Free Lust Plague (Steamwork Chronicles) by Cari Silverwood Page A

snagged it with finger and thumb. “This,” he murmured, eyes low as he looked at what he held, “was given to me by a friend…one of the last of us killed. This is all I have of him still.” He released the pendant and let it spin.
    Specks of silvery reflected lights flickered in her eyes.
    A friend? Funny. She’d never thought of frankenstructs as having friends. Yet in no way was Sten anything but human. He was far more tolerant than she was. More evenhanded. In her bones, she knew it. When else have I ever gotten anything so wrong?
    His other words came to her. All the others like him were killed? How would it be to grow up beside someone, play with them, talk with them, know them inside out, and then see them taken away to be killed? All because of a mistake made by whoever designed your bodies?
    “He and the others like him were killed because it was the law.” He inclined his head, shifted on his toes, his hands casually clasped between his folded legs. “Like your law that said I should be whipped and returned to slavery.”
    Ah. This was where he was headed.
    “My country’s law?”
    Those foundations she’d always held dear and close had shifted this last day, like a stone door shivered loose by an earthquake. She stared at him and, for a fragment of time, saw not a frankenstruct but a man.
    “Yes. Do you think maybe the law was wrong? Kaysana?”
    She weighed his words, played with a button on her shirt. “The law’s changed since then. Besides, I only uphold them, I don’t make them. Why are you doing this…to me? Revenge on humans?”
    “You don’t have an opinion?” He shook his head, amused. “And no, like I said, I don’t do angry anymore.”
    Kaysana swallowed. “You don’t?”
    “No. And after I had that orange-eyed fellow creep up on me, I could see this thing was bigger than anything else. It needs doing and every day counts, and I sure wasn’t letting you do it by yourself.”
    “That…” Struck by the oddity of his decision, she paused and figured her way through the maze. He admits this needs doing and knew it back then? Yet he’d bargained with her and coaxed that damn agreement about kissing out of her? Reality crept back into her head. What were they both doing?
    “Then you can call our agreement off. Though I can do with your backup. You have no reason—”
    “Yes, I do.” His tone dropped into rumbling depths, a coarse sound that went straight into her middle and set her quivering, anticipating, watching him. “I did it this way because I wanted to.”
    “But this is just an aberration. This attraction between us is purely temporary. It’s not us.” Yet her body ached to close the distance between them.
    “Are you sure?” He grasped her chin, tilted her head back, and slowly leaned in to kiss her.
    Move, her inner voice said. She didn’t. Could’ve, but didn’t. Why, she still couldn’t understand. His mouth descended onto hers. He devoured her, his lips on hers, pressing down, shoving her lips apart with his tongue like he might spread her legs to fuck her. She shuddered, opened wider, let him in. Let him eat her all up as the heat surged in her middle, where she wanted him, deep, deep inside.

Chapter Eight
    The steam cycle churned through the crop. Going down the cleared paths worked best but the machine happily went straight over the top, crunching the stalks flat to the tune of a racket that made hearing anything else difficult. Kaysana adjusted her goggles, cursed at Sten’s back, and wiped away more shreds of wheat. The man…frankenstruct, whatever, clearly had forgotten about roads.
    She’d had a choice—front seat squeezed in with, or on, Sten, or backseat with more room and the wolf next to her. The wolf had won. God knew why. She glanced sideways carefully, wary of attracting attention. Cadrach leered back, his big wolf teeth showing in the gap of lip. His meat-flavored breath warmed her shoulder. Already she had half a ton of shed