“Still avoiding,” he muttered under his breath.
He lifted his shirt to midchest and forced her to do a double take. The once-golden curls that encircled his navel were now a thick, inky black, making him seem older somehow. She hadn’t realized he’d dyed his body hair, too, and she couldn’t decide if she liked it. Her pulse seemed to, because it ticked to a new rhythm as she knelt in front of him and squeezed a bead of adhesive in his belly button.
When she inserted the tracker and held it in place, the hard press of dirt beneath her knees reminded her that she was kneeling, something she’d vowed never to do before any man. She started to shift to her feet but then relaxed into her original position. Kane didn’t count. He would never try to make her feel small or degraded.
In that moment she knew the answer to the question that’d plagued her since the night of the rebel raid. No matter which direction the evidence pointed, Kane hadn’t betrayed her in any way that mattered. He wouldn’t do that to her. So she stayed on her knees until the glue dried, then tapped the device a few times to test it before standing up.
“Where’s your com-link?” she asked.
He patted his pocket. “But it’s muted, so you won’t—”
“Be able to call,” she finished. “I’ll wait to hear from you.”
“Do your best to—”
“Stay out of sight. I will.”
“And stay close to—”
“The shuttle. I know.”
He gripped both hips and stared her down. His brows were lowered and his mouth curved up, as if he was torn between irritation and amusement. “Since you can read my mind, go ahead and tell me what I’m about to say.”
“Let’s see,” she said, and began ticking items on her fingers. “You want me to be careful, wear my pistol at all times, not talk to strangers, eat my vegetables, and say my prayers at night.” She mirrored his pose. “Does that about cover it?”
“And don’t tell Renny—”
“What we’re really doing here. Or he’ll jerk a knot in both our tails.”
He nodded with exaggerated slowness, watching her for a few silent beats. Then the barrier in his gaze went up again. “I also want you to know—”
“That you didn’t spy on me.” She dipped her chin. “I know you were only protecting your mother. I wish you had told me instead of going behind my back, but now’s not the time for that discussion, so let’s keep avoiding it.”
“So we’re okay?”
“Until Fleece kills us, I guess.”
“Well, be safe,” he said.
“You too.”
And then she watched him walk away, reminding herself as her feet twitched to run after him that there was no plan B.
To his surprise, it took less than a day for Kane (or Jude, as he was known) to settle in among the miners in their camp outside the ore caves. No one questioned his story when he walked into the dorm and announced that his cousin’s wife’s best friend’s brother—intentionally confusing so he wouldn’t have to remember any names—had secured him a job. The miners didn’t say a word, not even the foreman. They simply pointed their sooty fingers toward the empty bunks in the middle of the room and returned to their conversations and dice games.
While Kane rested in his upper bunk with one arm folded behind his head, he casually peered around the room to gauge the miners’ health. Most of them seemed tired, but so would anyone after a ten-hour shift. The real clue was in the trembling of their hands and the sweat glistening on their foreheads. By his estimate, the temperature inside the dorm was a perfect seventy degrees. Knowing the disease was airborne, he inhaled through his nose to check for unusual scents. All he smelled was a crew in need of a shower.
A while later, he closed his eyes and drifted to sleep, thinking how backward it was that he hoped to wake up sick.
The next morning he awoke with the room alarm. Yawning, he blinked against the early rays of dawn filtering through the windows. He noticed right away the air smelled sweeter than last night, similar to the fragrance of candied almonds at the harvest fair. He checked himself for symptoms, but if anything, he felt better than the day before. His head was clear and alert, and his muscles practically coiled with energy when he jumped down from his bunk. He bounded toward the community washroom on springy toes, feeling like he could leap over the moon if he pushed hard enough.
And he wasn’t the only one.
All around him, men chattered and laughed, high-fiving each other with hands that were steady and strong. Their foreheads were dry, their eyes bright. The mood was more like a party than the beginning of a workday, and several of the miners who’d ignored Kane now ruffled his hair and delivered welcoming slaps on the back.