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“Are wesomeone there?”

“Not there There’s a ship a few days in Sunward But locked to Hungaria Pella, it’s called”

“And after that?”

Filipof a Belter Apparently she could know that much, but no more She wondered ould happen if she pushed, and kneas an experiht I loved youI would have stayed if I could I would have taken you with me

Filip looked at her and then away

She’d spentthe birth in recovery The baby kept her fro at a stretch, but apart from one week of frankly hellish colic, he was neither harder nor easier than she’d been led to expect The worst thing she suffered was boredoroup he’d been drinking ere ht her engineering proble to solve They were the sort of work consultants would do for half a oodwill and the need to do so While Filip napped in the little plastic crib, she custora sequencers for shear force detection units She designed software overrides for testing the containnetic bottles

The kind of li, would fail on the Gamarra

“All right,” Naomi said “I’ll see what I can do”

“Do you have access to another ship?” Filip asked

“I ”

“You can’t just hire a charter This has to be untraceable”

Meaning, she knew, that whatever was going to happen, it wouldafter Filip and Cyn and all the others Maybe security forces,else that she hadn’t anticipated yet But there would be consequences And there would be violence

“Idiscreetly,” Naomi said “If it doesn’t work, I’ll be sure it doesn’t come back to you”

Filip sed For a limer than when she’d er than when she’d held him to her breasts to feed

“I would have looked for you if he’d let me,” Naomi said The words came out of her fro whatever burden Marco had put on hi him responsible for how she felt too wasn’t a kindness