Thief (8 page)

Jace laughed. “Life would be simpler if I was, but, no, I’m not a eunuch.” He looked out the window to the fathomless Void. “It’s funny, in a way.”

“What?”

Jace looked her dead-on. “If I hold you to whore, I’m suspect. If I don’t, I’m even more so. Even by
your
standards.”

Kraft opened her mouth to speak, then clamped her jaw with an audible click. She leaned back and considered him for a long, quiet time. Her gaze held the same intensity she’d had when she held him at the tip of her blade. “You’re right. I guess I’ve come to expect the worst. I’ve forgotten.”

“Forgotten what?”

“That you are so much more than pretty.”

“Don’t know about that.” Jace rolled his eyes. Why did she keep calling him pretty? Didn’t sound like an insult the way she said it, but it didn’t sound quite wholesome either.

Kraft unfurled herself from the counter like a deadly cat and looked down at herself. “My back is to the proverbial wall, Captain Lawless. I got no ship, shirt, or even pants but at your discretion.”

Looking up at him from a lowered face, she said, “Were you in mind, you could strip me bare and toss me out an airlock, and that’s either before or after you make my last hours hell. Lord on high, I’m at your mercy. You and I both know it.”

Jace nodded. “I once fell to your mercy.”

“And you were willing to give up everything just to save your crew.” Kraft frowned. “I don’t have
anything
to bargain with.”

“Is that why you spared me?” He’d long and deep into the night pondered why Kraft had let him go. In her hand, at the tip of her blade, she could have taken everything—his ship, his crew, his life. But she didn’t. She left him with everything intact and 5K in script goods. Kraft split the haul so even-steven he still couldn’t grasp why.

“Spared you?” Kraft shook her head and chuckled. “Heller could have killed us all in an instant with his Gatewin Gusher. If anybody did any sparing that day, it would be him.” She tilted her face to the window in the kitchen ceiling. “I danced. And while I danced with you, I found out you are smart, honorable and fair.”

“Don’t know about honorable. I am a thief after all.” Jace turned his attention to the swath of Void out the window.

“Being honorable in a dishonorable Void is a mite difficult, isn’t it, Captain Lawless?” Her voice rolled out to embrace him.

He looked at her, compellingly dressed in his own clothes, and felt his desire for her rise such that the heat would make him blush if he didn’t turn away. Suddenly, Senna filled his mind. He felt an almost crushing guilt and turned his back on Kraft.

“It is at that, Kraft. Being honorable in a dishonorable Void is mighty difficult.”

Chapter Ten

Within three days, Kraft’s life aboard
Mutiny
settled into a pattern. She cooked while Heller needled her every chance he got, Garrett took great pleasure in tossing limericks back and forth, Bailey developed a crush on her, and Payton and her daughter, Charissa, seemed endlessly fascinated by heavily censored tales of her derring-do.

Jace made himself scarce.

Kraft saw him, or at least his backside, only at meal times. She found her gaze drawn to his slightly too long black hair that curled against his shirt collar and brushed the expanse of his shoulders. His utensils looked small in his broad hands and drew her attention up his sinewy forearms, dusted with black hair, to his biceps below the folded sleeves of his homespun shirts.

Kraft found herself inordinately pleased when Jace maintained a reverent silence during meals. Talking took time away from enjoying his food. The others talked and joked, but the only time Jace responded was when one of the others complimented her on the meal; he would nod vigorously, but keep eating.

Bailey constantly groomed his blond locks and riveted his pale blue eyes to her. Ripe with his boyish crush, he determinedly made room for her at the table, but she refused.

“The cook does not eat at the table.”

Crestfallen, Bailey sat beside Charissa with a pout on his rounded young face.

“I’m not shunning your hospitality or your kindness, Bailey. I’m simply following a tradition long in standing. The cook serves herself last and eats in the kitchen. But if all are so inclined, I can converse from here.”

“The cook speaks when spoken to.” Heller, sitting to the right of Jace, rammed a fork-full of food into his mouth as he glared at her over the swollen purple of his broken nose.

“No, that’s children,” Garrett said from the long end of the table, directly across from Jace. “That would be you, Heller, not her.”

“Huh?” Heller turned his attention to Garrett.

“You’re acting like a child with a diaper full of piss and vinegar.” Garrett took another bite of his supper.

Heller glared, flexed his hands into fists and plunked them on the table, rattling the plates against the metal surface.

For all Kraft could see, Jace sat at the head of the table and continued to eat. What kind of a captain was he? She would have put a stop to this squabble as soon as she got wind of it.

“Don’t get bristled with me, polecat.” Garrett set aside his fork and looked at Heller like a father disciplining his son. “Since you can’t seem to grasp, let me lay it out.” Garrett took the napkin from his lap, tossed it on the table then stood. “Kraft has gone above the bend to get along with you, but you just keep sticking burrs in her boots. Get over it.”

“Got nothing to get over.” Heller settled in his chair, crossing his massive arms over his bulky chest.

“Kraft bested us,” Garrett said. “Not just you or me or Jace. All of us. Get over it.”

“Yeah, well, look who got bested now.” Heller shot her a malicious snarl.

Not wishing to change the beat, Kraft continued to watch Garrett dance with Heller. Jace had to step in, not her. She couldn’t believe Jace sat at the table calmly eating his supper while two of his crew members geared up for a show down.

“Bested? You think
her
bested?” Garrett laughed. “Who the hell do you think made the food you’re shoveling into your greedy, gaping maw?”

“Jace’s cook-whore.” Heller tossed off the insult like a gauntlet, then stood. At seven feet and a good three-fifty, he almost filled the galley with his mass. Heller’s eyes, rimmed black like a raccoon from Jace’s punch, challenged her.

Garrett tapped the table with one gnarled finger. “You stop glaring at her and look at me, Heller, since I’m the one talking to you.”

Heller’s head swiveled like a haunch of pork on a meat-hook. He sized up Garrett with the cunning eye of a beta dog probing for weakness in an upper pack member.

Even though Garrett was a tall, thin drink of water who was half Heller’s size and twice Heller’s age, Garrett stood and faced Heller unafraid. Garrett’s stance spoke volumes. Kraft knew without a doubt that if Heller physically challenged Garrett, Heller would get beat down. Not by force, but by skill. Garrett might come off as simple and ambling, but the man had dexterous speed where Heller had only bulk. Experience counted on the Fringe, and Garrett had a lot more than Heller.

Jace barely looked up from his dinner at the drama unfolding before him. As pleased as Kraft was that Jace found her cooking so distracting, she wondered if Captain Lawless really was the alpha dog on the ship. Garrett certainly seemed to be taking that position at the moment.

Payton waved her hand in front of her face. “Could we tone down the billowing clouds of testosterone? You two are spoiling an exceptional meal.”

Kraft wanted to applaud Payton for bringing the moment from a swift tango to a waltz.

“I agree.” Garrett plunked himself down and tossed his napkin in his lap. “You’ve done a fine job, Kraft.”

Kraft nodded. “Thank you kindly.”

Heller stood nonplused for a moment, looking around like a little kid trying to find his toys so he could take them and stomp home. No one challenged him, and he didn’t know what to do. In the end, he focused his burning eyes on her and mouthed the words, “Cook-whore”.

Kraft held his gaze and took a bite of her dinner. She refused to take his bait, but she didn’t back down from his challenge either.

“She bested us, Heller,” Jace said matter-of-factly. “She isn’t grinding it in your face. Sit down and let it go.”

Heller sat, but he shot Kraft a foreboding glare.

Kraft thought that Heller was like Smug, a terrible mean dog she knew once upon a time. Vicious and deadly, Smug had to be shown, clearly and sharply, who not to tangle with. Heller was by far stupider than Smug. Since Jace’s sharp rap across Heller’s snout hadn’t brought him into line, she would have to find another way. And she didn’t have to wait long for the training to begin.

At lunch the next day, Bailey stood first in line, but Heller shoved him aside and thrust out his plate.

Kraft waited for Bailey to recover, took his plate and said, “Fair is fair, Heller. Bailey was first.” She fixed Bailey’s plate and he sat at the table.

She took Heller’s plate and heaped it high. She held it out to him. He took it, looked around and snarled, “How do I know you ain’t poisoned it?”

“Cheery thought, but don’t you think—oh, wait.” Kraft deliberately turned her back on him. “You don’t.”

“What?” Heller asked.

“Think,” Bailey said, taking a bite. He grinned at Kraft like a well-trained puppy.

“That’s it!” Heller slammed his plate down on the counter, splattering food everywhere. “We’re going.”

Kraft sighed and rolled her eyes. “Fine. Mano-a-mano?”

“What?” Heller’s face wadded up like a piece of paper trash.

“Hand-to-hand, no weapons,” Bailey translated, gripping his plate of food protectively.

Heller tossed aside his blade. “That’s all I got on me.”

Kraft shrugged. “I can’t toss aside my weapon so easily.”

“Cheater.”

“No.” She shook her head. “But I’ll tell you my weapon first.”

“Go ahead.” Heller drew up until he loomed almost a foot over her.

“I have two fingers. Well, one finger, one thumb.”

“That all?”

“All I need.”

Heller spat, then motioned her forward with two flicking fingers. “Come at me, freak-show, and I’ll ram your two fingers up your fucking nose.”

Kraft smiled. For the most part, Heller only swore when Jace wasn’t around. “You’ll be on your knees before you can even process my threat.”

“Didn’t Captain Lawless tell everyone to—” Before Bailey could finish, Kraft grabbed Heller’s right hand with her thumb and forefinger, flipped his hand up and back, then forced him to his knees with steady pressure.

Bailey dropped his fork in open-mouth shock.

Heller’s eyes went wide. He twisted his hand this way and that, but only managed to make matters worse by giving her a better hold. He flailed his left arm, but his thick muscles prevented him from lifting his arm high enough to disengage her.

“Let go, bitch!”

She leaned close and whispered, “Stop challenging me, Heller. You stop right now, or I promise, I’ll wrench your hand so hard I’ll break it along with your arm, your shoulder, your back, and then I’ll get to work on your legs.”

His face went white, except for the still purple mask across his eyes and nose. If she were inclined to fight dirty, all she had to do was poke his schnozz and he’d scream uncle.

Jace entered the kitchen, considered their tableau for a moment, and calmly asked, “What’s going on?”

“An understanding.” Kraft spared Jace half a glance.

“You freak-show bitch!” Heller gurgled in pain as he knelt in front of her.

“Not the understanding I’m looking for.” Kraft tweaked the pressure point harder.

Heller yelped.

Looking down at him, using the rolling power of her whispered voice, Kraft said, “You got no reason but hurt ego to be fighting with me. I got no compelling reason at all to fight with you.”

“I’ll kill you when you sleep!”

Jace only watched with a curious indifference, and she began to appreciate his quiet authority. He didn’t have to constantly step in and take charge. He let his crew work things out amongst themselves, stepping in only when he had to. Jace didn’t step between Garrett and Heller because Jace knew Garrett could hold his own against Heller. Apparently, he felt the same about her.

“Heller.” Kraft tweaked his hand hard, causing him to almost go fetal on the floor. “Stop cutting in.”

“You crazy bitch!” Heller tried again to worm his way out of her hold.

Kraft could keep him pinned for the rest of her life. “Do we have an understanding?”

“Jace is the captain, not you!”

Kraft lifted her gaze to Jace. “I know. He’s my captain too. I’m dancing with him and you keep cutting in.” She turned her attention back to Heller. “Now, I’m all for a bit of healthy competition, but you got the wrong idea of it. I’m not your enemy. I’ve got no mind to hurt anyone, even you. Give over that we won’t fight each other anymore.”

Releasing the pressure, she gave Heller a reprieve from pain but made it clear she could reimpose it with a pinch.

“I think you better do what she says.” Jace squatted down to Heller’s level. “Seems to me my cook can more than handle herself.”

My cook?
Kraft couldn’t decide if the possessive nature of that comment pleased or enraged her, but she kept her focus on the matter at hand.

It seemed to take forever, but eventually, Heller gave in with a snarled, “Okay!”

Kraft released him and went back to the stove as if nothing had happened.

“I just thought she might be trying to poison us, is all.” Heller grabbed his plate and moved to the table. He shook his hand and cupped it to his chest, rubbing his palm carefully.

“I wouldn’t kill anyone with food.” The very idea went against everything she held to as a cook. “If I wanted to kill you, Heller, I’d want to get up close and personal. Poison is a coward’s way.” Kraft looked right at Jace. “I only kill when I have to and only with regret.”

A small frown wrinkled the edges of his mouth, and she wondered what caused his displeasure. Was he angry at her for the way she’d chosen to deal with Heller? Surely, Jace understood that Heller wouldn’t respond to anything but a clear and decisive physical besting. Jace himself resorted to physical violence when he’d punched Heller in the face. Perhaps Jace worried that she might turn her trick on him at some point.