Overlord: The Fringe, Book 2 (3 page)

“Nash said she didn’t sleep for the two days he had her on the
Damn You.
”

Michael pondered the concern he heard in Duster’s voice. Leaning near, he took a wide sniff to read the scent from his Master-of-Arms. Lavender distress. Over Mary.

The emotional scent of Duster clarified when he added, “Nash said she didn’t eat, either.”

“Do you have a point?” Michael injected ice into his tone, as if he hadn’t noticed her vulnerable state. He was a cad for even thinking of challenging her to a fight, let alone doing so.

“This isn’t a game anymore. This is a woman.” Duster dropped his voice a notch. “I never should have bothered you with something so minor.”

“You bring her to my attention as a challenging puzzle, then think I should give up before I solve it?” Michael chuckled as he leaned against his desk. “You know me better than that.”

“You want to know why.”

Michael nodded.

“Can’t you just give her the old sniff test?” Duster asked. “You’re the emotichemical perceptionist. Read her.”

“Her scent is…conflicted. I can’t read her. Besides, there are other ways to unravel the mysterious Mary.”

After a groan, Duster said, “Trust me, I’m sorry I brought her to your attention at all. You had to spend at least five times what she stole to hire Nash.”

“Granted.” Actually, he’d spent nine times. “Your point?”

“The math on that sucks, which makes me think your ego is bent over the fact she eluded you for a year.”

“She taunted me for a year.” Michael turned his gaze to the small holoplas screen embedded in his desk. “Sneaky little bandit. Stealing table scraps from all the ships in the black-market trade route.” He traced his finger along her face, and he smiled a bit when she turned her head closer, as if she could actually feel his caress. “Clever little bandit. Five years of getting away with her scheme, and then, when finally caught, she remains at large. For I still don’t know
why
.”

Whatever her cause, she would rather die than give up her secrets. Her stalwart stance fascinated him. She’d been terrified, yet couldn’t stop antagonizing him. He’d never met anyone with a mouth like hers, and he wanted to seduce the scowl right off her determined face.

“I think you just wanted to find out what kind of a person could best you for so long.” Duster popped a seed and tucked the spent pods into a vest pocket.

“Indeed.” Michael offered no argument. He’d pursued the Bandit of Taiga because of blatant curiosity, a puzzle to distract himself from perpetual mourning.

“Wanna explain to me why you offered to fight her?”

“I don’t know.” Mary had a gleam in her velvet-brown eyes, something longing to surrender, and it called loudly to that part of him longing to control. Not in a brutal, vicious way, but in a deeply sensual way. He never expected her to take him up on his offer, let alone attack him in a sudden, screaming burst. Like a caged animal suddenly free, Mary fought harder than anyone he’d ever known. What she lacked in skill, she more than made up for with ferocity.

“What if she would have kicked your ass?” Duster asked.

“I would have let her go.” Michael didn’t believe his own words. Her scent—floral, citrus, dark earth and a shock of conflicted spices—confused and compelled him. Mary was unique in being the first person he couldn’t read.

“You shouldn’t have fought with her in the first place.”

Unmistakable concern in Duster’s voice compelled Michael to take another deep breath. Lavender mixed with narcissus clarified that Duster felt responsible for Mary since he presented her as a puzzle.

“I shouldn’t have fought with her because she’s a woman?” Michael grinned. “Are your issues with women showing?”

“No.” Duster flashed him a guilty sidelong glance. “Nothing’s more dangerous than a woman with nothing to lose.”

“Maybe that’s why I did.” Michael sat on the edge of his desk, his arms folded, one long leg swinging easily, his eyes riveted on the main holoplas screen. “I think Mary has an awful lot to lose. She’s on a mission. She’s not
liberating
my goods for herself.”

After a chuckle, Duster asked, “How do you figure that?”

“Look at what she’s wearing.” Michael pointed to the main holoplas. “Homespun brown shirt and pants. The only weapon she had on her was a knife. Nash said she lived in a shack on Taiga that didn’t even have running water.” He shook his head. “If she’s selling my goods, she’s not keeping the money for herself.”

“Didn’t Nash find out what she was up to?” Duster fished through the stack of papers on the desk.

“He thought if he caught her, she’d spill.” Michael plucked the bounty hunter’s report out of the heap and handed it to Duster.

After a quick read, Duster laughed. “Gee, wasn’t he wrong.”

Michael pinched the bridge of his nose and uttered a pained sigh. “The only thing she spilled was vulgarity. Remarkably Average Mary has a remarkably vast vocabulary. Nash said he’s never heard such creative use of multilingual expletives in his life. He offered a transcript, but I declined.”

“How long is the transcript?” Duster asked.

“Over thirty pages.”

“Of just her swearing?” Duster sounded shocked and somewhat impressed.

“Mary only stopped when Nash gagged her.”

“Is that when she bit his finger?”

Michael nodded. “Had to pay hazard for that.” He could easily picture Mary spewing foul words as she sat bound in a cell on the
Damn You.
For some insane reason, he found the image charming. Endearing, even.

“I get the hazard payment, what with Nash’s bit finger and his crushed
cojones
, but why did you pay him bonus?” Duster flipped to the payout page and his jaw dropped. “Why did you pay Nash triple the contract total in bonus?”

“Nash refrained from killing her even though he desperately wanted to. He offered me triple if I let him kill the Bandit of Taiga. He didn’t mention the package was a woman at that time. I refused, offering him triple as a bonus if he succeeded. And he did. So I paid him.”

“You didn’t know the Bandit of Taiga was a woman until—”

“You hauled her into my office. Bound, gagged and blindfolded.” Shocked delight had filled him when he discovered his vexing target to be a wicked vixen. “When Nash called the package Remarkably Average Mary, I thought he demeaned a man by calling him a Mary.”

“Surprise, surprise.” Duster tossed aside the report. With a sheepish grin, he used his eclip to request the transcript. “I like the records to be complete, and we might learn something.”

“New swears.”

“Knowledge is power.” Duster tucked his eclip to a vest pocket and pulled out a handful of seeds. “What are you gonna do with the foul-mouthed, albeit lovely, lady Mary?”

“You think she’s lovely?” Michael considered her over the audvid. Disheveled chestnut-brown hair swept over her brow. Even in sleep, a frown darkened her delicately strong face.

“Seems to have all the right parts in all the right places.” Duster considered her. “A bit young. Obviously not a lady in the true sense of the word but, yeah, she’s pretty.” He paused on a sucking breath. “Oh, don’t tell me.”

“What?”

“You got eyes for her?” Duster sounded horrified.

“Mary is one hell of an enticing puzzle.” And he wanted to unravel every bit of her.

“She’s a kid.” Cold and low, Duster took a stand with the tone of his voice and the metallic note of his scent.

“Twenty-five.” Michael nodded to the report. “Four years younger than you. She’s no kid.”

“She’s thirteen years younger than you.”

“Let me know when you get close to having a point.” Michael didn’t enjoy reminders of how fast forty was coming at him.

“For once, do yourself a favor.” Duster popped apart a seed. “Try picking a woman who actually likes you, Michael. One you haven’t fought with.”

Rubbing his tender jaw, he gazed at the audvid of Mary and asked, “What would be the challenge in that?”

Chapter Three

Mary bolted upright, incensed she’d fallen asleep when she must focus on escape.

“Hungry?”

She jumped into a fighting stance.

Six feet away, Commander sat in an ornate chair, drinking clear brown liquid from a bulbous crystal glass.

“Or would you like a brandy before dinner?”

His relaxed posture trivialized her intensity, and she forced herself to calm down. “What’s brandy?”

Sleek eyebrows drew up. “Distilled wine.”

“A spirit, like whisky? I’ll have a shot.”

With smooth grace, he unfurled his long body from the chair, moved to a cabinet and poured her a small glass of brandy.

She watched him intently. His body had all the pent-up energy and grace of a wolf.
Aggressively sexy.
She shook her head to drive away the unwelcome thought.

When he handed her the glass, their fingers touched, and a shiver of fear and desire ran through her. Pushing down the conflicting feelings, she sniffed at the glass and winced back.

“Cup the glass with your palm to warm—”

She swallowed the alcohol in one gulp.

He regarded her with a dismayed frown.

“What?” She tilted her head to stare back at him.

“Nothing.” Military-short hair glinted under the lights when he shook his head. “House, let Cook know we’re ready for dinner.”

“Yes, Commander,” the mechanically lush voice of House responded.

Mary rolled her eyes. “Even your House sucks up to you.”

“Pardon me?”

“Don’t you have a name?”

“As I said, you will address me as Commander.”

“And folks say
I
have delusions of grandeur.” She set her empty glass on the nearest table.

“What folks?”

“Tell me your name and I might tell you who.” She put her hands on her hips.

“So this time you’ll keep your word?”

She wanted to hurl the glass at him, but the weight of the bracelet reminded her why she couldn’t.

“You didn’t the last time.” He swirled the glass in his palm, then sipped. “As I recall, if I won, you were supposed to tell me who you were working for and why.”

“Like you really would have let me go.” Standing as tall as she could, she felt suicidal for continuing to challenge him, but she also couldn’t back down without losing face.

“A moot point,” he said softly. “I won. You lost.”

“Yeah-huh. I remember.” Flushed from embarrassment, with a shot of potent liquor on a three-day empty stomach, she swayed a bit on her feet. “Are we going to eat or chat, Co-man-dur?”

He frowned at the deliberate insult of his title. Red Dardinian silk pulled taut across his massive shoulders as he swirled the mahogany liquid in his glass. “This bodes well for a pleasant meal.”

“You don’t like my attitude, you can always cut me loose.” She prayed he would take that option soon.

“I will when you tell me what I want to know.” He tipped his glass to her.

“Then strap yourself in for a wild ride, bucko. No matter how much booze you pour down my throat, I have no intention of telling you jack.” Seemed the alcohol went straight to the smart-mouth reflex in her brain.

“Really?” He set his glass next to hers and moved close.

She raised her arm in defense.

“Don’t be a fool, Mary.” He nodded to the plastimetal bracelet around her wrist.

Reminded, she lowered her arm and stood still, peering up into his beautiful eyes. Why did she want to kiss him as much as she wanted to kick him? “You really are a royal bastard.”

He lowered his lips a breath from hers. “So I’ve been told.”

With his body so close, she became aware of how good he smelled, like pine and lemon. When she felt her body react in a way that was entirely opposite of her brain, she stepped back, stumbling on the velvet couch.

He looked down at her sprawled form. “I was only going to offer you my arm.”

“Don’t you need that?” She righted herself, fighting down a blush. “I’d look damn stupid with three arms.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose and let out an irritated sigh. “I offered my arm to lead you into the dining room.”

Proud of herself for getting under his skin so easily, she said, “Unless you broke my leg while I was asleep, I can manage.”

She followed him into a room fifty times the size of her cabin on Taiga. A sheet of white linen, wider and longer than the main street of Pine Glenn, covered a table that could easily hold two hundred people. Elaborate gilded china and delicate fluted glasses were set with careful precision on the closest end.

Commander pulled her chair out for her.

Overwhelmed and intimidated, she snidely said, “I think I can figure out how to operate a fancy chair.”

“I merely offered a courtesy.”

“Yeah-huh.” She plunked herself down. He sat to her left, at the head of the table. Lifting her hand, she pointed down the table. “Why don’t you sit at the other end?”

“Because this is where I always sit.”

“Fine, I’ll sit at the other end.” She shoved her chair back, stood and reached for her plate.

He grabbed her wrist. “Sit down and shut up.”

“Or what?” She yanked her arm away from the distracting heat of his touch. “Are you going to send me to bed without supper?”

“If you insist on acting like a child, I’ll find a highchair and strap you to it.”

One look at his face, and she knew he intended to carry out his threat. Since she’d pushed him about as far as she dared, she sat, scooted her chair close and plunked her elbows on the table.

He rang a fragile crystal bell.

She had to bite her lips not to laugh. The gesture looked silly by such a big man.

A chubby young girl wearing a crisp, white uniform entered, wheeling a gold-and-silver serving cart. With quick, sure movements, she placed a shallow bowl of soup before each of them, then left the room, trundling the cart back into the kitchen.

“Magic’s easy when you have servants.” Mary peered dubiously into her bowl. Four wrinkled brown things floated in a light brown swirl with a sprinkling of green bits. “What’s this?”

“Chestnut soup.” He picked up a big gold-and-silver spoon and brought a spoonful to his lips.

She mimicked him. A strange, earthy bitterness laced with a tang of citrus. She’d never tasted anything like it. As soon as the first swallow hit her empty belly, her stomach growled.