Snowburn

by Frost, E J

  After what sounds like a long walk over deep carpet, she stops. There’s a clink of ice in glaz. A sharp tap on a hard surface.

  “Kezzy-Kez-Kez,” says a man’s voice. “Is that you, Kezzy? You look good. All grown up.”

  “Mister Kincaid.” Her voice is thin and sharp. Definitely not old friends. She doesn’t even manage to make it sound respectful, just irritated.

  “How long’s it been, Kezzy? Five years?”

  “Since I ran for Livvy? Eight. Are those my credits?”

  “Yeah, you want a drink?”

  He’s drinking at zero-eight-hundred? His addiction must be worse than I’ve heard if he’s taking the edge off with alcohol this early in the day. Or maybe it’s late for him.

  “No thank you. Do you mind if I count them?”

  “Go ahead.”

  There’s a snap and the rustle of plaz. A heavy feminine sigh. “This is short. The deal was twelve.”

  Twelve thousand credits. Close to what I’d guessed. And a windfall for a runner like Kez, even after she pays me off. But not enough to risk her life for. We’re going to have to have a talk about her priorities, her and me.

  “Oh, yeah.” A creak of genSkin. “Here’s the other two.” A rustle of plaz and the clink of octagons. “But you still gotta earn these.”

  “I’ve done the run. Your people verified that everything is there. I said no goddamn extras. Just pay me my money and let me be on my way!”

  A moment of deadly silence follows her outburst and my gut clenches. I close my eyes when I hear the next sound. The explosive contact of flesh on flesh. “You telling me what to do, bitch?” Another heavy slap. “You disrespect me in front of my own people?”

  Another slap, and on this hit Kez finally cries out. “No!” Her next words turn my blood to ice. “Let me go!”

  I snap the vid on, glimpse the dark, handsome face I remember from the Red Carpet, twisted with rage and flushed with excitement. He raises his hand over his head, brings it down with brutal force outside my range of vision. But the sound is enough, and Kez screams, “Stop!”

  “Get on that desk, bitch.” From the sound of it, she struggles. The vid pinwheels and steadies on a long expanse of bare wood, looking out on a panoramic view of the rain-streaked city.

  The sound of his fly being pulled open jolts me to my feet. “Kezra!” I roar into the com.

  There’s a sudden silence, broken by Kez’s breathy sobs.

  “Who the fuck is that?”

  A hand slams over the vid. Yanks it up until we’re eye to eye. “You the beast she brought to the drop?”

  “That’s right,” I say while I run through different plays in my mind. He likes it rough, the hooker said. Threats might just excite him, particularly since I’m too far away to carry any of them out before he rapes Kez.

  “Fuck off.” He slams her wrist back onto the desk. “You’re breaking up the party.”

  “Hope you’re not thinking of partying with Kez,” I say.

  He leans over and sneers into the viewie. “You gonna stop me?”

  “No, but I wanna make sure I get my share. Her ass belongs to me for the next forty-six hours. And I don’t take sloppy seconds.”

  Kincaid laughs a low, ugly laugh. “Shoulda known you’d already be rented out.” He disappears and I look out across the desk and over the city again. I wait to hear if he closes up his fly. There’s no noise except Kez’s hitching breaths.

  “Get up, bitch,” he says finally. “You’re bleeding on my desk.”

  She moves. The vid spins and pixilates. A rustle and clink as she picks up the wrapped stacks of credits. The vid goes dark as she shoves them in her backpack. Spins again as she puts the backpack over her shoulder.

  “Put that down,” Kincaid says. I can’t see him; Kez’s wrist is pointed at the ceiling. But I can hear the creak as he sits down. “You still gotta earn these two.”

  “Keep them,” Kez mumbles.

  “Kezzy-Kez-Kez, you say that like you got a choice. Put your bag down and get over here right fucking now.”

  “You heard Mister Snow—”

  “It’s only your ass he’s got a claim on, you numb bitch. Get over here. And turn that fucking thing off. It’s fucking up my concentration.”

  The viewie goes dead.

  I sink down into my own chair. Did I help, or did I make it worse? I rub my hands over my face. I should have gone with her. Left the box with her fucking narcoleptic brother and dogged her every step. I knew she didn’t like him; I knew he’s a sadistic prick, and I still let her go alone.

  I slam my fist into her fucking box. Watch it rock in mid-air. I should have gone with her.

  Five minutes of pacing the Marie’s tiny flight deck, imagining the worst. Five minutes of berating myself for not going with her. Five minutes of reminding myself not to care, that she’s just a good fuck, and that this, this is exactly why I’ve always been better off alone. Finally, the com buzzes.

  “Snow?”

  I slam the controls. No vid. The monitor shows me an eye with a red line through it. She’s turned off the vid on her end. “Where are you?”

  “Leaving Tyng Tower. I’ve got the money. You can give them the box.”

  “When I’ve seen that you’re okay.”

  “I’m . . . okay. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

  “Leave your viewie on.”

  “I said I was okay.”

  I don’t believe her. And if something happens to her on the trip back, I want to know about it immediately, not after she’s overdue. “In case you run into traffic.”

  “Fine.” I hear the hum of her board’s neg cells powering up. “See you in fifteen.”

  I pop an eskey out of the Marie’s console, hook it into my ear, and go to wake her brother. We’re not going to be outnumbered again.

  Sixteen minutes later, Kez walks through the wall panel that Hat Trick and his bodyguards left open. She’s carrying her float board under one arm, her ubiquitous backpack under the other. She’s limping a little. She’s pulled her slouchy hat over her dreads. It shadows her face, but I can see her mouth and chin. The skin around her mouth is an angry red and a thin crust of blood has dried over a split in her lower lip.

  Hat Trick, who tried to engage first me and then Ape in conversation but gave it up as a bad job, rises from the chair he’s been slouched in. “We good, b?”

  Kez nods. “Ape, give them the box.” Her voice sounds rough, raspy.

  Her brother’s got the box, so that my hands are free. They’re shoved deep in my pockets, gripping my knives in their hidden sheaths. Stroking the hilts while I’ve been waiting for Kez has been the only thing that’s kept me from cutting everyone’s throat.

  Ape holds the box’s tether out to Hat Trick, but Mara-the-Merc takes it out of his hand. Her partner nods at me. “Pleasure doing business with you.”

  I tip my chin at him. I’ve had plenty of time to stare down the two mercs while we’ve been waiting. Another time, another place, we’d be seeing who’s stronger, who’s faster. But here and now, they’re not after me, and I want to get Kez out of here as fast as I can, so we’ll all just walk away, nice and quiet and professional.

  Kez gives the mercs a wide berth as they pass her on their way out. I expect Hat Trick to follow them. Instead, he trails a few steps behind Kez as she makes her way across the dock to where Ape and I stand near the windows.

  “Let’s go,” she says.

  “Wait a mo, b,” Hat Trick says. “We ain’t quite done here.”

  Kez turns her head slightly. I can’t see her eyes in the shadow of her hat, but the corners of her mouth turn down. “Yes, we are.”

  Hat Trick adjusts himself again, bounces on his toes. “Mister Kincaid, he told me about you. He said you’d have somethin’ for me once everything was done. Something nice.”

  Kez lifts her head. As the shadows under the brim of her hat flee, I see the red and purple bruise circling her right eye. The spiderweb bloom
of blood in the sclera.

  My shiv’s in my hand before I have time to think about it.

  “Kincaid used up all my nice for today,” Kez says. “Besides, I hear you’ve got crabs.”

  So she did read the graffiti. I chuckle, loudly enough for Hat Trick to hear. His neck flushes.

  “Looky, bitch—”

  He reaches for Kez. She flinches back and before he can grab for her again, I’m there. Point of my shiv up under his chin. My hand on his wrist. I could snap the bone before he has time to whimper. But this is still Kez’s show, and I won’t kill, or even maim, until she tells me to.

  “You want something nice?” I dig the point of the blade in a little deeper. A bead of blood runs down its honed edge.

  Kez puts her hand on my arm. “Don’t. He’s Tyng’s nephew. Let’s just go.”

  I want a little payback. I want to hurt the family who has hurt her. Badly enough that I press a fraction deeper before I lower the blade. Flick his blood onto the permacrete.

  “Fuck, yodel,” Hat Trick whines. He touches the underside of his chin with his fingers. Blood smears into the stubble on his neck. “You didn’t need to do that.”

  “Remember that the next time a woman tells you no,” I say.

  Kez tugs on my arm. “C’mon, Snow, let’s go.”

  I let her drag me away, leaving Hat Trick standing forlornly in the middle of the dim, empty dock. After watching us for several seconds, he puts his earbuds back in his ears, bounces a few times on his toes, and wanders off in the other direction. Maybe Mike and Mara are waiting for him, but I don’t think so. They were there for the box, not to protect him. Guess the Tyng family doesn’t give much of a shit about its wayward sons.

  Kez leads the way to the Marie, moving faster than I thought she could. Either she’s desperate to be away from New Brunny – and I wouldn’t blame her if she is – or she’s pissed.

  I’ve left the Marie’s ramp open in case we needed to make a quick get-away. I catch up with her as she starts up the ramp. Put my hand on the strap of her backpack and begin to ease it off her shoulder. She yanks it back. Okay, she’s pissed.

  “At me, men or life in general?” I ask, keeping pace with her as she strides up the ramp.

  “All of the above,” she hisses.

  Given her day so far, I can understand that. Looks like I made it worse after all. “I should have come with you,” I say, by way of apology.

  She turns her head enough to look at me out of her reddened eye. “What are you talking about?”

  “If I’d been with you . . . it wouldn’t have happened. I should have come with you.”

  Kez shakes her head and stalks off towards the passenger lounge. Leaves me standing in the corridor, wondering what to say. Ape brushes by me, follows his sister into the lounge. “I knew it wouldn’t last,” he sniffs at me.

  Oh, no, Monkey Boy does not get the last word.

  I slam open the door to the passenger lounge as it cycles shut after Ape. Cock my thumb back towards the corridor. “Get out.”

  “Nice fucking timing, Ace.” Ape glances at Kez, who has stopped in the middle of stowing her float board. She’s glaring at me, a look that carries particular weight out of her bloodied eye. She doesn’t look at her brother. He shrugs and pushes past me again. The door snicks shut behind him.

  “If you two are gonna fuck, could you be quick about it?” he shouts back through the door.

  Kez shakes her head and shoves her board further into the storage compartment. “You want your share? It’s right there.”

  She tips her head at three wrapped stacks of octagons, sitting on top of her backpack in one of the passenger cradles. I don’t need to count them to know there’s three thousand there.

  “Thought we agreed on two and a half.”

  She shrugs and pulls the flight webbing around her board. “You’ve earned it.”

  “So that’s it?” If she thinks I’m giving up the hour plus she owes me in a bed, she can think again. But now’s probably not the time to mention it. “We’re all square?”

  She looks up at me. Her expression twists, going lost and anguished for a moment. Her lower lip quivers. She bites down on it, flinches and gets her face under control. “Sure.” She slams the compartment hatch. Reaches for the rolls of credits with jerky, broken movements.

  I take her by the shoulders and pull her back against my chest. Careful not to touch anywhere she might be hurt. Grateful that nothing about her pain and vulnerability has made me hard. I lower my face into her hair. Breath in the soap smell, soured by sweat. “Did I make it worse?”

  “With Hat Trick? Yeah, what were you thinking? The Tyngs never forget anyone who makes them bleed—”

  That’s why she’s pissed at me? For sticking Ass Hat? “With Kincaid.”

  “Oh.” She relaxes a little against me. “No. I . . . no.”

  “Did he rape you?”

  She shakes her head. “My ass is still your exclusive preserve.”

  Yeah, I was afraid she might see it that way. “You heard of the Red Carpet?”

  “In the Delta?” She shrugs. “I guess so.”

  “Very rough trade. ‘Bout two months ago, I crossed paths with Kincaid there. He’s a regular.”

  “So?”

  She’s too tired to make the connection; I supply it for her. “Threats would have made it worse. I said what I said to keep him off you. Didn’t have to be true.”

  She lets her head loll back against my shoulder. “But it is true, isn’t it?”

  “No, we’re square.” I’m not like Kincaid. I won’t be like him, no matter how much I want that time in a bed and the rest of what she promised me. She came to me. Gave herself to me. I took what she offered, but I didn’t force her. I’ve never forced a woman, no matter how much I wanted her, and I’m not starting with Kez. If she wants this to be the end, if she wants to walk away, I’ll let her go. Somehow.

  “I’m tired, Snow,” she says. It’s a whisper, but if it was a little louder, it would be a whimper.

  “Hour and a half to Nock City. Get some rest.” I let her go.

  She catches herself on the edge of the cradle. Slumps into it. I move towards the door.

  “Snow, wait—”

  I turn back to her. She’s holding out the three rolls of credits.

  So that’s the way it is. I take the credits. Cup her trembling hand in mine. “There are painkillers in the med kit in the ‘fresher. Take as many as you need.”

  She nods but doesn’t look at me. I let her hand go. Force myself to walk away and get on with what she’s paying me for.

  The takeoff’s quick and uneventful. I keep the ship on manual until we’re beyond the city and skimming over the rolling purple dunes of the desert separating New Brunny from the northern settlements. No matter how pissed off the water rioters are, I don’t see them heading out into the desert to shoot down passing ships. I leave the weapon-detection system on, though, just in case, while I flip the ship over to automatic and let the flight computer navigate the route I’ve picked back to Nock.

  I could try to sleep, but I’m pretty much guaranteed to dream of Marin. Sleep has no appeal.

  I fuck with the ship for a while. Adjusting settings that don’t need adjustment. Flicking through messages on the Multi. The long hop is still open, and their offering price has gone up. It leaves in less than five hours. I could be in cryo in eight. I’ve never been able to really sleep in cryo, but at least I wouldn’t dream.

  I’m about to signal the shipper when the airlock behind me snicks open.

  There are half-a-dozen blades hidden within easy reach. I tickle one of them out of its sheath. Hold it loosely while I wait to see who’s come through, and what their intentions are.

  Kez climbs into the co-pilot’s chair. Even out of the corner of my eye, I can see how she eases gingerly into the chair. How her hands tremble as she straps herself in.

  “Thought you were gonna get some rest,” I say. Let my voice
cover the quiet snick as I drop the blade back into its sheath.

  She doesn’t answer. I glance at her. She’s tucked into a ball in the chair, hands gripped to her chest. She’s put a derm over her damaged eye. Salve glistens on her lip. She looks worse than she did before she cleaned herself up.

  “Kez—”

  “Can I just sit here with you? Ape’s snoring already. I don’t want to be alone . . .”

  “Sure,” I say. I reach under my chair to the cold tray and pull out two more bulbs of water. Hand one to her.

  “I’m going to do nothing but pee tomorrow,” she says, but she takes the bulb.

  I sip my water. Let the silence stretch. Wait to see how she fills it.

  “The desert’s beautiful,” she says. “I’ve never seen it from the air.”

  “Yeah,” I say neutrally. We’re not gonna talk about the scenery. Not with so much hanging heavy between us.

  She feels it, too. Asks hesitantly, “When you dream . . . what do you dream about?”

  I’m tempted to fob her off with another story about imaginary teddy bears. But maybe the truth will bring her back to me. “A woman. Her name was Marin.”

  “Did you love her?”

  “Worse. I admired her.”

  She turns on her side. Rests her head in the pillow of her arm. Watches me out of her undamaged eye. There’s a rim of wetness under it. Has she been crying? Or maybe Kincaid damaged her tear duct. “What happened to her?”

  “She died.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Me, too.”

  “Were you with her a long time?”

  I take a swallow of water. Let it wash away some of the bitterness. Thirty-two standard years. Three hundred eighty-four months. Eleven thousand six hundred and eighty days. Less than three of them with Marin. “Not nearly long enough.”

  “What was she like?”

  “Beautiful. Smart. Fearless.” A thousand other things I don’t have words for. The relief in her eyes when she realized there was another sane soul on that ball of space rock. Her bitter-sweet ferocity when she refused to leave behind the man who eventually killed her. The feeling of her body against mine the few hours she let me keep her warm. “Like you.”