Page 44 of Breaking Point
“I know.”
Luciana sat up.“You do?”
Rayen nodded.“You resented a lot of people.Right up until you started your own business.Then the big ol’ chip on your shoulder melted away.I watched youuseit, to drive yourself.And look at what it achieved for you.”
“They’re going to take it away from me,” Luciana said.
“No!Who?How?”
Luciana explained about the meeting she had rushed to attend on the Bridge, and the outcome.
“Brice said the Bridge can just take it all.Pay me whatever they want.Or nothing at all, I suppose.Especially now I’ve spat in their faces.”
Rayen put her chin back on her knees.“I wish I had been there to see that,” she murmured.“Now his message makes a bit more sense.”
“I’m afraid, Rayen.”
Rayen met her gaze.“So am I.”
Rayen had always been the sensible parent.The sober and decisive one.And now she was admitting she was as lost as Luciana.And, oddly, it was comforting.
Luciana drank her coffee.
Rayen looked over Luciana’s shoulder.Her mouth formed into a small smile, and Luciana knew she was looking at the image Luciana had framed and put on the counter.
“We raised a great son.”Rayen’s smile widened.“Even if he does piss off people who can’t keep up with his mind.”She leaned forward.“Sometimes I wish I had his strength and self-respect and could say what I think to a few of the people at the medical institute.Doctors think they’re geniuses, yet some of them are astonishingly stupid.”
Luciana giggled.She pressed her fingers to her mouth.“That feels wrong.”
“Beating your chest and rending your garments the way you are right now might feel like the sane choice, but trust me, it isn’t,” Rayen said.
“What else am I supposed to do?”Luciana asked, genuinely curious.
“We, Luciana.What dowedo?”
Luciana rubbed her eyes with her free hand.“I can’t just wait the way you think I should.”
“Do you have an alternative course of action?”
“I…” She thought about all the calls and messages she had made, trying to find a way to speak to the captain, to ask for true justice.“No, I don’t,” she admitted.“I’ve been running on instinct for weeks.Since they arrested Devar.”
Rayen nodded.“Time to use strategy, Luciana.”
“What strategy?”
“That’s why I’m here.We need to figure that out.”
Strategy.“I use strategy all the time, managing the stalls.”
Rayen nodded.“You know more about the psychology of selling that any two people I know.”
“I just never thought about using that for…for something so personal.”
“Buyingispersonal, for the person doing the buying,” Rayen said.
“That’s something I said,” Luciana said.“You remember that?”
“Yep.I’ve used it, too.For businessandfor personal stuff.Seeing it from the other person’s perspective, figuring out what they want…it works, Luciana.”She leaned forward.“So what does everyone around Devar want?Why are they doing what they’re doing?And what can we do about it?”
