Liberation's Kiss: A Science Fiction Romance (Robotics Faction Book 1)

by Wendy Lynn Clark

  Cressida pulled Xan up the moss path to the mansion.

  Holding his hand felt good. Right. And after being pressed against his naked chest, breathing his masculine scent as it saturated her and imprinted deep in her pores, linking fingers felt positively chaste.

  Although her thoughts right now, as she led him to their private escape, were anything but.

  Lying with him on their own private island, between his bulging arms, as he stared down at her with his starlight eyes. Sucking his lower lip into her hungry mouth and hearing his breath go shallow. Shamelessly stripping and writhing under his mesmerizing caresses as she lost her mind….

  Cressida took a long, deep breath and let it out with a shudder.

  Xan squeezed her fingers. “Okay?”

  “Sure.” She unlatched the front door. Shutters slid along a silent track, opening up the veranda that ringed the house. Half-wall windows lined the rooms, and mirrors cast a subtle green glow onto the tall ceiling. A plush sitting area with rattan chairs, low tables, and the gleaming darkwood kitchen bar were much grander than she had imagined.

  She stepped into the hall. Her favorite composer seeped gently from the ceiling, and the kitchen bar morphed from polished darkwood to bold ink on white canvas. A disembodied voice said, “Welcome, Cressida Sarit Antiata.”

  Xan stiffened, his free hand flexing for his dead pistol.

  She squeezed his hand. “It’s local wiring.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “I’m sure.” She tugged him forward. Having him with her in this new place made her more confident, although she preferred not to dwell on the reason.

  He hesitated, scanning their surroundings like a soldier memorizing the location of ground cover.

  She relented. “My family’s friend negotiates shipping contracts that need more security than can be guaranteed in one of the glassed cities.”

  “The general’s a smuggler,” Xan said.

  Hmm. Apparently she hadn’t spoken obliquely enough. “He helped my parents continue with their previous work.”

  “Where are your parents now?”

  “Off world.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “I was supposed to rendezvous with them. Well, I’m still supposed to.”

  “How and when?”

  The impotence of the previous three days weighed on her. “I don’t know.”

  He pressed ahead and swept the house, his head swiveling while he limped. Every danger retreated from his electrifying dominance. They passed a vast indoor bath, a sauna set in a beautiful glassed atrium, and reached the back gardens without finding what she desired. She started up the winding staircase.

  He refused to release her hand, limping laboriously after her, despite her protests.

  “I think there’s got to be a medkit around here somewhere,” she explained apologetically, noting the perspiration on his upper lip. Normally he seemed strangely cool, and only when all of his effort was directed at something else did she note his perspiration.

  “You’ve never been here?” His question ended with a hiss as he stumbled.

  She stopped herself from going to hug him. He was a robot and, unlike a human, could just shut off his pain receptors.

  Well, humans could do that too, if they were military or had stents—

  He was looking at her expectantly. Oh, he had asked her a question. She turned away, flustered. This was not a time to be thinking of the ways in which robots and humans were similar. “No, I’ve never been to this place. I told you, it’s for discreet contracts mostly.”

  He eyed the single bedroom. “Mostly?”

  A giant bed sat in the middle of the loft, old-fashioned four posters secured from the ceiling, white and cream sheets accenting the subtle softness, and the inviting scent of real wood and sea mingled to create a relaxing, seductive atmosphere. Beside the bed was a night table and a gleaming pitcher, and an intimate terrace overlooked a lush waterfall, and she was not thinking of how lovely it would be to snuggle with Xan on the bed through the night and then breakfast on the terrace with his sheltering arms wrapped securely around her like they had been on the yacht, keeping her safe from any harm.

  “Business happens mostly in the daytime,” she said, shaking the needful pictures from her mind and scanning the walk-in closets, mirrors, and cabinets, “and if he stays the night, it’s with someone who only needs one bed.”

  Ah, inside a wicker drawer, she pulled out a medkit that would make a field surgeon proud.

  Xan leaned against the doorframe. His travel robe fell open to reveal his torn flight suit, tight against his chest, and he was every inch the powerful soldier that she was trying not to notice. “Discreet contracts with women named Vinitra?”

  “Yes.” She selected skin-seal and an applicator and moved a lounger to such an angle that she could work from the chair beside him and not see the bed or the terrace. Her hands still felt oddly clumsy as she lined up her tools. The gash gleamed, humanity flayed open to reveal the metal core.

  His eyes burned on her. “How well do you know this guy?”

  Her heart kicked in her chest. From his question, and not from having to look at him so closely. “I told you. He’s done a great service for my family.”

  “Enough that he trusts you with the code name he gives his mistresses?”

  “I once did some secretarial work for him.” She took out the numbing applicator.

  He grabbed her wrist. “Don’t waste it.”

  She wiped his injury with a sanitizing acid mini-cloth. His expression did not change even after the magnetese reacted to the acid and reversed its bonds. Blood gushed from his brows onto his cheek, jaw, and flight suit.

  She gasped and held a staunching cloth to his face. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay.” His jaw made the skin move, exacerbating the injury.

  “Don’t talk. Hold the cloth. Here.” She gave it to him and concentrated on ripping open the skin-seal. Her hands shook.

  “Does blood bother you?”

  “I guess.” She wasn’t thinking clearly. Her face felt hot. She wiped sweat from her brow with the back of her hand. “I mean, not usually.”

  “I can do it if it makes you uncomfortable.”

  “No, I can.” She took a deep breath and let it out. Calm. Poised. She shook the tube and pinched the applicator, trying to gather an appreciative smile. “You got this from my bed. It’s the least I can do.”

  His gaze flicked to the large single bed behind her.

  She swallowed the awkwardness heating her cheeks and tried to focus.

  He removed the staunching cloth and sat perfectly still as she squeezed the clear cellular gel into the ragged edge of his bleeding forehead wound. Filaments reached for the edges of the wound like a mold and knit them together, pulling tight. Blood slowed and then stopped. She used too much skin-seal in the deepest part of the wound and tried ineffectually to smooth it. The filaments reached for her thumb, suctioning it to his brow, and she pulled free with effort.

  When she finished, he was still looking at her.

  She felt that hot tremble again and turned away.

  “So the general doesn’t know you know about this place,” he said, speaking again as if the intervening pause had only been a moment.

  She found herself smiling ruefully. “No. He would be shocked.”

  “Because your relationship was public.”

  She jerked her head up. “How did you—”

  He remained steady on her.

  Oh. Of course. They had access to all the data from the upload—what she ate, where she visited, who she was with—for the past fourteen years. She rubbed her forehead, curled up in the chair across from him, and rested her hot cheek on her knees. He had known since the beginning. But still, confessing it made her feel stupid and small. “I’m not good with trust. He already knew about my situation, so it was convenient.”

  “How old’s that guy?” he asked, reminding her that altho
ugh the robot army might know everything about her, apparently they didn’t know everything about everyone else. Yet.

  “Forty.”

  “Real age?”

  “Oh, I have no idea. That’s his acting age, give or take a decade.” He was looking at her again. She shifted. “What?”

  Xan flexed his fingers. “He sounds like an asshole.”

  “Oh, no. He’s helped us out so much—”

  “Uh-huh. And what did your parents think about this relationship, real age unknown?”

  She rocked forward and began gathering up the medical supplies. “I suppose you would expect them to be upset.”

  “I would.”

  “I think they were grateful.”

  He stared.

  She chose her words. “After our discovery that I was on the Kill List, we went through a period of analyzing everything I had ever done to see if there was a reason.”

  She tried to smile through the old pain, unsure if she was successful.

  “The only thing worse than being told you’ve done something terribly wrong is not being told what it is. I went a little crazy trying to do everything right. Whether with my school or career, or with my hobbies, or with the family I still have left.”

  “Or in your relationships,” he said.

  She nodded. He did understand. “How could I tell a lover, ‘Thanks for the lovely night and, oh, by the way, your life might be endangered because you slept with me?’”

  “Sleeping with you doesn’t automatically put someone on the list,” he said.

  “Then what does?” she demanded. “Do you know?”

  He closed his mouth.

  “Then how do you know sleeping with me doesn’t?”

  “Cressida—”

  “No, I’m sorry. I don’t really believe that. But it’s still true that a man’s odds of needing a resurrection point go up the longer he’s around me. Look at what happened to you.”

  He shifted forward.

  She sighed. “Anyway, my parents cautioned me against any school-age romance. But as I reached majority and passed it, I think they became more worried I wasn’t having any relationships.”

  “So you started one to stop them from worrying.”

  “I don’t know if I thought it through so carefully. Dating an older man was my idea of a rebellion. But since my parents were worried about me listening to them too much, I think they were grateful to see me do something, anything, contrary to their stated expectations.”

  “But?”

  A silent laugh shook her shoulders. “Of course, if you think about it, then once again I was only doing what I thought they most wanted me to do.”

  His gaze burned on her brightly. The seam of his new skin, smudged with dried blood she hadn’t fully cleaned away properly, made him look all too human, and all too male.

  She stood. “Um, anyway. I can’t help you with your knee. I’m sorry. You’re welcome to look through the medkit in case you can find anything.”

  “He still sounds like an asshole.” Xan’s rough mutter filled her ear.

  “Why should you hate him so much? He was supposed to save me.”

  “And he failed. Isn’t that reason enough?”

  “I don’t have a lot of choices,” she said.

  “Yes, you do.”

  “No, I don’t. Aren’t you listening?” She threw out one palm. “There’s something wrong with me.”

  “There’s nothing—”

  “The general was so easy—he already knew about my situation. If I tried to tell someone else, who would believe me?”

  “I would.”

  “Of course you would. Your people are the ones who are trying to kill me!”

  She collapsed in on herself, more shocked at her own outburst than at everything else that had happened these past few days.

  Xan waited.

  It was exhilarating and strange to raise her voice. She always had to be in control.

  She smacked her palm to her chest. “This problem of mine has destroyed my family. It arrested my parents’ careers and cost my siblings a hell of a lot more. So what if I have to give up one little thing? I can’t hurt anyone else spending my life alone.”

  Xan took a deep breath. “You’re not alone.”

  “Oh, I know.” She rubbed her chest until she felt reasonably certain that the ache was gone from her voice. “I’ve had my parents for all these years, selfishly depriving my siblings. And now that I’m old enough, I can certainly go on to another planet, somewhere even farther away from the galactic networks, by myself. I’ll make my own way and be fine. I’m just complaining because I’m tired.” She took a deep breath and let it out. “Sorry.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” Xan’s gray-green eyes glowed on her with possessive brilliance. “You’ve been fighting a long time, but you’re not alone anymore. You have me.”

  His meaning made her catch fire. A pulse beat to life deep in her belly. Her chest squeezed in hungry yearning. It took all she had not to reach for him. She wasn’t alone. She had him.

  And he was a robot.

  She twisted to get away from her own uncontrollable need.

  He followed her back to the wicker drawers. She was too conscious of his presence at her back. Strong, virile, and nothing at all like the refined older man who made up the sum of her prior love experience. He bent behind her, his face too close, and reached over her shoulder.

  She became conscious of him with every cell in her being. He smelled human. Everything about him screamed attractive man. She wanted his masterful seduction with her entire soul.

  He promised to cut you open.

  She finished putting the medkit back, made her hands into tight, controlled fists, and rested them on her knees. Waiting until the heat waves at her back moved, and his inquisitive arm dropped, and she could escape.

  He caught her wrist. “Cressida.”

  She shivered. “What?”

  “You need to reconsider altering your chip ID.”

  The words hit like cold sea spray. She yanked her hand away. “There has to be a way to fool the shuttle.”

  “The shuttle is not the only thing we need to fool.” A muscle in his jaw flexed.

  A new darkness awoke in her belly. And just as she had started to feel safe once again.

  “Another android has been dispatched.”

  Cressida shook her head. “No.”

  “She’s an x-class like me. Because she’s still connected, she has the observation power of the solar system behind her and the logical processing power of the Robotics Faction at her fingertips.”

  “So she’s an upgrade?”

  “No, she’s precisely the same except for her subtype. I’m what is known as a team player. She places less weight on the value of human life.”

  Cressida took a step back and caught herself. As far as scaring her was concerned, he was doing a great job. “What are you saying, exactly?”

  “We need to slip by more than just a few passive sensors.” His sober face turned Cressida even colder. “We also need to outwit or outrun an android who is my exact match only better informed, better repaired, better armed, and more willing to use lethal force to obtain her objectives. As long as your chip ID is unchanged, nowhere on this moon is safe for you. She will find us.” He took a step forward, emphasizing it. “She’s working on it even now.”

  ~*~*~*~

  Xelia|Brae stared at the wall of screens. The combined security footage of the Central Transit Hub looped the same seventy-five minutes over and over. Somewhere in the vast undulating sea of miners, if she studied them carefully enough, moved her targets. Somewhere.

  “Representative Brae.” A messenger bot hailed her from the other side of the empty offices. Chairs were overturned and screens left logged on and idle from the rapid evacuation. “The Transit Authority has requested a report on deaths of eighteen security officers and one miner that occurred here in the Central Transit Hub.”

  “They wer
e interfering with my assignment,” she said.

  “Is that your full report?”

  “Yes.”

  The messenger clicked, noisily transmitting the message through their ancient, obsolete technology.

  She only watched from the moment they lost positive contact with the other x-class and his target, which was between the visible footage on security camera 03808 and the expected-but-absent footage on 21976a. On 03808, they had positively identified his oddly bulky shape with the target secured to his torso inside the mining suit. On 21976a, a cluster of miners entered simultaneously at an angle to obscure the identifying shape. Worse, the cameras were affixed at imprecise angles, so she could not reconstruct a 3-D model to run crowd simulations. Too much chaos was introduced; the blind spots magnified the incomplete percentile to unacceptable proportions.

  The messenger finished its transmission. “The Transit Authority has requested the New Empire’s assistance with fully funding the compensation for wrongful death for the nineteen casualties of a weapon you wielded.”

  “I do not make financial decisions for the Faction.”

  She had studied each segment of film in the cameras individually. Now she was hoping that her greater processing power would allow a pattern to emerge that would show her which direction the pair had gone. Down a tunnel? They had scanned everyone in the upper caverns. If he had gone below, his target would be dead from lack of oxygen, and half of Xelia|Brae’s assignment would now be complete. A ghost sensation filled her brain with simulated accomplishment; she deleted that false sensation and flagged the circuits that had misfired to generate it.

  Exited back into the city? She had reviewed exterior footage and found nothing. Examining all of the ducts showed no unusual entry. Xan|Arch was either still inside the Central Transit Hub or he had escaped, possibly on a private yacht; they had scanned all of the public ones and reviewed passenger lists from the privates. Nothing had raised any red flags. Not here, not in the rest of the city.

  “The Transit Authority requests some sort of recompense or they will no longer render assistance.”

  She turned to the clunky antenna on wheels. “I do not require any assistance with completing my assignment. However, the longer it takes to locate and neutralize the criminals, the higher number there will be of incidental casualties.”