Gods of Risk

“Girl’s nothing,” Hutch said. “All drama and easy to replace. Boy’s something special, though. Good cooks can’t be swapped out just like that.”

Aunt Bobbie started working the bullets out of the magazine with one thumb, dropping each one into her wide, powerful palm. “Everyone’s replaceable in work like yours. You’ve got four or five like him already I bet.” She took out the last of the bullets and put them in her pocket, then passed him the empty magazine. “David’s the one that got away. No disrespect. Not a risk to the operation. Just worked out until it didn’t. That’s the deal.”

“And if I say no?”

“I’ll kill you,” Aunt Bobbie said in the same matter-of-fact tone. “I’d prefer not to, but that’s what happens if you say no.”

“That easy?” Hutch said with a scowl. “Maybe not that easy.”

“You’re a tough guy, but I’m a nightmare wrapped in the apocalypse. And David is my beloved nephew. If you fuck with him after this, I will end every piece of you,” Bobbie said, her own smile sad. “No disrespect.”

Hutch’s scowl twitched into a flicker of a smile.

“They grow ’em big where you come from,” he said and held up the disassembled pistol. “You broke my gun.”

“I noticed the spare magazine in your left pocket,” she said. “David, stand up. We’re leaving now.”

He walked ahead, Leelee holding him and weeping quietly. Aunt Bobbie took the rear, keeping them going quickly without quite making them run and looking back behind her often. When they got near the tube station, Aunt Bobbie put a hand on David’s shoulder.

“I can get you through the checkpoint, but I can’t get her.”

Leelee’s eyes were soft and wet, her expression calm and serene. Filthy and stinking, she was still beautiful. She was redeemed.

“Do you have somewhere you can go?” David asked. “Someplace here in Martineztown where he can’t find you?”

“I’ve got friends,” she said. “They’ll help.”

“Go to them,” Aunt Bobbie said. “Stay out of sight.”

David didn’t want to let her go, didn’t want to lose the contact of her arm against his. He saw her understand. She didn’t step into his arms as much as flow there, soft and supple and changing as water. For a moment, her body was pressed against his perfectly, without a millimeter of space in between. Her lips were against his cheek, her breath in his ear. She was Una Meing for a moment, and he was Caz Pratihari, and the world was a heady, powerful, romantic place. She shifted against him and her lips against his were soft and warm and they tasted like a promise.

“I’ll find you,” she whispered, and then the moment was over, and she was walking a little unsteadily down the corridor, her head high. He wanted to run after her, to kiss her again, to take her home with him and fold her into his bed. He could feel his heartbeat in his neck. He had an erection.

“Come on,” Aunt Bobbie said. “Let’s go home.”

From Martineztown to Aterpol, she said nothing, just sat with her elbows resting on her knees, squeezing one of the bullets she’d taken between two fingers, then running it across her knuckles like a magic trick. Even through the chemical rush of relief, he dreaded what would come next. The disapproval, the lecture, the threats. When she spoke, with five minutes still before they reached Breach Candy, it wasn’t what he’d expected to hear.

“That girl. You saved her. You know that? You saved her.”

“Yeah.”

“You feel good about that. You did a right thing, and that feels good.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“That good feeling is the most that girl will ever be able to give you.”

The tube car’s vibration was almost imperceptible. The monitors had tuned themselves to a newsfeed, unable to find any common ground between him and his aunt. David looked at his hands.

“She doesn’t like me,” he said. “She just acted like she did because he told her to. And then she knew I had money.”

“She knew you had money and she knew you were a good guy,” Aunt Bobbie said. “That’s different.”

David smiled and was surprised to kind of mean it. Aunt Bobbie leaned back, stretched. When she shifted her head, the joints in her neck popped like firecrackers.

“I need to move out,” she said.

“Okay,” David said, suddenly finding himself wishing she wouldn’t. Too many losses today already, and this was one he hadn’t even known would hurt. “Where will you go?”

“Back to work.” Bobbie flipped the bullet up and caught it, then juggled it across her fingers again. “I need to find something to do.” She pointed at the news on the monitors with her chin. It was all about Earth and Mars and angry people with bombs. “Maybe I can help.”

“Okay,” David said again. Then a moment later, “I’m glad you stayed with us.”

“I should take you free-climbing,” she said. “You’d love it.”

* * *