“You’ve been hurt before. I’d prefer you weren’t hurt again. Vary your routine,” Roarke began.
“The lieutenant has already . . . suggested the same. Don’t worry, boy. I’ll be careful and trust you to do the same.”
Knowing he had to be satisfied with that, Roarke went upstairs. It surprised him not to find her in her office, but then again, he thought, it wouldn’t surprise him to find her facedown on the bed.
There, he found only the cat, stretched out as if on the rack, eyes fixed on the elevator. Galahad rolled over as Roarke approached, exposed his belly. Obliging, Roarke gave it a brisk rub.
“Went that way, did she?” Roarke nodded toward the elevator. “But to where?”
He crossed to the in-house intercom.
“Where is Eve?”
Eve is in the fitness room.
“On screen,” Roarke ordered, and angled to the screen.
According to Summerset, she hadn’t come home injured, he thought, but she sported a bruise on her cheekbone now, and a bloody lip. The droid—still so new he’d yet to do more than a test round with it himself—staggered back when Eve spun into a vicious back kick, rammed her foot into its midsection.
Crusher—he’d thought she’d find the name amusing—looked considerably worse for wear. Simulated blood ran into its swollen left eye, dripped from the corner of its mouth.
Roarke winced when the droid caught Eve on the shoulder, but she turned her body into the blow, used the momentum and flipped the droid onto its back.
Now Roarke hissed through his teeth as she stomped, enthusiastically, on the droid’s face.
“Ah well,” he murmured, and loosening his tie, began to change out of his suit.
By the time he pulled on a fresh shirt, she came, dripping sweat, out of the elevator.
“Hey,” she said. “You’re home.”
“As you are. Got in a workout, I see.”
“Yeah.” She swiped at her puffy lip. “Needed it. You got a new sparring droid.”
“I did. Do we still have it?”
“Yeah. Well, it said it needed to do an internal diagnostic.” She rubbed and rolled her shoulder.
“And you?”
“It’s got a hell of a punch. And it bleeds, blooms bruises, too. I have to give you the frosty on that. It threw me off some, and he got by my guard a couple times.”
“It’s a prototype. Or was.”
“I probably shouldn’t have stomped on its face, but maybe you shouldn’t bring really expensive toys around for me to break.”
“What fun would that be?” He opened the first-aid kit he had ready, took out a healing wand. “Over here.”
“I need a shower.”
“You do, yes, but this first.” He cupped her chin, ran the wand over her swollen lip. “Feel better now that you’ve kicked droid ass?”
She grinned, hissed at the sting. “Yeah, some. Mostly the day blew wide.”
He broke open an ice patch, laid it against her cheek. “Hold that there,” he told her, and did a second pass with the wand. “You know, you could’ve taken an hour with Master Wu, holographically, if you couldn’t manage a personal session.”
She thought of the martial arts master—and her Christmas present from Roarke. “Wrong mood. I just needed a fight, down and dirty. Needed to punch something, and since Summerset’s all bone and would likely crack in half with a couple good shots—”