The Game of Luck

by Catherine Cerveny

  When I felt his erection slide to where his hand had been, I pressed my hips back, wordlessly offering myself. He parted me with his fingers, and I felt the tip of him at my opening. Gods, only the tip! I tried to push back to take more of him but couldn’t. He held me still, a hand now on my hip to push my skirt up and keep me in place. Seconds passed, though it could have been an eternity. He kept us like that for an infinite moment, both of us breathing hard, waiting and wanting.

  “Alexei, please. Don’t tease me. I can’t take it,” I begged.

  “Tell me you want this,” he whispered in my ear.

  “Yes. I want this! I want you.”

  That was all it took. He plunged into me in a series of unsteady, rough thrusts. Each one buried him deeper than the last until he lifted me off my toes and crushed me against the glass. I cried out at the thrusts, my sounds drowned out by his deep groan of entry once inside me. My panties made it difficult to widen my legs, so the angle made him feel huge, the width of him almost too much.

  He fell into a machinelike rhythm, hard and grueling, as his hips snapped in and out of me. That rhythm drove me wild, not quite giving me what I needed but making me insane with wanting him. He let go of my wrists and brought both hands to my hips, all the better to fit my body against his.

  My orgasm built with sudden, blinding intensity, and it was as if he could sense the change in my body. Somehow he knew I’d caught fire and my orgasm was ready to detonate over both of us. He changed the angle of his thrusts, his breath on my throat, mouth finding the pulse in my neck, and teeth scraping my skin.

  It was the push I needed to send me over the edge, screaming as I came. I needed to hold on to something, but there was nothing but glass. I struggled against it, still coming. Then I felt myself moved and laid down on my stomach on another hard, unyielding surface. A shudder went through me. Oh gods, he was going to fuck me on his desk.

  I gripped its edges as Alexei continued to thrust. He bent over me, his breath harsh in my ear. And when he came, pumping into me, I felt this startled awe, overcome by my own orgasms, by him, by the urgent need that had brought us together with such ferocity.

  When it was over, we lay there, me trapped beneath him. While I was uncomfortable under his weight, I didn’t care. I wouldn’t have traded this moment with him for anything as we caught our breath, bodies still joined.

  Finally, I managed, “Was it the christening you’d hoped for?”

  His shaky laughter tickled the back of my neck. “It was. Welcome to Soyuz Park, by the way. Hopefully you’ll come again.”

  I grinned and stretched like a cat beneath him. “Thanks. I plan on it.”

  * * *

  Later, I sat on the counter in the private bathroom just off Alexei’s office, watching as he concentrated on cleaning us up. I should add my legs were spread and my skirt hiked to my waist while he worked. Though Alexei’s grip had been loose, there were faint bruises on my left wrist. Another marred my inner thigh but wasn’t worth complaining about. In fact, I felt relaxed and achy in the best possible way as he ran the warm, wet cloth over me.

  “Did I help you work through whatever was bothering you?” he asked, eyes flicking up to meet mine before looking back to the cloth.

  I stiffened with surprise. “What are you talking about?”

  “I know you, Felicia. I also know when something is bothering you and when you’d rather not deal with it.”

  His confession was shockingly intimate. I wanted to get annoyed he could read me so easily, but it was difficult to rustle up true aggravation as I came down from my post-orgasmic bliss. Plus he was rubbing the warm cloth over me with gentle attentiveness, which was distracting all on its own. And, well, he was right. I’d used him to temporarily push aside a reality I hadn’t wanted to face. He really did know me better than anyone.

  “I’m sorry I used you just for sex,” I said stiffly.

  That earned me a grin. “I don’t recall complaining. I’m more than happy to let you use me whenever you like. Besides, when you climbed out of the flight-limo, you looked so pretty and sweet, and sexy, I knew I wouldn’t be able to concentrate until I’d had all of you.”

  He threw the cloth down a slot in the wall that went to a centralized laundry facility in the building, managed by the in-house AI. Then he plucked me off the counter and smoothed out my clothes with appreciative hands.

  “I just want you to tell me what’s really worrying you. You know I’m here for whatever you need. All you have to do is ask,” he said, gazing down at me with undisguised affection.

  “I know, and thank you.” I sighed and led him from the bathroom.

  As soon as we were back in his office, I started pacing. Alexei leaned against his desk, watching me, saying nothing, letting me work myself up to getting the words out.

  Finally, “No sense delaying the inevitable. May as well spill it. I spoke to Grandmother today.”

  It was a measure of how quick he could be when he said, “Suzette in Nairobi.”

  I nodded. I couldn’t imagine calling Tanith “Grandmother.” It seemed like such a foreign concept to apply to someone so glamorous and chic.

  “Yes, it’s Suzette. Celeste said she wanted to talk to me. I wasn’t going to shim her—gods, Grandmother drives me insane—but then Celeste pulled the Nine of Swords, so I felt like I didn’t have a choice.”

  “And the Nine of Swords is a bad thing and now there’s trouble?”

  “Heaps of it.” I stopped pacing and tugged anxiously on my braid. “So far as I can tell, five family members are missing, with my father being one of them. Two on Earth, two here on Mars, and my father on Venus. There could be more, but I don’t know yet. Grandmother told me it was my job to find them because I was One Gov—which she implied makes me lower than dirt. So I’ve been on the CN-net all morning searching for clues, but I don’t know what I’m looking for. I tried tracing their One Gov citizenship chips, but I’m not getting anywhere. The work is too nuanced and I’m charging in like a bull. When you factor in the Nine of Swords, I can’t help but think they’re all dead and that scares me. I’ve never been close to my father. He basically abandoned me when I was five then checked out of reality for the rest of his life, but I don’t want to think he might be dead. I don’t want to imagine that for any of them. I’m terrified to even think it, but this may involve the luck gene. And if that’s the case, it’s critical I dig into this and stop it.”

  “You mean we have to stop it. After all, I did marry into this family and that makes it mine now too,” he said, and if such a thing was possible, I fell even more in love with him.

  “Okay, we’ll stop it. Tell me what we need to do next.”

  He removed his suit jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves to his elbows. The move revealed the small double-headed eagle tattoo on his left forearm. He had so many tattoos, sometimes they blurred together and I didn’t see them for what they were, or overlooked them entirely. I forgot each had its own unique meaning. In this case, the double-headed eagle meant rage against whatever authority was in power. Once, that authority was a government on Earth that controlled Russia long before it became the Russian Federation of Islands. Now, I guessed the power he raged against was One Gov. No. I had to stop thinking like that. Alexei said the Consortium had no plans to topple One Gov, and I believed him.

  Alexei sat us both on the couch and I looked from the tattoo to his face. If he noticed my gaze, he made no comment. Instead he said, “First, we determine if anyone else is missing. We do that by tracing the citizenship chips and tracking the movements, looking for unusual patterns that deviate from the norm. If any chips have expired, we need to assume the worst.”

  I felt a shiver of fear. “That they’re dead?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. I’m sorry.”

  “No, it’s…” I shrugged, not sure what to say to that. I didn’t want to think about it being a possibility. “Let’s just figure out a plan before we jump to conclusions. What next?”r />
  “We find out who knows about the existence of the luck gene. We’ll need to peel back the layers of the CN-net and investigate what’s underneath. Your mother’s research was highly classified by both TransWorld and One Gov. If someone else knows about her research into the luck gene, that information won’t be easy to find. We’ll need to dig.”

  He made it sound like scraping along the underbelly of the CN-net was something he’d enjoy.

  “I’ve already reached my CN-net quota. I can’t go back in until tomorrow.”

  He looked at me like I’d told him a joke with the lamest punch line ever. “It will be fine. The time will be off the record” was all he said.

  Since he had mysterious ways to work around the system, I didn’t doubt him.

  “Won’t I hold you back? I can’t dip in and out of the CN-net like you can.”

  “For now, you’re riding my coattails to see what we find. Then we’ll have a better idea on how to proceed.”

  He lay back on the couch and pulled me with him until I lay sprawled on top. The positioning was just as suggestive as it sounds. His body was warm and hard, and mine knew instinctively how to fit with it. As one of his legs slid between mine, my skirt rode up my hips to an indecent height. My face was inches from his. “This is your idea of comfortable?”

  There was that lazy grin again—the one that made me all hot and flushed. “I find it very comfortable.”

  “Do I need to remind you that you only get one office christening?”

  “That’s unfortunate, although there are other rooms we could investigate.” He kissed my throat, knowing how to melt my resistance. His hands were on my hips, rocking me slightly. It lined us up in a way that let me know how his body felt about having mine atop it. Turns out, I had a very high approval rating.

  “I love when we’re together like this,” he whispered into my hair. “I know you’re here with me, and the rest of the tri-system doesn’t matter. It’s only the two of us.”

  “And the dog,” I reminded him.

  “Yes, and the dog,” he agreed. He lay back on the pillow against the arm of the couch. “Get comfortable. We could be at this awhile.”

  Saying so, his hand went to the back of my head and pressed gently until my cheek rested on his chest. I could hear his heart beat, strong and steady. I nestled into him and felt his hands stroke my back. I could have stayed in his arms like this for hours, regardless of whatever reason had brought me there.

  “When we’re done, you need to feed me. I forgot lunch,” I murmured into his chest.

  “I’ll feed you,” he promised, his deep voice rumbling in my ear, the Russian accent soothing. “I need you to meet me at nexus-node 183. Do you remember how to get there?”

  “Yes, I remember,” I said as I burrowed in deeper, my cheek now resting against his bare skin. “I’ll see you there.”

  Then my eyes drifted closed and I let myself drop into the virtual e-world of the CN-net.

  8

  The CN-net had an intricate series of rules and regulations regarding how it operated and how the tri-system citizens could use it. Everyone with One Gov–approved tech specifications could upload their consciousness for a specified period of time to whatever predesigned realm they wanted, depending on their access privileges. Then there was Alexei Petriv, and all the rules went out the window.

  Unless you entered a closed-loop system parsed off from the rest of the CN-net, like in the case of One Gov’s virtual boardroom, your avatar entered the CN-net at one of the hundreds of different nexus-nodes. You selected the nexus-node that was closest to the realm you wanted to reach, then made your way through the CN-net based on that reference point. The public nexus-nodes were open to everyone and located near areas people wanted to visit—a nightclub, some sort of sensory experience, or a residential or shopping district. But it wasn’t an online free-for-all with everything up for grabs. There were morality guidelines in place and if you broke them, the AI queenmind would send drones to trace you. Not only would you be ejected from the CN-net, the drones would trace you back to your physical body, and you’d be arrested in real life.

  While One Gov regulated time logged in to the CN-net, it was possible to spend a good portion of your life there. And if you planned on building a second life in the virtual world, you needed something to do, somewhere to go, and somewhere to live. Hence, you could own property on the CN-net, buy and furnish a house, travel to any realm in human history, literature, or the vids, and in a few cases, even have a part-time job there.

  However, not all nexus-nodes or realms were created equal. Like everything One Gov did, there was a two-tiered approach based on wealth. Some realms were open to everyone, while others depended on the gold notes in your account.

  And then there were the others, like nexus-node 183, that for all intents and purposes didn’t exist.

  Nexus-node 183 was a shadow node punched into the CN-net by the Consortium, along with a handful of others, for their own personal use. Shadow nodes were so far off the grid, the average person believed they skirted the edge of the impossibly fantastic, like unicorns, Bigfoot, and perfect frizz-free hair on a humid day. They placed you between realms and allowed you to travel without being monitored by One Gov’s AI queenmind, making you a ghost in the machine.

  Once I’d logged in, instead of reaching for the standard nexus-node interchange, I toggled away to node 183. When I opened my eyes, I stood in a black shadow world of darkness. Behind it, as if that darkness was merely a thin curtain shielding me from the outside, I saw buildings that existed as faint points of light. I couldn’t touch or interact with them until I left the nexus-node and went into the CN-net proper.

  Alexei wasn’t there. Instead I saw a man with short dark-blond hair, brown eyes, and a slim build dressed in black—boots, pants, and sweater. He was a little taller than me and of average attractiveness. I couldn’t tell if he was young because of true youth or the Renew treatments; there was no way to know with avatars.

  I knew he was Consortium but didn’t recognize him. And where was Alexei? Sure, I was slow at toggling, but I couldn’t imagine I’d taken so long that he’d gone without me. Was this man supposed to take me to Alexei? And why the hell was he looking at me like that? It was pervy and made me uncomfortable.

  “Um…hi?” I tried, offering a little wave.

  At the same time, I eased away from him, nervous. I didn’t have a gut feeling to guide me, and it made sense to be cautious. I’d learned that on the CN-net, gut feelings didn’t exist. The luck gene didn’t work when my consciousness wasn’t anchored to my physical body.

  “Hello,” he said, the word flat and unaccented. The only people I’d ever met connected to the Consortium without some hint of a Russian accent were Brody and Konstantin Belikov.

  “I think I may be lost,” I tried, nervousness increasing. What if I’d hit the wrong nexus-node? It wouldn’t be the first time. But what if I was in the middle of a bad situation? “I was supposed to meet someone here, but I think I’m in the wrong place. Sorry…I’m going to log out and delete this location from my memory blocks. I didn’t see anything worth seeing. So um…okay, no harm, no foul. Again, sorry.”

  His smile turned to a look of alarm. “Felicia, wait. It’s me, Alexei.”

  I froze, uncertain. “Prove it.”

  “We’re lying on a couch in my office on Mars and my hand is on your ass. We’re looking for clues about your missing family members, and we just finished christening my office.”

  Well, that was specific. I gestured to his body. “Okay, smart guy, why don’t you look like you?”

  “It’s an avatar alias shell. I prefer using an alias rather than have my personal coding registered in the CN-net.”

  That made a lot of sense. “You could have warned me ahead of time. I thought you were some creepy pervert and I’d transitioned to the wrong node. In fact I’m not entirely convinced you aren’t a depraved lunatic.”

  “I think there a
re times when you believe that’s exactly what I am, and as much as it appalls you, you love it.”

  Wow. That sounded like Alexei. I held up a hand, signaling him to stop. “Enough. You’re clearly you. Or you sound like you. Hearing Alexei-type things come from someone else is a little trippy.”

  “Noted,” he said, sounding contrite. “I apologize. I should have given you warning. The alias shell is so ingrained, I wasn’t thinking. Which reminds me…” He reached into the ether—it was the only word that came to mind as his arm disappeared into the black nothingness around us from the elbow down. When it reappeared, he held a blue pill.

  I eyed it warily. “What is it?”

  “It’s retro-coding that will suppress your avatar with an alias shell. Putting it in pill form allows you to swallow it. Once it reaches your avatar’s base programming, it works from the inside out to camouflage your CN-net markers and system tags.”

  “What does that mean in normal-people language?”

  He smirked. “It means you’ll be unrecognizable and no one can track you.”

  I took the pill from my husband/not husband. It felt squishy and a little sticky, but it was a distant feeling. I knew it was in my hand, yet it didn’t quite feel like I held it. Or rather, it didn’t have the same immediacy as holding something in the real world. But then, all my physical CN-net interactions were like that—distant and intangible. I’d been told sensations were supposed to be magnified on the CN-net, but that hadn’t been my experience. Even sex with Alexei felt like an echo of real life, because of course we’d tried it. I’d even been the one to suggest it. I hadn’t enjoyed it despite Alexei’s best efforts, and when it came to sex, Alexei’s efforts were very good indeed.