Dragonfly (29 page)

I shifted, edgy. “I shouldn’t.”

“Come on, I could use the help.” He flicked stray hair from my face, lingering. “I’d very much like the company too.”

I wanted to smile, but I couldn’t. I wanted to cry, too. Intuition, talent, charm, smarts that made it out of his head, that maddening scent that lingered everywhere I went. He even owned a cat. Truth was, he was too damn perfect. I’d searched my whole life for a man like this. I’d thought I’d found him once, but that was Nikita; and though Mishka had captured my heart, there’d always been a barrier between us, deep inside, and for the first time I realized what it was.

Mishka was a true believer, Imperial to his core. But in the depths of my dirty-backwater-planet soul lurked a dark whisper of doubt.

And as I looked at Dragonfly, that whisper grew louder.

But I couldn’t let my weakness confuse me. This was about more than the two of us. He was about to kill thousands of people. The fact that he didn’t seem like an evil person didn’t make that right.

I tilted my face away, the movement slight but definite. “Umm … no, thanks.”

“Suit yourself.”

He shrugged, but I could tell I’d hurt him from the tension around his eyes. My heart stung, and I wanted to reach out to him, but he’d already turned away. Damn it. This was ridiculous. I had to back off, calm down, get rational before I gave myself away.

He tossed his coat onto the sofa and sat on a stool at his dented plastic console. The hardware on
Ladrona
was newer, more powerful; this one looked old, the display worn and flickering.

The cat hopped onto the console and curled up on a data readout, purring. I hunched on the soft gray sofa, rubbing my sore hands on my trousers and looking anywhere but at him. The study looked shambolic: tables stacked with electromag components, data printouts; datashelves crammed with chip cases and old text viewers and piles of burned-out console hardware. And that damn crate of detonators, sitting quietly on the carpet like it wasn’t the death of a few thousand filthy rich gamblers and Shadrin’s entire negotiation team.

The sofa beckoned, deep and comfortable, and my body sank into the seductive, velvety cushions, but worry hacked at my nerves and I couldn’t relax. I didn’t know what to do.

Across the corridor, Isabel was busy with her class, childish laughter bubbling out. I could go to help her. I could call Nikita and tell him to put Esperanza on alert. I could forget about the whole thing and carry on as Director Renko had ordered me: follow Dragonfly back to Esperanza and betray him to Axis with his murdering finger on the button.

But I couldn’t make myself do it, and my failure itched under my skin like a bad oblivion comedown. Something about this whole deal still didn’t feel right, and it wasn’t just that I’d somehow convinced myself that the man who’d been my sworn enemy for three years wasn’t a killer.

I wriggled my fingers, wincing as they stung. I wasn’t accustomed to lifting heavy loads in the cold, even for such a short time. I should have worn gloves. Fidgeting, I studied my palm where I’d pretended to cut it on the crate. No cut, though I had calluses along my right index finger and in the indent of my thumb from too much shooting practice. Some on the left hand too, though not so pronounced.

An image sparked of Max, rubbing his hand in the cargo bay, as if his palm hurt. As if he wasn’t used to lifting either. Strange that a career trash-hauler like Bastie wouldn’t hire more experienced help.

I recalled the angles of Max’s atomflash, tight against his ribcage, his innocuously pale eyes giving me the once-over for weapons. Rubbing his hand, those same pale calluses ringing his thumb and forefinger.

Hot bile churned my stomach, and with a sick jolt I remembered where I’d seen sweet young Max before.

My pleasure
, he’d said. The omega brief. Floor thirteen. Max was Axis.

I sat up, urgency twitching my muscles. I’d only sent Nikita that starshot last night. Surely they couldn’t find us this fast.

“Sasha, where’s Bastie?”

Dragonfly glanced over his shoulder at me, and the data streaming across his display paused. “What?”

My voice strained, harsh. “Bastie. Where is he?”

Across the corridor, Isabel screamed, and abruptly the air stung with the dirty static hiss of atomflash. The cat darted under the console, bristling. Dragonfly and I looked at each other and leaped up as one.

Furniture crashed in the classroom as we hurtled into the corridor. Children squealed and sobbed. Isabel’s voice carried over the din, frantic.

A male voice cut across her in harsh Rus. “Talk properly, bitch.”

We hit the wall, our backs thudding into the plastic pinboards.

Dragonfly cursed. “That’s Bastie’s new flyboy. What does he want?”

I sidled along the wall to risk a peek through the glass door. Atomflash crackled, and the glass vaporized, searing my face with a burning rush of air. I jerked back with a curse, singed hair stinking. The bastard was quick and accurate. Not just some spook from floor thirteen. More likely a black ops man.

An assassin. Excellent. But was he here for Dragonfly? Or for me?

“You okay?” Dragonfly touched my chin.

“Yeah, just the heat.” I turned my face away, my cheek already swelling. The scald stung like fire, but I could manage the pain. I just didn’t want him to see. “He’s in the left corner, low. Kids are on the floor. He’s got Isabel with him.”

He banged his head back against the wall, frustrated. “Weapons?”

“Just the flash. I couldn’t see anything else.” I thought furiously. No way could Nikita have called Max—or whatever his real name was—onto me so quickly. And Bastie had only signed Max on as crew at Vyachesgrad. No, Nikita had nothing to do with it. This was Surov the cat-man’s doing. Either Bastie was in on it, or they’d tricked him too. Surov wanted Dragonfly dead. And Max wouldn’t think twice about killing me if I got in the way.

Dragonfly wiped his damp forehead. “What do you want?” he called.

“You,” came the reply. “Alive. Alone. No weapons, no tricks, no help from your little girlfriend. I’ve got a story to tell you about her too.”

I swallowed, dry. Max knew who I was. But why would he give me away? I was supposed to be on his side. It struck me that maybe this was Agent Electra’s way of eliminating her competition for the A-D job: send Max out here with orders to kill us both. Hell, for all I knew, Max was just doing it for fun.

Dragonfly licked his lips. “Or what?”

“Or I count to five and another of your cute little friends goes ‘poof’.” A little girl screamed and Max laughed. “One, two, three—”

Atomflash spat. The screams cut off abruptly, and Isabel wailed.

“Shit,” called Max cheerfully. “Sorry about that. Guess you’d better get in here, you mind-fucked anarchist son of a bitch.”

The stink of burned flesh made me gag, and my muscles rippled tight and angry. Black ops collects the kind of twitchy, hyper-aware psychos for whom criminal insanity is just an occupational hazard. Nikita has nothing on these sick fuckers. To think I’d imagined I’d ever fit in there.

Dragonfly closed his eyes, clenching his jaw. I grabbed his arm and pulled him back against the wall. His muscles bunched, tense. I kept my voice low, but my hands quivered as I realized I’d made my decision. I didn’t want him dead, not any more. And that meant we were in this together.

“What are you doing?” I whispered. “You can’t go in there.”

“What else can I do?” His dark eyes shimmered. “I’ve outlived my usefulness. I’m not helping them any more. At least this way they might live.”

My heart clenched. He had more faith in Max than I did. And this was my fault, not his. I wouldn’t let him kill himself for me.

I chewed my lip and thought fast. “There’s another way. Give me your pistol, I’m a better shot than you.”

He looked at me blankly, shaking his head.

Frustration and sorrow clawed at my insides. I wanted to shake sense into him, make him understand he hadn’t come all this way to have his people die. That he hadn’t done so many ugly things for nothing.

“Pistol, Sasha, before he vaporizes another kid. You know some people actually give a shit if you live or die?”

Our gazes locked. Slowly he reached beneath his coat and unholstered, handing it to me grip first. Not the new pistol from
LightBringer;
this was his own, worn and dented with use.

“You got a plan?” he said.

I flicked the energy up to maximum and wrapped my fingers around the warm black metal, managing half a grin. “Yeah. Look too dumb to be a threat.”

The ghost of a smile haunted his face. “Worked well last time.”

“Yeah, it did.”

I squeezed his hand one last time, and concentrated on the plasma pistol’s weight in my sweaty grip. I breathed deeply, trying to quiet my heartbeat. I’d done this maneuver before a couple times, but always in a team, and Mishka always took the shot. Mishka had joined Axis from special forces, and he never missed. I didn’t even have time to adjust the pistol’s sights. And Max was black ops, his reflexes wired, his vision likely primed with laser targeting. No way I could beat him. But I had to try.

“Get on with it, dickhead,” Max yelled above squealing kids. “I’m in a counting mood.”

Asshole.

I thought back to Esperanza, the krypton light exploding above our heads when Dragonfly shot it out. The corridor on
LightBringer
where we’d fought, plasma exploding left and right. I lowered my voice, barely audible. “You fire high and to the left?”

Dragonfly nodded, and swapped places with me without me telling him. We thought alike. It warmed me and maddened me at the same time.

“Trigger pressure?”

He held up four fingers.

Sweat trickled down my temple, and I wiped it away. “Okay. You go in hands free. Close the door, head right two-thirty, two paces past the carpet’s edge and hit the floor. If I miss, use your imagination.”

He brushed damp hair from my cheek in a swift, affectionate caress, and warmth stole into my heart. He cared so deeply. I longed to explain, to tell him I was sorry for my lies, but before I could say anything he turned and gripped the doorframe.

“Hold your fire, genius,” he yelled. “I’m coming in.”

I sidled up behind him against the wall, and he inched the handle down and pushed the door open, glinting glass motes drifting. I edged up to the doorframe and closed my eyes, trying to visualize the room as I’d glimpsed it through glass that was no longer there. Max, in a few meters from the far left corner. Isabel on her knees before him. Kids huddled on the carpet.

Fuck. Surely, I was about to die.

Surprise might be my only advantage. Max knew I was from counter-insurrection and, like all black ops guys, he probably thought that meant I was soft. He’d be cocky, confident of success. He might not be expecting this.

I heard Dragonfly step inside. The door clicked softly shut. I gripped the pistol in both hands, sensing it, testing its balance. My pulse pounded, the sound obliterating everything but my shallow breathing. I pressed my forehead to the pistol’s warm barrel and counted, the closest thing I’d ever done to a prayer.

One step. Two. Three.

I curled my slick finger inside the trigger guard. Far left corner. High and to the left. Hope the bastard hadn’t moved too much.

Look left. Four. Five. Carpet’s edge.

I tightened my finger, pulling two pounds, then three.

Six. Seven. Look right.

“Oh, goody.” Max’s sarcastic voice, distant in my concentration. “Now let me tell you about your little lady friend before I melt your stupid rebel head off.”

I held my breath.

Now.

I twisted, kicking out with my right foot, the momentum spinning me into the doorway, my aim straight and level. My vision melted into a colored blur and I cocked my left wrist down a fraction and fired.

Hot scarlet plasma sizzled. Isabel screamed. I thudded into the locker opposite, the hard plastic bruising my shoulder. Pain mushroomed, and my breath hurt my lungs. I’d heard multiple shots. But I wasn’t dead.

I blinked, trying to see. Slowly, my pulse receded, and dimly I heard the kids screaming, Isabel sobbing in Espan. My vision cleared. I saw Dragonfly picking himself up off the floor. Max’s charred body was slumped against the wall in a fading plasma vapor cloud, next to two little atomflash-melted shapes that didn’t resemble children any more.

My shot had been accurate. I’d done it. Dragonfly lived, to go about his awful business at Esperanza. Agent Max was dead and could never tell him who I really was. Both our legends, intact.

Winning had never felt so wrong.

Carrie, Aragon, Lazuli—I was sick of legends and lies. I wanted to scream out the truth to anyone who’d listen: that I didn’t know who the fuck I was any more.

I let my head fall back against the locker, and had to use my other hand to uncurl my stiff finger from the trigger.

“Carrie? You okay?”

I took a deep breath, flipped the pistol and held it out to him. I didn’t want it.

Slowly, he took it. “Nice shot.”

“Thanks.”

Tears thickened my lashes, and I blinked them free. In my mind, he crushed me to him, warm and safe, his lips brushing my hair. Hot longing spread in my belly. I wanted to kiss him, feel his hair in my fingers, his skin on mine. But too many untruths mined the space between us.

He wiped my tears away, and his fingertips brushed my cheekbone, their touch so wonderful and warm yet somehow cold.

I wiped my face, pushing his hand away, and walked outside to let the chill wind scrub my skin clean.

32

By the time Dragonfly returned, the pale sun had slipped behind the shadowy streetscape and stars shone cold in the blackening sky.

Isabel had insisted on patching me up, once she’d sent her class home, though her hands still shook and her face shone sickly white. The salve she’d sprayed on my scorched face still tingled.

We’d found no sign of any other new arrivals. Max had come alone, and if Electra was indeed after me, she hadn’t shown her face here. Bastie we’d found dead, his pale mass stuffed in next to a bulkhead on his ship. Maybe he’d sold Dragonfly out, maybe he hadn’t. We’d never know. We’d crated his body for the freezer, in case he had a family.