Greenshift Read online

  “Don’t get me wrong,” David said, raising his hands in front of him as though he meant no offense. “It’s a good look, a little cold, like your personalities.”

  Killian motioned for the others to lower their weapons. “You have half an hour to get that ship out of here.”

  “If you have that big of a problem with my ship being here, take it up with the dockmaster.” David’s words snapped through the Media speakers. He didn’t let on that hearing his own harsh tone startled him.

  Apparently it made the contractors uneasy as well. They were still twitchy because they knew they had no reason to be here. Of course, most contractors he met never missed an opportunity to flaunt their authority over an Armadan, at least those Armadans not in uniform. Even contractors steered clear of any military involvement. David didn’t know how or when the cultural tension between Armadans and contractors began, but it had been gaining momentum recently.

  The thought gave him pause. He needed to end this before Ward and his friends stopped taking directions from Killian.

  Out of the corner of his eye, David caught Sean meandering toward them. The two latecomers noticed, too. Their attention split between David and Sean. As far as Ward was concerned, though, David was the only thing in the world right now.

  “I’d tell your crewman to back off,” the female contractor said.

  David almost smiled, thinking of the string of expletives that would roll out of Sean Cryer’s mouth if he heard that comment.

  “I wouldn’t worry about him. He’s a harmless mech tech.” Though David suspected Sean could be dangerous, especially if he had been dosing recently.

  David leaned in close to Killian and hid his face so the voyeurs wouldn’t be able to eavesdrop. “We both know you have a mark against you after that fight last year. The Embassy is going to throw you out of the guild if this incident goes any further. I may not enforce it, but I do know the law and so do all those viewers catching our exchange at home. Is getting back at me really worth your job? Why don’t you just take Ward, get him tucked into bed before it gets dark, and relax for the rest of the evening?”

  Killian’s expression was blank. Contractors gave new meaning to stoicism. “You’re bordering on harassment, Anlow.”

  “I know how to keep on my side of the fence,” David said. “Does Ward?”

  They both knew the answer to that question. Ward was bristling for a fight, and Killian couldn’t afford for that to happen in plain view of the system.

  David made a motion for Sean to hang back a bit, which to David’s surprise he did.

  Killian took a moment longer to regard both men before smacking his shoulder into David’s chest as he pushed past. “I’d watch my back if I were you. These docks can be dangerous.”

  The other contractors followed Killian’s lead, all except for Ward who stared at David and flexed his fingers around the grips of his guns.

  “Let’s go, Ward,” Killian called to him.

  David stood his ground and didn’t take his eyes off the group. Sean sidled up beside him, not speaking until the four contractors slipped back inside the security kiosk.

  “What the hell was that all about?” he asked.

  David’s appreciation for Sean backing him up evaporated as soon as the younger man opened his mouth.

  “They just wanted to say hi.”

  “We’re not staying here a couple of days,” Sean said. “We have to pick up Geir.”

  “Geir’s good to go until the end of the week.”

  “We’re not staying here,” Sean repeated as they walked down the boardwalk.

  “I think that’s a decision to be made by everyone. I know Kenon and Soli asked if it would be possible to spend a little more time with their amours. And Mari likes any excuse to be off-ship. I guess that leaves you with the only dissenting vote.”

  “Do you think they’d vote that way if they knew this was all just an opportunity for you to dick over those contractors?”

  David ignored Sean as they neared the Bard. Mari’s gaze met them. Even with David standing lower than her on the sloping gangway, she still had to look up at him slightly. She lightened his mood considerably. “This the last one?” he asked.

  “Last one,” she said.

  David gave her a fast once over, lingering on the bit of leg peeking between her short skirt and thigh high boots. He quickly diverted his attention to her face. “We’re going to stay the night.”

  “Soli will be happy to spend some extra time with Trala, especially since they’re expecting,” Mari said. “Have you ever seen Kenon’s prime? Her name is Giselle. She’s blonde and beautiful. A little snobbish, but Kenon doesn’t seem to notice. Of course he has three amours total so when he gets sick of one he visits the others. This will be fun, Sean, won’t it?”

  “Not so much.” He passed Mari on the gangway to head back inside.

  “Sean. Supplies?” Mari pointed to the final food pallet.

  Sean said over his shoulder, “I vote David unloads it.”

  “He’s always so pleasant,” David said.

  “Really Sean’s a good guy. He just has to get used to you.”

  “I’ve been here almost a month.”

  “A month’s not long enough for Sean. Are you hungry? We actually have food on board now. Well, most of it.” Mari looked at the pallet waiting to be wheeled up the gangway.

  “I’ll get that,” David said. “Then maybe we could go out for dinner? I know a couple of great restaurants along the bay.”

  “Yes.” Mari barely let David finish. “I’ll go change.”

  She put her palm against his chest in a formal gesture, but the warmth of her hand radiating through his t-shirt didn’t inspire thoughts of propriety in David.

  “Anyone else coming with us?” she asked, her fingertips moving ever so slightly against the fabric of his shirt. “I think I’ll wear that blue and silver dress you said you liked. You remember which one, don’t you? I wore it during your first week aboard when we all went out in Steckert City before Geir started his long-term project there. I wonder how Geir is—”

  “I remember the dress,” David said gently. “And, I think it should just be you and me this time.”

  “Good idea.” She brushed her lips against his, bringing the world to a screeching halt in that moment. “Very good idea,” she whispered, her face so close to his he could feel her breath dance across his cheek. Her proximity raised the little hairs on the back of his neck in a way even his earlier confrontation couldn’t.

  “See you in a bit.” She pushed away from him and walked up the gangway, but he could hear her pace pick up once she hit the grand staircase in the foyer. He was glad to know she was as excited about tonight as he was.

  FOUR

  Civvy life isn’t so bad.

  From their waterside table at the Rose of Sharon, David watched the synth spiders draw rainbow lines through the night air in time to the music they played. Like orchestral conductors their metallic legs looped and jabbed, weaving swirls of greens and blues then oranges and reds through the darkness above the reflective waters of Carrey Bay. A mosaic of patterned lights fronted luxury hotels in the tourist zone, enticing guests to come and stay or just drop by for a visit to shop and dine.

  Shiraz Dock came alive at night, the officious Hub traffic from the day transforming into glittery party-goers. David, sporting civilian dress pants and a green button down shirt instead of his fleet uniform, felt like he fit in for once. He didn’t realize he would enjoy being a regular citizen again. Several women gave him more than a passing glance, even as they hung on the arms of their escorts for the evening. Normally he would have been flattered, maybe thrown a smile or a wink their way, but tonight his interest never strayed from Boston Maribu. He had only called her by her given name the first time they met. The face she made said she would prefer Mari.

  She received more than her share of interest, too, especially in the tiny silver and blue dress which skirted on bei
ng a little too immodest for an establishment like the upscale Rose of Sharon. But if she noticed any of the men trying to catch her eye, she never acknowledged them.

  “Soli and Kenon live somewhere over there in Wright’s Landing.” Mari gestured toward the not-so-far shore, whose rolling hills sparkled with glimpses of spotlighted towers and multi-pitched roofs, a welcome-home beacon to those wealthy Hub citizens who could afford the real estate. “Though nowhere near one another. It’s a huge place.”

  “I’m surprised Kenon would be interested in scientific work if his family is so wealthy. He doesn’t exactly strike me as the ambitious type,” David said, thinking about the foppish man who never really seemed to do anything but hang out on the Bard and complain about his accomodations.

  “I don’t think he likes staying on-planet too long. He’d have to be around all his amours then.” Mari winked. “At least that’s what Soli told me. And if anyone would know, it would be Soli.”

  David silently agreed. Solimar Robbins was an Embassy-sanctioned archivist, which meant she had a duty to record all events surrounding her for public record. Coming from the privacy of the Armada, David hadn’t taken to Soli’s busybody nature quite yet, though she continued to be very warm toward him. And she and Mari were close.

  “The boats are taking up anchor to view the light show already.” Mari looked around with those big, beautiful eyes that always managed to captivate him. They owed their unique coral color to a slight reaction to a childhood vaccine. The effect brought a red-golden luminosity and intensity to her irises that he had never seen before. From the time he first met her he wanted to see those eyes staring up at him from his bed.

  The fact that she seemed game, eager in fact, should have thrilled him, but the more he got to know her through stories of her family and her out-of-the-way home on Deleine, the more she talked about her dreams and hopes for the future, the more he wanted to take things slowly, maybe be a part of that future, as foolish as the idea might sound. It took him this long before deciding to ask her out because they had formed a true friendship, and it made him a little nervous to change that dynamic. If things went wrong, not only would they feel awkward around one another every time they passed on the small ship, but he’d lose the closest friend he’d made since retiring.

  Yet all he could think about was how their friendship would only make a physical relationship that much more satisfying, how he could easily see spending the rest of his days talking to Mari, seeing life through her eyes.

  What the hell is wrong with me?

  His thoughts made him feel like a sentimental fool. Maybe his clock was ticking, that biological imperative to find a prime and make some babies. It was a little early to be thinking of marriage and a family, at least by Armadan standards—he had forty good years before he even hit his century mark. But, nonetheless, he was finally feeling that pull that his younger brother Ben had been describing for years. Had any of Ben’s relationships worked out, he would have been happy to settle down in his twenties, but as he followed David through his fifties, he’d probably just wait until he retired from the fleet.

  At a proper age, maybe eighty or ninety, like Dad, not like me who couldn’t even stick it out until middle-age.

  When he started on this path of regret at having given up his fleet commission, David just remembered the placid, stony look on Lyra’s face when she put a gun to his head and challenged his control of the Argo Protector. It had been the single most heart-breaking moment in his life.

  “Don’t you think so?” Mari asked.

  David hadn’t been paying attention. Taking a fifty/fifty chance, he said, “Yes.”

  Apparently it was his lucky night because she seemed pleased with his response.

  Once again she brought him back to the present and grounded him. She would never know how grateful he was for those times when just the cadence of her voice coaxed him out of that dark place in his head. Just like her beautiful, shining eyes, Mari had become his light.

  “Do you remember how you started ordering everyone around your first day on the Bard?” she asked.

  “And how they all just snickered and walked away? Yeah, I do.” David could laugh about it now, but at the time he’d been pissed.

  “Except for me,” Mari said.

  “Except for you,” David agreed. “You were always there to help, even when I didn’t need it.” He smiled to let her know he was joking.

  “If you’re talking about that time I accidentally sent all your clothes to the cleaners and you had to borrow Geir’s stuff for two days….”

  “That’s exactly what I was thinking about.”

  “You looked good in those tight t-shirts,” she said.

  The blush that crept into her cheeks made David want to touch her, to see if her skin felt as flushed as it looked.

  She got a little shy then and worried her bottom lip between her teeth.

  I can do that for you. He was mesmerized by that plump, wet lip.

  She stared at him like she knew his thoughts. The blush grew a little deeper. This time she lowered her eyes and moved the food around on her plate with her fork, but she couldn’t hide her smile.

  She did this often, being bold and forward as though coming on to him, then pulling back demurely at the last second. It drove him crazy…in an absolutely wonderful way.

  As they finished up dinner, she talked about each detail surrounding them on the waterside patio. From the Rose of Sharon’s iridescent purple and green canopy overhead to the string quartet warming up in the main dining room, she was excited by it all.

  Her swooping hand gestures punctuated her enthusiasm and made the matching silver cuffs she wore on her small biceps glitter in the magenta glow of the candlelight. The design of delicate vines weaving around her arms in silvery swirls couldn’t have matched her personality better—not just that she liked shiny jewelry and anything that had to do with plants, but because she was so lithe and wispy and easily wove her conversation from one topic to the other. He could imagine her wearing those cuffs and nothing else as he studied the facets of her animated face.

  “The gardenias along Wright’s Landing will be blooming in a day or two,” she said. “They’re supposedly an heirloom variety native to here, but I don’t believe it. In this climate? They have to be hybridized with a heartier strain, probably gened up in a lab. But it’s still breath-taking to see nothing but white flowers stretching all along that side of the bay, and the smell is wonderful.”

  He couldn’t imagine anything smelled better than Mari. Even when she wasn’t around him, he swore he still caught a hint of citrus and flowery notes from her scentbots. Maybe the pheromones which those bots also released through her pores were working overtime on him. He envisioned pulling her close and breathing her in, tasting the scent on her lips and every patch of skin. He’d start with her neck and take his time there until he could feel her pulse race against his mouth. Then lick his way down to her breasts.

  For most of the evening, he’d avoided looking directly at her perky nipples pushing against the silky fabric of her dress. But now his gaze kept drifting as more racy thoughts swept through his mind, bringing the expected reaction down below. At least there was a dinner table hiding him. He needed to think of something else.

  “The gardenias are nice,” he said. “I’ve seen them a couple of times here before. But, I have to say, they pale in comparison to spring in the Koley Mountains. The rhododendron and laurel bloom the same time as most of the wildflowers. The forest is painted for kilometers in brilliant color. From my lake house, the surrounding mountains look like one of those pixel paintings. Do you remember those? They were popular a few years back.”

  Mari shook her head no.

  So maybe it was more than a few years back.

  “They were an odd fad. The artists would only put a dot of color every so often on a solid colored canvas to give the impression of distance.”

  Mari rested her chin in her hand and looke
d at David with a lazy, wistful expression. “I’d like to see that. Your lake house, not the paintings. There weren’t many lakes where I grew up on Deleine. At least not ones that weren’t chemically polluted or had a river of acid mine drainage pouring into them. Do you have a boat?”

  “Everyone in the family does. It’s the easiest way to get around Cheat Lake.”

  “I bet it’s like paradise. When we studied all the eco-systems on Yurai in school, I always said I’d go there one day. Koley is in the Sparta Territory, isn’t it?”

  “That’s right.” He took a sip of scotch. “You would enjoy the mountains. They’re the best part of Sparta, or any of the other territories on Yurai, in my opinion.”

  “Then you should take me there, so I can decide for myself if it’s paradise.”

  He couldn’t tell if her smile was genuine or mischievous, but his body took her words as innuendo.

  I would gladly take you to paradise.

  Maybe his thoughts read on his face because she pulled her gaze away and changed the subject. “I’m glad you suggested this place. I’ve never eaten here. Or any place this nice. I like the name—the Rose of Sharon. Of course, I like most everything that has to do with flowers and plants,” she said.

  David liked most everything that had to do with Mari, especially hearing her talk, even if he sometimes got distracted in his own thoughts while she went into an especially long soliloquy.

  “Do you know I’ve never seen a real Rose of Sharon bloom? I mean, on vids, yeah, but you can’t smell a vid, can’t touch one.” She reached out to the dual blossoms branching out of a narrow silver vase in the middle of the table and ran light fingertips over the pink petals. David nearly felt her caress on his skin. That warm, light feeling in his chest returned, and for once he allowed himself to indulge in it.