The Steam-Powered Sniper in the City of Broken Bridges (The Raven Ladies Book 2)

by Cassandra Duffy

The battle raged on long after Bruce accurately assessed the killing blow that was the sinking of the Hercules. Olivia didn’t know which captain took control of the tattered remains of the fleet once the command vessel was destroyed. She had a few theories, but she didn’t imagine it mattered. The patrol fleet fought on with no hope of victory and no real option for retreat. The shore forces under Coffey, Olivia, and Commander Marceau did their best to support, but the night was already lost with Alcatraz and the Hercules.

  They focused on pulling survivors from the water and covering their evacuation as vessel after vessel met its water end in the bay. Olivia wanted to move off the command bunker to find her personal tank, but Bruce held her back. Her men were better off with their leader in a position to see the whole field than leading them around by the hand. She’d left her running, and even a bit of Bruce’s, to Esme who was perking up as the night wore on.

  Bruce began the ball rolling, saluting Esme after he gave her an order to deliver. The respect for her work spread like wildfire through the militia and the military regulars who witnessed it. Under Coffey, the militia functioned far better than it ever did under Cavanaugh. They were motivated, organized, and determined in ways nobody had seen to that point. This manifested in respectful treatment of Esme and the other runners. When the Slark targeted her or one of the other message carriers, the militia, without orders to do so, gave covering fire, provided shelter, and guarded the lines of communication as though the messengers weren’t simply disposable.

  The hillside above the old wharf and the open ground between the water and the rise became a muddy, cratered mess. The fields of grass, orchards, and crops were obliterated by tanks, tractors, and troops on the human side, and bombardment from the Slark navy. Esme raced among the trails she could find in her increasingly tattered and dirty dress, boots, and leggings. After a time, Olivia stopped worrying after her and focused on the battle. Esme was clearly the least likely of all the people on the field to die, which included Olivia as mortars targeted the command bunker on more than a few occasions.

  Once the last of their navy was obliterated, dragged on to destruction by some captain or lower admiral who survived past the command vessel, the real battle began in earnest. The Slark tried again and again to land an invasion group to gain a foothold on the beach. Olivia’s Clockwork Warriors and their mountain goat tractor tanks played an integral part in repelling every attempt to establish a beachhead. The Slark moved their invasion force to a different part of the beach, and Olivia’s men were there to greet them.

  As the morning began to gray with the coming dawn, the Slark withdrew their navy from the harbor’s edge to the open water to begin the process of bombardment to soften up the position. Commander Marceau gave the general order to dig in, string razor wire, fortify trenches, and build bunkers. Olivia watched Esme run the order, nearly getting hit on more than a few occasions by the incoming bombardment. She moved toward the edge of the command bunker reflexively only to be pulled back by Bruce Coffey’s gentle hand.

  “You’ve got to let her work,” Bruce said. “Besides, with that leg of yours on these muddy hills, you’d only succeed in getting yourself killed and then her when she tried to save you.” When Olivia didn’t seem convinced, Bruce handed her his field glasses again and pointed her attention to a forward position near the ruins of the sea wall where a fiery young man with a shock of orange hair, dressed in the battle armor common to top hats of an iron breast plate and a leather uniform, was shouting orders to direct men in gas masks and heavier armor in the stringing of razor wire nets across the gaps in the wall. “The Hotspur-like figure you see down there is my husband, Jeremy. Could he get blown off that wall at any point? Probably. Will it do either of us any good if I go down there and tell him to hide? Not a chance.”

  Olivia looked back to the heroic figure on the battlements with a new appreciation. “He’s beautiful,” she murmured. When she looked back to Bruce, a broad, knowing smile was beneath his impressive black moustache.

  “And believe me, he knows it,” Bruce said with a wink.

  Olivia finally pieced together why Esme was so energized by the work that was the same work that used to terrify her. She’d never had the respect, the support, or a share of the unified goal that made being a soldier worthwhile. That night, Bruce had seen to it that Esme received the support, but Olivia had to respect her enough to leave her to her work.

  Olivia began to wonder why she’d ever thought of Bruce as an enemy.

  †

  Within a few weeks, the old tension along cold battle lines returned although with different boundaries as the Slark gained a lot of ground in taking Alcatraz and control of the bay. Treasure Island was lost, the last of the Bay Bridge was destroyed, and humanity severed another tether to the mainland. Olivia looked over her maps every night when she came home and again the second she awoke. With an entire army of Slark fortified outside the wall on the south, open ocean with no harbors left on the west, an occupied Alcatraz and no Bay Bridge on the east, the peninsula had effectively become an island. The mutants pushed the human defenders back to the last juncture in the BART tunnel that could still be sealed before their attack petered out. One more push by Slark or mutant underground and they would lose the tunnel as well. They had ships, but nowhere to safely dock them, the Golden Gate Bridge to the north that they couldn’t use or repair, and an overwhelming enemy laying siege.

  Esme came up behind Olivia at the kitchen table and wrapped her arms around her, resting her chin on Olivia’s shoulder to look at the map as well. “All those red lines make things look really bad,” Esme said.

  “We’re an island now,” Olivia replied. “That shouldn’t bother me as much as it does considering I grew up on one.”

  “Can we hold out?” Esme asked.

  “At a diminished capacity, I suppose,” Olivia said. “We can’t re-supply from our outposts, fish, or use any of the fields on the eastern shore, but they can’t close off the western beaches since the water there is too rough to land mutant attackers and the sea wall defenses have enough range to hit something twenty miles away.”

  “Why can’t they shoot the bay then?”

  “They only point the one direction and my father said the Transcended will only change that if they see fit to.” Olivia began to wonder if her constant pestering of her father about the Transcended might finally be wearing on him in a bad way.

  “For such a smart man, he sure falls back on the same answer a lot.”

  It was statements like that making Olivia fall for Esme. She hadn’t really considered how important it was for her to be with someone who truly got her, especially the parts of her that she hid from most people, but Esme, without even trying, understood so much about Olivia and her enigmatic relationship with her father.

  “I think I need to see something good on this table for once,” Olivia murmured, kissing Esme’s forearm wrapped around her.

  “I could make you breakfast, anything you want,” Esme replied.

  Olivia began rolling up the maps to set them aside. “No, I think I’d rather see something else.”

  It took Esme a few moments to piece together what Olivia meant, but when Olivia had her pulled from her place behind the chair to the front of it, her ass pressed against the edge of the table, and Olivia firmly pressed against her, she seemed to figure out the intent of the comment. She kissed Esme fiercely, slowly lowering her back onto the table. Esme responded with aggressive kissing of her own, pawing at the front of Olivia’s uniform jacket. Laid out fully on her back across the table, legs spread around Olivia, and her dress threatening to creep up her legs, Esme did indeed look a whole lot more appealing than the bleak maps she replaced. Olivia stood for a moment to admire the view, particularly liking the way Esme’s hair was splayed across the wooden surface around her head. Olivia’s hands made their way up the tops of Esme’s thighs, pushing the bottom hem of her dress up as she went.

  “I haven’t the foggiest notion
why I would look at maps every evening rather than you,” Olivia said.

  “It’s morning,” Esme replied.

  “See how my exhaustion has confused me?” Olivia said. “It’s a bloody catastrophe how addled I’ve been lately.”

  “Do you need some direction in your current task?” Esme asked, giving Olivia a coquettish smirk.

  “I would adore some.”

  Olivia couldn’t remember how the joke between them arose, whether it was out of Esme loving Olivia stoic British-ism as she’d put it, or if it was the difference in rank and position in the military, but a fun little game of role reversal increasingly became the norm. Esme had the power in the bedroom while Olivia gave the orders on the battlefield.

  Esme continued the work Olivia started in pulling up the hem of her skirt. She hadn’t finished getting dressed for the day when she’d decided to take a break to kiss on Olivia, and so her leggings, boots, and underwear were still in the bedroom, folded neatly on the dresser.

  Esme traced her fingers along the soft, caramel colored skin on the interior of her thighs. “I think you should start by kissing along here,” she cooed.

  “Smashing idea,” Olivia whispered, lowering her head between Esme’s legs to do just that.

  Esme responded with a sharp inhale and a long, slow, satisfied exhale as Olivia’s tongue made its way up and down her legs, tickling at her in a delicious way. “I think you should lick me,” Esme murmured.

  “I already am,” Olivia replied, returning to the taunting work. She knew what Esme meant, but she liked making her say the actual words as she said it in such an adorably bashful fashion. Even now, she could mentally see the blush rising to Esme’s cheeks as she worked up the confidence to give voice to the request.

  “Lick my pussy,” Esme said barely above hearing. “Please?” she added almost as an afterthought.

  It delighted Olivia right to her very core to hear Esme ask. It was something they both wanted, something they would both enjoy, the entire reason Olivia had laid Esme on the table in the first place, but to hear Esme ask for it you’d think she was requesting the world from the only person capable of granting it. Unintentionally, Esme had an unerring power to make Olivia feel special. And so she did as was requested. Taking several, gentle licks along the outside first to push away the faint hairs, then deeper into the unmistakable tang that Olivia had come to adore. She waited for it, licked a few times more to see if she could hear the words above the quickened breathing and moaning coming from Esme.

  “Thank you,” she finally heard her lover whisper.

  It was all Olivia could do to not giggle. She wondered if Esme thought she could even hear the words or if she was so polite in everything that she simply couldn’t say please without following it with a thank you when the request was granted. Regardless, Olivia had come to expect the little reward of the whispered gratitude and liked Esme a little more every time it was uttered.

  Briefly, Olivia considered teasing another request out of Esme, one she’d managed in the past, but she was on a bit of a schedule that morning and what she really wanted was to hear Esme climax. She would have to cajole the unambiguous “please…?” that actually meant “please lick my clit” at some point in the future. She focused her attention entirely at the top of Esme’s slit and the hard bead, eager for attention. She flicked at it in slow, even strokes of her tongue at first, picking up on Esme’s cues to increase speed and intensity until she had her lover writhing and ready to explode. She pressed her lips over Esme’s clit and suckled at it to finish what she’d started in a lovely series of strangled, embarrassed moans from Esme. With as much effort as Esme put into controlling her sounds of pleasure, Olivia always felt a sense of accomplishment at getting her to make enough noise to disturb the neighbors.

  Esme’s hands came away from the edges of the tabletop she’d been gripping at and began to caress Olivia short, already messy hair. “I need to do something nice for you,” she said.

  “Haven’t you already?” Olivia asked, licking Esme’s taste off her lips.

  “Okay, but now I need to do more,” Esme said.

  “Such a giver.” Olivia stood, admiring her handiwork of Esme’s glistening pussy before sliding the skirt of her dress back down. “You can make me breakfast while I work out the week’s duty rosters, and tonight, if you’re still concerned about our balance sheets, you can do whatever you feel necessary to make us even.”

  Esme surprised her by sitting up quickly to prevent Olivia from walking away. Her hands found their way to Olivia’s belt, pulling her back into the embrace of Esme’s legs wrapped around her. Esme looked up to Olivia with sparkling eyes and a knowing smile.

  “I want to draw you,” Esme said.

  The request was so abrupt and earnest that all Olivia managed was a ‘huh?’

  “Completely naked except your mechanical leg,” Esme elaborated. “It’s artistic, you’re artistic, and you’ve inspired me to pick up something I thought had gone out of me years ago.”

  “I don’t…” Olivia began. She didn’t really know what to say to the request. She’d never considered any of what had happened to her as artistic. The leg was functional and necessary, but sexy and worthy of being immortalized in a sketch?

  “Please? I love the way your leg is the mechanical counterpart of your other leg, perfectly matched in shape, but not in composition. It’s like the face of Janus, but with a beautiful…”

  “I’ve never heard you talk like this before,” Olivia said, catching immediately on what word had stopped Esme’s description. “With a beautiful…what?”

  “You know.” Esme blushed furiously.

  “Do I?”

  Esme took a deep breath and sighed. “With a beautiful pussy between them,” she said very quickly.

  “Yes, you can draw me.” Olivia leaned down, cupped Esme’s face in her hands, and kissed her gently. “Be kind though. I’ve not been immortalized in artwork to this point and I couldn’t stand it if I thought you pictured me as undesirable.”

  “Be kind in return,” Esme replied against Olivia’s lips. “It’s been years since I’ve drawn and now I have to try to capture your beauty along with Dr. Gatling’s craftsmanship.”

  “A daunting task, but I have faith in you, Mouse,” Olivia said.

  “I love when you call me that.” Esme grasped at Olivia, pulling her in for another kiss, this one far more erotically charged, and suddenly breakfast and the duty roster were forgotten.

  Esme clearly had designs on something in that exact moment and Olivia was eager to see what it was.

  Chapter 29:

  Even Gods Can Die.

  Claudia could no longer find comfort in anything but walking. The hospital room was oppressive, the districts beneath the ground were claustrophobia inducing, and sleep was nearly impossible.

  Olivia and Esme still came by from time to time, although never together. Claudia doggedly pretended to be asleep when one would visit her. Esme remained silent, read awhile in the room, and then left. Olivia didn’t believe Claudia’s act for a second and always talked at her, unconcerned with whether or not Claudia would respond. Olivia explained about her and Esme’s budding relationship, apologized for being so callous about Liam’s death, and said she was available to talk if Claudia needed to. Olivia only ever asked Claudia one question: “When I found you wandering in the ruins, why did you ask me if I knew your mother?” Claudia was surprised that Olivia remembered the delirious comment spoken in French or that she’d found someone to translate it for her. Claudia didn’t answer, couldn’t really think of an answer other than to say she spent several hours talking to two dead people and so she thought she was dead as well; since that would sound crazy and would break her silent treatment, she opted to turn her back on Olivia and pull a pillow over her head. Olivia didn’t come back after that, but Esme stopped by with books or donuts nearly every day. Claudia didn’t feel like eating or reading.

  Within a few weeks, Claudia was
declared physically fit for duty, although her mental status remained a question. It galled Claudia to think a couple weeks was all it took for her to recover from an ordeal that killed Liam. She’d done so little to save him when he’d clearly sacrificed himself to save her and she was walking away with only a few faint scars on her shoulder from the scratches that in no way indicated she’d survived a life threatening attack. She couldn’t keep from going back to that night again and again in her mind, wishing she’d done something different, anything really. She could have shot at the Gator and Liam as they fought; she might have hit him, or she might not. She could have waited for a flash of lightning to shoot. He could have kept the gun, shot the Gator, and then come to her aid. The more she thought about it, the more the list of ways out of the situation with them both surviving grew until it was impossible for her to think it wasn’t entirely her fault that she’d walked away and he hadn’t.

  She asked Dr. Gatling for a gun. He gave her an identical sniper rifle to the one she’d lost with the only admonishment being not to lose too many more. Apparently it was an increasingly popular design.

  Before Dr. Gatling would clear her to have ammunition for the rifle or rejoin the military, Claudia had to clock a few hours with the battlefield counselor. Claudia almost laughed that such a person still existed. It only took her ten minutes of talking with the bespectacled little British man to figure out he wasn’t really a therapist or counselor, but a ship chaplain from one of the military vessels in Hastings’ flotilla. All his questions were designed to lead Claudia back to the existence of a higher power and the invisible hand this godly being had in her life. Whenever he thought he’d led her to a particularly miraculous occurrence that he thought could only be explained by a specific Judeo-Christian deity, he waggled his eyebrows and waited expectantly on the edge of his seat to see if she would suddenly feel the power of the Holy Spirit and instantly feel better. When he’d done this in response to finally hearing about how Liam died, or more specifically when he read it to Claudia from the report she’d had to submit after her ordeal, she wished she had her gun to blast him off the edge of his sanctimonious chair. She walked out of the chaplain’s office, up a few flight of stairs to Dr. Gatling’s lab, and demanded he give her bullets for her rifle so she could put someone out of their misery. He asked if she meant herself. She explained she was more of a threat to the chaplain than herself. He gave her the ammunition and cleared her for active duty.