Free Touch of Steel by Kate Cross

nached his bedroom, he entered it to find the bed turned down and a glass of whiskey sitting on the bedside table. A little nip before retiring always helped him sleep. He took the glass with him to what looked like an ordinary armoire, and opened the doors. Inside was an aether engine—a large device with a typewriting machine keyboard for typing in commands and requests, and a specially crafted glass screen that allowed him to see images. This model was connected to the W.O.R. engine via a transmitter antenna on the roof of the house designed to intercept and interpret as well as send aetheric transmissions.
    Alastair took a sip of the whiskey before sitting down in front of the contraption; then he turned the key on the front of the cherrywood housing. The guts of the machine came to life with a click of gears and a gentle chug. He waited until the engine fully engaged and the inquiry box appeared on the screen to type “Claire Brooks.” He struck the SEARCH key. Within moments, the Warden databank returned several images and articles for him to read.
    Claire Brooks stared at him, a study in gray on the screen. He moved the handle on the machine so that it brought up the next page of evidence, only it brought up another photo—this one of Brooks dressed as a cancan dancer. “Sweet Jesus,” Alastair whispered, taking another drink. “That should not be allowed.”
    Once he got beyond the photographs, he was able to begin reading all the information the Wardens had ever acquired about the attractive spy. She was skilled in combat, was known for her ruthlessness and determination, and had once killed a man with a pair of sugar tongs. Her main alias was Claire Clarke, and apparently she was well known under it as an American actress. It was a good cover, and judging from the photograph of her in the scanty dancer costume, a thoroughly distracting one.
    It made for fascinating reading. And he was going to read it all, regardless of how long it took. Luke might trust Claire Brooks, but he did not. There was a glimmer of desperation in her eyes that unsettled him.
    Luke said there wasn’t much difference between the Company and the W.O.R. Brooks had supposedly been a loyal agent—as loyal as Alastair himself was to the Wardens. So what would make someone such as himself turn against his agency? Nothing but the deepest of betrayals would sway him to forsake his vows of duty and obligation. Perhaps the Company had been responsible for her brother’s death after all.
    Still, she was a little too eager and agreeable for his liking. She was planning something; he could feel it in his bones, so he would prepare as best he could. He would learn all he could about Claire Brooks, because she was as much his enemy as the Doctor and Stanton Howard.
    He flexed his augmented hand and ran his thumb along the faint scars softened by a pinpoint ray of aetherically particalized light. He could easily crush a man’s throat with that hand—even a skull. He did not need Arden’s fancy weapons to get himself out of a bad situation.
He
was a weapon.
    So when Claire Brooks eventually turned on him—and he knew she would—Alastair would be ready.

Chapter 5
     
    It was nothing short of a miracle.
    Claire rotated her tors Nd">s LT Std"o, stretched and bent. There was little to no discomfort, despite her having been torn open by an aether blast just days ago.
    “You should sell that concoction,” she told Dr. Stone as she soaked in the bath the good woman had prepared for her. “You could make a fortune.”
    The doctor smiled. “That’s not why I invented it. You’ve soaked long enough. The salts in the water are designed to reinvigorate. Too much and you’ll feel as though you have ants under your skin. To your feet now.”
    Dutifully, Claire stood, not the least bit embarrassed about her own nudity. “Isn’t this a little beneath you? Helping a prisoner bathe?”
    “It’s part of your recovery, which is my responsibility. One I