He scoffed. “Of course not. It was a piece of bullshit. He made it up.”
Mae was floored. “Why would you say that?”
“Because it was too well rehearsed. Couldn’t you tell? There was no spontaneity whatsoever. No emotion. He’s told that story a hundred times, like he’s reading from notecards. Besides, think about Dominic…aka Mr. ‘I don’t like cities.’ Can you picture him in Vancouver, let alone Li Vale? That’s a place Leo would go, and he’s just incorporated it into this fairy tale.”
She didn’t know what to say to that right away. Leo’s story had certainly sounded thorough, but she never would’ve guessed that it was because he’d made it up. The circumstances he’d described hadn’t sounded that contrived either. People certainly met under weirder ones. Her own past was proof enough.
“Why would Leo make something like that up?” she finally asked. Justin was so frustrating, but the inner workings of his clever mind were fascinating.
“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Justin adopted an overly mysterious voice. “Maybe it’s a secret. Or maybe the real story’s too boring. It could’ve just been matchmaking on the stream. Who can say?”
“Are you going to ask him?”
“Nah. I’ll find out sooner or later without even trying.”
So they were back to the arrogance and self-assuredness. She was starting to think she’d imagined those brief moments of sincerity in the hospital. At least his interest in Leo had distracted Justin from his speculation on her own romantic past. Mae kept it too well guarded in her heart, and there was no way she’d put up with Justin’s analyzing that volatile roller coaster of a relationship. Leo’s story—true or not—was tame compared to the drama-filled epic of how she and Porfirio had met.
A lot of that night’s memories were a blur. Other things stood out in perfect, crystalline clarity. But then, that was how ree worked. As one of the few intoxicating substances the implant couldn’t metabolize quickly, its effects surged inconsistently throughout the prætorian body.
Cohorts on city duty sometimes pooled their resources to throw large private parties, since drunken prætorian antics in public didn’t always go over so well. The military hadn’t gone out of its way to fix the ree loophole, but everyone knew too much abuse might eventually draw the research department’s eye. The Maize cohort was responsible for the party in question that night, and it had done its best to make the gathering a showstopper, going so far as to rent out a hall with a live band and bartender. There were about a hundred prætorians there, pretty much anyone who was within a day’s travel of Vancouver.
Mae spent most of her night at a round corner table with Val and several other prætorians. Val and an Azure named Albright had just returned from South America and brought back a card game they swore was the Most Fun Ever. Unfortunately, there were a couple of problems. It was a complicated game in and of itself, and neither of them could remember all the rules. Compounded with everyone at the table’s being drunk, the whole thing was kind of a mess. Mae didn’t really mind, though. She was afloat on a ree buzz and able to roll with just about anything—or so she’d thought.
“That’s trump,” Albright told Mae as she started to play a card. He’d been particularly solicitous in tutoring her. “Save it for the next round.”
Val’s brow furrowed in thought. “No, hearts are trump.”
“I thought it was spades?” asked some Crimson across the table.
“Hearts,” Val insisted.
Albright was an extremely easygoing guy and didn’t have a problem with the switch. He leaned toward Mae, putting an arm around the back of her chair as he looked at her hand. “That one, then,” he said, pointing.
Mae, who was pretty sure everyone was wrong and that diamonds were trump, played the card without protest. Normally, she would’ve chafed at some guy attempting to take an instructive role toward her, but Albright did it in such a friendly and laid-back way that she didn’t find it threatening or overbearing. She also discovered she was liking him more and more as the night went on. Mild-mannered prætorian men were rare. Usually, they were all brash and outgoing, and she wondered if maybe this particular personality type might be a sound choice to invest in.
“That’s bullshit! I know someone who could clean the floor with you!”
Mae and Val both looked up at the same time as a loud, familiar voice carried over to them from several tables away. Even in a noisy, crowded room, the two women were always tuned in to Dag. His back was to them as he stood near a table of what looked like Violets and Indigos. Without uniforms, it was hard to remember. Regardless, Dag was clearly worked up about something as he gestured wildly with a sloshing ree cocktail and spoke to someone Mae couldn’t see.
Val shook her head ruefully but didn’t look particularly concerned. When you mixed volatile soldiers with intoxication, conflict was inevitable. “I leave him alone for five minutes and look what happens. What are you doing?” That was to Albright.
“You just said hearts were trump,” he reminded her patiently. He was the least drunk of all of them, which might have played a role in his also being one of the least obnoxious men in the room right then.
Mae took a sip of her own drink, enjoying the heady rush it brought. She had recently returned from a trip of her own, in the Asian provinces, as backup to the EA. After some of the sights there, she was grateful for this reprieve. “He’s right, Val.”Val looked skeptical and gave Mae a knowing look. “Of course you’d agree with him.”
Dag’s voice carried over to them again. “Fifty bucks says she can kick your ass.”
This brought cheers and chatter from those seated at the table, and suddenly, half of them were on their feet. More astonishing still, Dag was leading the entourage over to Mae’s table. He staggered to a halt and pointed directly at her.
“She’s the one. She’ll do it.”
Mae nearly looked behind her but then remembered she was sitting against a wall. Her whole table came to a standstill. “What are you talking about?”
A man pushed his way through the others and stopped beside Dag. Mae felt her breath catch. He was one of the most beautiful men she’d ever seen, and she wasn’t the type who usually looked first and asked questions later. He had a physique outstanding even among prætorians and wore a simple blue T-shirt that did an exquisite job of displaying all those well-sculpted muscles. His face was as perfectly chiseled as the rest of him, with a strong chin and high cheekbones complemented by piercing eyes that were so dark, they nearly looked black. His hair was black too, thick and wavy, pulled back into a ponytail that grazed his shoulder blades. It was the kind of hair women involuntarily ran their hands through; she felt her own twitch.
At first, the tanned skin and dark hair made her think he was plebeian, but then she noted his features were too European. There was a stamp to him that hinted of a Mediterranean caste, which was surprising. She could probably have counted the number of prætorian castals on one hand, and like her, he possessed no obvious signs of Cain. Then again, any castal in the military would have to be in good health.
Those dark eyes looked her over in a way that suddenly made her feel as though he’d just taken off her clothes, and there was an arrogance and smugness there that confirmed his castal background nearly as much as his appearance. She was familiar with that superior attitude, having been bred with it as well. A satisfied smile curled his lips.
“Her? Sure. No problem. It’d be my pleasure.”
The cockiness snapped Mae back to attention, and she quickly hid her unwanted attraction with a well-practiced expression of indifference. She glanced at Dag, refusing to give the other guy any more of her attention. “What have you done?” she asked in as bored a voice as she could manage.
“This guy.” Dag pointed at his companion dramatically, just to make sure there was no misunderstanding. “He says he was some kind of canne prodigy back in his caste. And I was like, ‘Whatever, there’s only one castal canne prodigy around here.’”
Mae’s cool mask faltered as she jerked her gaze back to the other guy. “You play canne?”
“Other people play it, darling,” he told her, still with that damnably self-assured smile. “I live it.”
Dag moved in between Val and another Scarlet so that he could lean across the table toward Mae. “Finn, you have to take this asshole out. I’ve got money riding on you.”
“Me too,” a couple of people shouted beyond him.
Mae gave Dag an incredulous look. “You signed me up for something without asking me?”
“I didn’t think I had to ask,” he said. “I thought you’d want to do it. You know, as a matter of principle. And stuff.”
A Silver whom Mae knew came up and nudged the black-haired man. “Porfirio, why are you harassing her? Shouldn’t you castals stick together? And what the hell is canne anyway?”
“A sublime sport for those who are both athletes and artists,” declared Porfirio. His gaze fell back on Mae. “A charming ladies’ pastime for others.”
She could only assume it was the ree that caused what happened next. She shot to her feet. “‘Pastime’? I was nearly professional!”
Porfirio didn’t look impressed at all. “Nearly,” he repeated. “But you weren’t. What went wrong? Not good enough? Baltic boyfriend wouldn’t let you?”
Mae was too outraged to correct him. Dag was quicker. “She didn’t do it because she joined up with us, dumbass.”
“All right, all right,” said Porfirio, giving her a lazy, almost predatory smile. “There’s only one way to settle this. You and me. On the mat. Then we’ll see the difference between a profession and a pastime.”
Excitement raced through her body at the prospect, and her implant kicked to life, trying desperately to shake off the ree’s intoxication as it sensed endorphins and hormones indicative of some confrontation. “Name the time and place. I’ll be there.”