He recoiled, a disgusted look on his face. “You’re in luck. Paadric also didn’t have time to pack a bag and he was on the scrawny side. If you don’t mind blood, what’s in his cabin is yours.”
“Delightful.” A dead man’s closet. Yo ho ho.
He marched her down a narrow corridor, shoulder to shoulder, and watched her carefully from the corner of his eyes like she was a prisoner and he expected hijinks. “How’d you know how to do that for Naston?”
Great. Questions.
Thalia shrugged. “I was apprenticed to a doctor. I picked up some things.”
“You’re a medic?”
“Fuck no. I was like the orderly. I followed a drunk doctor around and kept the exam room smelling like disinfectant rather than booze.” A lie, but remarkably close to the truth.
Dray stopped in front of a cabin door. He covered a keypad with his hand but made no move to unlock it. “What kind of ship has its own doctor? You military?”
“Does anything about me look like I’ve been in the fucking military?” Thalia held up a lock of her vivid green hair. God, she was sick of that color. She should go for something boring, like purple.
“Your mouth sounds like it.”
“I’m sorry, I already did the job interview with Sue.”
His top lip curled. “Sue gets emotional about the males she’s fucking. I don’t know you, and I don’t trust how you just happened to be there when Naston needed you. It’s very convenient.”
Thalia rolled her eyes. This asshole right here.
“I didn’t order him the murder-berry beer and I didn’t pour it down his throat,” she said. She hated all this posturing. She got her fill from Nicky’s crew. Every new guy had to prove he was the biggest and the baddest. The dimmer ones viewed her as weak and thought they could gain some credibility by swinging their dicks around.
Words could not express how incredibly short-sighted it was to antagonize the person responsible for stitching up injuries. She never had to say anything, but Doc always forgot to give those particular assholes numbing agents and did a sloppier-than-usual-job with plenty of jabs. Usually they figured it out.
Experience told Thalia that Dray was not the kind to figure it out on his own.
Havik never had to posture or threaten her. Even when she poked and teased and she could see the frustration boiling inside him, he never tried to intimidate her into submission. Maybe that confidence came from being an uptight, law-abiding goody-goody or maybe it was just from being the biggest, meanest-looking guy in the room. If anyone knew the mean-looking red bastard doted on a giant pet scorpion, the scandal would ruin his reputation. Then again, he kept a giant scorpion as a pet.
The thought of Havik carrying Admiral Stabs around in his arms like an infant brought a smile to her lips.
Thalia hoped she hadn’t made a mistake by joining Sue’s crew and she hoped there was more Havik for her on the other side of this.
“Is this for your vision?” The asshole plucked the glasses right off her face.
Rude.
Thalia grabbed them back, aware of the smudges he left on the lenses. “I needed them for distance. You gonna open the door or are we just going to keep staring at each other?”
Dray huffed but pressed the pad, speaking the code as he entered it. “Remember it because I’m not going to come back and unlock your blasted door.”
The narrow cabin boasted a bunk on one side and a desk on the other. A stale funk of unwashed sheets hung in the air. Paadric, whoever he had been, had not been a tidy person.
“Charming,” Thalia said, tossing her backpack on the bed. “Is there a medical bay or something?”
He pointed to a red box on the wall. “That’s all you’ll need for your doctoring. What was the name of the ship you were on?”
“Nunya,” she said.
“Nunya?”
She dragged a finger across the surfaces and frowned at the trail left in the dust. “Yeah, none of ya business.”
“What about—”
“Fuck!” She kicked a chair out from the desk and tossed herself down. Hard plastic and unforgiving, the chair felt about as comfortable as Dray’s heavy-handed interrogation. “You want my life story? Fine. Once upon a time, there was a small-time crook who taught a little orphan girl to pick pockets. But that guy was a hypochondriac.”
“What’s a hypo—”
“He worried he was ill all the time, so he hired an old drunk as his personal physician. I just kept Doc from choking to death when he passed out. Sometimes I assisted him with patients. Then Doc got himself killed and our boss didn’t need me anymore.” Thalia could still taste the splatter of Nathan’s blood. No matter how much she scrubbed out her mouth, the metallic taste lingered. Hoping Dray didn’t push the issue, she did not want to explain how she was sold at auction and somehow cool working with smugglers known to deal with human trafficking.
A nasty expression settled on Dray’s face, like he thought he had the upper hand. “So, you couldn’t fuck your way into his good graces like the way you fucked the doctor?”
“For the love of—” Thalia sprang to her feet. She jabbed a finger in the center of Dray’s chest. “Doc Mitchell was my friend. My best friend. He was a flawed man, but he didn’t fuck underaged girls.” She hadn’t known him to have a romantic or sexual relationship with anyone. That just didn’t seem to interest him. “But if you’re so insecure that you need to convince yourself that the only work I can do is on my back, go right ahead.”
“I think you’re an empty-headed bitch,” he snarled, knocking her finger away.
“When it’s you gasping for breath on the ground, I just might remember I’m an empty-headed bitch and oopsie.” Twirling a lock of hair around her finger, Thalia’s voice increased in pitch, becoming bubbly and babyish.
“I’m watching you, human,” he said, stretching out the word