Part 13 (1/2)
”In politics, it's a problem. Makes me wonder what the next revelation will be.”
”I don't think you should be bothering yourself with this, truly.” Kingsley's gaze came back from abstract distance to a worried focus on her.
”I like it. And what should I be doing, fretting over my rickety body?”
”It's a fine one, quite worth the attention.”
He stood and she turned away toward the flowers, their heady fragrance. ”Don't start.”
”I'm only expressing what we both feel.”
”No, what you feel. I'm...” She could not think of the right word.
”Troubled, I know. But I feel radiating from you a need, and something in me wants to answer it.”
His long hands clasped her arms from behind and she bowed her head, the honeyed air swarming in her nostrils. His hands were strong, certain, deliberate, and she was the opposite. ”How...how much of this is unfinished business?”
”From decades ago?”
His voice came softly through the layered air and it helped a great deal that she could not see him. But the hands remained on her upper arms, calm and rea.s.suring and altogether welcome.
”Somehow it's not over,” she managed to get out.
”When I saw you again, after so long...”
”Me, too.”
”I don't believe we're being altogether rotten about this.”
She laughed silently, head hanging. ”Not so far.”
”I didn't mean that. Only that you need support and-”
”And if Benjamin's too busy to give it, you will.”
”Someone must.”
”Support, that's all?”
He turned her gently with the long, big hands and she tilted her head up to look into his eyes. They were unreadable. ”Maybe that was one thing I always liked about you, that I couldn't tell what you were going to say or do.”
”And with Benjamin you could.”
”Something like that. The lure of the unknown.”
”I don't mean anything wholly s.e.xual in this,” he said with an almost schoolboy earnestness.
”I know. I wouldn't do anything like that.”
”I'm quite certain not, yes.”
She wished she were half as sure as he seemed. She could not predict what she was going to do these days, or understand why. ”It's emotions here, not actions.”
”Yes, yes.” He seemed suddenly embarra.s.sed.
”New territory. I've never died before.”
”It's...the physicians...they-”
”Pretty d.a.m.ned sure. I've got maybe a few weeks.”
”Benjamin knows.”
”Some of it. The technical stuff is pretty boring.”
”Shouldn't you be under more care?”
”I hate hospitals, and the hospice I stopped by gave me the creeps.”
”But surely-”
”I'm giving in to my personality flaws. Without them I'd have no personality at all, most days.”
He smiled wanly. ”Your tongue is as fine as ever.”
She kissed him suddenly and just as suddenly broke it off.
He blinked, engagingly fl.u.s.tered. ”I scarcely expected...it would not have been...”
”Appropriate? Right.”
”There are levels here...” He was appealingly awkward.
”Yeah, and me, I'm at one with my duality.”
This provoked a grin from him, dispelling his mood. ”You're amazing.”
”Just improbable. Side effect of the chem supporters they've shot me full of.”
”Medication?” His eyes widened in alarm.
”A new line of delights. Keeps your metabolism running pretty flat and steady, just ducky until the whole system crashes. I've got some embedded chips just below the skin, tasting my blood and t.i.trating into it some little bags of wonder-drug stuff.”
”I think I read something about those.”
”The bags they tipped into my upper thighs. They don't even itch or anything.” This was too much detail, she saw.