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cross-trained in the other members’ specialties.”
    “What are Batzorg’s special areas?”
    Attracting you. Unfamiliar jealousy pinched his chest and made Vilmos grateful Batzorg had closed the triad’s mind link. “Weapons, tactics and command.”
    “How about three of three, what does he do?”
    “Lorcan handles logistics, tech support and cooking.” Maybe she was simply curious about them. Relief expanded his lungs.
    “The vital stuff.” She took another sip of soup, closing her eyes to savor the broth.
    “We can all cook,” he said stiffly, mortified to recognize he was illogically disturbed by her comment and jealous once again. He tried to smooth his gruff response. “Lorcan simply prepares food better than Batzorg or me. He has had more practice.”
    “I’m sorry.” Her wide silver eyes were shiny with unspilled tears of empathy. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. I meant to tease.”
    “Mechs do not tease,” he said with less grace and more honesty than wisdom. She had shocked him by picking up on his thoughts and emotions. He had studied human intuition and empathy, but had never experienced either.
    She moved the table aside, crossed to him, and gently laid her palm against his biceps. Her soft hand seared right through his reinforced derma layers, heating the embedded sensors. “I really am sorry.”
    A shiver of awareness passed through him. The position put her breasts too close for him to ignore. He dragged his gaze away from the small mounds. Then using the utmost care not to scare or intimidate her with his size, he covered her delicate hand with his and gave a soft squeeze. He sighed with relief when she did not object. He stroked the smooth, smooth skin over her dainty knuckles with his thumb.
    “Mechs learn fast.” His voice deepened with desire.
    Minka tugged her hand from under his, however she smiled and her unspilled tears seemed to recede. “You certainly do, Doc.”
    “Doc?”
    “You said you didn’t mind if I called you that. Doc is sort of like pal, except more you.”
    A nickname, for him? A sign of affection. His ears heated with excitement.
    She returned to the bed and sat on the edge, dangling her long, slender legs. Her beauty gave him no safe place to focus.
    “I want to understand more about all of you. Why are you called mechs?”
    Still basking in the honor of a nickname, he swallowed a sigh of relief that she had asked something easy. “It is a shortened form of bio-mechanically enhanced human.”
    “I can understand why they shortened it. That’s quite a mouthful.”
    He detected nothing in her tone to indicate she was repulsed by their unnatural status. Perhaps she did not comprehend the stigma attached to artificially reproduced humans. Before he had a chance to explain, the distraction of her lips slowly pressing back together and then parting to reveal even, white teeth and her wonderful pink tongue, scattered his thoughts.
    “Are all mechs assigned to a triad?”
    With his concentration fractured by her nearness, Vilmos had to replay her words in his mind twice before he formed a sensible response. “Those mechs in operational combat units, yes.”
    “But not all?”
    “No, not all, some are still in training.”
    She accepted this explanation with a nod. “What happens when you retire?”
    Again he hesitated. Although he had paid attention to what she was saying well enough to understand the question, his mind blanked. Stumbling through a simple conversation humiliated him. His subspecialty—communications engineer—intensified his embarrassment. However he had never considered the possibility of retirement. Triad battle units were assigned to missions too hazardous for natural humans. Leaving active duty was even less likely than survival. “I do not know. Retirement has yet to become an issue. Mech triads have been operational for four years, eight months and six days.”
    She accepted his information without comment, asking, “How