Not one solitary thing.
A half-brother who wanted rid of him. A father who wished he’d never existed.
He wasn’t anybody Sprite expected anything from, either,—hadn’t Mischa said so? He’d screwed up. Everybody expected it. Why in hell shouldn’t he deliver? Only major time he’d ever helped Marie, he’d screwed up.
And why spare Christian, or his father? Why cooperate with anyone at all, except to spite the powers that created him? Try helping them, maybe. Worst thing he could think of to do to anybody.
Didn’t want to hurt Tink, though, really didn’t want to hurt Tink, or get him arrested, or lose his license—he didn’t even know the guy but a couple of days, but Tink didn’t deserve it. Wasn’t fair that he couldn’t think about Corinthian anymore without remembering specific faces, guys like Tink, guys like those sons of bitches he’d like to find when he didn’t have a cable on his wrist, but he didn’t want to kill them, just…
Wasn’t damned fair. Corinthian hadn’t been faces to him. Hadn’t been people like Tink, at all.
Which meant he should disappear fast when he got to Pell, just out the lock and out of port, no note to the cops, nothing that could screw his father the way he deserved.
* * *
Chapter Six
Contents – Prev/Next
—i—
NUMBERS WERE SPIELING OUT TOWARD jump, arbitrary destination at this point, but crew of both shifts on last-minute errands needed the time to reach secure places. The bridge was all shift-changed. The last, the pilot switchover, was quick, exchange of a couple of words of report, and Beatrice settled into her post, still mildly pissed, you could tell it in the set of her jaw.
Mildly pissed was more worrisome than raging hell in Beatrice’s case, and Austin kept an eye on the aristocratic, pale-skinned arrogance that was one damned fine pilot smiling with perfect friendliness at her outgoing shift-mate.
Mildly pissed meant that some event had made la belle Beatrice a little happier about the cause célèbre Beatrice wasn’t talking about, namely Hawkinses. She wasn’t giving him advice, he had had all the advice he wanted, and he strongly suspected the meeting between Beatrice and Christian, that he was sure he wasn’t supposed to know about, had had something to do with a handful of dockers trying the new boy on board, something to do with Christian’s pulling said new boy aside—for a talk, presumably.
From which, exit Tom Hawkins with new clothes—expensive clothes. Christian’s. They were about the same size.
“On target,” Beatrice said, without looking at anyone. “Five minutes, mark.”
Beatrice was, face it, jealous—jealous of her position, which never was threatened except by her damnable moods. So her personal effort had produced a shipboard Bowe offspring. It hadn’t been his idea. Ten years of immature brat whose whereabouts had to be assured before the ship moved, thank God for Saby or the Offspring would have gone smack against the bulkhead for sure. Ten more years of juvie phobias, psychoses, and damn-his-ass attitudes before the brat was supposed to turn into an adult with basic common sense.
Which meant knowing when to take a wide decision and when to realize he didn’t have all the information and he should ask before he did something irrevocable.
But, oh, no, Christian wouldn’t ask. Christian knew everything.
Christian was full of bullshit.
Christian had been tormenting Hawkins, probably from the time he came aboard, right down to the instant he caught him at it, and now Christian was a sudden source of wardrobe and brotherly sympathy?
Don’t mind papa, he beats up on all of us?
Double bullshit.
Christian had gotten Hawkins’ temper up in the encounter they’d just had… and he’d gone on to try that temper, quite deliberately—only prudent, considering Hawkins had had that particular mother for a moral and mental guide, Marie Hawkins whispering her own sweet obsession into young Hawkins’ ear, guiding his steps, maybe right onto Corinthian’s deck, who but Hawkins could possibly know?
Hawkins’ back had hit the wall and he’d come up yelling I’ll kill you. Which was the truth. Maybe only for that moment, and maybe only in extremity, it was the unequivocated truth—but extremities occurred, moments did happen, desired or not, and Hawkins was a bomb waiting all his life to find such a moment.