Page 119 of Seven Oars
All of that barely registered before other details of his appearance snagged her attention.
The Striker’s body was glistening with sweat. It saturated his hair, making it look darker. Left loose, it hung down the sides of his battered face, softening its rough aspect.
He had beautiful hair.
Yes, all Rix had beautiful hair, but a silly resentment rose inside Rosamma.Why him, too?Why did he have to have the features she admired in Rix, in Phex? His warrior size and build. And now his shiny mink mane.
That hair shifted like silk when he raised his hand, pointing a nasty-looking tool at her throat, a pair of heavy-duty wire cutters she’d just been wishing to find.
“Speak. Or I’ll cut your throat.”
He was fully capable of doing it. Would it hurt terribly? The wire cutters’blades looked lethally sharp.
“It’s very hot, Striker Fincros,” she said in a voice that barely registered above the din of the Service Block’soar.“I am looking for a climate control regulator.”
His brows arched slightly above his black eyes.He’d heard what she said, but he didn’t believe her.
Still, to Rosamma's knee-weakening relief, he lowered the wire cutters.
“The climate system is broken,” he informed her, and he sounded tired.“Come with me.”
He prodded her toward the door with the blunt side of the cutters.
She went ahead of him down the passageway until they came to another door. She’d never been to this part of the station. Climbing over the high metal threshold, not dissimilar to that at the Cargo Hold, she stepped inside.
The air reeked of hot metal, and melting plastic, and chemicals, and industrial dirt. The ever-present background hum of the station’s equipment was not a hum but a loud whirring and clanking.
Above the cacophony, anotheroargroaned as it spun, working against pressure.
She was in the Engine Room, the belly of the beast.
The heat here was much worse, rivaling that of a sauna. The gravity, too, was extreme, as if someone dropped a load of bricks on her shoulders.
Fincros went around her, disappearing behind a metal rack.His steps were heavy, and he struggled as he walked. With his much heftier frame, this gravity must be hitting him a lot harder.
She followed his wide back.
He favored his left side as he walked, and she realized he had a nasty rip in his side. A knife wound. It wasn’t bleeding now, but his pants were all dark on that side. Soaked.
She forced her lead feet to carry her after Fincros, careful not to step on patches of grease coating the mesh floor.
After passing a small labyrinth of containment units and caged rotating devices, they came to a stop in front of a small hinged door. Tools were spread on the floor beside it.
Fincros lowered to one knee and propped the hatch open.
“Give me that.”He pointed at some kind of small ratchet.
She picked it up and placed it into his large, dirty palm.
He went to work.
This heat must be unbearable for him, yet he was working methodically. His heavy arms flexed with purpose. His upper body was a super-charged weapon without a hint of weakness. It radiated power. She’d seen what damage it could do.
He threw a length of tangled wire to her, making her jolt.
“Wind it tight.”
She picked up the spool he pointed to and began to wind.The prickly wire bit into her fingers, but she didn’t dare wince.
