it ever went through the rounds.” And by that, we both knew I meant not only the stampings of approval, but the burnings as well.
“That’s unusual.” She looked at me, her fingers still lightly tracing the bold, gold lettering of the embossed title. I noticed her fingernails. They weren’t dirty, but they were definitely a little unkempt, just like the rest of her. “It must have been in a very secure location to go unnoticed,” she said.
I shrugged. Luckily, I was good at getting into secure locations and decoding locks, especially the fancy ones. Also, the galactic government didn’t seem to be actively hunting and destroying these kinds of relics anymore. They must have figured they’d gotten the bulk of them in the beginning and could let slide the spread-out, occasional, hard-to-find rest. Otherwise, places like this shop and a small wing of the Intergalactic Library would have been goners.
“If you like that one, I have four more with me today, and I can get you sixty-seven others. Really good stuff.”
She hummed a little under her breath. “So many. Did you steal them?” she asked.
First Shade with his bullets, and now this? Do I look like a thief? Apparently, yes.
I lifted my chin. To hell with it. I was always living on the edge. And from the looks of this place, the utter lack of order, I was pretty sure I was safe. “I heard about their unjust imprisonment and liberated them from an unappreciative source.”
There was total silence for a moment, and then a laugh cracked out of her. “Anyone who talks that way about books is definitely a kindred spirit.”
I was beginning to understand what she meant by that. A slow smile spread across my face. “Can you take any of them?” I asked, hope for my new armored door bubbling inside me.
“I…” She shook her head in what seemed like pretty easy surrender. “If they’re all as beautiful as this one, they’ll be hard to resist.”
Yes! “I need five thousand in universal currency,” I said in a low voice.
She sucked in a sharp breath. “That’s…not easy.” The book lover’s gleam in her eyes turned into distress.
“I know. I’m sorry. I would give them to you if I could, but that’s my best price.”
She leaned toward me, her soft waist pressing into the counter, her even softer brown eyes pleading with me to drop my price. “Why? Why do you need that much?”
All the frustration and want and hope and sadness inside me punched out, seeming to blow holes right through the slots between my ribs. “So I can repair a door, fly off this rock, and liberate more things that need freeing.” I didn’t confine my mission to books. As much as I loved and appreciated them, other things ranked higher than novels on the list of what to deliver from tyranny.
Susan closed her eyes and took a deep, long breath, her hair like a halo of fire around her head. When she opened her eyes again, I could have sworn they were wet. For some reason, that made a hint of tears burn behind my own eyes, when I hadn’t cried in years. This amazing place—and woman—were wreaking havoc on my heart.
She finally nodded, her look saying it all. How can I? But how can I not? Her skin seemed to scream it from every pore.
“Bring me the rest in two days,” she said, “and I’ll have what you need.”
Relief sang through me. That was perfect.
Her eyes suddenly darted to look at something beyond my shoulder, and she shoved the book under the counter, whispering an urgent “Get behind here.”
Years of living on the run honed certain instincts in anyone. That tone of voice—low and brittle, with rising panic just underneath—I knew it so well that I didn’t hesitate for one second. In two steps, I was around the counter and diving down faster than a comet about to inflict Armageddon on some poor, unsuspecting planet.
Chapter 10
The bell tinkled loudly just as I landed on all fours behind the counter. Susan stayed close to the register and used her foot to nudge me toward the stairs, sending me oozing down the steep, tight spiral. I held the bag of books against my middle, trying not to make a sound. I stepped quietly, hardly even breathing, and ended up in what must have been her living space, although it closely resembled the bookshop.
My heart racing, I eased backward until I was out of sight entirely but could