Cyberevolution aftermath.., p.9
Cyberevolution Aftermath II, page 9
She realized she’d never fully appreciated the world she’d been born to, or more specifically, the technology. Generations before her had studied ‘the problem’ of processing and found shortcuts until it had reached the point of being handled completely by machine.
And then all people had to do was pick out what they wanted, pay for it, and use other machines to get it from the shelf or the refrigeration unit to the table.
She liked that. She enjoyed eating. She didn’t enjoy the primitive process of getting it from the field to the table.
In all honesty, she didn’t enjoy the damned ‘bread-like’ substance they made. It was like eating paper that had been made into dried pudding—it had very little taste, but what there was wasn’t enjoyable to her.
Maybe it was an acquired taste?
She sure as hell hoped they weren’t going to be around long enough for her to acquire it, though.
She’d begun to really hate the bastards that had burned down the tree house by the end of day.
Of course they were dead already according to Kameron, so they’d paid the ultimate price for their greed, but the bastards had made sure everyone else paid for it, too.
She didn’t give a damn if the company had lost money in the event—it was pennies beside their wallets. A lot of people that couldn’t afford to lose anything had lost everything, though. And if that wasn’t bad enough, there was nobody to help them recover—not even neighbors since everyone had been effected.
So, in essence, the bastards had killed a lot of people, because they weren’t going to survive.
She was way better off, she realized, because she had the guys and she was pretty convinced by that time that they could do pretty much anything.
She was too exhausted the first week of their ‘visit’ with the l’okins to do much besides drag herself to her pallet at night and out in the morning for the chores. But she’d regained enough strength and stamina by the second week that she could weather the chores and still have enough energy left to be alert enough to realize something just didn’t feel ‘right’.
They guys hadn’t tried, even once, since the fire to get into her pants. She’d just been glad she didn’t have to fend them off because she was too damned tired to have any interest in recreation. And, really, when she finally became aware enough to notice they seemed to be keeping their distance she still didn’t feel up to a romp.
Well, at least part of that was the fact that the hut didn’t actually give them a lot of privacy from the villagers and none from each other. And she wasn’t comfortable enough with herself or them to feel like she wanted to have sex with one while the other two watched and waited their turn. That took the recreational sex to a whole new level.
But it was extenuating circumstances and maybe they could have convinced her—if they’d tried.
So she gradually went from being glad they were considerate enough to let her rest, to wondering why they were being so damned considerate, to being angry that they seemed to be angry with her.
And feeling guilty because she was sure they blamed her for losing everything and she thought it was her fault, too.
To being resentful that they blamed her for something that might have been her fault, but that was completely out of her control.
To being upset that they didn’t seem to have any interest in her anymore.
Granted, she’d thought it would come to that and that was one of the reasons she’d thought it would be ok to mess around with the giant, dangerous cyborgs. They just thought they wanted to form a family unit with a human woman because they had no real clue of what it was all about.
Now, undoubtedly, they’d come to see her as a burden, not an asset.
Very lowering. Very depressing.
She hadn’t realized she’d gotten so used to their company until they’d begun to act so withdrawn.
Well, she thought they had before she’d noticed, but it really bothered when she finally did notice and then it depressed her.
She didn’t doubt she looked the worse for her situation—worse even than she had to begin with, because she was down to one outfit to cover her naked. And they hadn’t been in the village of the damned long before it was stained, well worn, and even beginning to tatter.
The villagers didn’t spend a lot of time on personal hygiene—because they worked from daylight till dark just to feed themselves—so there was little available for her.
She still had her duffle, but it had been stuffed with survival supplies. Granted soap and toothbrush and paste were among that list, but in very small quantities since there were a lot of other things way more important to survival.
She didn’t realize just how desperate she’d gotten to break through the barrier that seemed to have sprung up, or been erected, until she found herself trying to figure out how she might entice them—any or all.
In she was honest, she was more focused on Kameron, but she was very fond of all three and, really, she was convinced that if she seduced Kameron, the other two would play follow the leader.
Unfortunately, it was along about that time that she realized she didn’t have a damn clue of how to seduce them. She’d never had to seduce a man. Most of her life she’d focused on beating them off if they got too familiar with her, too aggressive, too demanding. She didn’t know why they behaved that way. She didn’t think it was anything in particular that she’d done, though. Just being young and female seemed to be all it took. She wasn’t beautiful by any stretch of the imagination or even staggeringly well built.
She didn’t know anything to do but smile at them and try to engage them in conversation and when that didn’t seem to be working, she had to put some real thought into it.
Being naked might do the trick, but she just couldn’t bring herself to strip naked and dance around the hut when they’d convinced her by that time that they had no interest. And she didn’t have a damn change of clothes so she couldn’t pretend she was just changing.
It was a sign, she supposed, of just how desperate she was that she finally decided to ask Kameron to take her to the river to bathe and wash her clothes.
She needed it since all she’d managed since their arrival was bathing from a container with a cloth and her clothes could definitely use a thorough cleaning. But as warm as it was during the day, it got cold toward sunset. And she worked all day and then they ate, so it was nearing sunset by the time she could get away at all.
She decided she could stand it—she would.
She took her Mylar survival blanket to wrap in after the bath since she intended to wash the clothing she was wearing and she had nothing else.
As much as she dreaded the bath itself, she was thrilled when Trinity and Caleb decided to join them.
Maybe she’d get really lucky?
Chapter Ten
The water near the river’s edge was shallow and had been warmed by the heat of the day to tepid—which wasn’t terribly pleasant when the air was already cooling, but it was bearable.
Trying to pretend she had no more interest in the guys than they seemed to have in her, she went in with clothes on—since she didn’t have a lot of experience with hand cleaning clothing—wet it like she would have her skin and then used her hands and the sliver of soap she still had to soap it. The cleaning process actually did divert her, especially when she’d done what she thought she could and began trying to struggle out of the damned thing.
She had generated a good bit of heat by the time she got the thing off, squeezed as much water out as she could and then carefully arranged it to drip from the branch of the closest tree. Returning to the river, she washed her under clothes much faster and then waded out to hang those up to drip.
She flicked a glance at the guys when she headed into the river again.
All three of them were standing in knee deep water looking like pointers.
Feeling very pleased with herself, she struggled with the desire to approach and push them a little further and an almost equal reluctance—due entirely to lingering doubts.
Trying to convince herself that she could count on having broken the ‘ice’, she settled to bathe.
When they drew her attention again, it was to discover all three of them wading out.
They returned a few minutes later and washed their own clothing.
And then left again.
Stark naked since they had no change of clothing either, Caleb and Trinity gathered up the laundry and headed back toward the village.
Dismay flickered through Amanda, but Kameron had stayed and she focused on her bathing for several moments more in the hope that he would grab her and fuck the hell out of her.
“We should get back,” he said after a few moments. “It is nearly dusk. The beasts will be coming to drink.”
Amanda’s heart jerked, but not with happy anticipation.
She shot to her feet, waded out, and snatched up the blanket she’d brought to cover herself.
She felt like squalling, though.
Dismissing it with an effort, she struggled for something to say to turn her own mind from her disappointment. “How long are we going to stay here?”
He didn’t respond right away. “We are waiting for the trader to come.”
Amanda glanced at him in surprise. “Why?”
“We will ask her for … a ride into Capitol City. When they see that you survived, the bounty will be removed.”
A gust of excitement rushed through her. For many moments she couldn’t get past the thrill of being free and in a city where there was all sorts of things available. Then she remembered that the guys had hinted that there might be bounties on them. “What about you guys? Didn’t you say that it was risky for y’all to go into any of the cities?”
He nodded. “This is why we must wait for the trader. She will be able to take you directly to the company to settle the matter.”
Amanda frowned. “Y’all are going to wait here?”
He hesitated. “Yes,” he said finally.
She didn’t believe him. She didn’t know why, but she didn’t.
She just couldn’t bring herself to demand to know, though, if they intended to wait for her to clear up that dangerous situation.
Because she’d never actually accepted the ‘mating’ thing, she realized.
She hadn’t said no, though, she thought angrily. They’d acted like that was sufficient to be accepted as a ‘yes’.
It took her two tries to swallow past the lump in her throat. “It’ll be safe? I mean, just two women? Wouldn’t we …? But I’m sure we’ll be fine.”
Kameron frowned and she could see he was considering the situation.
That made it clear that she’d, maybe unconsciously, put him in the position of feeling as if he was endangering her by refusing to escort her.
“She travels everywhere with two Hercs as protection. She has not had to fight off an attack that I have ever heard,” he said slowly.
But then maybe she hadn’t had a golden egg with her before, Amanda thought wryly and with more than a little uneasiness?
Regardless, she wasn’t helpless—far from it. She was sure if the other woman commonly travelled with the Hercs as protection and hadn’t been attacked that the four of them could fight off anybody bent on collecting the bounty.
And she not only didn’t feel like she had the right to expect Kameron, Trinity, and Caleb, or any single one of them, to risk so much for her. She didn’t want them to. She didn’t think she’d be able to live with herself if anything happened to them—at all—and especially not if it was her fault.
“Oh—well there you go! We’ll be fine. And I’m guessing she has some form of transport? So it should be a fairly short trip? I mean, I don’t have a clue of the distance, but I wouldn’t think she’d travel very far out in the wilderness with just two Hercs.”
Kameron didn’t say anything so she let it drop.
In any case, she was way more devastated by the news than thrilled.
Well, initially, she’d been thrilled, but that had been before she realized the guys were, basically, throwing her back.
She did understand that it was dangerous for them.
She didn’t want anything to happen to them and she didn’t even want to risk that it might, but how the hell did that equate to them taking off the minute she had rescue in sight? They couldn’t even offer to wait? They couldn’t discuss it?
She had money and land coming to her.
Not that she’d actually acknowledged it, but it would have worked out really well for her if they’d decided to hang around and help her build a damned house—build up a ranch or something.
How was she supposed to do all that by herself?
Of course, having them wasn’t in the original plan. She’d had some vague notion that there would be plenty of people to hire to do that for her and she would have plenty of money to pay them. It hadn’t occurred to her when she’d made all of her plans that it took all fucking day to prepare food to feed themselves and, if everybody or even most of the settlers were living like that, then they weren’t going to be able to work for anybody else.
She shook the thought.
It was her problem.
She supposed she might have to go with her alternate plan—find a place to live in town and continue to work for the company. She was a pilot. She might be piloting nothing but drones, but she was convinced there would be some kind of job. Maybe, eventually, she’d be able to do something with the land, but she was young. She had plenty of time if the planet didn’t kill her.
So she really didn’t need/need the guys.
She just wanted them.
Damn it! If that wasn’t just like a man to take off the very moment they’d convinced you to want them around!
She spent a miserable night after the bath.
She hadn’t considered how uncomfortable she was going to be after getting her splint wet or that the damned thing with drip half the night.
She hadn’t considered that it would be wasted effort or what it was going to be like to sleep naked after she’d gotten herself all worked up in the belief that she was going to get laid—maybe in triplicate. And, really, she was damned if she could understand how just being naked kept her so hot and bothered all night. She had covers next to her skin. Why was that so different from wearing clothes?
Or was it just her state of mind?
She didn’t know, but the miserable night gave way to a miserable day—because she was so damned tired.
And depressed.
And, not unnaturally, the miserable day gave way to another miserable night when, by rights, she should have been too damned exhausted to sleep so poorly.
Thankfully, the trader arrived before she died of exhaustion.
Belinda McNeal looked like a sweet little older lady—not old, but too old to be parading around as a smuggler.
And that was what she was even though she posed as a trader.
Because she had a wagon full of contraband—all sorts of things that Amanda knew damned well she hadn’t paid duties on, else she wouldn’t have priced them so cheaply.
She had a chance to observe her when Kameron and Trinity approached her.
Clearly, she wasn’t any more immune to their good looks than Amanda was if the transformation in her was anything to go by—because she went from serious businesswoman to flirty bimbo inside of five seconds.
“We have brought a woman from the forest who crashed there. We would like to trade to arrange passage for her to Capitol City.”
‘A’ woman, Amanda noticed, struggling against the knot of misery that instantly rose in her throat. Not ‘our’ woman.
She thought for several horrifying moments that she would burst into tears. Her nose stung. Her eyes stung. But by batting her eyes furiously and sniffing, she managed to defeat the urge as the woman looked at her.
“Oh my god!” she gasped. “Is that …? Is that who I think it is?”
“She is Amanda,” Kameron responded.
“The captain of the Anna Marie? Oh my god! There’s a bounty on her. You know that?”
Kameron and Trinity both whipped a look at her at that, stared at her expressionlessly for several moments and then apparently dismissed her. “She was injured. She was not able to travel, but we were forced to move her because of the wildfire.”
“Poor thing!” Belinda exclaimed. “Well, she is welcome to have a seat in my wagon. It won’t be very comfortable, but … I’m going that way. I don’t need to be paid to help a fellow colonist out. Especially when ….” She broke off realizing it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to mention her daughter. “When she’s hurt and should have medical treatment.”
“This is what we have thought,” Trinity said. “We have done what we could, but ….”
“Well, thankfully the natives have cleared some space for her.” She frowned. “You don’t want to escort us? I mean, at least part of the way?”
Kameron and Trinity exchanged a long look and then glanced at Amanda. “We will escort you until you are close enough to the city that there is less danger,” Kameron agreed.
Amanda’s heart thudded with hopefulness she knew she shouldn’t feel.
He was being his usual noble damned self, she thought irritably, quite possibly just for the older woman who would be in danger just having her around.
They didn’t linger even though it was mid day before the woman arrived. As soon as her mercs had stacked the supplies and arranged for a spot more than big enough to accommodate Amanda, she was helped into the back.
To her surprise, Caleb joined her.
He favored her with a ghost of the grin he had used to bestow on her any time he was allowed near her. It looked a little sheepish, actually. “We have only two beasts to ride now. We offered one for the feasting the first night when we arrived.”
Amanda instantly felt a little queasy. “That was our beast we ate?”
He shrugged. “I was not happy with the notion either since it was my beast, but they were not happy to have us and we had to offer a gift to convince them.”
