The Seeds of Time by Kay Kenyon Read Free Book Online

Teeg offered me an escort back here.” She smiled wider, trying to lock on his eyes with hers. “Were you worried?”
    Hillis was still scowling.
    Teeg said, “Well, I got her back safe and sound, so no harm done.”
    “You give up on the hookers, Teeg?” Hillis asked.
    A light jumped into Teeg’s eyes, and he threw back, “No, I just tired them out. Show you how sometime, if you get bored with your plants.”
    “Think you could get it up if I watched, Teeg?”
    “Cut the crap,” Clio said. She tugged on Hillis’ arm, trying to snip the thread of conversation before it got worse. “I’m going up. You coming?”
    Teeg was shifting his weight from one foot to the other, already in a fury. “You’re such a gimp, Hillis. Such a retroid. Someday somebody’s going to shove your nose into the back of your head. I’d do it myself, but Clio tells me she’s not sick of you yet.”
    Hillis was already walking away with Clio, toward the elevators.
    Teeg said to their backs, “When she is, I’ll be waiting.”
    In the shower, Clio let the stream of water break over her face, pummel her eyelids, roar over her ears. It felt so good she nearly forgot to soap and rinse before the water cut off for the night. The Regrade left its deposits in her hair, a filmy unease in her mind. Zebra was gone, quarried. Could have been me, Clio thought. Then Teeg hitting on her, and damn strange:
I see how you look at me …
and what a fantasy that was, the reality being that he was watching
her
. Dripping water onto the mat, she raised her hands before her face, watched as they trembled, a gentle palsy that visited her hands, her stomach, maybe her brain itself.
Stuff is killing me
. Gonna give it up. But just a few more missions, girl. Squeeze out just a few more …
    The light was still on in the bedroom. Hillis was playing a video game, sitting on the edge of the bed, jacked into the TV screen. She sat down next to him, toweling her hair. Hillis punched at the joystick, thrusting his chin with each squeeze, racking up points. She watched the tension ride across his shoulders, move into his jaw, settle there. She moved behind him and began kneading his shoulders.
    “You got a headache?”
    He shrugged. That meant yes. She started working the spot just under his left shoulder blade.
    She wondered if Hillis had been in the Regrade tonight, if he had found some comfort, some release.
And you can be quarried for that too, no mistake
. The anti-gay laws were tied to Sickness paranoia, so there was no sympathy, no reprieve. Clio worked on his hard, sculptured shoulder. He needed her. Needed her for cover. The hetero façade.
    “You pissed at me?”
    Hillis punched in a score. “You could have called me after the hearing. For all I knew they could have been ripping your fingernails off in the basement of the Bureau.” Snide but cheerful, Hillis was enjoying his game, winning.
    Clio smiled at his back. “OK, so next time I’ll call. Aren’t you even curious what happened? Meres decided the accident couldn’t have been prevented, so me and the company both got off, and everyone is happy, even Brish.” She started to work on his neck.
    “Russo killed three people and everyone’s happy,” Hillis said, ramming home another score.
    “If Russo screwed up, Brisher would have dumped her,” Clio said. “I think she was on orders from Biotime, so technically Brisher’s at fault.”
    “And people like Brisher never go down.” Hillis jabbed at the stick, missing his prey, racking up a few debits.
    “You’re such an idealist,” she said. Hillis sneered at that. “Yes, you are. You and your Old Green.” What was an Old Green, if not an idealist? The old forests, the old savannahs, all the old green places that he wanted to keep, that one percent of the people cared about; what was that if not idealism?
    “And you and your New Green,” Hillis said. “You really think we’re ever going to bring back green from the stars? Green that