Page 29 of Kiss of Steel

To her great surprise, she received a modest influx of credits on her card. The work week had ended yesterday, and Maven surprised her with seventy-five pay credits—three-quarters of a day’s pay for the six hours she’d stocked shelves. She’d assumed it would be added to the next pay period. Although she could now buy the items she’d set aside, she decided to hold off until she got a full week’s pay. She’d always made a practice of living beneath her means to build a rainy-day fund. If she hadn’t had emergency savings, she never would have been able to get away from Blane long enough to apply for sanctuary. Maven agreed to hold her items until the following week.

The first official day at work flew by in a whirl. She and Maven finished stocking the shelves in preparation for the arrival of the travelers while tending to a brisk business by residents. Word had spread travelers would be arriving the next day, and Haven regulars rushed in to shop.

She broke for lunch, eating a solitary meal in the mess hall. Their work schedules weren’t in sync. She learned at breakfast he started his shift a half hour before she did and worked a half hour later. Most days, he’d be “on the range” and wouldn’t come in for lunch. The extra hour combined with the lack of an official lunch break made for a long day for him, but the way he ate, he could use the extra money. Again, he’d eaten a triple meal at breakfast and ordered three box lunches to go. A robo delivered them to the table as they were finishing up.

By quitting time, her feet hurt after standing all day. As she trudged home in the fading light, she imagined how tired Jason would be. Wrangling hornigers had to be more physically demanding than stocking shelves and recording transactions. The house was cold since they hadn’t stoked the stove when they’d left. Herb cakes cost money. They had enough freebies to last the week if they rationed them. The easiest way to stretch their supply was to not heat an empty unit.

Happily, she carried in a brick with the tongs.It’s the simple things that make life good.

With the cabin heating up, she went to take a shower. Examining her wardrobe options, she realized they would need to spend money on laundry before payday. She’d packed a good amount of clothes, but much of it was unsuitable for a cold clime. Judging from Jason’s lone duffel, he had less warm clothing than she did.

In the next day or two, she’d drop off a load at the robo laundry.I’m surprised we don’t have to bring our clothes down to a creek and beat them on a rock.

Haven Ranch was a mix of primitive and advanced. Robos ran the laundry and bussed tables. They used electronic pads and pay cards. A peek into the infirmary had revealed high-tech medical equipment. But while domicile lights ran off solar energy, they heated the unit with animal dung.

People landed in spaceships then drove around in drafty, uncomfortable vehicles not much different from the covered wagons that crossed the prairie hundreds of years ago on Earth. And Haven intended to domesticate the hornigersto be riddenfortransportation. Who rode animals in this day and age?

By the time she emerged from the shower, Jason still hadn’t gotten home, so she gathered up her dirty clothing to take to the laundry. He had tossed his used clothes into a corner of the closet.Note to self: get a laundry bag.Starting with nothing, they needed nearly everything. Maybe the robo laundry had totes they could borrow. Or…

What about the duffel? His bag still looked half full. He hadn’t gotten around to unpacking.

I’ll unpack for him, and we’ll have the duffel for dirty clothes.

From his bag, she withdrew a clean pair of pants and two long-sleeved shirts. However, there was a one-piece workman’s coverall, which looked like it could use washing. No underwear or socks. She hung up his meager wardrobe and tossed the coverall in the laundry pile. With such limited clothing, he’d need laundry service frequently.

Like her, he’d probably fled Earth in a hurry. If she hadn’t had the foresight to stow a trunk at the spaceport, she wouldn’t have half the stuff she did, although in actuality, only a fraction was wearable.So, maybe we’re in the same boat. I’d better set another pair of pants and some shirts aside for him at the mercantile. And underwear and socks.

Rooting around inside his bag in case she missed something, she bumped a hard, solid object. She widened her eyes as she pulled out a blaster.What the hell?Why did Jason have a weapon? How had he gotten it past the scanners?

“What are you doing?” He stood in the doorway, his furious gaze zeroing in on the weapon.

* * * *

How dare she snoop through his belongings? Was this what she did when he wasn’t around?

“I was collecting dirty laundry, and I unpacked for you so I could use the duffel. Why do you have a weapon?”

Anger and betrayal surged, but assassins were trained to assess a situation before attacking. He took stock of his clothing hanging in the closet, the pile of dirty clothes—hers and his—her expression of confusion, and added it to her plausible explanation and his previous impression of her.

Anger drained out of him. She hadn’t been snooping; she’d been collecting dirty clothes like she said. The fault was his; he should have hidden the blaster. He reclaimed the weapon, setting it on the top shelf of the closet and shutting the door. There was no point hiding it now. “My life was in danger. I had to protect myself,” he said.

“We were screened for weapons before they let us enter the terminal. How did you get it past security?”

“It’s created from a special polymer that doesn’t show up on scanners.”

She was still sitting on the floor. He offered his hand and hoisted her to her feet. She pressed a palm to his chest. “I’m sorry. My intentions were to help, but I shouldn’t have gone through your duffel without your permission.”

“It’s all right,” he said.

“If the bad guys are armed, the good guys need to be. We probably,hopefully, won’t need a weapon here, but I don’t object to having one. Not after what I went through. The authorities hung me out to dry, so I had no choice but to protect myself. After the trial, I bought a blaster. I would have brought it with me if I could have gotten it through security. So, fuck the rules.”

He chuckled at her vehemence, relieved she didn’t insist he get rid of the weapon, but an undercurrent of guilt ran through him.

In truth, he was one of the bad guys. There had been many people who’d needed protection from him, failed to get it, and ended up dead. He couldn’t alter the past—he could only create a different future. He didn’t want to be a bad guy anymore. But he wasn’t giving up the weapon, so he was glad she hadn’t asked him to.

“Did you ever fire your blaster?” he asked.

“No.”

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