Earth Thirst Read Online Free PDF Page B

engage one boat at a time, leaving the other to go about its bloody business. But if that were the case, they'd be splitting up, trying to put as much distance between themselves as they approached the pod. Making us choose one or the other. Why the tag-team approach?
    I sense another presence behind me. Mere. Her scent is easy to pick up in the close quarters of the bridge.
    “Is your girl going to be ready?” Captain Morse asks. “If any of those bastards even think about shooting at us, I want to know before they get the courage to try it. Okay?”
    “Aye-aye, Cap'n,” I echo. “She'll be ready.”

    * * *

    “Was that little show for my sake?” Mere asks me a few moments later as we navigate the narrow hallway outside the bridge.
    “No.”
    “Is she actually going to shoot first?”
    I stop, and turn on her, showing her my teeth. “We never shoot first,” I snarl.
    She holds her ground. “What if they don't miss?” Her cheeks are flushed, and her eyes are bright.
    “Then—” I break off, looking away from her face. Then, there will be one less whisky-tainted mouth-breather to leech off her resources. Then, there will be more for the rest of us.
    “Why are you here?” I shake off the other thoughts. Remember your priorities.
    “This is where the action is,” she says.
    “There's action in Afghanistan, too.”
    “Not the same sort.” She shakes her head. “Besides, I don't care for the heat. Nor, I suspect, do you.”
    “You don't know me.” Still on edge from my conversation with Talus, from the threats and accusations rumbling beneath his words.
    “I think I do.”
    A bark of laughter escapes me—a hyena-like bray of noise. “Do you now?”
    “The Beering data. It wasn't an accident that my guy found it. He was supposed to give it to me.”
    The laugh dies. “Who?” I try.
    “Not ‘what?'”
    “What?” It isn't hard to be confused.
    “You asked me ‘who,' not ‘what.'”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “I'm talking about you're not as clever as you think; I'm talking about how much danger you're in, and how this little excursion had better be worth a great deal to your people because it is going to cost you.”
    “You have no idea what you're talking about. What do you know about costs ?”
    “You tell me.” She lifts her chin, and the scar is like a serpent coiling down into the hollow of her throat. “You killed him, didn't you?” she asks. “You killed Kirkov.”
    I look away again, unwilling to let her question in. Talus's accusation echoes in my head. I have lied to him, as I've lied to everyone since that night.
    Up the old fire escape outside the run-down apartment he's lured her to. The old Chechen gangster, Illytch Dmitri Kirkov, wanting revenge for the damage her story has done to his organization—not Beering Foods, but the other organization that was piggy-backing off Beering. Kirkov limps, an old wound from the First Chechen War, but his grip is strong and secure. He's got a knee in the small of her back, and he's pulling her head up. The knife is the only thing he's kept from his old life, back in Chechnya, and it's worn with age and use. He goes to cut her throat, and he almost makes it.
    But not quite.
    The first lie—the one that has set me on this path—is the one I tell myself that night: She didn't see anything.
    I tried to forget. But we're not good at letting go of memory. It's so fragile. We can't help ourselves.
    And so we lie instead.

    * * *

    The captain plays tuna with the harpoon boats for the rest of the day, completely oblivious to the fact that we never spot a single whale. Whoever is in command aboard the factory ship knows we're hiding in plain sight onboard the Cetacean Liberty . They know we're somewhat at the mercy of the captain's whims. By catering to his blind desire to be the man who saved the whales , they've lured us away with the two harpoon boats.
    Eight hours, spent watching three boats engage in a clumsy game of Chase Me!