
heart had been weak. Had he known, he would never have gotten so rough with her, but she hadn't told
him. She'd done just the opposite and actually egged him on. He was an innocent babe in the woods and
all the kinky suggestions had come from her.
Damon stopped for a moment, rehearsing his new defense and trying it on for size. It might just work.
The way he'd tell it, that little prostitute been so hot for his money she'd have done just about anything.
Actually, it hadn't been that way at all. But who was to know? The girl was safely dead, and he could
slant his story any way he wanted.
Her eyes wide with fear, she'd actually ordered him to leave. "I've changed my mind," she'd said.
Turned on by her resistance, he'd just laughed. "Well, I haven't!" Then he'd proceeded to show her who
was boss. While she fought like a wildcat, it was only when she bit him that he really saw red. The nerve
of her! She'd drawn blood too! He was perfectly justified in doing what he did next, but he'd no more
intended to kill her than he had any of the others. All he wanted was to teach her a lesson. She resisted
and he'd squeezed a little too hard.
Fortunately, they'd been alone. The four walls in her tacky little house weren't going to talk and now it
was just his word about the rough sex. That was the way it had always gone before and who was going
to contradict him now? Certainly not a dead whore.
The more Damon considered his argument the better he liked it and now he was sure he could make the
sale. But in the unlikely event this masked judge didn't buy his story, there'd still be plenty of time to
straighten things out. Wouldn't there?
True, they'd brought him to trial much faster than he'd expected. In a matter of days, to be precise.
Anywhere else, there'd have been the usual months of preparation, endless press coverage, and an
inevitable public airing of the victim's dirty linen. With his baby face and disingenuous manner, he'd have
garnered plenty of public sympathy for being led astray by a loose woman. Especially when he lowered
his curly blond head and promised tearfully, with all the sincerity he could muster, to mend his wandering
ways. But when he'd suggested that, the stupid advocate hadn't seemed to understand.
Damon's boyish features and gentle manner had served him well in the past and his angelic appearance
had swayed more than one verdict in his favor. But on Nublis, it seemed they took the concept of blind
justice literally. The advocate told him the Archon had no idea who he was and wouldn't even be able to
see his face. Damon had been hoping to make an impression with his innocent demeanor and good
looks, and that had been a blow.
Now he'd come up with a decent defense, he felt more confident. He looked toward his advocate for
reassurance but the man's expression was grim. As the arresting officer came forward to testify, Damon
cleared his throat. He checked the instructions on the sheet and prepared for his first question.
On the throne above Damon, the Archon leaned forward slightly. As the afternoon wore on and he
listened to the accused's pleasant tenor voice reel off one lie after another about the woman he'd killed, a
blackness descended on Cassius' spirit. Whoever he was, the man was not a native Nublian, though he
spoke the language well. To distract himself from his depression, Cassius tried to place the accent.
Andromedan perhaps? No. That planet's language was much too harsh. With those soft syllables and
inflections, he had to have come from much further out.
Then he had it. Aretz, of course. In pre-colonization days, the beautiful blue planet had been known as
Terra or Earth. Even now in the Fifth Millennium, the natives still called the place by its old name. A