Read Online Entangled by Amy Rose Capetta - Free Book Online

neck, her fingers. It felt good. Not that Cade had a real frame of reference. She had gotten so used to the club—hands grabbing at her, eyes unpeeling her clothes. But this was different. Good-different. Knowing that Xan waited for her made it easier for Cade to keep walking, over and over the dunes.
    â€œHey,” Cade said. She was the first to see it.
    The spaceport rose from the sand like a radioactive wart. It was the only lit-up building for miles. The rest of Dana City was just a winking suggestion in the background. The spaceport was the thing.
    She sent a beaming flash of it to Xan.
    â€œHow do we get in?” Cade asked.
    â€œYou think I don’t have a plan for this?” Lee said, dropping to a knee in the sweat-cold sand. She seemed to take most things as challenges. And so far, she’d risen to them all. But Cade still doubted that she could get them both off Andana without trouble.
    â€œIt’s against the law to be human and in the spaceport at the same time,” Cade said. “Unless you’re getting dumped here.”
    â€œI know.” Lee rummaged in her pack. “I’m Human Express. Twelfth generation.”
    With a winning smile and a flourish of the wrist, she shook out a uniform—the blue and white of a spaceport worker. It unwrinkled and Cade saw that it had a thin plastic film attached that would turn human skin a pale blue. There was also an extra rolling eye that could be fitted with a bit of adhesive to the back of the neck. It was an outfit designed to make a human look like a Saea, one of the closest known species. The stitching across the breast pocket read SAEANNA .
    â€œThis uniform is cargo class,” Lee said. “Makes it easier to lump around a bunch of stuff and pretend I’m delivering it to someone else.”
    â€œNice,” Cade said. “But not really enough. I’ve never heard of a two-headed Saea, and the fit for both of us looks . . . snug.” She dropped down and sifted her fingers through the pack. “Have another one of those lurking around in here?”
    â€œI used to.” Lee’s voice fell out of its usual rapid firing and dropped to a rare, slower pace Cade had heard only once before. “Had to stop carrying it around. I’ve covered this route alone for three years now.”
    â€œYeah, well, that’s how I usually work, too,” Cade said. “Alone.”
    She snatched up Lee’s pack and started to walk toward the spaceport. The weight of it meant almost nothing to her arm muscles.
    â€œWhat are you doing?” Lee asked, running after her and launching herself on Cade’s back. “You rot-faced, sour-livered spacecadet, give it back!”
    Cade shook Lee off with a twitch of the shoulder and turned to face her. She dropped the pack in the sand and backed off. Lee’s storminess had returned full force. But this time Cade laughed.
    â€œI’m just testing it,” she said.
    â€œFor what?” Lee mumbled as she rubbed the sand off her pants and the side of her face.
    â€œHow much it carries.”
    Cade looked Lee over. Three full heads taller. But skinnier than she was, in every instance. A papery slip of a girl.
    â€œYeah,” Cade said. “This should do.”
    Â 
    Cade—dressed in a light blue skin and stuck with a bonus eye—entered the spaceport by the maintenance door. She marveled at the number of nonhumans streaming up the glass concourses, down the glass stairs. She couldn’t have imagined the number of ships they packed into one dome.
    Another Saea stopped her halfway up the stairs. Rolled both eyes at her—the two front ones, at least. It was a greeting. Cade rolled her eyes back.
    â€œDo you know where you’re going?” the Saea asked.
    Cade didn’t nod. She didn’t shake her head. She just looked up at him with her best, wide, I’m-a-lost-little-girl eyes. She’d seen those work on