Page 37 of The Red Woman on Mars

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

38 Sols to Presentation Day

“More wine, Miss Bowen?” offered the Martian man seated next to her.

Vivian blinked at him. “Oh, no thank you.” The glass of pale sparkling wine she’d sipped while awaiting her breakfast was plenty. She tried to focus on the conversation happening around her.

In the days since her recovery from the egg retrieval procedure, Vivian’s social calendar had filled up, and three men had settled into a friendly rivalry as they courted her. Vivian sensed from their easy banter that they had spoken to one another about their intentions, but they certainly hadn’t consulted her.

At least they’d brought her outside the four walls of the compound. The open-air restaurant terrace overlooked a sculpted park with twisting redstone paths leading through a landscaping of inky-blue jagged volcanic rocks and ornamental grasses dotted with vibrant flowers. Vivian watched a young Earther man weaving unobtrusively through the Martian couples and groups as he pruned the path. No one else seemed to notice him. Vivian wondered what had brought him to Mars and what sacrifices he’d made to pay for his ticket.

The three Martians hadn’t noticed her distraction. Ren, the man who enjoyed poetry that she’d met during the first luncheon, was lecturing on some topic while the other two nodded vigorously.

“You must understand, Vivian dear, my Martian foreparents were among the first to establish a base on the planet,” Ren told her. “Their wise choices have allowed our family to be one of the wealthiest and most powerful in the dome. They had the good sense to sell their property in Tokyo before the sea level rose too high. After Typhoon Michi, they were able to sponsor much of our extended family to flee to Mars. Populating the planet with their genetically enhanced descendants would honor their legacy.”

“Then Mars has always been a home for refugees,” Vivian offered tentatively in response.

“I would like to think so.” Ren gave her a bashful smile. He was good looking, Vivian decided. Objectively. He had straight black hair that brushed his shoulders, a neatly trimmed beard, and kind eyes.

One of the other men leaned across her. “If the Nakamura family wishes to retain their wealth, you should tell your uncle to stop pouring good money after bad into the lanthanum mines. Everyone knows they are about to bust.”

Ren turned away from Vivian to argue about mining investments, and she returned to making the occasional noise of interest. The Earther man on the path ducked his head and scrambled out of the way of two Martian women’s swishing skirts.

In the next five weeks, she would need to select a partner. She thought of Silas’s mouth on her breast and tried to picture one of her three dining companions in the same position. Putting her fork down, she stared at her cooling cultured sausage. She didn’t think she could eat another bite.

The day before, she’d gotten a brief text-only message from Miranda, the camp aid worker. She’d helped treat a burn onVivian’s mother’s neck. A cooking accident, her mother had explained. Only the regular, circular pattern looked more like a cigarette burn.

She needed to get her parents out. Could she pick one of these men today? Would they think she was too forward? Too transactional?

Their genetically modified eggs were ready for fertilization, Wim had announced yesterday. The Intelligence had recommended implantation as soon as possible, not waiting for the official wedding ceremony on Presentation Day. The day after they selected their partner, the embryo would be implanted. The very next day.

I can wait a little longer, she thought with a wave of guilt.

At the conclusion of their breakfast, Ren offered her his arm. “Please allow me the honor of escorting you home, Miss Bowen.” Vivian took his proffered arm and stepped down the winding redstone path to the street. “Give me a moment to summon my driver.” Ren strode toward a nearby café where the driver must have been waiting.

“Vivian.” She looked up to see Silas leaning in the shadow of a door frame. “I hoped I’d catch you alone.”

Vivian tensed. “How did you know I was here?”Was he following me?A few weeks ago, she might have found his interest exciting, but now all she wanted was for him to go away.

“Word travels,” he said with an air of put-upon casualness. “I miss you, Vivian. I was hoping we could find a chance to be alone together again.”

“I …” Vivian looked around for Ren, but he was nowhere in sight. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.” The memory of giggling and pulling Silas into her bedroom seemed far away, as if it had been some other woman.

“Why? Because the Council is forcing you to do their bidding? I could help you. You could come with me, away from here.”

“What! I can’t simply melt away. The dome is only seven square miles.”

Silas waved a hand. “I have connections. You could start over, Vivian. We could start a life together somewhere else.”

“A life together?” Vivian repeated incredulously. He didn’t seem to care about her own expectations for her life. But then again, who did?

Xavier cares, her treacherous mind thought.

“The groundcar will just be a moment,” Ren said as he strode back to her side.

Vivian turned away from Silas, and, when she glanced back, he was gone.

When Ren returned Vivian to the compound, she escaped to the garden. She put aside her fascinating and dense Martian textbook and loaded an Earther historical romance novel onto her new reader. Anything to forget the real world that morning. On the screen, the dashing duke declared himself to the beautiful debutante. He pulled her against him, crushing her to his chest as he kissed her fervently. The heroine wanted the embrace. She was caught up in the moment.