Future Prospect (26 page)

“In the interest of making our argument, I will need to question our witness about facts outside the realm of the incident at hand.”

Moca made a nod of approval, and Colan’s face tightened as he stared at the man.

“Cit. Nestor, were you involved in a sexual and personal relationship with Riva Estep?”

“Kind of hard to have sex without it being personal.” The crowd tittered at Colan’s sarcastic remark, but Lia felt even more awful, her stomach heating with dread. Colan would be so angry his private life was going to be entered into public record, forever linked to a murdering woman.

“Some do manage to separate them.” The advocate turned to the residents with a knowing smirk, and the woman next to Lia laughed. Lia didn’t. She wanted to slide under her chair. “So Citizen, you confirm you had both a personal and sexual relationship with Riva Estep?”

Colan’s face flushed and he nodded once. Lia’s stomach decided it did not like that acknowledgement and began to burn and roil with emotions she couldn’t categorize. She decided to duck her head behind the shoulder of the person sitting in front of her so she wasn’t in Colan’s line of sight any more.

“And you were aware she wished to maintain this relationship to the present?”

Colan shook his head, and the advocate pressed, “We need you to answer; you knew she was still amenable to continuing a personal, sexual relationship with you.”

Colan shifted in his chair. Lia could see his left arm move, and she risked a glance up at him to find he scanned the crowd, looking for her; his mouth drawn into a sharp line. She ducked down again.

“Yes, I was aware, but I wasn’t—”

“Your intentions or indiscretions are not yet part of this line of questioning, Citizen Nestor. We need to establish Riva Estep’s state of mind. She was distraught, desperate.” The advocate again turned to the crowd and raised an eyebrow as if to say ‘look at this man, trying to avoid responsibility for the emotional state of his lover’. The woman next to Lia shook her head at the perfidy of love, echoing the motion of several others in the audience.

Moca narrowed her eyes and spoke up in her best magistrate tone. “No need for speculation. Please arrive at whatever point you’ll make soon.”

“Would you confirm you knew the reason Riva requested your presence was because of your personal relationship, not because you hold any sort of official position in the safety of the settlement?”

“I suppose. But we weren’t invol—”

“Thank you, Citizen Nestor. Now we will explore what might have driven Riva Estep to such an extreme length to gain your attention that night. Would you confirm you had indicated an interest in initiating a sexual relationship with another woman recently? Just before this incident?”

The crowd gasped with this salacious bit of innuendo, and Lia’s face burned with embarrassment. Colan leaped to his feet and pointed his finger at the advocate’s nose. A security officer took a step toward the front, and Colan sank back to his seat. “None of your damned business; she has nothing to do with this!”

Lia curled even farther behind the person in front of her, which gave her a new viewing angle of the front tables. Riva’s face trembled as Colan’s words echoed in the room, and she sobbed like a betrayed lover. Which she apparently was. Now Lia was the other woman in this sordid little mess. Crack and blast.

One of the new security people walked toward Colan, and she assumed he was being encouraged to remain in his seat. Swallowing against the pressure in her throat, Lia sent her gaze in another direction. Only the floor was safe, so she stared at the sheller’s incredibly battered boots as the advocate started in again.

“Was Riva Estep aware you were involved with another woman?”

“I don’t know what she was aware of. She manufactured explosives and killed people so—”

“Magistrate, if you would inform the witness to answer the question and not proffer inflammatory opinions—”

“How is stating a fact an inflammatory opinion?” Colan interrupted with a growl, and Lia shivered at the rage she heard in his voice.

“It’s not your fact to state, Citizen Nestor. Your facts begin and end with your relationship with Riva Estep and how your promiscuous behavior created an untenable emotional environment for my client.”

“My promiscuous—” Colan’s voice deepened with disgust. Lia risked a glance up to see he stared at the advocate as if he wanted to shove him in the room with Riva and her explosives. The side door opened and Zashi marched in, likely alerted by one of his staff about the charged atmosphere. He glanced from Colan to the advocate and scanned the crowd.

“Yes. Didn’t Riva Estep interrupt a liaison with another woman at your house the night of the fourth?”

“What? What liaison?”

Colan sounded confounded, and Lia remembered that encounter. She’d left quickly, but apparently Riva had read a lot into her presence in Colan’s house. Or read into it very accurately, considering that soon after, Lia and Colan had actually begun a personal, sexual relationship. This all sounded very bad.

“As a matter of fact, Riva’s anguish at the realization you were engaged in intimate relations with another woman, Citizen Nestor, drove her to seek a way to gain your attention and harm herself.”

More mutters from the crowd, and Lia blinked at the floor, desperate to leave but not sure how to escape the suddenly hot room without drawing everyone’s attention. She’d seem like a guilty party, slinking off in shame. Maybe she was.

Her eyes burned with the start of tears, and she swallowed again rather than make another sob. People shifted around her, and she noticed a pair of shiny black shoes near hers. Looking up, Lia recognized the stern, unemotional face of Zashi. He held his hand out to her, and she took it and rose, balancing herself in the crowded row as best she could. He held out a datpad flashing nonsense for her to hold and act as an excuse for her exit. The woman next to her looked between them and smiled at Zashi as if she’d gladly take his other hand, but instead, the security officer led her out of the clot of chairs and people. She didn’t let her gaze stray to the front of the room; she didn’t want to see Colan or his outraged expression.

* * * *

“Where is she?”

“Her suite. It seemed like the most private place.”

Colan wanted to rush back out the door and go to her, but he paused and gave Zashi a nod of thanks. The calm security officer nodded back and returned to his inventory of a locker of weapons.

As he left the security station, Colan increased his pace toward the admin complex. As soon as he’d been dismissed from the witness stand, he’d burst through the holding area and asked where Zashi had gone. When he’d seen Lia escorted from the room, his stress level had gone down dramatically. He hadn’t felt like assaulting Riva’s sneaky little advocate anymore, so that was a major improvement in his ability to behave in a way that wouldn’t end up with him arrested or held in contempt.

Cutting across the common area at a jog, Colan blinked in the sunlight and then made his way to the door of the residential unit. The door was locked, and he pressed on the alert, temper spiking again because he hadn’t thought to ask the security chief for the code.

The display buzzed at him, and Zashi’s face suddenly appeared on the monitor, all sorts of weapons hanging in the locker filled the background.

“You got there faster than I expected.” Zashi glanced at something out of view of the lens, and the door lock
clicked
. Colan pulled it open and walked through the lobby and into Lia’s corridor, wondering when the security officer had decided to facilitate his co-worker’s personal life. He was glad; without Zashi’s subtle encouragements, it was possible circumstances might never have come together to bring him into Lia’s life. Not that he’d be welcome there any longer. Finding out her lover’s last fling had been with the woman who’d nearly killed her would certainly put a damper on their new relationship.

Colan reached her door without giving himself time to contemplate his use of the word relationship, even if it was only in his head. He pressed the alert, took a breath, and pressed it again. Trying to fight back the nervousness threatening to overtake him, Colan stared at the monitor, willing Lia to appear. Another few moments of silence and he pressed the alert once more, already worried she was avoiding him, picturing her standing on the other side of the door shaking her head and determined not to admit him. She had to be upset, she was probably angry with him for not saying anything. The soft sound of the door lock disengaging stopped his thoughts, and his mind went blank when Lia appeared. She was red-eyed and pale, her hair hanging in little strands from a disarranged braid, and she took his breath away.

“Lia, I…” Faltering to a halt, he wasn’t sure what to say next.
I’m sorry? I wish I’d never met her?
Which utterly true admission would express the regret he felt, the fear he would lose her,
had
already lost her in that awful time in the courtroom?

“Riva Estep?” Lia’s voice cracked, and her mouth trembled as she swung the door wide. He stepped inside, and she swung it closed behind them. At least she’d let him in, although it might be because she wanted privacy for an impending argument.

“Lia, I—”

“She’s still in jail, isn’t she?” Lia interrupted him with a frown as she re-engaged the door lock and checked her monitor observing the hallway. “Zashi would have sent me a ping if she was loose, but she wasn’t pardoned, was she?”

Colan tried to regroup. “Yes, she’s still incarcerated. Moca ruled she was to be tried as incompetent but a danger to the public, so she’s back in the lockup until the next shuttle.” Lia had been fearful of Riva getting loose, and what, tracking her down?

She let out a breath and double-checked the monitor. Just as Colan relaxed into the notion Lia wasn’t upset about the news of his involvement with Riva, she turned back to him, her frown even more pronounced. She pushed out her hand and gave him a shove to the chest. He took a step back as he overbalanced and bumped his back into the hallway wall. She was strong.

“Riva Estep? You were involved with that unbalanced woman?” Lia turned and strode into her quarters. Colan followed, keeping a safe distance.

“I was. Very briefly, a long time ago.”

“Huh.” Lia halted in front of her seating area and stared at him. “How long ago and how briefly?”

“A year and a half ago. For a couple of months. Until I went off to set up survey links in the highlands.”

“Oh, so you took off on her too?”

“But I never came back to her.” Colan tried to smile but knew his mouth wasn’t working correctly. He was numb with worry.

“Not funny, Colan.” With her lips tight and eyes narrowed, Lia looked ready to battle. She had to have felt awful hearing about it while sitting in the middle of a crowd of strangers. He’d caught glimpses of her watching him from behind several large people and had initially been comforted by her presence. But as soon as the advocate started in with the personal questions, Colan knew she was blindsided. He should have told her something about it before, but he hadn’t wanted to talk about subjects that might make her see him in a worse light. Things were too new and tentative between them.

“I know. I’m sorry I didn’t say something earlier.”

“You sort of did, now that I think back, I just didn’t realize that in Colan-ese, ‘close’ meant sex partner. I understand. You’re a very private person.” Lia shook her head and rubbed at her temple as if she was getting a headache. “It must have been difficult for you when he started asking those questions.”

Colan shrugged. His main concern had been her at the time. As soon as Zashi had arrived and escorted her out he’d been much less worried about himself. Only about her. He owed the safety chief a drink or two. And a quart of gin.

“So, do you still care about her?”

“No more than I would for a fellow human being. Probably less now since she killed people.”

Lia shook her head, a tiny smile creasing her lips. Colan’s heart started to beat in his chest, and he took a breath. Better now.

“See, that was funny. Morbid and twisted, but funny.” She took a step his way, and his body warmed a few degrees. “I should confess something to you too.”

“Do you need to be under oath?”

“Funny again.” Now she was only half a meter away, and he couldn’t look away from her chocolate eyes. “There is someone on planet I had a relationship with. I don’t any more, but in the interest of disclosure, you should know.”

“Stev.”

Her eyes widened, and she took in a deep breath. “How did you know?”

“I put together all sorts of little clues and hints.”
And Zashi told me.
It had been in a roundabout and subtle way, but Colan had gotten the picture. And maybe he owed Stev a drink for behaving in whatever irredeemable way that allowed Lia to not care about him anymore and yet still be receptive to Colan when she arrived on Gamaliel.

“I’m surprised. I thought you only paid attention to mountain ranges and river courses.”

“That’s not all I notice.” He studied her; her careful posture, unwavering gaze, rapid breathing. Maybe he could touch her now and not have it go awry.

“What do you see?”

“I see you.” Taking a breath and a risk, he reached out for her hand, and she rushed to him, feet quick as she pressed herself against him. There she was with her warmth and softness, smelling like home. He curled his arms around her and held her tight, so grateful for another chance with her. She leaned up and kissed his neck, and he ran his fingers into her hair, tugging at her loose braid, inhaling her scent, shaky with relief and desire.

“Do we need to tell each other any more about past lovers?” Her breath tickled his skin.

“No.”

“We probably should have gone over our sexual involvements earlier than this.”

“I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, just keep doing that.”

She chuckled as she leaned up to get a hold of his mouth with hers. Her fingers clenched in the muscles of his shoulders as she pulled him down or pulled herself up. It didn’t matter. She managed to kiss him properly once he scooped her close.