Now that she was alone with us and away from the Bettelhines, she revealed a simmering fascination for Skye, asking her if she really remembered everything Oscin had said and done since the two had been apart.
Skye said, “You want to know what he’s doing right now?”
Colette colored, glanced at me, then hid her little grin with a fan of her fingertips. Not hidden at all, the fanning gesture as expressive as the grin itself had been. Like most people enjoying their first encounter with a linked pair, she could not help thinking about the erotic possibilities.
I sensed how easy it would have been to like her, if I allowed myself.
If I didn’t consider her obscene.
Skye wasn’t fooled by my gentle demeanor as I told Colette my questions would be no more than routine, and apologized again for snapping at her before dinner. But she remained silent, merely backing me up with smiles and nods and occasional leading questions that followed my leads.
What followed was, for most of its length, by design one of the dullest and least informative interrogations I’ve ever conducted.
Any pretense that I might have considered Colette an important witness faded as I exhausted substantive matters and steered toward fripperies, such as the important people she’d hosted in her years on the carriage, and her favorite places to spend her time off. She told a funny but respectful story about Arturo’s fussy behavior. I made a little scandalous joke about Philip Bettelhine. She tittered and found the nerve to ask how long the Porrinyards and I had been together. I told her, offering a cute and slightly risque detail for lagniappe. More laughter.
We had a great time. We became good friends.
By the time another twenty minutes had passed, it was all one great big fucking party.
At which point, I shook my head to deny the most recent burst of gentle laughter, shot a sharp glance at Skye, and repeated, “You know, I really do need to apologize again for the way I treated you during dinner. I was out of line and I apologize.”
She fanned her fingertips over her lips again. “You don’t have to keep doing that, Counselor. I understand. It’s not the first time I’ve ever had to deal with a stressed-out client.”
“Thank you,” I said, with dripping sincerity. “Because it’s really become important to me that we get along.”
“Thank you. I feel the same way.”
“That’s good, because you’ve impressed me so much with your vivacity that when—not if, but when—we reach Xana, I’d like you to take some time off and stay with my companions and me. We’d like you to be our personal valet.”
Never had eyes been so bright, or a smile so ingenuous. “I’d like that.”
Skye began to see it, realization just beginning to turn her own amiable expression into the beginnings of a scowl. “You do understand, this invitation means you’d be sharing our bed.”
Now Colette seemed incandescent with happiness. “Oh, of course.”
I said, “It also means that you’ll make yourself available whenever we wanted you. You know that this is important business we have with Mr. Bettelhine. There are times when we’d have to leave to tend to important company matters, and might not be back for weeks. You’d have to confine yourself to whatever quarters we’re assigned, occupying yourself however you can until we get around to making our way back. During this time you’d also have to refrain from any contact with your own friends or family. That is, if you have any friends and family. This situation might last, oh, I don’t know, a year or two. Maybe three. Do you have any problems with that, Colette? Any problems at all?”
She said, “Not as long as it was cleared with my Bettelhine sponsor.”
“Which Bettelhine is that?”
“Magnus.”
“We haven’t heard of that one.”
“He’s one of the uncles,” Colette explained. “He’s a much younger brother of Hans. Not much older than Philip really.”
“Uh-huh. And he’s the one who hired you?”
“Yes, Counselor. He’s the one who gave me this opportunity. I wouldn’t want to be unavailable for him if he needed me for a trip up to Layabout.”
“Yes,” I said, with a pleasant twinkle, “I’m beginning to understand how your orbital station got its name.”
Colette tittered, the fingertips fanning her lips again.
Skye, who was beginning to look ill, said, “Where did he find you?”
The bartender crossed her legs, arching her back to emphasize the curve of her breasts, her entire manner now more about flaunting her sensuality. Even her voice had become throatier, more of a seductive whisper. “I was one of the researchers at a Bettelhine facility in the outer system. We were charged with reverse-engineering an intelligent guidance system the Cid developed for the mass-driving planetary defense grid.”
“Sounds like tough work,” I said, shaking my head at the impossibly complex world of high-level weapons research. “It’s certainly over my head!”
The haunted Skye managed a version of my own impressed laughter, but there was no amusement in her eyes. “What level of education do you need to merit a position like that?”
Colette grinned. “I received my second doctorate when I was nineteen.”
“And when did Magnus meet you?”
“When I was twenty-five. I’ve always looked younger than I am, and he’s seen to it that I’ve had some rejuvenation treatments since I took this position.”
“How long ago was that?”
There was a moment’s hesitation, as Colette did the necessary arithmetic in her head. “Ten years.”
“Were you involved with anyone when he found you?”
“I was engaged to be married, Counselor.”
“What was the lucky guy’s name?”
“Erik Descansen. He was my lab partner.”
“Did you ever get married?”
“We stay in touch. He understands that this is an important assignment. He knows that we’ll see each other again someday.”
Skye was now covering her mouth with her hand. It was one of the occasional drawbacks of having two minds in one: twice as much empathy. Get past their horror filters and they feel it twice as much as anybody else.
I, on the other hand, pride myself in my ability to play cold bitch, and hadn’t allowed my predatory smile to waver a millimeter. “So let’s review, shall we? It’s been ten years since you voluntarily abandoned your education, your research career, your fiancé Erik, and your plans for your future to work full-time aboard the Royal Carriage as Magnus Bettelhine’s bartender and concubine, where you will if requested also make yourself physically available for the sexual entertainment of any other guest who wants you.”
“Yes.”
“Arturo Mendez was recruited from a beach resort, the closest thing to the homeworld he’d been missing his entire life, to serve as ‘companion’ to a ‘lonely,’ elderly Bettelhine named Conrad. Was making himself sexually available to Conrad among the terms of his employment?”
“Oh, yes. I remember Conrad. He was a kind and generous man. And he loved Arturo so much. He died a while back. Arturo still mourns him.”
“I seem to remember Arturo expressing a personal preference for women. Is he bisexual?”
“Not in his private life. But Conrad was Inner Family.”
I pressed further. “What about your fellow stewards, Paakth-Doy and Loyal Jeck? Are they also expected to perform a similar range of duties?”