Reap the Whirlwind

The radiant hostess and club proprietor lingered half a step behind Jea

“Hola, Diego,” she said, staring at his eyes. “You can relax, I didn’t come to make a scene.”

“Well, that’s a relief,” he said, struggling to remain cordial. Her ability to read his surface thoughts had always bothered him. Though he knew that she couldn’t help it, every time it happened it felt like an invasion of his privacy. Blocking her from his thoughts was difficult and required a great deal of concentration—either to flood his mind with random mental noise or to quiet his surface thoughts altogether. Of the two, achieving peace was the more difficult option, so instead he found his thoughts agitated and muddled whenever he had to spend time with her.

After a few awkward seconds, he motioned to the chair. “Please, sit down.”

Jea

“Thank you for having di

Jea

“I guess I’m just a lucky man,” Reyes said as he read the wine list and cluttered his i

Not yielding to his clumsy imitation of charm, she asked, “I don’t suppose you had anything to do with delaying our departure, did you?”

“Not in the mood for a Brunello tonight, huh?” He could see that she wasn’t going to let him off the hook. “Fine, you caught me. I wanted to make sure I had time to talk to you before you left. Doesn’t mean we can’t have a nice di

She shook her head as she unfolded her linen napkin into her lap. “Still can’t come at a problem straight, can you? There always has to be a secret, or a twist, or a bit of deception.”

Smoothing his own napkin into his lap, he asked, “If I had asked you to come to my office, would you have shown up?”

“Of course not,” Jea

“Touché,” Reyes said.

Manón returned to the table at that moment, clearly taking the emotional temperature of the former spouses before she said, “Can I offer you something from the bar before you order?”

Taking the initiative, Reyes said, “Bring us a bottle of that good Vulcan syrah, would you?”

“The ’59 Saylok?” Manón asked for clarification.

“That’s the one, thanks,” Reyes confirmed. Manón nodded and left to procure the wine. The commodore looked at his di

Feigning a difficult search of her memories, she said, “Let’s see…I was calling you a duplicitous, overly secretive jerk…and you were ordering wine.”

“It’s just like we’re married again,” he said with a sarcastic grin. A server in a black-and-white uniform appeared from the shadows, filled their water glasses, and vanished without a word.

Jea

“You’re an esper,” he said. “Don’t you know?”

She swallowed a bitter chortle and wrinkled her grin into a grimace. “It doesn’t take a telepath to guess this is about the protectorate treaty for my colony.”

“Things are moving fast out here, Jea

“At least I know why the Klingons are there,” she said. “Conquest is what they do. But if you want me to trust Starfleet, try telling me the truth.”

“Everything I’ve told you is the truth,” Reyes insisted.

She traced the rim of her water glass with a fingertip. “It’s part of the truth, not all of it. Why is the Federation so interested in Gamma Tauri? There are lots of UFP colonies that need your support more than mine does. Cygnet’s been asking for help finishing its spacedock for almost a year, but you’ve had your S.C.E. team digging ditches around New Boulder for a month.”

“I prioritize based on need,” Reyes said. “The president of Cygnet XIV assured me just last week that her people can finish their own spacedock. Your colony is trying to get a high-yield crop planted on one of the hottest M-class planets in the sector, and you’re already behind schedule.” He picked up his menu. “The seafood is very good here, by the way.”

She stewed for a few seconds while he filled his mind with the appetizer list. Lifting her own menu, she asked, “Have you ever met a subject you didn’t change?”

“Sure I have,” he said. “I recommend the fried Vulcan mollusks. You’ll love the pepper-aioli dip they come with.”

Manón returned to the table with their bottle of wine. She showed the label to Reyes, who nodded his approval. While she worked at uncorking the bottle, Jea

“Of course there’s something I’m not telling you,” Reyes shot back. “I’m a flag officer ru

Conversation paused as Manón filled his glass a couple of centimeters deep with dark red wine. He placed his fingertips on the base of the broad tulip glass and jogged it in a small circle, swirling the wine inside the glass to aerate it. Then he lifted the glass, inhaled the wine’s sweet, almost floral bouquet, and sampled a mouthful. Complex yet subtle, it was light enough to mesh with seafood but strong enough to be paired with meat. He swallowed, then said to the ravishing hostess, “Excellent, thank you.”

Manón filled Jea

His ex-wife’s glare told him all he needed to know. “Give us a minute,” he said. Manón gave a small nod and stepped away to attend the seating of more di

“Diego,” Jea

Words caught in his throat. Much of the bitterness of their divorce had stemmed from the fact that he hadn’t wanted it. Ending their marriage had been Jea

“You just did,” she said under her breath, and as soon as the words registered in his ears, he realized that they both were blushing, him for shame at being found out, her for knowing that his torch for her still smoldered, however weakly. She closed her menu and put it down on the table. “Just ask me to sign the protectorate agreement so I can refuse and get out of here.”