Field Of Dishonor

If he kept trying long enough, he'd get lucky. Worse, someone else would get killed. He might have started this, but she was the one who'd brought matters to a point where other people could die, and that meant it was up to her to end it somehow. Self-preservation demanded it as much as justice or the need to protect bystanders, but how did she get close enough to challenge a man who'd crawled into a hole and pulled it in after him?

She frowned in thought. There had to be a way. No one could cover himself every single moment, unless he wanted to retreat to his private estates and cower there, and Young couldn't do that. He was a politician now, and hiding that obviously would be fatal to his position. Her lips tightened in contempt at the thought of Pavel Young aping the role of a statesman, but it tingled in her brain with a familiar, persistent presence.

Her brow furrowed as she probed at it, sensing its importance with the same intuitive sixth sense that plucked the critical element from a complex tactical problem. She'd never understood how it worked in combat, and she didn't understand now, but she'd learned to trust it the same way she trusted her kinesthetic sense in a high-speed approach maneuver.

He was a politician—or he wanted to be one. She could understand that. With his naval career in ruins, it was the only sort of power he could grab at, and he was a man who craved power. He needed it like a drug, but to exercise it, he had to make regular Parliamentary appearances. That was why he had to stay in Landing. For that matter, it was why he had to kill her. As long as she was alive and her accusations hung over his head, no one would take him seriously. He'd still have his wealth and family name, but they wouldn't help his power base. They could assure him a seat in the Lords, but that was all—

She stiffened suddenly, eyes popping open, and Nimitz's head flew up in her lap. The 'cat twisted around, staring up at her, and bright, unholy fire blazed in his eyes as they met hers.

CHAPTER THIRTY

The Earl of North Hollow squirmed, trying to get comfortable in the luxurious chair. He failed, but perhaps that was because his discomfort wasn't physical. Cool air drifted about him, and the quiet of the House of Lords was broken only by the woman standing to address her colleagues.

North Hollow surveyed the speaker with coldly contemptuous eyes. Lady Greenriver was thin as a rail, with a voice that was anything but musical. She was also one of the few nonaligned peers who enjoyed near universal respect, and she'd been gassing away in support of the special additional military appropriation for over fifteen minutes. Which, given her voice and looks, was fourteen and a half minutes too long.

Who cared about the appropriation, anyway? The damned Navy could piss in a vac suit, as far as North Hollow was concerned. It wasn't going to be a roll call vote, so he could vent a little spleen by voting against it without anyone knowing, and he intended to do just that. Fuck them. Fuck them all. He knew how the Fleet must be delighting in the fresh humiliation the bitch was inflicting upon him. Well, let them. He was building his own political machine, and once the bitch was out of the way—

His thoughts broke. The bitch. It always came back to her, and he could no longer lie even to himself. He was terrified of her. He felt like a hunted rabbit, dashing from one bit of cover to another, and there were jokes—jokes about him—in the cloakrooms. He knew it; he'd seen the way conversations broke off when he appeared, then resumed about some utterly inconsequential subject. Even here the bitch could reach him, destroy him. She'd already taken away his Navy career; now she was hounding him again when she should already be dead, damn her to hell!

He closed his eyes, and damp hands clenched into fists. She was like some monster out of myth—like a hydra. He hacked and hacked at her, until anything human would have lain down and died, and every time the bitch simply climbed back to her feet and came after him again. She wasn't a hydra; she was Juggernaut, rumbling along on his heels, pursuing him remorselessly until he stumbled and fell and she could crush him at last, and—

He clenched his fists tighter, and forced his breathing to slow until the panic attack retreated into sick, roiling nausea.

She wasn't Juggernaut, damn it! She was mortal, not mythical—and anything that was mortal could be killed. Those incompetent fuckers might have missed her at Regiano's, but sooner or later someone else would get lucky, and Georgia could go fuck herself if she thought she was going to talk him out of having Harrington killed! He wanted her dead. He wanted her rotting in the ground so he could piss on her grave, because until she was dead he was a prisoner. He could only hide in his residence or cower here behind Parliament's security while she walked around heaping contempt upon his name.

The bitch. The puking, baseborn bitch! Who the hell did she think she was to hound him this way?! Why, his family could have bought and sold hers a dozen times over before she started rolling in her fucking prize money! She was nothing, just one more yeoman slut, and a deeply hidden part of him hated her most of all for the contempt he'd seen in her eyes the first day they ever met. She'd been a fuzzy-haired, homely, stupid commoner, yet she'd dared to look at him without awe, without fear. With contempt.

His teeth grated, but at least Greenriver was sitting down at last. He tried to find some comfort in the blessed silence of her grating voice, then checked the huge time display above the Speakers desk. Another three hours and he could leave. His mouth twisted afresh at the thought. Leave. The other lords could take themselves off to their clubs, to restaurants, or the theater. No madwomen were waiting to kill them. But the Earl of North Hollow could only scurry out to his limousine, race home to his residence, and hide there the same way he'd hidden here, and—

His thoughts hiccuped as the House doors opened. There was some sort of stir down there, and he frowned as he shifted position to watch. Someone was talking to the Sergeant-At-Arms—someone wearing the red-embroidered black of formal robes over one of the chivalrous order's scarlet and gold splendor. The Sergeant seemed confused, from the way he was shaking his head, but the newcomer waved an insistent arm, and the Sergeant gestured to the Speaker.

The unusual commotion piqued North Hollows interest despite his frustration and fear. No one else in the House chamber wore formal robes, for this was a regular working session. Full regalia was trotted out only on ceremonial occasions like the Address from the Throne or for a new peer's maiden speech, and he couldn't remember seeing any new names on the roster.

He brought the day's agenda up on the terminal at his ornate desk, but it offered no clues. And now the Speaker himself was striding over to the door.

North Hollow's forehead creased, but at least the disruption was something different, and he could use any diversion that offered. He watched the Speaker reach the newcomer and stop dead, then wheel on the Sergeant with a quick, choppy wave of his hands. The Sergeant spread his arms, eloquently disclaiming any responsibility, and North Hollow chuckled at the comedy playing out before him. The Speaker confronted the newcomer, shaking his head adamantly, but then the headshakes stopped. He folded his arms, cocking his head to one side and listening intently, then nodded with slow, manifest unwillingness. The newcomer said something else, and the Speaker nodded again, then threw his hands up in disgust as the newcomer made some additional point.

Buzzing conversation echoed around the chamber, and some of the peers were rising and flowing toward the door. North Hollow saw the closest ones stop dead exactly as the Speaker had, then wheel back to the peers behind them, gesticulating and muttering animatedly, and some were looking back at those of their colleagues who were still seated. North Hollow had shu