Read Traitor, Book 1 of The Turner Chronicles Page 48

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  Breakfast was tepid water drunk out of his cupped hands. He groaned with pleasure when the water slid down his throat because the damn stuff was fluorinated. Sometimes a person just missed the small pleasures of home.

  Hoping, Aaron tried several times to image the lower cellar in his mind. Each time the image slipped away. He pictured the bus station, the compound and the service station. All three images came cleanly into his mind, and he knew he could easily transport over to them if he tried.

  But he could not go back to Isabella. By disconnecting the wiring connected to his spine, the government doctors had changed the focus of his talent. No matter how much he tried, he could not go back to his real home.

  Damn.

  So they were stuck in Jefferson, without extra clothing and without food. For that matter, Kit actually had no clothes. The entire situation was verging on intolerable, needed to be rectified, and there was only one way Aaron could see to do that.

  The card for the cab company sat on the end table near the phone. Picking up the phone, he dialed the number.

  "Is Kara available?"

  "Which Kara? We got three of them."

  "The one with the nose studs. Kara Perkins."

  "No," the voice said. "She doesn't report in until noon today."

  "Oh." Aaron tapped his fingers impatiently on the phone desk. "Could you have her call this number when she gets in? I want to hire her cab for a few days."

  "Sir, a full shift's rental is fifty five dollars. A car rental will only run you five dollars a day." The man sounded quite patient. He spoke as if he were trying to explain something very basic to an idiot.

  "I never learned to drive," Aaron told him. "Also, I said I wanted to hire her for a few days. I did not say I wanted to hire only her cab."

  "None of our drivers are permitted to prostitute themselves."

  Aaron rolled his eyes and wished the women were not in the other room because he really, really felt like cursing. In all, it took him ten minutes to convince the man to tell Kara with the studs to call the apartment's number.

  Afterwards he turned on the holovision and watched it for a couple hours. When nine o'clock rolled around he started worrying about whether the women would bother to ever wake up. At ten o'clock he went to the bedroom door and knocked softly.

  "Come in."

  He found them entangled together, blinking sleep heavy eyes.

  "I-um-I wondered if you were okay," Aaron stammered. "I haven't heard a sound out of either of you." Why was it so warm in here?

  "We are just fine, love." Sarah rolled onto her back, modestly pulling the covers to her neck. "We'll be out in a few minutes but I want to talk a few things over with Kit first."

  "So I see," Aaron said while his belly churned unhappily.

  Thirty minutes later Sarah came into the main room. She glowed. "Is there a hair brush around here? Where's the food?" Her walk was panther smooth. She stopped in front of him and languidly stretched. "I've never slept so good. I swear Aaron, you have the most comfortable bed I've ever been in."

  "I wouldn't know," Aaron said sourly. "I've never slept in it."

  "Really? You are missing out. Where is my brush and what's for breakfast?"

  "One brush, no breakfast," Aaron told her. "I need to buy a lot of things, especially for Kit. I won't have her prancing around in the nude like that."

  Sarah smiled. "Poor baby. We are mean to you. Still, you more than deserve it. We wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you."

  The phone rang, and Aaron rushed to pick it up. Sarah sat down and watched curiously while he talked.

  "What were you doing?" she asked when he hung up.

  "That thing is called a telephone. It allows people to talk across long distances, and I used it to hire us a cab for the day. The driver will pick me up in twenty minutes, and then we will go shopping for supplies and food, some clothes. Do you know what size Kit wears?"

  Sarah chuckled. "Aaron, I don't know what size I wear. This is a totally different place from the one I know. I'll fall down in shock if they size things the same way. Tell you what. I'll take a bath and hand you my clothes. Use them to buy new clothing for both of us. Kit is almost my size. Her legs are a couple inches shorter and her chest is bigger. You'll figure it out."

  She went into the bathroom. A minute later the door cracked open. Sarah tossed her clothes out and then a few moments later the shower started. Muttering small curses against women, Aaron collected the clothing and folded it neatly so it would be easier to carry.

  The phone rang again. Yes, he told the front desk, he was expecting a cab. He would be right down.

  The door guard greeted him cheerfully. "We haven't seen you about, sir. You must do most of your running during the night shift. Have a pleasant day."

  Perk held the cab door open for him.

  "Poked another hole in your face," Aaron asked. Three tiny pearls lay in a horizontal row along the side of her nose where there had only been two before.

  "Just the one," Perk answered. "Been feeling a bit low lately so I went in and got myself jabbed again. So tell me, how come the arm and legs work now?"

  "I saw some doctors," Aaron said truthfully after she closed his door and climbed in the other side. "What about yourself?" He gestured at the side of her face. "That is some bruise you have there."

  She flashed him a smile in the mirror. "My foot slipped on the mat when I threw a kick. I was so upset about it that I forgot to duck afterwards and got decked. So, Mister Aaron Turner, where are we going today?"

  "I want to exchange some more coins."

  "Do you want to go someplace different than the last time? I have just the place in mind, but he charges an extra five percent, and he isn't bonded."

  "I think so," Aaron said. "I'm not into getting beat up today."

  The place turned out to be the dojo where she trained. Her trainer turned out to be no humble older man like Aaron had come to expect from the holovids. Instead he was big and loud and exuberant. He also had a very large safe that released several five hundred dollar bills and two single hundreds into Aaron's hands. Aaron handed over three of the coins.

  Next on the agenda were clothes. Perkins raised her right eyebrow in surprise when he told her they were buying women's clothing, specifying that he wanted clothes offering free movement without being too baggy, figuring that not only were Sarah and Kit active women, they were also women who might soon need to run or fight.

  Perk showed him the best shops and quickly became exasperated by his fumbling. Two hours passed before she was satisfied with his choices, but at the end of it he had two complete sets of clothing for each woman. Since he had absolutely no idea what size shoes they wore he picked two different styles of comfortable looking workout shoes and bought seven different pairs of each. With so many different sizes, he figured one of them had to be right for each woman, unless they both wore the same size. In that case they would just have to agree not to match.

  Perk made him buy the undergarments. He moved into the department, bought the first items he saw, and then got out of there.

  He even remembered to buy new hair combs and toothbrushes.

  Afterward, Aaron let Perk choose his dishes and silverware. By the time the shopping spree was over he had spent well over thirty two hundred dollars, a very small fortune. The clothing he bought for himself was cheap by comparison.

  It was five o'clock before he returned to his building. He told Perk exactly where he wanted her to park and then spent the next minute memorizing everything he saw. Afterwards he loaded her down with bags and grabbed the rest for himself.