In the Black

by Sheryl Nantus

  Kendra rolled her shoulders. “They’ll survive. Last time I checked, you couldn’t die from not having sex. So what are we waiting for?”

  “The marshal’s on his way, so we’re sort of in neutral until then. Sean took April back to her quarters. He said she should sleep for a bit. If you want to help I’d appreciate it if you could keep an ear open in case she gets upset again.” Sam paused, trying to find the right words. “She might be emotionally unstable.”

  April had found one of her companions with a slit throat. There was nothing Sam could say or medication Sean could give to ease that image from the courtesan’s memory.

  Sam knew the power of memories.

  Kendra nodded, her lips pressed tightly together. “I hear you. She’s not that far away. I’ll keep an ear open and call you if we need help.” She paused to chew on her lower lip. “Hold the course, Captain. It’ll all work out in the end.”

  The monitor went dark.

  Sam sat back, rubbing her eyes with the palms of her hands.

  If we need help. As in, you keep up there on the bridge and keep the business end going.

  The sad thing was Kendra was right. Sam had no doubt that behind the weeping and sobbing in the cabins there was at least one courtesan looking forward to getting Halley’s customers when the ban was lifted and the money began flowing again. This was a cutthroat business at the best of times, and a whole new block of customers had come free for the taking.

  A low beep came out of the speaker, signaling a base communication. She tapped the button again.

  “What the fuck are you doing with my men?” Trainer snarled. The jovial miner who’d introduced her earlier was gone.

  “Doing my job. As you’re doing yours, I assume.” She leaned forward. “Keeping things cool until the marshal arrives.”

  Trainer let out a growl. “You’ve got Huckness taking statements from my men. They’re locked in the landing bay like criminals.”

  “One of them might well be. I have a dead woman and no one standing around wearing a sign saying ‘I did it.’” Sam jerked a thumb toward the wall. “I’ve got every right to keep your men sequestered until the marshal arrives. Unless you want to bust them out and I’ll have to call the Guild and demand a boycott.”

  “But that’s no reason to...” he started, not taking in what she’d just said. “Boycott?” His voice rose.

  Sam nodded. “Boycott. As per the Guild rules if there’s a problem with a particular base, a standing danger to any Guild ships. You want to explain to your men about how they’re not going to get any Mercy or Charity visits ever again?”

  The momentary panic on Trainer’s face lasted for a second before his official foreman mask slipped back on. “You got proof one of my men is involved? We got rights, you know. You can’t keep them all locked up without arresting someone. I put a call in to Swendson and you’re going to get the union on your back, you’re going to have to answer to them and the Guild if they launch a complaint about—”

  She cut him off. “Your security chief disagreed. Huckness and I had a nice chat.”

  Trainer’s upper lip twitched. “Aren’t you tight with the chief.”

  “Yep.” Sam smiled. “He agreed we need to keep everyone who was on the ship apart from the rest of the crew until the marshal arrives and we figure this all out. He’s taking statements from each one as we speak.”

  “But you can’t keep my men there for hours and hours,” Trainer protested. “It’s kidnapping, right?”

  “Could be. I’m no lawyer.” Sam glanced to one side, pretending to be reading something. “Feel free to call the Guild and ask what their position is on this. I’m sure they’d be glad to talk to you about the death of one of their courtesans, likely by one of your men.”

  A bead of sweat appeared on his forehead.

  “But that’s not going to happen because you’ve already agreed to allow the security chief to do his job.” Sam saw Trainer’s expression shift as she continued. “So I’ll be reporting to the Guild that you cooperated fully and willingly with the marshal and me. And that you’ve cleared this with Swendson as a show of unity between union and management looking for justice to be served.”

  “Yes. Yes, of course.” The foreman let out a relieved sigh. “When can I get my men back?”

  “As soon as the marshal says it’s okay. I don’t know how long it’ll take but I’m sure we can make your fellows as comfortable as possible under the circumstances. We’ll process them as quickly as possible.”

  Trainer nodded. “Please call me with an update at your convenience. Until later, Captain.”

  The screen flickered back to the empty corridor.

  She didn’t want to think about how long it’d take for the marshal to arrive. A shipload of sexually frustrated men with a dead courtesan floating in her cabin and five less-than-enthusiastic courtesans losing money with every hour spelled trouble in her book.

  If she was lucky they’d be able to at least question the men and get some of them cleared before trouble started—the mob was a powder keg ready to go off. It would only take one accusation of cheating at cards or one insinuation about someone’s sexual prowess. Trainer was ready to start screaming to his superiors about meeting his quotas and she knew he’d blame it on her and the Bonnie Belle if it kept him out of trouble.

  Death was death but business reigned supreme.

  Belle startled her out of her silence, the melodic voice coming out of one of the many hidden speakers. “Sam, there’s a group of men at the front door. They’re claiming that they’ve got appointments and want their agreements fulfilled. They seem rather upset.”

  “Damn it.” She rubbed her forehead. “Didn’t we refund all the money?”

  “I did so. But they’re still there.” The AI paused for a second. “Should I call for base security?”

  She glanced at the monitor showing the landing bay. The men assigned to do door duty were likely inside, keeping the peace among the annoyed miners. The security force on a mining base like this wasn’t limitless and Huckness could already be spread out pretty thin with the extra coverage.

  The last thing they needed was an all-out brawl between the miners and security starting in the hallway and spreading into the landing bay. The guards would be outnumbered in no time and while Belle could easily gas them all if they were on board, it’d be making the situation worse.

  She cracked her knuckles.

  Nothing she couldn’t handle on her own.

  She pushed herself out of the chair and into free-fall. “This is our business, not theirs—not yet anyway. Let me see if I can talk them out of being stupid. Give Trainer and Huckness a heads-up call but tell them I’m going to deal with it, use some sweet talk to turn them around. I don’t want to call the troops on them unless it’s necessary. Tensions are high enough, I don’t want a complaint about us using excessive force to keep them either in or out of the Belle.”

  She’d be damned if she’d let a bunch of bullies start pounding on the front door and making a ruckus like frat boys looking to crash the nearby girls camp. She might not have been able to keep Halley from dying but she could handle a bunch of punks without bleating for the foreman and security chief like a pup in her first firefight.

  Jenny popped out of a hatch, almost slamming into Sam in the small cockpit. “You hear that?”

  Sam instinctively reached out to grab the intruder with her left hand, her other fist drawing back for a punch before recognizing the tech. “Fuck.” She pulled in a breath. “You’re damned lucky I didn’t get hold of you. I thought you were locked down.”

  “Belle knows me.” Jenny beamed. “And she knows I have to get ’round to make things work. Locking me down don’t get things done, and we need to be ready to cut lines, ’specially now, right? Don’t worry, she’s been watching me.�
�� Her voice rose. “Right?”

  “I have been monitoring and recording your movements for future review by law enforcement personnel.” The computer sounded almost apologetic. “While the lockdown of the ship is important, repairs and scheduled maintenance take priority and must be completed on time to ensure the continued safety of the crew.”

  “Whatever.” Sam caught the strap. “Just don’t blame me if the marshal wants to interrogate both of you and download every kilobyte of the recordings.”

  “What?” Jenny peeped.

  “We’re all suspects in Halley’s death.” Sam didn’t try to sugarcoat it. “The marshal’s going to want to know where each one of us was at the time of death. And you swimming around the underbelly doesn’t look good.”

  The mechanic frowned. “Me? Kill anyone?” She pointed at herself. “Me?” Her voice rose an octave.

  “I didn’t say you did it.” She resisted the urge to pat Jenny on the head. “I’m just saying to be careful. Because if you didn’t do it and I didn’t do it—” She left the sentence unfinished.

  “Oh.” Jenny tilted her head to one side. “You hear that?”

  “Hear what?”

  “Listen.” The mechanic touched her hand to the wall. “Close your eyes, do this and listen.”

  Sam resisted the urge to sigh, then pressed her palm to the panel, close to Jenny’s. She closed her eyes and waited.

  Sure enough there was a faint pounding reverberating through the ship, an uneven pounding. If she hadn’t been told what to listen for she’d have missed it.

  There was a reason why Jenny was one of the best mechanics in the Guild. It took a special skill to pick up the odd noises, the wrong noises, in the middle of the living and breathing machine that was the Bonnie Belle.

  “That’s not nice,” Jenny whispered. “Hitting her like that. That’s wrong.”

  Sam ground her teeth.

  Not on her ship. Not right after the death of one of her girls.

  “We seem to have some dissatisfied customers,” Sam deadpanned. “Or ex-customers, it seems.”

  “It’s at the front door. You want I should gas them?” Jenny grinned. “Belle can—”

  Sam took hold of the overhead strap. “No, we are not going to gas anyone until it becomes necessary. If you can’t stay still then go and make sure all the repairs are going as fast as possible. If we have to cut and run I don’t want to be trailing cables and crap behind us.”

  “What about the marshal?” Jenny asked. “Don’t you want me to stay put?”

  “Too late now.” Sam tried to add disapproval into her voice. “You’ve already broken curfew so there’s no use locking you up now.”

  Jenny pouted for a second then slipped down into darkness. “Right. I’m down under. Call me if you need me.”

  Sam glanced down the venting shaft, hearing a giggle bounce off the metal.

  She swam halfway down the corridor toward the galley before stopping and changing her route, retracing her steps. A short stop at her personal quarters and she was ready to deal with the unwelcome visitors.

  After all, when it came down to it, running a Mercy ship was about keeping up appearances.

  Chapter Three

  She walked through the landing bay and approached the main hatch at a leisurely pace, listening to the pounding and various curses in different languages—all of which she understood and knew appropriate replies to, including paternity and maternity questions.

  The miners huddled in one corner glared at her as she strode by. No one asked how long they’d be stuck in lockdown, no one let out a wolf whistle or proposition. She didn’t look to see if the pup still wearing her lipstick print was among them.

  This wasn’t entertainment.

  This was cold, hard business. The type she could sink her teeth into and enjoy.

  The security squad originally assigned to the Belle’s entrance watched Sam, and the corporal gave her a cautious look.

  “You want us to deal with this?” he asked, gesturing at the closed hatch.

  “Let me talk to them first.” She gave him a wide smile. “Apply a little lube first before we start going hard, hmm?”

  That earned her a chuckle and red faces among the squad.

  She twisted the circular lock and swung it outward as fast as she could.

  A squeal and a series of yelps. She’d accomplished her first task—“accidentally” pushing a few of the rowdier idiots against the corridor wall. They squeezed free a second later, rubbing various parts of their anatomy that had been pinched, and staggered through the crowd in a stumbled retreat.

  It was a good start.

  “I understand you boys have a problem.” She stepped through and let them see the business side of the captain of the Bonnie Belle.

  Playtime was over. No leather jumpsuit, no deadly black stilettos, no smiles and winks. The old combat pants and leather jacket over a ripped ancient olive green T-shirt might not have been sexy, but they weren’t supposed to be. Her sidearm lay low on her hips, the regulation pistol in the holster securely tied to her thigh.

  The heavy mag-boots added a final touch to the image, keeping her feet securely on the ground. Sam knew how to fight in near-zero gravity but there was no point in doing so if there was no need. Unfortunately the majority of the men at the front had the same idea, their stained, dirty mag-boots holding them securely in place with only those in the back of the mob floating in free-fall.

  She could smell the sex in the air. The thick, musky scent of men who’d had their fantasies all lined up, toys and all, and were now denied.

  This wasn’t going to be solved by a flirtatious kiss on some rookie’s scalp.

  Sam stood and waited, hands on hips. Her fingers itched to slide down to the leather holster, maybe give it a gentle caress.

  She held back. All in good time.

  “You know who I am.” She eyed the group. “I realize you’re upset at your appointments being canceled but we’ll make it up to you. We’ve got a situation that needs to be dealt with and we can’t have any more customers on the Belle right now.”

  Her tone was something between what she’d stroke the rookies with when they were fresh out of boot camp and what she’d whip them with a few weeks later when she needed them to dig down and get the job done.

  In other words—don’t fuck with her.

  The first thug to speak was a thick-necked punk at the front of the line, a blue vein on his forehead bulging out like the mark of Cain. He grated out the words, “Look, I paid for a good time and I’m gonna get it before I have to go back to work.” His right hand grabbed his crotch as he thrust his hips forward. “Let me get to those bitches.”

  Sam smiled. “You got your money back. You all did.” She let her voice rise up over the mumbling of the crowd. “I don’t know what you boys are going on about. We’re on lockdown. You know the drill. You know the rules.”

  The punk shook his head. “Don’t know, don’t care. I made my appointment and I want my time with one of your women.” He strode forward. “Now get the fuck out of my way or I’ll start having my fun with your sweet ass.”

  A second later he floated nearby, his arms flapping out from his sides, unconscious from being clipped under the jaw with Sam’s right hook. His mag-boots kept him anchored to the deck, making for a somewhat comical scene.

  “Anyone else want to start something?” She glared at the mob. “Anyone?”

  The men moved back as one. Sam stepped forward, around the KO’d miner. “You’ve all gotten your refunds. Now unless you want me to put you on the blacklist, get out of here.”

  One young man looked at his buddy, obviously confused.

  “Blacklist?” he whispered.

  Sam jumped in, grabbing the opportunity to strike fear in
to the miners. “Blacklist, as in I pass your name on to the Guild and you don’t get anything, anywhere, ever from anyone or anything associated with the Guild. No videos, no books, no visitors.” She let that sink in. “Even the Charity ships won’t see you.”

  The miner who had asked the question chewed on his bottom lip. She knew what he was thinking: a lifetime of nothing other than the working day grind. No entertainment other than what you stole or traded for. They’d be at the mercy of the black marketers, who would double and triple their prices for anyone on that list.

  “Now, you really want to risk that?” She looked from face to face, watching the eyes drop away from her intense scrutiny. “Do you?”

  The mob shifted, broke apart and then fell together again into small groups, each moving backward out of the corridor. Some disappeared down side passageways into the dimly lit recesses of the base. The tension in the air evaporated as the anger dissipated and dribbled away.

  A pair of men shuffled forward, eyeing Sam carefully. One pointed at the groggy miner behind her with a dutiful lowering of his chin, acknowledging her superior status.

  She nodded her approval. They came forward and grabbed the arms of the half-conscious miner. He mumbled something incoherent, blood from his cut lower lip dribbling down his chin. They dragged him away from her, turning down the nearest corridor. His boots made a rat-ta-tat sound as they tripped along the metal tiles.

  That was how you made a statement. Without tear-gassing the lot.

  She advanced down the hallway. Technically her authority ended at the Belle’s hatch, but she hadn’t had so much fun in months.

  She spotted the tail end of the crowd limping along, splitting off into smaller and smaller groups going down side corridors as they made their way away from the Belle and into the mining camp itself.

  She paused, weighing her options.

  Odds were, base security would be showing up soon, reacting to what they’d seen on their monitors. It was a good time to retreat to the Belle before she had to field the inevitable questioning about her handling of the situation. Much better to have this talk back in the cockpit through speakers and a screen rather than in person with the chief, another vet who might sympathize with her actions but sure as hell wouldn’t condone them—not on his watch.