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  Well, it won’t work this time. Bianca had friends and allies on Eris, and in the Martian capital Anderson, and in the MBC. People who had known her parents for decades. She would find out what Victoria’s true scheme was.

  But she had to get this RedIce mess under control before she could concentrate on Victoria. If she couldn’t take a success back to Eris, her standing and leverage with the board would be diminished. That meant she had to wrestle this rebellious mining company into submission within two weeks. And that meant finding out whatever Cesare Chan was up to. Her instincts were all telling her that the mysterious bloke was the key to the trouble swirling just beneath the surface of RedIce.

  At that very moment her vidscreen chimed an incoming com. “Cesare Chan, RedIce,” it announced.

  Bianca stared at her screen for a moment. Never let it be said that Heaven lacks a sense of irony, she thought. She tapped a request for the origin of the com. “Eris Space Elevator Station, Guest Suite Five,” her screen said.

  Cesare Chan had been on Eris this whole time, and no one had told her. Unbelievable.

  Then the vid resolved, and on her screen was none other than the gorgeous bloke from the elevator terminal—the one who had caught her pac and flirted outrageously with her. For an instant, she sat frozen in her old plaz desk chair, staring at him in shock.

  He stared right back, seemingly as surprised as she was.

  Quickly she checked that her mouth wasn’t hanging open and she wasn’t blushing. No and no, thank Heaven.

  But then, his eyes lit up and his firm lips curved in a wicked grin. A fiery blush instantly spread over her face, and he grinned wider. “Well, ni hao! I think I’ve guessed your name after all. Bianca, isn’t it?”

  Chapter Three

  Suspicion

  Eris Space Elevator Station

  Cesare couldn’t believe his eyes. On the vid in front of him was the hot chic from the Eris terminal. He had actually caught himself thinking about her a time or two over the last days, even though he never expected to see her again. Now here she was, even more of a stunner than he remembered.

  “Yes, I’m—I’m Bianca Ross,” the woman on the vidscreen said.

  Bianca Ross. His first impulsive grin faded away as a series of facts forced themselves past his libido and demanded his attention. This was not a fantasy woman. This was one of a family of corporate snakes. Her job was to take RedIce away from him. She was a threat to hundreds of people he was supposed to be protecting. Hot or not, she was the enemy.

  How’s that for a kick in the stones?

  On the screen, it seemed Bianca too was rapidly recovering from her fit of embarrassment. Her dark eyes had gone cool and watchful, soft red lips set into a businesslike smile. She said, “Forgive me for seeming so surprised, M’Chan. I didn’t realize who you were when we met on the elevator. I take it you remember?”

  Time to begin the charm offensive. “How could I forget?” he said. “You were my damsel in distress. Standing on a balcony, no less. A bloke couldn’t ask for a more dramatic introduction. Though we didn’t get around to exchanging names, did we?”

  “Well, M’Chan, I am grateful...” She trailed off, as if she didn’t quite know what to say next.

  Cesare said thoughtfully, “But I think my heroic actions deserve a more substantial reward than I got. Buying you a drink was nice first installment, but it’s not quite enough.”

  She blinked. “Reward?”

  “Ay. In return for saving your travelpac, I want you to call me Cesare.”

  She looked at him for a moment, her chin tilted up, brows slightly raised. He suddenly had the uncomfortable feeling that she was studying him as if he were an amoeba crawling around on a petri dish. Right, so maybe the charm offensive needs some retooling.

  Then again, maybe not. Icy as her expression was, her delicate ivory skin was blooming with heat along her throat and her fine cheekbones.

  “Cesare,” she finally said, imbuing the two syllables of his name with a sense of how utterly unimpressive she found him. For some reason Cesare found himself smiling wider.

  “Is there something you would like to discuss with me?”

  “Ay, Bianca,” he said, reining in his smile. “In fact, I’ve wanted to introduce myself to you, ever since you started trying to take over my company.”

  Her expression didn’t waver. “Your company? I believe you mean your father’s company.”

  He shook his head slowly. “No, Bianca. My company. No matter what the legal documents say, RedIce is mine.”

  She let that declaration sit for a moment, her dark almond eyes narrowed at him. “Why do you think that?” she asked finally.

  “Why?” he repeated, a bit surprised. “Because RedIce has been in my family for a hundred years. I’ve been training to run it since I was born, and I can do a damn green job of it. I know my mines backward and forward, and my people know me and trust me.”

  Bianca was watching him closely. “Those are your reasons for claiming moral rights to this company?”

  “Well, ay. I think they’re actually pretty good reasons.” He eyed her. “What other reasons were you thinking of?”

  She gave him the amoeba-on-a-petri-dish treatment once again and then said, “My accounting team and I have come across a lot of strange data in the RedIce files. There seem to be a number of employees with incomplete or missing records, and several money transfers that left extremely muddled trails. I have to wonder if your reluctance to deal with us has anything to do with these accounting problems.”

  Cesare swore to himself. He thought he had camouflaged that data well enough to confuse anyone for weeks. How had she found it in a matter of days? And how much more had she learned, or guessed? Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Briggs giving him a meaningful look.

  He summoned up a quizzical smile. “I’m not sure I understand. Are you accusing me or my father of something?”

  “No, I don’t have any basis for an accusation...” He could almost hear the word yet at the end of her sentence. “But I notice that these patterns are similar to the ones brought up in the court cases involving Arescorp and Qin ten years ago—do you remember? The two companies who were convicted of the illegal exploitation of imported workers?”

  Cesare was floored. Was this chic—a Ross for feck’s sake—actually insinuating that he was abusing Earthers? Laughable. If nothing else, the incident ten years ago had completely ruined his credibility as a ruthless corporate overlord. She had to be playing with him, taunting him.

  He studied the lovely, composed face on his vidscreen. She looked sincere. Watchful, shrewd even, but sincere. Either she was completely ignorant about him and his past, or she was a world class liar. With all he knew about the Rosses, he had to suspect the latter.

  He mustered all the calm he could. “Don’t compare RedIce to Qin and Arescorp. Our people are paid well and treated right, and they’ll all say so.” A sudden inspiration struck. “In fact, you can see it for yourself. Why don’t you go down Pavonis Mons and visit the Tharsis mine?”

  “What?” she said, surprised.

  He leaned toward the screen a bit. “It’s the top mining complex on Mars. You can interview people, tour the facilities. It’s well worth the visit.”

  “Tharsis does have a good reputation,” she said slowly. “But why would you want me to tour your most important mine if you don’t want StarLine to acquire it?”

  “I want to put your suspicions about our business practices to rest, for one thing,” he said, a slight edge creeping into his voice. “But I also want to convince you that trying to take over my company is a poor business move for you.”

  She tilted her head a fraction at that. He said, “Look, a mining operation is completely outside the realm of expertise for a space tech company. There’s no reason for StarL
ine to acquire RedIce except to dismantle it and sell it off. Hundreds of people will be thrown out of work, or—or worse,” he stumbled a bit, surprised when something like concern passed over her face at the mention of the workers. “And the end result will only be marginally profitable. The simplest modeling program could show you that,” he finished.

  She said, “I assure you, we have no plans to sell off the company’s assets. As it happens there are very good reasons for StarLine to acquire a mining company. Heavy metals and exotic minerals are by far the most profitable export to go up the cable for shipment to Earth, as I’m sure you know. With the new Earth elevator going up, demand will be stronger than ever. It’s an opportune moment to acquire mines.”

  That was a reasonable position, Cesare admitted. Earth was starving for Mars’s metals. Humans could fabricate nearly anything they could imagine these days, from sunships to nanobatteries, but they still had to have the basic elements to start with. Earth’s billions of people had severely depleted those resources on the home planet, so whoever controlled Mars’s mineral wealth controlled something incredibly valuable.

  Still, Bianca’s rationale sounded a little too pat to his ear, as if she was just rattling off an argument that she didn’t quite believe.

  “Is that Victoria M’Ross’s reasoning?” he asked, probing.

  Her eyes sparked. “Victoria M’Ross is not managing this deal,” she said coldly.

  Ah, a hit. So they are wrangling. He filed that information away for later, and pushed on. “Even if you do keep the company intact, there’s no way you can run the mines without taking a huge cut in profits while you learn the threads. You visit an actual mine and you’ll see for yourself how impossible it will be to integrate RedIce into StarLine. Not on a datascreen, but in real life.”

  A flash of some complex emotion darkened her expression. Then she shrugged slightly. “I would like to take a tour of the mines, but right now I have a lot to do in Pavonis. A tour will have to wait.”

  Cesare decided to try another approach. “How do you think you can command the respect of a company full of miners if you’ve never even seen an actual mine?”

  She hesitated at that. Instantly, he pushed his advantage. “What If I were to escort you around personally?” he said.

  Briggs began gesturing frantically at him. Cesare ignored him.

  “What do you think that would accomplish?” Bianca asked coolly.

  “You can investigate me and my business practices, and I’ll try to convince you to give up on this acquisition. It’ll be a great time.”

  On the screen, Bianca’s eyes narrowed in thought, her soft lips slightly pursed. “There are a lot of reasons that’s not good idea,” she said. But she was wavering, he could sense it. She was still the girl from the café on Eris, after all. And that girl couldn’t resist a dare.

  He cast her a superior smile. “I understand. You’re a spacer. Going Outback must spook you.”

  “I am not spooked in the least,” she informed him.

  He played his ace. “Or maybe you’re afraid you can’t get permission from Victoria?”

  She shot him a look of pure fury. “I don’t need permission to go anywhere.”

  “So you can come to Tharsis then.”

  She huffed out a little breath. “All right,” she finally said.

  Cesare hid a surge of satisfaction. “Green. I’ll start down the cable right away. We’ll head out for Tharsis as soon as I get down.”

  “As long as you understand that I’m agreeing only to the tour and the offer to investigate you, and I have no intention of giving up on the merger.”

  “You can investigate me any which way you want,” he said, just to make her blush again.

  She did, that slight, lovely flush of color over her perfect pale features. “I’ll try to keep that in mind. Listen, I have a meeting I have to get back to. In fact, I’m already late. I’ll com you on your way down and we’ll settle the details then.”

  “I’ll look forward to it,” he said.

  Bianca nodded gravely, and ended the com.

  He leaned back in his chair thinking as Briggs said, “Are you cracked? What are you doing leaving Eris right now? We’re finally getting some traction, and you’re running down the cable to squire Bianca Ross around the Outback?”

  “You heard her, Sam. She’s obviously not as stupid as you thought.” A snake, maybe, but not stupid. She had already mined deeper into RedIce data than he liked. “I have to get her away from Pavonis before she makes any more progress with the acquisition or digs up any more information on us.”

  He turned back to the dull gray screen where her luminous features had burned like a flame a few seconds ago. “I’m almost certain there’s some kind of fracture in the StarLine leadership I can capitalize on. I gain Bianca’s trust, find out what’s going on between her and Victoria, and see if I can’t get her on my side,” he said.

  Briggs eyed him with a knowing air. “Now I get it. You’re going off to drill her into submission. Just try to do it right this time.”

  “I don’t think it’ll require anything that drastic.” Not that it would be a hardship if it did. Quite the opposite.

  Maybe when he got to see her for the snake she no doubt was, he would find her as repellent as he found Victoria. But for now he could picture her as she had been in his fantasy last night, her lithe body wrapping around his, giving him anything he wanted.

  Then he took his fantasies, his doubts and his oddly sharp regrets, and tossed them away. Baseline was, he couldn’t afford to let her dig around in RedIce. He had to get her under control.

  “Get me a summary of today’s negotiations before I go, would you, Sam?” He shoved himself up out of his chair to start packing. “I’ll be leaving in an hour.”

  RedIce Main Office, Pavonis

  Bianca touched off her vidscreen and buried her face in her hands with a groan. Had she really just agreed to run off to Tharsis with her business opponent, a bloke who practically had “chic hunter” inscribed on his forehead, because he dared her to?

  No, no, no. There were perfectly good, solid reasons to go on this tour with Cesare Chan. She ran her fingers through her hair, getting her thoughts in order.

  She knew that Cesare was hiding something. Prostitution, extortion...it could be almost anything. A bloke in his position had the opportunity to inflict any number of horrors on people.

  Although, it was hard to reconcile the idea that this particular bloke would exploit his workers. He had seemed genuinely offended when she suggested he was involved in labor abuse. Maybe he was just what he seemed to be—a man trying to gain control of a company he felt was rightfully his.

  She felt a twinge of something that might be guilt, but ruthlessly squelched it. She had to accomplish this acquisition or lose her own standing. That was just the way the Sol worked. If she failed now, she would lose her chance to go home.

  If there was a problem, she had to figure out how to put a stop to it and clean up any damage. A scandal would dust her chances of taking a business triumph home to Eris in time for the MBC meeting.

  And the miners themselves—I have to make some kind of overture to them. I can’t succeed with this company if I don’t get them on board eventually.

  So, it made perfect sense to investigate the RedIce mines personally. She just had to keep an appropriate professional distance from the main target of her investigation.

  Above all, she had to resist his evident power to make a woman want to plaster herself on him like a c-suit.

  Eris Space Elevator Station

  Javier Woods stepped into the security lock of the executive habsuite. He let his head bob back and forth to the music blasting in his ears as the sensors scanned over him, looking for any hint of weapons, poisons, hostile comps, anything and everything that migh
t be dangerous to the high and mighty occupants of the rooms beyond.

  It took a minute for the sensors to process his antique cassette player and headset with the original wires. But they found nothing they could categorize as a threat. Just as he had expected. Finally, the door to Victoria Ross’s chamber slid open.

  She was sitting in front of her mirror vidscreen, as usual. She didn’t bother to turn around as he strolled through the door, just kept admiring her reflection and running that damned brush through her hair. He eyed the back of her blond head speculatively. It was almost on a level with his own head, even though he was standing and she was seated. Fecking mookies. Well, maybe the low gee on that hellfried rock down there made them all half a meter taller than him, but it also made their bones as brittle as glass. With one flick of his wrist, he could crush his boss’s exalted mookie skull. So tempting.

  Instead, he flopped into one of her uncomfortable chairs and said loudly, “Ni hao boss! What’s up?”

  Victoria slowly turned around, the slightest look of irritation on her beautiful face. She nearly did a double take when she saw him. In a low, measured tone, she said, “What is that thing on your head?”

  He popped off the headset. “This? This is a genuine antique music player from Earth. Real plastic. More than three hundred years old, and still working.” He waved it in front of her enticingly, the tinny-sounding music still wafting from the earpiece. “Like it? I’m hard up for cash at the moment, so I’ll give you a good deal for it. Only cost you seven hundred.”

  Victoria’s lip curled slightly, and she said with exaggerated patience, “I called you here to get instructions, not to peddle me your useless Earther trash. Get rid of that thing.”

  “Whatever you say, boss,” Javier said, trying to keep a smug smile off his face. He knew she’d turn him down. He fiddled with the player for a moment and the music cut off, replaced by a soft whirring sound. Casually, he stuck it halfway in his hip pouch.