Doomsday Warrior 08 - American Glory by Ryder Stacy Read Free Book Online Page A

lips lustily, and spun around toward Kim, her long red hair swinging wildly like strands of fire behind her. The two of them eyed each other like cats suddenly having to share a household in which one has been queen.
    “So pleased to meet you,” Rona said, poisoned sweetness dripping from her full lips. “I’ve heard such sweet things about you. And you are sweet. Why, you’re just the cutest little thing.” She looked over at Rock with a half snort of disgust that the man she loved would pick such a tweaky little thing—even though he was two-timing her.
    Rockson kept his eyes focused on infinity as if, like an ostrich burying its head in the sand, that was somehow going to save him.
    “And you,” Kim said loudly, pushing her chest out, putting her clenched fists on her hips, “for all your muscles and your Amazon proportions, look—almost like a real woman.”
    Rona stepped forward, cocking a fist, ready to deck the blond bug before her with a single blow. At 5'10" plus, the one thing the statuesque acrobat and fighter was sensitive about was her well-developed physique. Sometimes in her most depressed moments she had felt that perhaps Rockson wanted a more feminine kind of woman—a petite charmer with dainty sex-kitten little movements and fickle tosses of the head. And Rona would never be that, could never play the coquette.
    “But dear, you don’t look healthy at all,” Rona retorted, looking down at her rival, withdrawing her fist as she realized it wouldn’t help her cause with Rockson to smash in the teeth of his paramour. “You really should eat more—your ribs, everything—that is, what little there is to see—is poking out. Meat—eat more meat, my poor little thing.”
    “She really is a remarkable specimen,” Kim said, turning her big blue eyes to Rockson, whose headache was threatening to jump back into his head, combat boots first. “With those thick arms and huge legs, perhaps she’s the female Homo Mutatiens, like you. Although from what you told me about Dr. Shecter’s theories of post-nuke evolution, she looks more like a throwback than a new species. Something more related to a Neanderthal, perhaps.”
    At the word Neanderthal, Rona threw herself through the air at her rival, and only Rockson’s outstretched hand at the last second snatched her back by the hair as Kim raised her fists for a go at it. Rona turned around toward Rock, bringing her knee up toward his solar plexus as the chairman’s gavel cracked loudly several times. He coughed and looked down at Century City’s most renowned fighter and the two women who were about to set in tooth and nail. And even they had to soften under the stern gaze of council president Randolph, appointed recently after the disaster. He had a strong presence and had resolved to run all meetings under the full sway of the City’s laws and rules of decorum.
    “There will be no fighting in this chamber as long as I am council president,” he said, severely admonishing the three of them, who melted under the words as hundreds of eyes peered over in astonishment from around the room. The trio, their faces red as burnished apples, sat down in the front row, not one of them daring to look at any of the others.
    “And now that the little pre-meeting entertainment has ended,” Randolph went on, “we can begin.” The council president looked over suddenly to the right side of the stage and nodded his head quickly. A scratchy sound came over the P.A. system.
    “Please rise,” Randolph said, as the words of the Star Spangled Banner began. “Please rise to welcome the President of the United States, Charles M. Langford.”
“Oh, say can you see,
    By the dawn’s early light . . .”
    Every man and woman rose as Langford got up from his chair and managed to slap a smile of sorts on his face. He walked toward the podium and, as if remembering the charisma of days of old, held his hands high over his head in a victory sign. The delegates cheered,