Page 35 of Tempting Jupiter (Arena Dogs #2)
At her description of the riders, he wondered how she would describe him and his brothers. Wild? Violent? Pitiful? Jupiter realized he was scowling and tried to calm. “They all came from this pit?”
“I’m not sure. Most, I think. Some might have been runaways. Maybe drifters from the badlands.”
“You admire them?” Jupiter didn’t like the jealousy that stirred.
“Yes. Yes, I do.” She laughed but the sound was bitter and broken. “I’m grateful for them. For what they do.”
Jupiter wrapped his arms around her. He wanted to take away her pain but didn’t know how.
“This whole planet is owned by Petro Corporation. They founded the colony back when the Alliance didn’t patrol this sector.
” She shook her head. “Petro shipped people here to carve out the towns and build their factories. When they’d done that, Petro told them they still hadn’t finished paying back their passage.
Roma aren’t the only ones guilty of making slaves of people. ”
“These children, were slaves?”
“Yeah. I guess you could say that. They call it a tax. It’s the price you pay for living on Petro-5. Every family gives their first-born child to the factory.”
He hadn’t thought his opinion of humans could sink any lower. “The people of this world give their own offspring to this factory?”
She nodded. “That’s the way it’s always been.
No one questions. At least not publicly.
It wouldn’t be so bad, if the children worked a few years and then went back home.
But that’s not the way it works. Parents hand over the child then forget about them.
They don’t care that they work from the time they wake until they can’t stand.
That they cry for the first few days and then never cry again because crying takes energy they can’t afford to waste. ”
Her voice cracked on the words that came from somewhere deep inside her. Jupiter didn’t know how to comfort her. He could only hold her.
“They work until they’re not able to work anymore. Then they’re brought here, to the pit. Nobody cares if they’re dead when they get here or if they die lying on the ashes.”
Jupiter turned her in his arms, pressed her face against his chest, and pressed his lips to her forehead. He understood now. He understood what she wasn’t saying. “You were the first born. They sent you to the factory.”
Her nod brushed against his lips. The moisture of her tears soaked into the thin material of the shirt she’d given him as her hands fisted in the fabric. “But you survived. You’re a survivor.”
“No, not really. I was saved. Rescued.”
Jupiter remembered her love of the man who’d raised her. After she’d escaped this hell, he realized. “Your Roland?”
“Yes.”
He lifted her chin, forcing her to meet his gaze. “Why did you want me to see this?”
Tears overflowed her warm brown eyes and clung to her cheeks. “I just…It’s part of me. I wanted you to know me.”
When she tried to look away, he wrapped his hands around her face and held her there.
He wanted her to see his feelings for her in his eyes.
“This is a part of you. Your past. But it’s not all that you are.
I’ve been coming to know you every day since the moment we met. From the moment you rescued me.”
He thought she’d argue. He could see what she wanted to say lodged in her throat and choking her. She swallowed it down and the moment was lost. She gathered her strength around her like a cloak, her shoulders back, her spine straight. Jupiter rubbed away her tears with the edge of his thumb.
She smiled—no hint of her grief left on her face—as she stepped back from him and patted one palm against his chest. “Keep that in mind the next time you feel like killing me.”
She turned and led the way back and Jupiter followed, confused and saddened, not by what she’d said, but by what she hadn’t. Despite her claim that she wanted him to know her, she still hid from him.
***
They found a booth in the Crooked Path and waited for Toolman. Feeona did her best to hide her impatience. She didn’t like being in town and out in the open. They had too many people looking for them. And Jupiter’s hooded cloak stuck out more sitting inside.
He sat across from her with a local beer sitting in front of him. He hadn’t liked the taste. One sip and he’d been done. Her whiskey was half gone, but it hadn’t done a thing to slow her heart rate or dull her heartache.
She liked that Jupiter didn’t enjoy the taste of beer. It made her smile when she wanted to scream at the universe for making her choose between this man and the kids.
The sound of the door swinging open drew her gaze just as it had every other time it had opened since they’d arrived. Some part of her still hoped Toolman would arrive and that she’d be able to talk him into giving her the kids on credit.
Her stomach twisted. It wasn’t Toolman.
There were two of them. She recognized one. He’d been with Morgan the last time she’d seen him. Morgan’s men were here early. Damn. Damn. Damn.
Her heart pounded like the wings of a wild bird caught in a trap. She could hear the rapid beating in her ears. Jupiter’s ears pricked and his body tensed. She reached across the table and grabbed his wrists.
She pleaded with her eyes. “Don’t fight them. Please. Don’t fight them and they won’t hurt you.” It was a stupid thing to say. There was nothing better to be said.
She expected him to fight. Despite her warning, she expected him to fight. Instead, he sat stone still. There was hurt in his eyes. Disbelief.
A shadow fell across the table. “Hello there.”
The man whose name she couldn’t remember stood with one hand on the weapon he wore on his hip.
The other man held a hypo-injector and stood at Jupiter’s shoulder.
Jupiter’s arm twitched, moving the wrist beneath her grip.
Beyond that he didn’t acknowledge Morgan’s goons.
His eyes never left her. She wouldn’t break down again.
She created this drama and she would play her role, even though it would cost her Jupiter.
She wanted to tell him so many things. She was sorry.
She hadn’t thought it would come to this.
None of it mattered. She’d betrayed him.
And whatever was between them was over. She couldn’t expect anything different.
And she couldn’t give away her feelings for Jupiter.
Morgan’s men couldn’t believe she was weak.
Couldn’t know she had skin in the game. Feeona pulled her hands back and turned away from Jupiter.
“You’re early. My contact isn’t here yet. ”
“Never count on a thief. A lesson someone should have taught this one.” Morgan’s man indicated Jupiter with a thumb in his direction.
“You’re a real charmer, aren’t you?”
The man, she remembered now his name was Ibor, shrugged. “I wasn’t expecting him to be so cooperative.”
Feeona forced her gaze back to Jupiter. Her heart crumbling into smaller pieces with every minute. “You’re going to cooperate, right?”
“They’re not from Roma?” A muscle ticked along Jupiter’s jaw.
She shook her head. “No. They’re not.”
“If they were, they’d have darted me from the door.” A threat rumbled at the edge of his words.
They couldn’t take him. Even now, he could best them. She’d known that. She needed him to give himself up. “Understand one thing—it had to be you . There wasn’t any other choice.”
His eyes narrowed and then his chin dipped so subtly she might have missed it, if she hadn’t been studying his face like a navigation chart. She wasn’t giving them Seneca. That was all that mattered to him.
She looked up to Morgan’s man. “He’s going to cooperate. And you’re going to honor my bargain with Morgan.”
“Right. He won’t be harmed. Just as Morgan promised.” His steady unflinching agreement reassured her less than she would have hoped.
With a thought, she used her implant to send Toolman’s account number to Morgan’s man. She’d used it plenty of times before and Ibor stood close enough that she had no trouble hacking the com unit he was carrying.
“I just sent you the account number. Go find a booth. Wait until I signal. When my contact’s here you’ll pay him directly.”
“Yes ma’am.” He said it, sounding agreeable.
But the man behind him stepped forward and slapped Jupiter’s shoulder with the hypo-injector.
Jupiter never jumped. Never made a sound.
He’d been expecting it and he’d let it happen.
She hadn’t. She’d hoped for a moment more to explain herself.
It had been foolish. It didn’t matter. When you betrayed someone, it never helped to make excuses.
Besides, he wasn’t hers. Never had been. So why did it hurt so damned much?
Jupiter slipped into unconsciousness and Ibor slid into the booth beside him, pushing him against the wall. It wouldn’t do for the whole restaurant to notice a man falling unconscious onto the bench seat.
“I’ll just sit here with you, keep you company until your contact arrives.” With a wave of his hand, he dismissed the other thug. “My friend will wait outside.”
Feeona pasted a smile on her face. “Sure. Why the hell not?” Her sense of control was slipping away, replaced by self-loathing and a burning rage at the universe.