Lace & Lead

He slapped his gloves against his pants, sending up a small cloud of filth. “And I’m a horrible person. Next question?”

“How am I supposed to pawn the jewellery I brought with me?”

“Let me take a look at it later. I know a few different people, but it depends on what you grabbed.”

“Okay.”

His head tilted. “Anything else, or can I get back to my baby?”

She looked past him at the hulking pile of metal. “What is that?”

“She asks with disgust.” He sounded amused. “That is an Antonian cruiser. I bought it after the wars, but haven’t had a chance to work on it till now.”

Her father had never allowed her to wander to the garage; he claimed that it was no place for a woman. Still, Emmaline stepped closer, intrigued by the project. Not by Taggart, she reminded herself. But when she looked, all she saw was scrap metal. “So…is this supposed to look nice?”

He snorted. “You’ve never seen a cruiser before?”

“No.”

“What the fuck do they teach you blue-bloods in school?”

He moved toward the workbench, motioning for her to follow. A few quick flicks of his hand and the holoscreen lit up with some kind of beautiful.

Peirce couldn’t help but grin at the rapturous expression on Emmaline’s face. She may not know what a cruiser was, but at least she had good taste.

“It’s a beaut, isn’t it?” Pride coloured his words but he didn’t care if she understood or not.

“You’re going to make that,” A gesture at the piece of junk, “into that?”

“That’s kind of the point of a restoration.”

“Can I help?”

No one could have said no to a face that eager. He could probably just hand her a spanner and she’d be over Krait’s moon. “I guess so. But not wearing that.”

“I don’t care if it gets dirty,” she said as she reached for the plasma torch.

He bit down a smile and moved the torch out of her grasp. “It isn’t safe,” he explained. “I’d hate to set you on fire.”

“At least not until after I’ve paid you, right?”

The light clicked on a second later when he saw the corners of her mouth turning up shyly. “Was that a joke, Miss Gregson?”

“A feeble attempt at one,” she admitted.

Silence descended. To his surprise, it was comfortable. It was as if an invisible line had been crossed, but not in a bad way.

He made the decision. “Come on.”

“Where?”

“If you actually want to help, you’ll need different clothes.”

Her nose wrinkled. “We’re going shopping?”

“I’d sooner be castrated by a cleaning bot.”

“Good.”