Judge by Karen Traviss Read Free Book Online Page B

technology. Barencoin was always a more creative thinker than Becken, though, and he frowned. “Ade, you said you’d been done. Why did you need a condom?” The joke evaporated. Barencoin couldn’t have known how painful a topic it was, and that meant he didn’t know when to stop. “And she’s past it—”
    The wound was still more raw than Ade had thought. “You know the worst thing about c’naatat ?” he snapped. “It fixes all that stuff. Yeah, we need ’em. Because it all went wrong, and we had to get rid of the baby. So shut the fuck up about it, okay?”
    Barencoin’s face was suddenly all regret and shock, which was rare for him. He didn’t have any smart-arse comebacks for once. “Look, I wouldn’t have taken the piss if I’d known. I’m sorry, mate. I had no idea.”
    Ade felt worse about it now than he had when the pain of the abortion was fresh, and had to walk away. He wasn’t stepping back to avoid hitting Barencoin, but because it was so intensely private a tragedy—something Shan would never have wanted others to know—he was instantly ashamed of his outburst. It was one more thing in the growing list that he couldn’t share with the people he’d trusted with his life up to now, and it left him with a bigger sense of loss than if he’d been physically separated from them.
    â€œHey, come on.” Barencoin tried to go after him but Ade could hear him struggling to get past the tide of ussissi walking the other way. It was a busy ship right now. “Come on, Ade, I’m sorry.”
    Ade was halfway to the aft section of the ship when he realized he still had the gel coating on his hand. He slipped into a comms alcove for a moment. Come on, you were handling this okay. People deal with it all the time, and do it for a lot less reason. You couldn’t bring a c’naatat kid into the world. He wondered how much of his reaction was realizing that the stupid fantasy of creating an average domestic life of the kind he’d never had was just that—fantasy. He would have to be content with having a woman he loved and who he knew he could trust. And it didn’t matter that he had to share her with Aras. Normal had changed for good in the Cavanagh system. It was just a matter of accepting that there would be days when he slipped back into the basic human mold.
    The ship moved.
    Ade had to check that it wasn’t just the visible horizon that had shifted. The views from the bulkheads weren’t always exactly line of sight; they were projections of some kind. But he was sure the ship was moving. The crew going about their business around him reacted too. Then he saw why. Esganikan Gai strode through the ship, her copper red plume of hair bobbing as she moved like a juggernaut. Shan trailed after her. Ade somehow read the body language as Shan playing bagman to Esganikan, and he wasn’t comfortable with that. The Boss had to be the alpha female. She could tear Esganikan up for arse-paper, he was sure of that.
    â€œYou can disembark shortly,” Esganikan said. “We’re landing.”
    â€œWhere?” Ade asked.
    â€œFor the time being, the location called St George. There’s accommodation provided for us elsewhere, but I want to inspect it first.”
    More saints, then: it boded ill. They hadn’t had much luck with the islands of Constantine, Chad and Christopher back on Bezer’ej. Esganikan swept on but Shan paused and gave Ade a shrug. “Well, you wouldn’t expect her to wait for the monkey boys to tell her where she can land, would you?”
    â€œSo who’s doing the diplomacy and liaison?”
    â€œDon’t look at me. It’s not my forte.”
    Ade had complete faith in Shan. She could do anything. She could even act as if she actually gave a toss what humans on Earth thought about her, for a while at least.
    â€œYou’ll do