Baruke’s gaze went past her, to Lenato and Hal, and cleared his throat. “I appreciate you enquiring as to my condition.”
“I obviously did want to do that,” Fiona said. “But I also thought that we could do something a little more concrete to ensure we don’t need to have everything that passes our lips tested.”
Kivisha looked up sharply at that. “What do you propose?”
Her father frowned at her, then at Fiona. “Yes, what can we do?”
“Talk to each other.” Fiona lifted a shoulder. “It was surely to stop us doing so that someone tried to kill us both. There were plenty of dignitaries at the dinner, and we were the only two targeted. I asked you for a meeting earlier this week, and you couldn’t fit me in, but as we were sitting together at the dinner table, whoever didn’t want that conversation to happen must have decided extreme measures were required.”
“You’re saying if you do talk, and it becomes known, they will have no need to try to kill you again, because the damage would already be done?” Kivisha asked.
“Exactly.”
Kivisha looked over at her father. “So even this visit, with nothing of substance discussed, would be enough?”
“I don’t know.” Fiona pulled out the chair that was placed up against the wall near the head of the bed and sat down on it, getting to Baruke’s eye level. “It may be that our talks would have sparked some action on our part, but even just the news that we have talked would help, I think.”
“I’ll leave you for a little bit.” Kivisha stood. “I need something to drink and to stretch my legs. I’ve had a few messages from your staff, Dad, and I’ll get back to them, let them know that you’re fine and that you and Fiona Russell are speaking with each other.”
She looked a little less stressed, Fiona thought. As if having a way to help, a path out of constant worry about another attack, had lifted a weight off her.
She squeezed Baruke’s hand, and then left.
For a moment, the room was quiet.
“This frightened her.” Baruke broke the silence. “My first instinct was to tell you I didn’t want to talk to you, but seeing Kivisha’s reaction has forced me to accept that it is what I am going to do.”
“Why did you want to refuse?” Hal asked.
Baruke glanced at Lenato, and the doctor gave a quick smile and began backing out of the room.
“I have patients to see to,” he said as he reached the door. “If you need anything, ring for the med techs,” he said to Baruke. “I will be sleeping just down the hall when I’m finished with my rounds, so I’ll be nearby the whole night.”
When he was gone, Baruke rubbed at his forehead. “I was told not to talk to you,” he said at last.
“Threatened?” Fiona asked.
He raised his head sharply, looking at her, then shook his head. “No. It was phrased as them helping me. Doing me a favor by letting me know to avoid a conversation with you because you were going to make demands I couldn’t comply with and that was going to make things awkward between us.”
“Two questions,” Fiona said. “Who is ‘they’, and what demands did they tell you I was going to make?”
Baruke sighed. “They are a committee of Balcoan manufacturers. The person who spoke to me on their behalf is the head of the committee, Halarian Bost. And the demands he warned me you would make are for the parts that have been delayed for Paxe’s Class 5.”
“I’m looking into this committee and Halarian Bost specifically.” Eazi’s voice was a murmur in her earpiece. “I haven’t heard his name before.”
“I’ve never heard of Bost,” Fiona said. “But he was right. I was going to ask why we haven’t received the parts for Paxe’s Class 5.”
“I cannot compel the private companies on Balco to produce parts.” Baruke flopped back onto his pillows. “And they told me it was killing them financially to work on custom parts for Paxe rather than more mass-produced items they could sell to the general public.”
“So why not say that, why keep pretending the parts were going to be delivered any day?” Fiona crossed her arms over her stomach.
“I . . .” Baruke frowned. “I don’t know. I didn’t know what they were saying to you, what excuses they were giving, but Bost gave me the impression you weren’t taking no for an answer.”
“We kept giving them chance after chance, but we’ve already started looking at sourcing parts from the Grih, and once that gets rolling, the Balcoans will be cut off completely.” Fiona noticed Baruke’s eyes widen at that statement. “We’ve worked out we can’t depend on Balco, and the meeting I asked for was a last ditch attempt to see whether we could still deal on good terms together, or whether we needed to cut our losses.”
“Did Bost give you any other reason for their reneging on their contracts?” Hal spoke for the first time.
Baruke shook his head. “I did tell him that they hadn’t been forced into the contracts, but he made it sound as if the expectations on them were so heavy, they’d signed against their better judgement. I know I pushed for Balco to be fully involved in Paxe’s rebuild, and Bost used that to make me feel guilty about their struggles to meet their obligations.”
