Page 10 of Border Control
I’m just a Parthiastock, and I need what I need. I frightened a female. Me. I’m supposed to protect them. And I can’t get her soft touch, or her eyes, out of my head. Oh-Law-rah wouldn't choose a mere clone for a mate. She deserves a True Born, a properly raised male born of an Olorian female, not a Tuber, the slaves developed to serve Olorian society. And if I lose my equilibrium, if my focus is torn from Nevare, I can't help my Apex when he needs me most.
‘Arik, please,’I send to him in a tight mental plea. I give him a glimpse of my inner turmoil, and in return a wash of pity surges up the bond to me.
He’ll give me what I need tonight.
We stand up together, away from Nevare who’s already fallen into a deep slumber, and I hand my correction tool over as we pace toward El-len’s storage shed opposite our lodgings. She hadn’t expressly ordered us not to go in there before she and Ilia left, so I only feel a slight twinge as I pull back the metal door. The creak of it echoes across the empty yard.
“Dom…” Arik begins, wringing my tool in his hands.
“I need this,” I reassure him, entering the darkness. It smells of semi-sweet deteriorating vegetation, the floorboards shadowy with silent hulks of machinery around the perimeter. Our only witness.
We don’t have a correction frame, so I have to make do, leaping up to grab hold of the metal beam bisecting the roof. Thestretch in my aching muscles helps to ground me, and I know, as my fingers tire, the pain will keep me in my body and not in the maelstrom taking over my head.
I need to clear my mind to focus on Nevare. I need this.
“Do it,” I tell Arik, bracing myself.
THREE
LAURA
Frack.I spent too long with Arabella, and lingering with the purple aliens means I need to step on it to get back to my apartment in time for the remote meeting. Fortunately, I make it with seconds to spare and dial into the conference call, and it’s not one Morgan attends. As everyone introduces themselves, my mind swirls around Arabella, trying to hold the farm together on her own, and a wall of purple scales.
I tap my pen on my desk. Okay, yes, the extra-terrestrials have done nothing threatening. Gara’s busy downloading books about, ahem, human relationships, so I’m less worried about Arabella’s safety. While they’re huge and packed with muscle, with those scales which no doubt act as protection, I get a kind of feeling when I’m with them.
They don’t meet my gaze easily, they respond to every question as if it’s an order, and that one—Dom, with the purple eyes—actually fell to his knees on the gravel. The crunch made me wince in sympathy for his poor joints. I can’t believe how fast he dropped when I told him he'd scared me. He hadn't, not really; having a big purple guy run at me like that was unexpected, that’s all.
I pull out my papers, running my fingers along their edges to straighten them out. I rub my fingertips together, then trace the ripples of the wooden desk.
The scales on his cheek started hard as oak, then softened into warm skin. I was expecting him to be as cold as a snake. He wasn’t. Not at all.
His lilac eyes haunt me. Soft, brimming with pain.
Pain at the very idea of scaring me.
And I wanted to wipe it off his face, clear the suffering from his gaze.
“Laura, the inquest starts at what time on Friday the thirtieth of March?”
“9 sharp,” I answer easily. Nine days from now. Not even aliens will distract me from my work, I won’t allow them, empathic knee-jerk reactions notwithstanding.
I lace my fingers together while someone else drones on, repeating things I already know about the case. Arabella has done an Arabella thing. Her modifications are way outside the specifications the local council granted Ellen permission to do to her heritage barn. The permissions are fixable, maybe, if I put in a variation application, like, yesterday. For that, I’ll need access to Arabella’s drawings and pin her down so she doesn’t make any more changes. Best if I’m there to supervise.
While I’m there, I can investigate what’s going on with these aliens. What exactly happened to them to make them fear us?
In the last ten minutes of the conference call, when no one's really saying anything of importance anyway and it's just the other senior partners trying to stay relevant on my case, I mute myself and move around my apartment. I pack the basics: changes of clothes, my toiletries, and my deluxe top of the range espresso maker and travel bean grinder. Can't live without that.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, I haven't even got a plant in the apartment to worry about while I'm away. I'd love a pet butI know my lifestyle of work hard and then work harder doesn't suit animals, even for a cat. Plants have a special place in my heart, but I can't promise to water them on time. Maybe I'll get a succulent, or a house-leek. They seem sturdy.
Once the call is done I pull off my headphones, gliding my fingers together through my hair. My fingertips tingle as if they're skimming lavender scales, their hard, sharp edges softening. Warming under my touch. His eyes turning liquid and fathomless.
As if he was trying to tell me something.
Shaking my head, I pack my vitamins—can’t afford to get sick right before the inquest—and gather together the charging cables for my various phones. A notification flashes on my dating phone. Swiping it open, my heart leaps.
“You have a match!”
Still haven't got round to closing down the account for now, but… what harm can looking do?
