Poseidon VII
by S. J. Willing
ISBN: 1599987627

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Chapter One

“I will not sleep with you in my bedroom!” Anis glared at Simon. Angry he’d even think of suggesting the idea. “Especially not you.”

No! She was not sleeping with a six foot two inch, dark-haired Greek god who had an absolutely perfect physique. Especially not when his deep green gaze constantly distracted her from her duties.

That she would even be attracted to the man… Simon. Yes, the name suited him. How she could even be attracted to Simon defied understanding. After all, she hadn’t successfully foiled thirty years of suitors to fall foul of this—stranger. Anis was grateful for the anti-aging drugs, though. She may be sixty-seven years old but her body was still a nice, supple twenty-five.

Her problem was simply a symptom of the latest calamities the Company was suffering. She was allowing herself to become unbalanced, drawn away from the tasks that really needed her attention.

“I assure you, Miss Anamer,” Simon told her respectfully. “The last thing I intend to do is sleep.”

Anis felt the blush creep up her cheeks and cursed silently. She hadn’t lost control of herself like this since she’d been a green teenager working on the central Rim expansions. Back then she’d been a junior manager helping to construct the 300^th to 321^st levels in the Rim of the huge space base they called the Anamer Gas Mining and Refinery Corporation.

Anis’s father had taught her many things about managing during those years and the most important had always been “don’t give yourself away”. Every Anamer was trained, almost from birth, to treat every transaction as a business one and to keep their thoughts—and feelings—very close to the chest.

Of course Simon hadn’t meant “not sleeping” with her in that way—he’d not be sleeping with her in her bed, in fact he wouldn’t be sleeping at all—but with the current distraction, her thoughts had filled in a thousand non-existent blanks and she’d totally embarrassed herself.

“All our agents at the Pangalactic Bodyguard Bureau are skilled in discretion. We only see or hear what our employers wish us to see or hear,” Simon continued as if her blush was of total irrelevance.

Anis gave a mental hmmph as the clicking noise in the air supplier began again. She glared at it for a moment, wishing she could turn the thing off but knowing she couldn’t. Being one thousand levels down from the Hub and without an air supplier meant the room would soon be filled with stale, toxic air. The annoying thing was she’d had it replaced only a few weeks ago.

“You’d think being the CEO and President of the Company would mean I never got defective equipment,” she said dryly, trying to regain a grasp on the situation at hand.

Simon gazed at the unit and gave it the same stripped-to-the-bone assessment he’d given her when they’d first met just a few hours earlier.

Anis absently waved aside the problem of the air supplier and walked to the small autobar in a corner of the bedroom. She needed a quick, hard drink.

She knew what the attraction was, of course. Simon was totally unaffected by her. Simon did nothing. He just wasn’t interested in her physically—well, not physically in the way other men were interested in her. Not that it was a bad thing. She really did need to concentrate on the Company and the recent assassination attempts. But she still had some pride.

Then again, since when had she wanted to be the object of a man’s desire?

Why on Poseidon did Vinnis arrange for bodyguards for them all anyway? Surely her brother had seen the Company handle insurgents before, even sporadic assassination attempts from the odd anarchistic group. With a population of almost ten million it was unavoidable. Some group or another always planned, thought or wished for a coup.

Anis’s father had established the Poseidon Military, then heavily funded the police force and the Qinada to counter the occasional unrest. The Qinada, the internal investigations department, often efficiently—if not ruthlessly—proved their worth in the protection of the Anamer family. It remained a source of Qinada pride that most of the organized crime was restricted to Beta Quad. Now known as the Blade Quad because of the numerous gang-related knife fights that took place in the Beta Quad Bilges.

Anis shook her head sadly. Vinny had every right to worry in a way. Six months ago he’d lost the use of his legs in a nearly successful assassination attempt. Another three months and the nanomed treatment should fix the nerve damage and he’d be able to walk again, but she could tell the experience would never leave him.

Five assassination attempts against the Family in six months gave her something to be worried about, agreed—but bodyguards? Worrying, she also realized, wouldn’t help. She needed some positive action to deal with the problem, something to help Kellan. As head of Qinada, Kellan had already hinted his personnel losses in this investigation had been unusually high. Anis was determined to find out why.

“You may be discreet.” Anis accepted Simon’s word. “But this is my room, my sanctuary.” The only place in the Company where she could be free from the exacting demands of others. “I would like to keep it like that.”

“I’ve worked as a personal bodyguard for many women. You won’t even know I’m here.”

Anis forced her hand not to tremble as she took another long sip of her drink. It was stupid being this affected by a man, a bodyguard no less—she’d fallen into one of the true clichés of romance realvids. Anis finished her drink with a hard swallow. She refused to become a cliché.

It may take a day or two but she would have her room to herself. One man wasn’t going to disrupt fifty years of hard-handed business training and undermine her decisions—even if he did look at her with that icy-cool, unaffected gaze.

Anis toyed, for a moment, with stripping naked and flaunting her body at him. Prepared to languish in the breakdown of his calm facade. She didn’t, because her only reward would be to stand naked before that calm, assessing stare.

God! She hadn’t even felt this way about Jacques before she’d discovered him embezzling millions. Their divorce and Jacques’ subsequent sacking and exile from the Company had been a mere formality compared to this.

“I feel uncomfortable about you staying in my room,” Anis told him, laying down her concerns openly. “Couldn’t you provide a female agent?”

Simon had the grace to look apologetic. “Agent Karis is too low in rank and is currently assigned sleep duty to your sister, Carrie,” he answered. “Agent Holly is on assignment for another week. Of course, as soon as she is free Agent Holly will be shipped to Poseidon VII to assist and will take over your nighttime watch. There are no other female agents of sufficient rank available.”

“So why does rank mean Carrie gets Karis and not the CEO?” Anis thought she already knew the answer but felt annoyed enough to press the point.

“Agent Karis is only a rank three P.B.B. agent,” Simon replied patiently. “And your brother Vinnis indicated you were a high priority risk. Therefore as a rank one agent, and the P.B.B. coordinator on Poseidon VII, I’ve taken responsibility for your sleep duty myself until I can be relieved by Agent Holly.”

Anis felt a surge of irritation. Simon’s arguments were all logical and sound. She’d be willing to bet he could play the boardroom as well as she could. The clicking in the air supplier suddenly became a clatter.

“Will you shut up!” Anis snapped at it.

Before she’d even finished the sentence a two-inch hole appeared in the supplier facing. A glittering silver ball flew out of the hole, heading directly for her.

Anis just had time to blink before she felt something fly past her and the Remote Assassin fell, sparking, to the floor at her feet.

Shaken, but refusing to show it, Anis carefully picked up her nightgown from where her maid had left it on the bed. She gave a curt nod to Simon as he put away his needle gun. Frowning, Simon bent down to examine the destroyed bot.

“Take care of that, will you,” she said. Refusing to reveal how much the attack had shaken her, Anis turned and walked into the bathroom. “I need to take a bath.”

���

One of the luxuries of being CEO of the Company was the bath. Anis loved her bath. The size of a small swimming pool and heated to just the right temperature, it was her escape from the rigors of Company dealings. The pastel blue walls and bamboo furnishings gave it a far-away feel from the hectic hustle of Company life.

Stripping off her clothes and leaving them on a nearby table for the maid to tidy, she walked down the steps into the steaming water. Like everything else the bath was measured for her, deep enough for the water to wash sensually over her floating breasts—not too deep so she’d sink under. Allowing herself a contented sigh, she settled into one of the smooth marbled recliners raised up from the floor of the bath, one that was tilted at just the right angle to ease her tension but not flat enough to tempt her to sleep. Then as the gentle jets of water pulsed over her, cleansing and soothing, she looked up at the stars rotating above.

That was another aspect of being CEO she really enjoyed. Her whole bathroom ceiling was coated with screens fed live from sensors on the surface of the base. Sometimes, when she turned the lights out, it was like bathing in the deep cosmos itself.

A plume of evaporating water spiraled out into space from the base Rim. Shell Maintenance must be replacing the water shield in that segment, flushing out the ionized water and readying the chamber to replace it with clean, non-radiated water. It was a costly, life-preserving process and the main reason why water was so heavily rationed within the Company. A small fleet of Harvesters constantly shipped in the raw gases to keep the water production facilities supplied.

The Company, officially the Poseidon VII colony to outsiders, was a major accomplishment of space engineering. A double-skinned space base with twenty meters of water between the skins to filter out the high levels of radiation from this system’s sun—radiation that reached as far out as Poseidon VII, the seventh planet of this giant system. Deaths from overexposure to the star’s deadly rays were more common than Anis would like. Thankfully most of the casualties were from the Walkers—people who worked, or played, outside the base without taking the statutory radiation precautions.

Pressing some buttons on the control unit, Anis added more lavender and rose scent to the bath water. Then she closed her eyes, stroking her hands over her skin. She was leaving the lights on this time.

The assassination attempt had frightened her more than she’d realized. She was still shaking inside, and a full-fledged panic threatened to overwhelm the hard businesswoman veneer she used as her defense. Assassination attempts had happened before, but not here—not in the heart of the Anamer household. Not in her bedroom! If they could reach her here, nowhere was safe.

No. Anis clamped that thought down hard. Thinking along those lines led to madness. Instead she concentrated on the bath. Thank goodness the water was so warm, it helped stop the shivers that threatened to take over her body.

She wasn’t one to lie to herself. If it hadn’t been for Simon and his amazingly fast reflexes, Anis would be dead by now.

For a moment, cold chilling dread washed over her, unaffected by the heat and the steam. She needed some kind of release, and only one thing would do it

Simon.

Anis focused on the cool-mannered bodyguard. In her fantasy, she shocked him out of his frigid sentinel pose. Her body started to react to the image, edging her terror out. She guided her hands to more sensitive parts, sliding them over her breasts to rub gently against her nipples. Squeezing the nubs just enough to add fire to the itch that burned between her legs.

Simon, standing by the bath, stripped to the waist with his crystalline stare replaced by a steaming gaze of lust as he watched her in the water. She moved a hand down her body, stroking the sensitive skin of her lower tummy. Slipped her hand between her legs to toy with her bushy curls. Should she make him stand and watch, like the servant he was, or would he be so driven by lust he’d disobey and leap into the bath with her? She teased her outer lips, dying to rub the sensitive button within and forcing herself to wait, loving the tease and hating it too.

Simon’s hands, large, smooth. She could feel them cup her breasts with heated desire, kneading them within the warm water. Would he be gentle, or crazed enough to be rough and hungry as he squeezed and nipped at her nipples? Succumbing to her need, Anis let her fingers part her lips and mesh against her swollen sex. She’d become so sensitive that the first touch made her gasp and arch her back, raising her breasts and tummy out of the water. Her hand made little splashing noises as she rubbed, harder and faster—her other hand squeezing and pulling her nipple, matching the imagined motions of Simon’s hands.

The fire burned throughout, radiating from her groin and her breast. Sharp, sweet. Unfamiliar pangs of longing tensing her body like a loaded spring.

Then, suddenly, something burst inside her and sent flame-like tendrils searing along her nerves. She cried out, startled by the strength of her own orgasm as it flooded her senses, scared away her fears and left her depleted, content.

She lay breathless, amazed—shocked by the overpowering sensations. It had never felt that good before. So…complete.

Slowly her senses settled, but her skin remained oversensitive to touch and she shivered in small waves of pleasure as the water flowed around her. But her mind was clear, and her silly notions about her bodyguard no longer interfered with her thoughts.

The bodyguard remained, for now, in her bedroom. The Remote Assassin had given a good reason to allow that. Once the crisis was over, though, her room would be her own. No arguments.

Resigned to the decision, she opened her eyes—to see Simon standing guard by the doorway.

The horror of mortification stunned her. He’d seen her in one of her most private moments. Then she felt anger as her groin vibrated with a crashing wave of arousal that rocked her. He’d seen her, and it turned her on!

She must be sick. She’d call the doctor first thing in the morning.

Then she was crushed by embarrassment, like a young teenager caught having sex for the first time. Anis hoped none of her tumbling emotions showed on her face as Simon stared impassively at the wall behind her. She locked her feelings down hard by slipping into her business persona, her standard protection against showing how she felt, as she waited for the waves of weakness and—God help her—longing to pass.

Sadie’s Hell, he was just her bodyguard!

She switched her attention away from him, fixed her gaze on the stars above.

“What’s your report?” she demanded, anger bolstering her. How dare they attempt an assassination in her room? How dare Simon watch?

Simon gave a small grunt at her words, making her wonder just where his thoughts were. A moment later, he became his usual, unreadable self.

“Vadarian Remote Assassin bot,” Simon confirmed her suspicion. “Pretty standard issue, charged with Luxirian death adder venom it targeted through voice recognition. It activated whenever you spoke.”

Anis shivered in the warm water. “Pretty nasty stuff,” she agreed. It was the second time someone had tried to kill her with that venom.

“The only known poison without an antidote.” Simon agreed. “Slow and very painful death, but most assassins and their employers don’t care about that.”

Anis had researched the venom immediately after the first time it had been used against her. To die, with your body suffering accelerated decay from the extremities in, drove most victims to suicide. Unaided, a person could live for two weeks. Some victims lived for a month in an autodoc, clinging to a lost life.

“The only adaptation,” Simon continued, “was a poorly constructed metal cutter so the device could cut its way out of the unit to attack. If it hadn’t been defective, it would have attacked you three or four days ago.”

When Simon wouldn’t have been here to save her. The significance of that fact registered hard. Under other circumstances Anis would already be dead.

“How did it get into the unit in the first place?” she asked.

Anis saw a warm glow in Simon’s eyes. She wondered if he admired her ability to seek out the weaknesses in the failed assassination rather than sink into a futile panic.

“I just contacted the manager of the cartel used to assemble the unit. The engineer who worked on it, Jack Nichols, started work a few days before your unit was made and vanished a day after it was shipped—somehow bypassing the normal security measures.”

Anis looked at Simon’s face, guessing his thoughts. “So someone knew that my old air supplier had failed.”

“Probably knew it was going to fail,” Simon said. “I’ve got the cartel manager looking for the faulty unit you sent back. If we can find it, I suspect there will be signs of sabotage.”

The hairs on the back of Anis’s neck prickled as she caught the inflection in Simon’s voice. “Then that would mean—”

“—the assassins have a contact in the Anamer household.” Simon finished for her. “One that has access to your room.”

Anis closed her eyes, refusing to let her earlier fear return. It was obvious, of course, but who amongst the Anamer household would betray them? “You’ll need the names of everyone who has access, I suppose?”

“Do you know who has access?”

Anis gave a small, nervous laugh. “Aside from family, some of the more trusted maids and cleaning staff, the occasional maintenance staff… I don’t know all their names, but Rothwell organizes the roster. He will know. Oh, and Marcella Strong, my assistant.”

“Marcella Strong? I haven’t met her yet.”

“It’s her day off.” Anis gave a wry smile, aware of the Company’s false reputation of slave-driving its workers. “We do allow our staff the occasional luxury.”

The warmth of the water was suddenly no longer enough to keep away the chills of fear so Anis stepped down from the recliner and walked up the steps out of the bath. Naked, she went to the heated towel rack, her skin tingling as she felt Simon watching her.

“I’ll speak with Rothwell in the morning then.” Simon’s voice sounded slightly strained.

Anis smiled to herself. She wrapped one of the huge towel sheets around her, then turned and sat on a nearby bench before taking a smaller towel and twisting it around her hair, drying it. She’d have to speak with Kellan in the morning and see what Qinada could find out about a traitor.

“Please forward a copy of your report to Kellan Joice,” Anis told Simon. “I’d like you to keep him informed of anything you discover.”

“I’ve already mailed a brief summary to his workpad.” Simon nodded. “I’ll send him a fuller report as I get the details.”

“Good.” Anis stood, refusing to show how impressed she was with his efficiency. “What’s different? Why, after all these years, do we suddenly have such well supplied insurgents? What’s changed in the Company to make them so deadly?”

Anis questioned Simon as she headed toward him and the nightgown she’d left on a bench nearby.

Simon surprised her by clearing his throat. She looked up to see a thoughtful expression on his face, a much softer expression than he usually had. “It’s probably due to the War,” he ventured. “You have one of the largest and most successful rare gas mining companies in the universe. Hyperdrive fuel is at its cheapest here. It wouldn’t surprise me if some outside faction wished to gain control over your production facilities so they could monopolize them for their war efforts.”

Anis faltered for a moment and gave a dry swallow. Of course she’d considered the idea of a hostile takeover several times but generally dismissed it as unfeasible. Poseidon was so deep into Independent territory she’d always thought it unlikely that either the Federation or Separatists would come this far. Having Simon suggest it in his matter-of-fact tone suddenly made the possibility much too real.

“So you think the Federation will try and invade?” she asked. If that was truly the case, the Company was lost. They couldn’t hope to combat the Federation resources. Even the hastily organized and loosely commanded Independent Space Navy currently being cobbled together by the Independant colonies would have no chance against determined Federation invaders.

“I’d lean more toward a Separatist takeover,” Simon said. “They have a record for making invasions and have been seen closer to this sector, in force, very recently. But yes. I’d guess either the Separatists or the Federation are attempting to annex Poseidon VII.”

“You know an awful lot about military things. How did you get all that knowledge?”

Simon looked uncomfortable for a moment. “I trained with Federation Mil up to junior pilot. After joining the P.B.B., I was posted to protect several prominent military personnel—on both sides of the War.”

“Can I truly trust you to protect me?” An ex-Federation pilot appearing on her doorstep amidst the cluster of assassination attempts did little to bolster her confidence. “Especially if the Federation are attempting to invade?”

“I am first and foremost loyal to the P.B.B.,” Simon answered.

“And,” Anis did a few quick calculations in her head, based on knowledge gleaned from years of old diplomatic visits, “isn’t it rather unusual to retire from the Federation Mil while you’re still a junior pilot? Most officers reach full pilot status at the least.”

Simon looked decidedly embarrassed, encouraging Anis to push her interrogation further. If there was any reason to think Simon was a danger to her or her family, she needed to know it now, and deal with it.

“I didn’t retire,” Simon finally admitted. “I was…released.”

“Drugs?” Anis asked. “Petty thievery, murder?”

A sly grin momentarily split across Simon’s face, a rare and precious glimpse of the warmth he held within.

“A most hideous crime,” he admitted. His face and features were carefully neutral as he stared at the wall over her shoulder. “I was found in an awkward position—with the commodore’s daughter.”

Anis nearly laughed, trying to imagine any awkward position he’d be able to get into. Still it was, truly, a pretty harmless crime. Not one she’d have thought worthy of destroying a young man’s career for.

“So you have very little love for the Federation?” She wanted to assess the depth of his loyalty to a system that had rejected him outright for a foolish mistake.

“I have very little love for any military regime,” Simon replied, a satisfying hint of bitterness in his voice. “I get hired to keep people alive. I like my job. I’m good at my job. This is all I do.”

Anis nodded. Simon might be telling the truth, but caution warned her to be wary of trusting him completely.

“So,” she asked. “With your experience of both parties in this war, who do you think is trying to take us over?”

“Separatists,” Simon answered immediately. “This has all the hallmarks of a Separatist invasion.”

“And those hallmarks are…?”

“The Separatists usually take control of a colony by offering power to a minor group within the colony and aiding them in leading a coup,” Simon explained. “After that a small Separatist fleet goes in, ousts the new, weaker leaders and begins their occupation. Not to mention it would also be a very special coup for the Separatists to hold a colony so deep in Independent territory—one that would enable them to strike close to the heart of Federation space.”

Simon’s description unnerved Anis. She sensed nothing but blunt honesty in his arguments.

Poseidon VII had contingency plans her father had made long ago. Anis mulled these over in her mind as she absently stripped off the towels and slipped the eider-silk nightie over her head. First thing in the morning she’d speak with Andrew, the general of her army, and work out several ways they could handle an invasion—including preparing her people for a possible war.

Unfortunately they’d be fighting overwhelming odds against a highly equipped force. A complete evacuation would be impossible. Her people would have to find ways to hide. The army, of course, could vanish and fight a small guerilla war. Then she’d have to find reinforcements—mercenaries perhaps—who would be able to drive the invaders away. It seemed like the only route they could take.

She’d also need to advise the cartels within the Company that trouble might be coming. No point warning her people until they were more certain of the invasion, though. Tomorrow she’d work up a press release for the overly eager newsvid production companies, then if the worst did happen all she’d have to do is release it. How she could protect them all from an occupying force eluded her for the moment, but maybe Andrew would have a few ideas to add to the mix.

Passing Simon, she waved her hand over the lockpad to open the door and entered her bedroom. Looking at the air supplier with its gaping hole unnerved her.

“You should sleep in another room tonight,” Simon told her. It wasn’t a suggestion, it was a command.

Anis bristled at the order and turned to face him.

“Why?” she demanded. “Destroying the bot isn’t enough?”

Simon nodded. “Until we have some engineers look through the unit I’d rather not trust it. Your attackers seem pretty determined to kill you, I’d prefer not take the chance.”

Anis fumed. Again Simon’s damned, unperturbed logic made perfect sense. “Very well,” she reluctantly agreed, allowing him to see a flash of anger in her eyes. “Though it would be better if you made suggestions rather than giving me orders.”

Simon paused for a second, then gave her a small nod. “I apologize, I’ll try to keep that in mind for the future.”

“Thank you,” Anis moved over to her closet and pulled a gold mios-wool dressing gown from it, slipping the almost weightless garment on over her nightie. “Is it safe to sleep next door, or would the assassins have set a trap in there too?”

“Have you had anything replaced in there recently?” he asked.

“No,” Anis answered. “The maids only go in there once a week to keep the dust down.”

“Then I’d say yes, you should be safe in there.”

Stepping away from the mahogany four-poster bed, Anis moved to the door that led to the corridor. Suddenly she was feeling very tired, and going to bed had a great deal of appeal. She had a lot of work to do in the morning.

The door slid back almost noiselessly and she stepped out into the silver and gold lined walls of the corridor—an extravagance her father had presented to her mother on their wedding night. The precious metals gleamed with low-level atmospheric lighting like some esoteric elven tunnel.

Given the size of the individual family rooms, it was a short trek down the corridor and around a corner before they stopped outside Anis’s secondary bedroom. Anis paused. “Is it safe?”

“Let me check.” Simon stepped forward. Taking a small electronic unit out of his utility belt, he quickly scanned the door and the lockpad, then stepped back.

“The door is safe.” He waved his hand over the lockpad and the door slid open, whispering into the wall. “I’ll get hold of a larger ScanTrap tomorrow and we can check all your rooms and appliances.” He entered the room, casting his gaze over everything in it. “You’ll be safe in here for tonight.”

Anis followed him in and let the pale green of the room soothe her. Ignoring the small resinwood bar and, for once, forgetting her nightly skin care routine, she went straight to the elegant four-poster bed. Carved from cionda wood, the bed had been imported at great expense from Cyberius III and dominated the room with its warm red tones.

Taking off her dressing gown and leaving it on a nearby chair, she slid back the Muana-skin cover and worked her way between the shiny platina sheets. She was already yawning as Simon pulled another chair over to the door and sat on it, watchful and alert.

Luxuriating in the cool eider silk and metal fabric and the velvet feel of the covers, Anis had just one more thought before sleep overtook her exhaustion.

Anis knew the value of money, had frequently seen how easily loyalty could be bought. If the Federation and Separatists were really fighting over her Company, how in Sadie’s Hell could she trust anyone—including Simon?

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