Dead Space by Kali Wallace (top romance novels txt) 📕

explosions in the cargo bay caused fires that cascaded uncontrollably through Symposium’s atmospheric control system, the living areas had been swamped with superheated air. The scarring in David’s lungs was from breathing. From surviving. I had the same scars.

“He wasn’t killed by diminished lung capacity,” van Arendonk said. “What have you found that’s actually useful? Those rabid fuckers are wound so tight I wouldn’t put it past them to kill each other while we’re in here.”

Ryu rolled their eyes and didn’t even try to hide it. “Right, sure, okay. No surprises in the cause of death. Blunt object, many blows, you can see it. But there is one weird thing. Look at his sleeves.”

They slid from their stool and lifted one of David’s hands. I hadn’t noticed before, in the airlock, but I saw now that the cuffs of his jumpsuit were cinched tight to his wrists with soft bands of pale yellow.

“His feet too,” Ryu said.

Larger versions of the same bands cinched his trousers to his legs.

“He was dressed to put on a space suit,” Adisa said.

Ryu nodded. “That’s what it looks like. I noticed because Hester and I just went through it.”

David’s clothes were secured at the arms and legs to make it easier to don a vac suit like the ones Ryu and I had worn in the maintenance shaft, the ones that never fit quite right and always bunched up the clothes underneath in awkward places.

“Did he go outside? How did you miss that?” van Arendonk asked.

“No,” I said quickly. “The airlock never depressurized. The outer hatch never opened.”

“Not even during the blackout period?”

I shook my head. “No. That airlock wasn’t depressurized that day. Hasn’t been for a few weeks, since the last logged maintenance check.”

“So he was preparing to go outside, aye?” Adisa said. “There was no suit with him.”

“Maybe the other person was supposed to bring it?” Ryu suggested.

“What’s out there?” Adisa looked at me expectantly.

I blinked, caught off guard. “I, uh, I’m not sure. I’d have to check. Sigrah said they only go out for—”

“Routine maintenance on the cargo transport system, but let’s make sure she’s right about that, yeah? Who uses it, how often, why.”

“Right. That will be in the logs.”

“We should look for the suit too—recyclers, incinerators. We can start in the warehouse,” he said. “Hugo, what did you get from HQ?”

“Fuck-all and jack shit,” van Arendonk said. “A whole lot of arse-covering from long-winded puckerfaces telling me to ask someone else.”

“Sit down with Sigrah and try to scare her into telling you more.”

“Oh, you want my help with the interviews now?” van Arendonk said. “I’m so flattered. Let me check my calendar.”

“Threaten her with legal repercussions if she doesn’t cooperate. You’re good at that.” Adisa turned toward the door, then stopped. “What do you know about Neeta Hunter? Why is she out here?”

Van Arendonk laughed. “I have no bloody idea. Most likely she took off on her own to prove that she isn’t tied to Mum’s purse strings. It’s practically a rite of passage among the families, as a way of feebly exerting our imaginary independence. Some of us run off to volunteer legal aid to ungrateful Martian freedom fighters, and some of us run off to rock-hop for a few years before it gets boring. She’ll crawl back to Yuèliàng when she runs out of money.”

“Must be nice to be a Hunter,” Ryu said dryly.

I wanted to agree, wanted to roll my eyes and nod, but all I could think was: how bloody unfair. How staggeringly fucking unfair it was that Neeta Hunter could leave anytime she wanted, but I couldn’t even venture outside of Parthenope territory without bankrupting my entire family for generations to come because my life and work and time and even my limbs didn’t belong to me anymore. How bloody unfair that life could be so easy if you were Neeta Hunter or Hugo van Arendonk, but for the rest of us, ruined by events beyond our control, there were no good paths, no safe options, only choices that hurt more and choices that hurt less.

“Any chance she’s working for Hunter-Fremont?” Adisa said.

Van Arendonk considered it. “I doubt Leonora would be so gauche as to use her own daughter as a spy. That’s the sort of thing she would hire out to a well-vetted professional. But it seems like a clever investigator might want to ask the girl herself.”

“It does seem like that, yeah.” Adisa then looked squarely at Ryu. “And you’re going to get some rest.”

“But I’m—”

“Rest,” he said. “Find a spare bunk. That’s an order. Marley, meet me in the warehouse to dig through some garbage.”

After Adisa and van Arendonk were gone, Ryu made a face. “I’m fine,” they said. “And I’m not finished here.”

“You don’t really look fine,” I said. I brushed a strand of hair back from their face to get a better look at their damaged nose and black eyes. “You look like shit.”

“Oh, wow, thanks ever so much, Safety Officer Marley.” They glared at me briefly before reaching across David’s corpse to grab the other side of the body bag. “This is your first field investigation, isn’t it?”

I dropped my hand. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“And the victim is someone you knew.”

“And?”

There was a pause that lasted just a shade too long, then they said, “It’s nothing.”

“What’s nothing?” I said.

“It doesn’t matter. Never mind.”

“No, come on, what is it?”

Ryu looked at me for a long moment. We were about the same height, but right now their slender shoulders were stooped with tiredness and pain. “I don’t mean anything by it,” they said. “It’s just that you seem distracted. Like there’s something you’re on the verge of saying.” They spoke with a soft sort of weariness that indicated they were already sorry they’d said anything.

They were right, of course. They knew me well enough. Every single time we spoke about what David had gotten himself into, it was there on the tip of my tongue, pressing against