Coldly, calmly, he said, “I know that Martin Humphries wants you. I think that you married me to escape from him. I think—”
“Lars, that’s not true!”
“Isn’t it?”
“I love you! For god’s sake, don’t you know that? Don’t you understand it?”
The ice thawed. He realized that he held in his arms the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen. That she had come to this desolate emptiness on the frontier of human habitation to be with him, to help him, to love him.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered, feeling ashamed. “It’s just that… I love you so much…”
“And I love you, Lars. I truly do.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
He shook his head ruefully. “Sometimes I wonder why you put up with me.”
She smiled and traced a fingertip across his stubborn, stubbled jaw. “Why not? You put up with me, don’t you?”
With a sigh, he admitted, “I thought we’d be back on Earth by now. I thought we’d be rich.”
“We are. Aren’t we?”
“On paper, perhaps. We’re better off than most of the other prospectors. At least we own this ship…”
His voice faltered. They both knew why. They owned Star-power because Martin Humphries had given it to them as a gift.
“But the bills do mount up,” Amanda said swiftly, trying to change the subject. “I was going over the accounts earlier. We can’t seem to stay ahead of the expenses.”
Fuchs made a sound somewhere between a grunt and a snort. “If you count how much we owe, we certainly are multimillionaires.”
It was a classic problem, they both knew. A prospector might find an asteroid worth hundreds of billions on paper, but the costs of mining the ores, transporting them back to the Earth/Moon region, refining them—the costs of food and fuel and air to breathe—were so high that the prospectors were almost always on the ragged edge of bankruptcy. Still they pushed on, always seeking that lode of wealth that would allow them to retire at last and live in luxury. Yet no matter how much wealth they actually found, hardly any of it stayed in their hands for long.
And I want to take ten percent of that from them, Fuchs said to himself. But it will be worth it! They’ll thank me for it, once it’s done.
“It’s not like we’re spendthrifts,” Amanda murmured. “We don’t throw the money away on frivolities.”
“I should never have brought you out here,” Fuchs said. “It was a mistake.”
“No!” she contradicted. “I want to be with you, Lars. Wherever you are.”
“This is no place for a woman such as you. You should be living comfortably, happily—”
She silenced him with a single slim finger across his thin lips. “I’m perfectly comfortable and happy here.”
“But you’d be happier on Earth. Or Selene.”
She hesitated a fraction of a second before replying, “Wouldn’t you?”
“Yes,” he admitted. “Of course. But I’m not going back until I can give you all the things you deserve.”
“Oh, Lars, you’re all that I really want.”
He gazed at her for a long moment, then said, “Yes, perhaps. But I want more. Much more.”
Amanda said nothing.
Brightening, Fuchs said, “But as long as we’re out here, at least I can make a decent home for you in Ceres orbit!”
She smiled for her husband.
CHAPTER 3
Build a habitat big enough to house everyone living at Ceres?” asked Martin Humphries, incredulous.
“That’s what the rumble is,” said his aide, a winsome brunet with long-lashed almond eyes, full pouty lips, and a razor-sharp mind. Even though her image on his bedroom wallscreen showed only her head and shoulders and some background of her office, the sight of her set Humphries’s mind wandering.
Humphries leaned back in his wide, luxurious bed and tried to concentrate on business. He had started the morning with a vigorous tussle with a big-breasted computer analyst who nominally worked in Humphries Space Systems’ transportation department. She had spent the night in Humphries’s bed, yet even in the midst of their most passionate exertions he found himself closing his eyes and fantasizing about Amanda.
His bedmate was in the shower now, and all thoughts about her or Amanda were pushed aside as Humphries talked business with his aide, whose office was several levels up in Selene’s underground network of corridors.
“It sounds ridiculous,” Humphries said. “How reliable is this information?”
The aide let a wintry smile cross her tempting lips. “Quite reliable, sir. The prospectors are all talking about it, back and forth, from one ship to another. They’re chattering all across the Belt about it.”
“It still sounds ridiculous,” Humphries grumbled.
“Beg to differ, sir,” said the aide. Her words were deferential, but the expression on her face looked almost smug. “It makes a certain amount of sense.”
“Does it?”
“If they could build a habitat and spin it to produce an artificial gravity that approaches the grav field here on the Moon, it would be much healthier for the people living out there for months or years on end. Better for their bones and organs than sustained microgravity.”
“H’mmph.”
“In addition, sir, the habitat would have the same level of radiation shielding that the latest spacecraft have. Or even better, perhaps.”
“But the prospectors still have to go out into the Belt and claim the asteroids.”
“They are required by law to be present at an asteroid in order for their claim to be legal,” the aide agreed. “But from then on they can work the rock remotely.”
“Remotely? The distances are too big for remote operations. It takes hours for signals to cross the Belt.”
“From Ceres, sir,” the aide said stiffly, “roughly five thousand ore-bearing rocks are within one light-minute. That’s close enough for remote operations, don’t you think?”
Humphries didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of admitting she was right. Instead he replied, “Well, we’d better be getting our own people out there claiming those asteroids before the rock rats snap them all up.”
“I’ll get on that right away,” said the aide, with enough of a smile curving her tempting lips to show that she had already thought of it. “And mining teams, too.”
“Mining operations aren’t as urgent as claiming the stupid rocks.”
“Understood,” she said. Then she added, “The board meeting is this morning at ten. You asked me to remind you.”
He nodded. “Yes, I know.” Without another word he tapped the keypad on the nightstand and her wallscreen image winked off.
Slumping deeper into the pillows, he heard the woman who’d spent the night in his bed singing in the shower. Off-key. Well, he said to himself, music isn’t her best talent.
Fuchs. The thought of Lars Fuchs pushed all other notions out of his mind. He’s out there with Amanda. I never realized she’d stay out in that wilderness with him. She doesn’t belong there, living in a crummy ship like some gypsy, some penniless drifter wandering out there in the empty wastes. She should be here, with me. This is where she belongs.
I made a mistake with him. I underestimated him. He’s no fool. He’s not just prospecting and mining. He’s building an empire out there. With Pancho Lane’s help.
The young woman appeared at the bathroom door, naked, her skin dewy and flawless. She posed enticingly and smiled for Humphries.
“Do we have time for one more? Are you up to it?” Her smile turned just a tad impudent.
Despite himself, Humphries felt stirred. But he said gruffly, “Not now. I’ve got work to do.”