Runner: The Fringe, Book 3 Read Online Free

do not have a weapon.” Using her most practiced doctor tone, she pointed out the obvious facts. “You are transporting me to a brutal death. Even were I to somehow elude you, I couldn’t fly your ship. As you so aptly put it, I’m dead in the Void. I’d like my last week to be as pleasant as possible. I’m not demanding silk sheets and a handmaid, only that you move me to a cell with a shower.”
    He left without a word.
    Disappointed but not surprised, she continued to eat, savoring each bite of her meal. For all she knew, it could be her last. She didn’t think Roberts would care if her jailer fed her or not. After she finished every last morsel and ran her finger around the edges of the five compartments, she washed her fork and tray in the small bathroom sink, then slid them under her cell door.
    “A criminal would have tried to keep the fork.”
    Startled, she glanced around. A smooth black lump on the ceiling in the center of the hallway between the six cells had to be the com unit. Lifting her face, she addressed the com as if Foster stood in front of her.
    “I considered it. However, your finger is infected, not your brain. You would know if I didn’t return the fork.” She turned away, washing her face and hands in the sink. “I sincerely doubt I could free myself with a fork. You could perhaps turn it into a deadly weapon. I could not. The only use for a fork I know of is to eat with it.” She paused. “Oh, yes, and to use it to subdue a particularly tight knot.”
    With a seductive beat, he said, “I could watch you if you took a shower.”
    The bass of his voice made the entire ship throb, causing vibrations to run up her body and stroke the sensitive spots with a curious heat. The thought of him watching her was not as unappealing as it should have been.
    Dismissing the notion, she finished washing up. “Your reputation is such I would expect you to watch.” Drying herself with a small cloth, she turned and faced the com. “I find, given the current scope of my life, you watching me bathe is the very least of my concerns. You and your lecherous nature are not my biggest worry. Roberts is. With a few choice words and the gentle twisting of circumstance, my lifetime of good works is forever tarnished. I am hunted for a crime I did not commit.”
    “All I care about is my contract.” His low voice boomed, rumbling up her body in pleasurable waves.
    “Fine. You don’t believe me or don’t care. I am a hapless pawn, but you are a willing rook, played by a foul hand.” Carefully folding the washcloth so it would drip-dry over the sink edge, she turned her back on the com. “You are a glorified meatbag. Nothing more, nothing less.”
    “I am not a meatbag.”
    Dark and furious, his voice blasted her ears. Every speaker on his ship echoed his anger at being called a mindless mercenary. She didn’t need to see his face to know she’d touched a nerve.
    “I am one of six triple-platinum Runners on the Fringe. Do you know what that means?”
    Pushing down her fear, she tidied her cell. “I know who you are. I know every contract you’ve ever signed you’ve delivered on.” Nodding at the com unit between the cells, she made up her bunk. “You will deliver me to Roberts. Of that, I have no doubt. So that means I must worry myself over Roberts, not you.” She shook her head as she carefully sat on her newly made bed. “I’ve hurt none, survived many. I will survive you.”
    “You won’t survive Roberts.” His voice held no emotion at all.
    “That remains to be seen. The point is, I will survive you. Roberts wants me alive.” Jynx stared up at the com. “Correct?”
    He didn’t answer.
    Fear began somewhere in the pit of her belly and worked out along her limbs. She shouldn’t have deliberately antagonized him by calling him a meatbag. Not when he had a formidable reputation to live up to. Especially not when he had total control over her.
    “Mr. Nash?”
    Resounding silence was her