill with wine, “is that they know I am aware of them. And so are many more people. Justice depends first on revealing the crime, and second on the aware parties acting upon it.” He seemed about to say more, then stopped himself and offered her wine.

  She refused it. Why did her cheeks continue to heat as though she felt an emotion from his continual solicitude? She didn’t feel anything. She didn’t, she didn’t, she didn’t.

  While she fought with her emotion, her robot took over. “You are referring to the people who ignored the crime against your two half sisters. Cressida and Mercury.”

  He lowered the wine.

  “Cressida was targeted fourteen years ago by the rogue agent you are trying to protect. And your family, once made aware of the threat, did nothing.”

  “Denial isn’t true awareness.”

  “Isn’t it?”

  His frown tinged with that genuine concern for her, a true desire to give comfort and ease pain. He reached out to stroke her cheek.

  She jerked her face away.

  “And the lady rogue had her reasons for erasing my sisters’ restore points.” He left his hand hanging in midair, and then curled it around his wine glass. “They can always record another. Shooting them in the head feels more invasive.”

  “The rogue started it.”

  “And your Faction is trying to finish the work.” He tilted his head. “Why is your Faction trying to kill us? Do you know?”

  Honestly, she didn’t. And if her robot knew, it wasn’t revealing the reason to him. Nor to her.

  Out of curiosity for what he would get her robot to reveal, she allowed her robot to continue questioning him. “Why did you allow the rogue to destroy your restore point?”

  “She did it on her own. I didn’t ‘allow’ her anything.”

  “You are working together.”

  “She made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

  “Which was?”

  “I told you already. A video chat.”

  “What does that mean?”

  He smiled without answer.

  “A blithe answer about ‘reasons’ from a known criminal satisfies you? If your rivals succeed in murdering you, you won’t simply wake up in a few weeks as if from a long nap. You’ll be permanently dead.”

  “I would sacrifice myself on any altar to protect my family.” He swirled his wine, studying its color. “The altar of failure, the altar of humiliation, the altar of death. If that is what is required to put things right.”

  His reso
lution shook her. He sounded so noble, just like her brother, and willing to sacrifice anything in just the same way.

  Don’t fall under his spell.

  No. She jerked away from her memory of respect and spat her words. “Shall I paint the target on your back, or are you leaving it up to your rivals?”

  He stepped into her space. “Resa, Resa, Resa.”

  Every word touched her like a smooth caress, sliding across her bare skin, hooking into her heart.

  No. She felt nothing, and she stood her ground to prove it. “Yes?”

  “We are the same brand of ruthless.” He moved a lock of hair gently away from her face, almost but not quite touching her sensitive skin. “When the time comes, I expect you will be the one standing over me, pulling the trigger.”

  As a robot, she shouldn’t care about whether a human touched her any more than she should care about a carpet or a wall. But she did. His gaze transfixed her. Sensations whirled away, evoked by the soothing touch.

  “Good,” he said quietly.

  She jerked back. “I feel nothing.”

  Something passed over his face. Sympathy, quiet understanding for a sharpness that she didn’t understand herself.

  He patted her back. “Sure.”

  She did not feel his hand, like a white-hot brand, seeping heat into her back. Leaping to her feet, she backed away.

  He rolled over on the couch and pillowed his hands under his head. “I’m having an early night. You should rest too. Tomorrow could change everything.”

  Yes. Tomorrow could change everything. Or today, or anytime.

  She left him resting on his couch to start her night patrols, and stopped first by the security booth. Nothing had pinged her remote sensors, so nothing should be out of the ordinary—

  All of the settings had been flipped back to the Robotics Faction.

  A deep quake roared in her belly.

  No.

  Impossible.

  She had coded it perfectly. The metal trap couldn’t be opened. Not by anyone except herself—

  A delivery alarm chimed throughout Aris’s private rooms. Resa saw on his private security monitor that he rolled over, a hand on his face, to ask what important item had been delivered. The answer had him rolling to his feet wearily and transforming into a public servant once again.

  So, her investigation into who had broken her security went on hold, and she headed directly back to his room.

  A troupe of courtesans spilled into his public bedroom in low-cut robes and high-gloss makeup.

  “Gifts of entertainment,” one bowed, “from your loving cousin Darvin.”

  Exhaustion blackened the edges of Aris’s eyes.

  Then, his great public smile chased it away. He opened his arms wide. “How could I refuse a delightful present from my loving cousin? Please, make yourselves comfortable and do as you wish.”

  They unfolded instruments and gowns, little tables and beautiful vases. Aris leaned back on his couch, making no pretense of staying awake. He entrusted her completely with his safety. Courtesans snuggled up to his sides.

  A blue box of special nanobots worked magic on the performers and their accoutrements. Confections distilled from the very air; flowers cycled from rose to tulip to orchid; gold and silver dishes ever-filled and goblets overflowed. Their excesses disappeared before they could touch the floor, ripped apart at the molecular level like so many petals from a dead flower.

  Resa retreated to her shadowed window seat and studied the performers.

  Coercion forced their movements. One woman even snarled, not aloud, but in the microexpressions crossing her face whenever she looked at Aris.

  She was the dangerous one.

  After a sinuous dance, she concealed her snarl in a faceful of scented powder and secreted a candy in her palm. Fear and loathing crossed her face. Then, calm. She carried the candy to Aris.

  “Is this seat taken?” She tumbled into his lap with a giggle.

  Aris easily caught the lithe dancer. “For you, of course it’s open.” He scooted forward on the seat as if to rise and give her the couch.

  The courtesans on either side twined around his arms. The dancer gripped his thighs with hers, straddling his lap.

  He stopped.

  “What are you doing?” he flirted. His eyes looked past her, at Resa.

  She curled her fingers into his hair. “Playing.”

  He laughed. Empty and calculating. Was Resa the only one who heard it? The others laughed with his false sound. “There are no toys.”

  “Don’t worry.” She put the candy between her teeth. “I’m sweet.”

  She moved forward to kiss him with the candy.

  Resa stood to intervene.

  But Aris moved first.

  His amusement hardened. He pushed the woman back, keeping her at arm’s length. “I prefer tart.”

  “It’s rainbow candy.” She struggled to regain her embrace. “It can be any flavor you—”

  “Sorry.” He stood, helped her to her feet, and set her off of him. “I need a real meal.”

  “Um, well.” She almost stomped her foot as he turned his back on her, neatly avoiding the confrontation. She spit the poisoned candy into a wine glass and wiped her mouth. “Which of us does suit your taste?”

  He stopped.

  The music tinkled on, but the rest of the party watched him.

  He turned back. Resolution filled his features.

  He enfolded his would-be poisoner’s shaking hands in his much larger ones. “I couldn’t insult such a wonderful feast. You are all beautiful, very much to my taste. But my palate craves only one flavor.” He pointed at Resa. “Hers.”

  Strange electricity tingled over Resa’s skin. She rubbed down the hairs pulling up her arms. Damn his careless words that meant so little to him and so much to her. He used her as an excuse to diffuse a deadly situation, distracting the performers and circumventing their plans. She summoned the impassivity of her robot. Coolness masked over her feelings and gave her a safe, numb harbor in which to rest.

  The woman took a moment to find Resa, as though the gray secretarial suit hid her as much in these white walls as they had within the gray ones. “Your… secretary?”

  “And newfound love.”

  The woman blinked. Relief mixed with fear. “She doesn’t mind sharing.”

  “She very much minds.” He patted the woman’s hands as though comforting her. “I can’t kiss another. I’ll wake up with a knife in my back. That is why,” he addressed the rest of the troupe, “you must eat, drink, and enjoy yourselves here, on my behalf.”

  He placed the surprised woman’s hands into the care of another performer. “Music? Very good. I want all of you to enjoy a plate and a good evening. Play on.”

  Resa stepped forward and picked up the wine goblet. The candy bubbled suspiciously inside. She locked eyes with the other woman. The poisoner swallowed.

  “Maybe they should leave,” she said. If Aris was pretending for her to be his beloved, she would use it to secure his household.

  “I cannot stand against you.” He clapped and summoned his household staff to urge the performers out.

  Resa started to carry the candy to the reprocessor unit. Analysis of its molecular components could reveal its origin and manufacture.

  “Wait, my love.” Aris broke off a flower, arresting it mid-change between rose and orchid. He tucked the flower into her hair.

  She abruptly forgot what she was doing.

  While his staff pushed out the courtesan troupe, Aris led Resa out into the garden. He breathed out beneath the stars and rested near a bench. “These things are going to kill me.”

  She touched the delicate flower. Soft petals caressed her fingers. The base of rose scented the evening, and the orchids sprayed out, splashing color.

  No man had given her a flower before.

  And no man had now, either. He used her as a prop, a ruse to suit his desire. She forced her hand away from the dangerous bloss
oms.

  “How did you know the candy was poisoned?” she asked.

  He jerked his head out of his hands. “What?”

  She lifted the goblet. “Preliminary visual analysis shows that the candy coating is reacting in a way consistent with biolite acid. Once the outer layers wear off, it will eat a new hole in your esophagus.”

  “Shit.” He rubbed his face and looked back at the empty lounge. “Is she going to be okay?”

  “Most likely.” The woman so carefully bit it with her teeth her saliva barely dissolved the inert candy coating, but if Aris had taken it fully into his mouth, the molecules would have dispersed throughout his body like a cupful of ground glass.

  “Shit.” He rubbed his face again, scrubbing the knowledge into his brain. “Shit! Ah, nanofire and crushing damage.”

  She waited.

  He dropped his hands. “If sending over a poisoned fruit basket is Cousin Darvin’s idea of a subtle ploy, then I’m afraid he can’t be behind the much more intelligently plotted orchestration of events turning my employees against me.”

  It seemed unlikely.

  “Well, at least he tried here, now. We should be safe for tomorrow.”

  “Because?”

  “Hot as my life is, assassinating me under his roof with the rest of the family visiting from off-world would cause no end of embarrassment.”

  “I would skip it,” she advised.

  “My father already has more than enough topics to fill our lecture.”

  “Better a long lecture than a short dirge.”

  “Darvin isn’t a threat.” He mused over the bubbling poisoned candy. “This is clumsy. Darvin’s not a danger so long as I have you.”

  His words curled around her heart and tugged. She wanted to smooth his furrowed brow and promise his faith was justified, that she would protect him from all the dangers. And then she wanted to drop her mouth to his lips and taste the real pleasures their near-kiss had denied.

  Heat flickered in her center, burning low and hot. Whispering insistent desires her robot didn’t hear, suggesting delicious intimacies directly into her heart.

  So if her robot didn’t hear these suggestions, perhaps she could act before it realized her intent. She could stand up and go to him. He would let her. She would touch his rough jaw, press a kiss, and go up in flames.