look.
“Do you talk to just anyone like this?” he asked.
“I don’t talk to anyone.”
His brow creased, and I wished I could take that back. Being a total recluse probably wasn’t an attractive quality to a man who lived and worked in the swarming docks. And despite the situation, and Jax’s completely rational cautioning, I wanted Shade to like me. It had been so long since I’d been kissed.
I swept my bangs behind my ear, adding, “Except for my crew. I talk to them.”
Shade moved away from me, taking another sip of coffee. “Do you think science is incompatible with creativity?” he asked.
I relaxed a bit with more distance between us—and because he’d chosen to continue the conversation, despite its slightly dangerous undertone.
I shook my head. “Some new discoveries are accidents, but most come from a person’s vision, from having enough inspiration to imagine the next step.”
And yet the Overseer constantly tried to stomp the imagination out of life. He wanted everything to be clinical, uniform, as boring as the brown clothes he always wore. For such a competent, smart, and horrible man, it was surprising he didn’t see that there couldn’t be hypotheses and experiments without imaginative thought.
Shade looked pensive.
“What do you think?” I asked.
He didn’t answer right away. Then, “I think life would be damn dull without good books in it, and there’s a great little place in Windrow that might want what you’ve got.”
My heartbeat took off with a sudden burst of speed, and my smile couldn’t help but go along for the ride. “Windrow?” I asked.
“The bookstore is about twenty blocks south of the docks—on the corner of Baxton and Lorn. A woman named Susan owns and runs the place. It’s called Flipping Pages and has quotes by Vivica Vot all over the front. You can’t miss it.”
“I love Vot.” Vivica Vot was a poet and philosopher who’d taken a spot on board Exodus 2, the second mass transport to definitively leave Earth to explore the galaxy and look for safe places for humanity to plant new roots. Her poems were full of the fear, hope, and wonder that accompanied the first irreversible leaps toward new horizons.
Shade nodded. “Who doesn’t like Vot.”
It wasn’t really a question and didn’t invite further discussion. That was too bad. I loved talking books.
I mentally filed away the name and address of the bookstore. “Thanks. That’s a really big help.”
Shade rubbed the back of his neck again. He took another sip. “How come you’re the captain?” he asked.
I bristled a little at the question. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
He shrugged. “Just asking how it all came about.”
Most of the truth was off-limits. I chose my words carefully. “When we first got together, I was the only one who knew how to fly.” It was an honest answer. Innocuous, I thought.
“And the one who knows how to steer the ship ends up steering everything else?”
I thought about it. Fiona was really only interested in her plants and the possible damage they could do to some—and their potential benefits to others. Miko and Shiori just wanted to survive one more day until the inevitable end. And Jax… Jax didn’t care who was in charge as long as it was someone with a conscience who listened to what other people had to say—which was what he’d been fighting for his entire life.
“I think we steer together,” I told Shade. The crew only listened to me because they chose to, and that was how it should be. When I gave an order, they obeyed, but that was because loyalty and trust had been earned, not imposed in any way. If one day I asked them to do something they didn’t want to do, they wouldn’t. And I would respect that choice.
Shade didn’t say anything.
I finished my coffee. “Well, I’m going to let you get to work while I go see about those books.”
He glanced toward his bag, a smallish brown thing he’d brought up along with his heavy equipment. He went over to it and rummaged around. When he came back, he flopped a hat down on my head.
“You’re so pale,” he said, adjusting the brim to shield my face. “You’re already getting sunburned.”
My whole chest clenched tight, as though two big fists had grabbed on to my heart and squeezed out an oh! and a my!
“Thanks,” I said a little hoarsely, resisting the urge to fiddle with the hat myself. It was good having something to shade my eyes. And hiding my face from possibly prying