New Chapter up on my Patreon

I've posted a new chapter of Triple Junction on my Patreon!

Here's a bit:

The evening before Parliament opened its Spring Session, Lord Oxford held a party at his guesthouse, which was just across Liberty Park from Harper’s house. Harper took both Jossa and Martin along with him.

Martin was one thing – he had a chip, so even if they ran into trouble, the most that would happen to him was he might get tanked. But Jossa was delinquent on her contract. Jossa, they would shoot.

“No one’s going to arrest me,” Jossa soothed, when Martin pointed this out to her. “It’s Oxford’s House. I’m as safe there as I am at the Academy when Efram is in residence.”

“Except the Academy ain’t hip-deep in Port City. Or filled with holders from Kadir’s side of the aisle.”

“Lord Holders from Kadir’s side of the aisle don’t even see contract labor, not unless they want something. We’ll be fine.”

Martin spread his hands at Dallas, lying on the bunk he and Jossa shared with Luc asleep beside him, but Dallas just shrugged. “I’m not the leader of the network,” he said. “Don’t ask me what she should do.”

Martin bared his teeth. “Maybe this is Harper’s way of dealing with the leader of the network.”

Jossa laughed. “Harper doesn’t want me dead.”

“I’d like to see him run the network without Jossa,” Dallas said, patting Luc’s back gently. “Tell Sen what to do?”

“Or Will, for that matter,” Jossa agreed. “Are you going to comb your hair before we leave?”

“I already did,” Martin said, and both of them laughed at him then.

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So are the first three chapters of Triple Junction, the sequel to Broken Slate.

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Saturday Afternoon

When I was a kid, Saturday afternoon was my favorite time of the week. Nothing to do, and no one leaning on me to do it. I would usually wander around in "the woods," a scrub area out back of our subdivision in Metairie, Lousiana. In the spring, snakes were everywhere out there; in the summer, bugs and rats and nutria; in the winter, just me. Or sometimes my brothers and their friends, notorious for starting fires with stolen gasoline, or shooting at one another with B-B guns. I'd climb trees and poke snakes with sticks, capture bugs and caterpillars, try to figure out what kind of insect made that pod and which that. The "woods" was actually a giant landfill, so anywhere I dug, I'd turn up rusting trash and filth, old shoes, boxes. My first archeological event! Every hole filled with soupy red water, stinking and foul.

I made up epic stories as I wandered around, of course. When I was with my friends, as I occasionally was, these stories were less interesting. Their stories always had current television stars, or worse, local boys in them. Plus, they wanted to direct my plots. No, I would say. No, no, no. That can't happen. Because it doesn't make sense for her to act that way, that's why.

Saturday afternoons are a little less fraught these days.

I spent the morning at Aikido, and all morning I have been working on Triple Junction. Made some turkey soup for dinner, and did some laundry. Now it is back to work on this epic novel. It is raining and raining here, perfect weather for soup and writing.

I need some woods to wander around in. And many, many Saturday afternoons!