”“So he told you that without the replicator you would have no work?”“Tha’s right. Bleedin’ liberty.”“Was it true? Should the governme...t have banned the replicators?”The pair had been walking while they talked, but now the young man stopped and turned to face the reporter properly.“He had ten workers. He got one replicator and got rid o’ three workers. Then he was made to get shot o’ the replicator and he made all the rest o’ his workers redundant. You tell me. He just didn’t want to employ. . . he started touching you and then, when your top came undone and his hands touched your breasts . . . I’ve never seen anything like that before.’ Kate nodded, understandingly. ‘I was frightened, too,’ she confessed, ‘and I suppose I didn’t really think it would go as far as it did, but . . . well, the truth is, it was his hands – the roughness of them. I suppose it’s the work he does, but all the surfaces of his hands were really hard and when they rasped against my skin . . . Well, they. Then my mom asked again as to what they wanted, at that time one of the worker held her from behind and the other one started smooching her. She tried to run but one of the workers showed her the pic of her in her bra and blackmailed her saying that if she tried to run they would put the pic on the internet and show it to everyone.My mom got scared and asked them what she could do for them.They told that they would delete the pic but in return she would have have sex with them.She found no. Firm.’ It was a running joke between the three of them. Jeremy wrapped his arms around her properly and squeezed them together. He felt her shoulders relax and she did the same. He buried his face in her neck so that his lips were pressed against it, careful not to purse or move them but intentionally taking in the smell of her perfume, her hair, her skin. He exhaled as he pulled away and she did her best not to show how the warm breath on her neck had made her shiver. It had been a long time.