“
Thank you, Tiah,” Malcoma muttered even as the courtesan opened the office door their short walk had led them to. She didn’t say anything, but left with a hint of a polite grin. Within the room, stood randomly around the furniture, was a smartly dressed human man and three humanoid women: an arkanian, a birdlike omwati, and a rutian twi'lek. She greeted them in order. “
Damris. Pranda, Avan—!”
SMACK!!
No time allowed for an
It’s a relief to see you again, or an
How was the crossing? Nor for her name, Luha. She, evidently, had no time for any more of the madam's rare pleasantries. Malcoma took the blow with a sharp hiss, turning down her face, but never recoiling. Tone glowering, Luha accused, “
You sold out. Left us.” The one retaliatory move she made, though it wasn't really, was to hold up a hand to dissuade Damris from whatever defensive action he planned taking. She braced herself for more, but none came. Instead, Luha fled the office.
A stretch of silence followed, a shockwave wake left behind by the twi'lek. Finally, "
Mal—?" Avan quite literally chirped.
"
It's alright," she interrupted, waving her hand now, to dismiss but not dismissively. "
Go." She heard the girls hurry after their occupational sister and then Damris cross to her. "
How many of them feel like that?" she asked, turning her reddening face up to him.
He glanced away quickly at the door. No words meant all of them, even those that had not been present. “
They'll come around. They're just not used to being away from you." Ah, the journey was hard on them "
She's right though. Minus the slap, we’d be having the same conversation.”
Malcoma wouldn't argue. She had made herself a business proposition when she had founded Eve never to contend when she couldn't win. All that left was to her their side, and since Luha couldn't assert it, she asked-without-asking him. “
Then let’s have it.” Slap or no, she needed it.
“
What you need is to choose." He chose his words very carefully, but Malcoma was beyond the point of caring. "
Who do you look out for: them, us, yourself? The girls need to know. I need to know. There’s no room for even two of those options.”
She wasn't sure that much was true anymore.
Had it been on Coruscant? Yes. In the CIS? Absolutely. But now? Time to redefine her terms. She had hitchhiked with Captain
Wynter Rackham
for one reason and one reason only: to get out of Confederate space - to look after herself. Now that that reason was spent, and her girls had returned to her, she again had a business, not
The Fool
's charity, to run. She had muted her commlink, but even the silence formed into more
beep, beeps.
Rissk
.
Lliara Daeva
‘s was a matter of time. Wyn’s too. Annoying, surely, but she simply couldn't practically pay off this parcel of rouges' insatiable desire for, well,
whatever, while also reconstructing her own.
"
I'll break this off." She looked towards the ajar door. "
Call me when they've had enough time."
"
Let me know if you need backup," Damris offered.
In lieu of every smart reply she could have made, she nodded and left. Thank the Gods she was vain enough to carry a compact everywhere she went. It sat on the marble sink counter as she powdered the welt swelling on her cheek. "
Mikal," she called into her nearby comm's speakerphone, "
cancel my appointment." Enough strangers had already seen her like this - her escorts, bodyguard, the Le Magnifique receptionist. No one else.
An exceedingly strong drink was what she needed now, not energy healing, and privacy. Thank the Gods, too, that she had a full bar in her Bellevue suite.
Valerya Tion
, had wanted but what she paid half was plenty for entertainment expenses on 
