Faring Soul - Science Fiction Romance by Tracy Cooper-Posey Page A

barman was heavyset and florid and
his jowls wobbled as he nodded at her. “I wondered when you’d stop
by. Good timing. There’s a man looking for passage to Soward. Said
he’d pay premium for non-Fed and under the radar.” His gaze
flickered toward Brant standing silently at her side.
    “He’s with me,” Catherine said.
    The barman nodded again and relaxed.
“He didn’t say, but I think there’s more than Feds he’s trying to
shake.”
    Catherine considered it for a moment. A
near-normal run to anywhere would help everyone settle in to
shipboard life with a new member. “It wouldn’t hurt to talk to him.
Where can I find him?”
    “He said he’ll be back tonight for the
game.”
    “Sounds good.” She shook the barman’s
hand and left folding yen behind, then headed back out onto the
concourse and blinked at the brightness.
    Brant was still with her, moving like a
shadow just behind and to one side of her. It was the perfect
body-man position. “You’ve done body work?” she asked him, dropping
back even with him.
    “I’ve done a lot of everything since I
left Gry.”
    “Which cadre was yours?” Catherine
asked. “The last I heard, there were only five cadres on Gry. The
best of the best of the enforcers.”
    Brant glanced at her, before letting
his gaze return to roaming around the concourse. It was a very wide
strip that ran around the outer edge of the spoked-wheel station.
The commercial district took up half the circumference, split
almost evenly on both sides, giving space-farers quick access no
matter what landing bay was their dock assignment.
    Once, a long time ago, the station used
spin to provide gravity. But now that energy was so cheap and
bountiful—at least, it was in the Federation core—artificial
gravity was used and landing bays were built along the perimeter
instead of being confined to the no-gravity center. Instead, the
center was used as the termination point for the sky hook down to
the surface of Darwin.
    The commercial districts were the real
center of the terminal, though. They were busy at any time of the
artificial day/night schedule. Darwin terminal was similar to
hundreds of other terminals, stations, endpoints, platforms and
other variations of geosynchronous orbiting ports servicing their
worlds’ jump gates and the interstellar traffic that used them.
Catherine could have found her way around this one without benefit
of the station map that had been zap loaded into the Venturer as they had docked.
    She glanced at Brant as the silence
lengthened. “Rather not talk about Gry?”
    “Is it true you’re a direct descendant
of Glave of Summanus?” he asked.
    “Old history, best forgotten,” she
said. “I get it.” As he dropped back once more she shook her head.
“I don’t want to advertise your role.”
    He moved up level with her again.
    “Besides, nothing is likely to happen
here.”
    “I’ll come with you tonight, just the
same.” His tone implied it wasn’t open to question. Then he added,
“Unless you would prefer Lilita?”
    “She’s far too young.”
    “Ah. Then it must be me.”
    Catherine laughed. “You realize I can
deal with anyone who comes at me with anything short of a nuclear
device?”
    “You hired me as muscle.”
    “You’ll earn your pay, later.”
    “Indulge my whim,” he said, his voice
soft.
    “Your whim, or your conscience?” They
were nearing the end of the commercial section. The doors of their
bay were two hundred meters into the administration section and on
the inner rim. Some of the bays came off the sides of the original
rim. Accessing them involved sloping catwalks and shifting gravity
fields as you walked “up” the wall to the doors. Catherine
preferred to pay extra for same-level docks.
    Brant wasn’t answering her again.
    “Are you not used to meeting new
people, or are you just shy?” she asked.
    “If I’m talking, I can’t listen.”
    “You like listening that much?”
    “That’s the best way to