Part 45 (2/2)
He sighed. ”In this society, you need identification. A driver's license. A credit card. A card with your name and picture.”
”Like the tattoo on my arm?”
”No! Not like that.” He gave her a searching look, then lowered his voice. ”Not because people belong to other people. But because you need to prove who you are.” Before she could ask for more details, he added, ”I never asked... do you have a last name?”
”A what?”
He struggled not to let his feelings of frustration bleed into his voice. All he'd been thinking about was getting Rinna home and keeping her safe. He was starting to find out just how complicated that was going to be. Taking a step back so he could look at her, he said, ”I'm Logan Marshall. Logan is my first name and Marshall is my last name. Do you have something similar?”
”Slaves have a name and a number,” she said in a barely audible voice. ”I'm Rinna thirty-eight. But that won't work here, right?”
”No. But we'll get you a last name.”
”How?”
”I believe I can buy one.” He stopped, thinking about the logistics. ”Well, maybe we'll need to use some other name.”
She looked down at her hands. ”Jandar changed my mother's name from Hester to Lana because he liked it better.”
”I would never do that! But I might have to get you an ID for someone who was born in this country.”
”How?”
”There are ways to do it. Sometimes people who are switching their ident.i.ties take a name off the gravestone of a child who died young. Someone around their age.” He thought for a moment. ”But I need to think about the social security number problem.”
”You said you didn't use numbers,” she answered.
”Well, not when you give your name. But everybody has a number, for tax purposes. And for a retirement account.”
She looked like her head was spinning, and he tried to imagine how overwhelmed she must feel.
”I got into trouble in your world because I didn't know the right thing to do. It's natural,” he said.
She remained silent, taking her lower lip between her teeth.
”We'll talk about it later.”
He found her hand and led her down the hall to the family room, where she stopped short and dragged in a shaky breath.
”What?”
”You live like this, like a... a... n.o.ble?”
”No. A lot of people live like this.”
”Your house...'”
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