The Color of Rain (23 page)

I find a bit of metal in the pocket at Ben's calf and freeze.

“Well?” Johnny asks.

Ben must want whatever it is, but what if Johnny figures out that I lied? What if he starts to think that Ben and I are together? I pull out a tiny screwdriver from the pocket. “Just this.” I hand it to Johnny, and he turns it over in his hand before tossing into the pile on the bed.

“Thank you, Rain. You can go.” I turn to leave, but he grabs my arm. “You're coming on planet with me tomorrow, so make sure you're presentable.” I nod and make it to the door before I'm stopped by the unmistakable sound of fist against face.

Ben holds his mouth. He's bleeding. Johnny shakes his fingers loose.

“Well, I feel better,” Johnny says rather jovially. He glances at me. “Get out, Rain.”

I wrap Johnny's dress shirt tighter and go to the Family Room. The green girls hush when I enter in a way that prickles up my bare legs, but I'm too hungry to care. I change into a plain top and pair of pants from the community closet, trying not to think about what happened to the clothes' former owners.

I'm also trying not to think about Johnny and Ben in that bedroom. Will Ben fight back? Probably not. Would he even win? For all Ben's strength, Johnny has always felt more dangerous—more capable of violence. Maybe for the simple reason that he enjoys it.

A short-haired brunette glowers while I select a weird ball of purple fruit and some grainy bread in the kitchen. I return to my mat with my food. It's been weeks since I slept here on my own, and yet somehow the spot is comforting. For one thing, Ben's area is only a stone's throw away at the far end of the window, and for another, there's the window itself.

Bright strings weave and dance beyond the glass.

We'll be on Entra tomorrow . . . and tomorrow is when Ben and I try our risky plan. I keep trying to bite into the colorful fruit,
but I can't help but think of the Touched down in the cargo hold. Most of them are starving. Ben says they rarely get food, and when they do, they fight like animals over it. I set the waxy purple ball down and tear into the bread, making myself take a huge bite.

WHAM!

Something slams into the back of my head, and I sprawl on my mat. In seconds, half a dozen girls pin each of my limbs to the floor while the short-haired brunette crashes down on my chest like she means to flatten me.

I try to cough up the bread, but she presses a pillow over my face. Kicking and struggling, I fail to get a hand free or a leg.
Are they trying to kill me?
The brunette finally lifts the pillow, and I launch my half-chewed wad at her face . . . and am rewarded by another stretch of minutes under the cotton.

“What do you want?” I gasp when I'm released.

“Where're Sare and Lula and Dom? What'd you do with them?”

“Me? I don't even know who those people are!”

“What about Kaya?” the girl holding my left arm barks. “You knew Kaya.”

I can't get enough air beneath the brunette's crushing weight. “Kaya?” I manage through puffs. “Kaya is dead.”

One of the girls holding my legs cries out, and the girl on my chest hisses at her to shut up. “You had her killed. Admit it!” She tugs at my hair until I have to bite down to keep from giving her the scream she wants. “My mother always said that red was the color of the devil!”

“Don't leave a mark, Amanda,” another girl warns.

The brunette's grip on my hair slackens. “Wouldn't want to hurt Johnny's pet.”

“What makes you think that I made your friends disappear?”

“You show up and green girls go missing,” the short-haired girl—Amanda, I guess—says. “What do you whisper in his ear that makes him get rid of us?” Before I can answer, she shoves the pillow over my face again. This time it doesn't come up when I start kicking; my body thrashes from the lack of oxygen.

It doesn't come up until I stop moving altogether, ready to pass out.

And I don't even breathe when the pillow is removed; it's like I forgot how. Amanda smacks my chin, jolting me into a gasp. Then she presses her face down on mine like she's going to bite my nose off. “You go off with him, and we disappear. Explain it!”

“Maybe it's Johnny's fault. You ever think of that?”

Several of the girls cry out and let go of my arms and one of my legs.

“Don't question Johnny.” Amanda slides off my chest.

“What's wrong with you?” I get up on my elbows. “
Why
would you stand up for him after all he does?”

“Don't bite the hand that feeds you,” Amanda says.

“I'm just trying to get to the Edge in one piece. I don't have anything to do with your missing girls.”

“The Mec!” a girl standing lookout calls. The rest of them disappear in various directions, but Amanda gets to her feet and looks down on me.

“You won't get out of this untouched.” She slips away through
the curtains, and I'm left in a mess of fruit, picking at my smashed bread. They were careful. I won't have one bruise from their attack, but still, every part of me aches. I don't even remember the names she listed, but three girls are missing, and they all think that it is somehow my fault.

I believe them.

I stand before the window, unable to sleep. The stars are like a web of lights, two of them growing brighter and brighter: the two suns of Entra. When Kaya spoke of them, her eyes glazed with longing. Is there someone waiting for her to come back to the planet? Friends who won't see her again? A family she left behind?

At least Lo didn't have anyone else. Just Walker and me.

“Are you ready for Entra?” Ben says through my thoughts. “We'll be there in a few hours.” He steps around the veil to enter my small area. I press my fingers to the cool glass and am reminded of Walker's pod. I should find a minute to visit him. If things go bad on Entra, I may never see him again.

“Hello?” Ben steps closer. “We can talk now. I've bumped the feed offline so we can go over the plan.”

“The other girls could hear, Ben.”

“Most are out with clients,” he says. “But we'll be quick. I—I wanted to check in with you after this morning.” I take in Ben's face for the first time and find his bottom lip swollen, split down the middle with a puffy, scabbed line.

“Oh.” I reach for him without thinking. He catches my hand before I can touch him and pulls it down. Still, he holds my fingers
for a few moments before letting go. “He won't let you heal that?”

“He took my
toys
, remember? Besides, I think he likes seeing me hurt more than actually hurting me. But then, he does enjoy a good streak of violence.” Ben's tone is joking, but his words are heavily serious.

“I'm sorry about your . . . screwdriver.” I almost joke, too.

“That was for you, so you could prove your loyalty to him.”

I should have guessed that he had thought all that through. “You really are smart.”

“I just knew that he'd make you check me. He'd like to think that you're afraid of me like the other girls. He really thought that he was
having fun
with you as well as punishing me.” Ben frowns, and I remember what he said about Johnny making him hurt the girls.

“What does he make you do to them?”

“The usual is lock them up. The unusual is worse.” He's staring at me with a bared sort of intimacy, and I can't quite keep his gaze. “So,” he clears his throat, “the plan.”

I'm ready for this part at least. I've been going over and over our scheme for the past two days. “I drug him when we're at the casino, and then we boost the hover cab and steal the Touched from
Imreas
. Then we free them on the far side of the planet.”

“I'll take care of the mechanics and security. Thankfully we don't have to move the Touched from the cargo holds. Those bins work like huge drawers; they come right out from the side of the ship. We can empty them and replace them without anyone noticing . . . hopefully.”

“So that's how Johnny has people loaded up without anyone
suspecting. They were sealed into those holds before they even left Earth City.”

Ben nods. “500 per hold.”

“A thousand souls. I didn't realize there were that many.” So many people to damn if we fail . . . not to mention what will happen to me and Ben. And Walker.

Ben nods. “Of course this all rests on your ability to knock Johnny out.”

“Easy.” I rub my stiff neck, failing to hide a groan.

“What's wrong?”

“I got blitzed,” I say. “The other girls think I'm some sort of evil omen that caused three of them to disappear.”

“Ah.” Ben writes three names in the fog I left on the glass: Dom, Sare, and Lula. “Johnny marked them for liquidation.”

“What the hell does
that
mean?”

“Means he's going to trade them on Entra. He'll use them as gambling tokens, most likely. Gaming is huge on that planet and
very
corrupt.” He wipes the names from the glass with his arm. “We'll never see them again.”

I tug at my sore neck, remembering Johnny's conversation with the chubby passenger. So it is my fault. Johnny wasn't planning on gaming until I showed up and got his blood moving.

“Did they hurt you?” His hand slips from my elbow to my wrist.

“Not as much as they wanted to.” And now I don't blame them. “But Ben, what was up with Johnny this morning? What's he afraid of on Entra?”

“Crysta.”

“His old girlfriend?”

“His old love,” Ben corrects. “We shouldn't run into her, though . . . not this time. I've reserved his room on the farthest side of the casino, and there's no record of her name in the outpost's current manifesto.” He hooks his thumbs under his arms, making his biceps round up. “You don't want to see Johnny when she's around.”

“I thought she helped him start his girl trade and all that. What happened?”

“What happened is that Johnny could turn her into a prostitute, but he couldn't reverse his success. You should see her now—drop-dead gorgeous but as lethal as arsenic. He really messed her up. Too many men. After awhile, all these girls get . . .” His voice falls off level, and he drops his arms. “Hell, Rain. I'm not trying to make you feel—”

“Save it. I'm fine.” I face the window. “I'm nothing like Johnny's old love.” I cradle my aching body, but something feels off. “What—”

I feel his shadow inexplicably.

His height. His leanness.

I swing around. “Johnny.”

“Hello, Rain. Ben.” He is a black pillar among the dim veils. “What's keeping you two up?
Bonding
, are we?”

F
or a long moment, Ben and I stand speechless. How much did he hear? My heart slams, and I search for words, but Ben beats me to an excuse.

“She's filing a complaint. Rain was attacked by the other girls.”

I glance hastily at Ben. “I can handle it, Johnny. I—I didn't want to tell you.”