Silver Tongued Devils (9 page)

He put in a new cartridge and started
it up. “I know that. One more stripe and we’ll have enough to fool
my own mother.” His smile was grim.

No, he didn’t like the plan, but they
were limited in resources and trust until their mole was
caught.

Their.
After it all went down, she wanted to take them to Sakura and
let Brom see the children he’d saved. The records for all the kids
were buried in a safe away from their home. Unless the Outpost had
a major cleanup of their ship graveyard, it was waiting for
her.

There was another side to this plan. If
they managed to get free, their traitor would still be able to
compromise their mission. She needed to create a communication
deadspace. The only way to do that was from the border satellite.
It was black crystal. Four years ago, she’d seen what shattered
black crystal could do to a site. Every sliver would create a
dissonance with each sound, effectively destroying the possibility
of sending or receiving messages until it could be replaced. It
would take an Imperial vessel five days to be within range of the
next satellite system.

They would be on Sakura and on their
way long before then.

Raesa wondered at what point she’d
decided to stay with Na’varr and Brom. It didn’t matter if they
thought it was a bad idea or not. She’d convince them to let her
remain by their sides. Once she had her father’s legacy, she’d have
one last mission and then she was free to travel the
stars.

So far so good.
They’d managed to make it past initial security
with her tools mostly intact, though there was a rough moment where
a pat down grope nearly cost the bastard his life. Na’varr had kept
Brom in check, but just barely. He still fumed beside her while
they stood in a corner of the waiting room. With his hair pulled
back in a tight ponytail, you could easily make out the stripes on
his skin.

“What do you think?” Brom pitched the
question for her ears alone. They’d chosen the mercenary speak as
their primary language, but it didn’t matter.

“We’re being recorded. Voice and
visual. I don’t know the quality, but the set up stinks of it.
They’re waiting for someone.” She could make out one camera, but
there could be dozens and she wouldn’t know it.

“Who are they waiting for?”

“Whoever wants Na’varr dead or
captured.”

Brom nodded. She’d likely confirmed his
own thoughts. Even though they were in a life or death situation,
it felt like the hybrid was testing her. Worry ate at her, but she
tried to keep her doubts stuffed away.

She’d gone over the plan in detail.
According to Na’varr’s navigator, the standard operating procedure
of these hustlers involved separating officials from their body
slaves as soon as possible. So far Na’varr had managed to keep them
together, but it wouldn’t be long before they’d be split up. When
that happened, things would move at lightning speed. Otherwise,
Na’varr’s life and those of his crew would be in danger.

The door opened and an annoyingly
chipper official walked in. “Sorry for the delay, Mr. Varrian. Our
supervisor is on leave so we had to wait for our commander’s call.
We have him on satellite in the other room if you’ll follow
me.”

Na’varr gestured toward them and Raesa
pushed away from the wall.

“I’m sorry sir, we don’t allow pets in
the conference room.”

Pets? Raesa moved and Brom caught her
wrist. She caught the negative shake to his head.

Na’varr stared down the little man
until he fidgeted. “Show me to the conference room. If something
happens to my slaves, I’ll ensure the replacement compensation will
come from your pay.”

The man laughed. “They’re just
hybrids.”

Anger burned through Raesa, but she
kept it in. She glanced at Brom and found him completely relaxed
with a bored look on his face.

Na’varr glanced in their direction.
“They’re highly trained pleasure slaves. It took years to mold them
to my needs.”

“No one will bother them.”

“Both of you stay put,” Na’varr
commanded and both she and Brom bowed in acquiescence.

They left. “Stay safe,” she
muttered.

She ignored Brom and walked around the
room. There were two maintenance panels and nothing else on the
smooth walls.

Brom watched her every move. She paused
in front of the door and pressed her palm against it. Surprisingly,
it opened. A guard turned to face her. Raesa glanced back at
Brom.

“He told us to stay here,” Brom
warned.

“I’m a cat. I do what I
want.”

“You can’t leave,” the guard glared at
her and pointed back into the room.

She smiled and leaned close to his
face. She eyed his chest where the name Monarch was stitched in
perfect Imperial script. “Take me for a walk, Mr. Monarch. I need
to use the lady’s room. Unless you’d like to clean up the mess in
here…” She let it trail off and he sighed.

“Fine. Both of you with me,
then.”

“Why me? I don’t need to
go.”

Monarch drew his firearm, it looked
like a nasty thing, old metal and gunpowder. They really were
living on the fringes out here. “Just move.”

Brom’s hands went up. “You got
it.”

They left the room with the guard
several paces behind them. “Where do we go?”

“Straight ahead to the end of the
corridor, and then you take a left.”

She nodded and flounced
ahead. They turned the corner and she ran into a broad chest. She
looked up and found jade green eyes assessing and immediately
dismissing her as insignificant.
Who the
hell is this guy?
Another person walked
with him but she dipped her head and let them pass with a quiet
apology. They turned the corner and she heard a scuffle.

“You,” Brom’s growl came over her
earpiece. “You were the one.” He dropped into Arnek. “Go, Raesa.
Now.”

Her heart thundered with fear but she
sprinted down the hall. The communications closet was tucked in a
room close to the wash rooms. She needed to send the command for
their ship to be released and then shatter the comm
crystal.

Two shots fired behind her. “Brom.” She
hissed his name.

“I’m fine. Go.”

He didn’t sound fine, dammit. She
reached the comm room and ripped open the control panel with the
stiletto she’d put in her hair. In a heartbeat she bypassed the
security code and entered the room. Every second lost was precious.
Raesa set the stiletto next to the keyboard. She loosened her
fingers and let them fly on the central computer.

Was Brom—

She cut off that thought before it
crippled her. Her mind dove into her job. What felt like eternity
only took a few minutes, but she broke through. A bulletin alert
came on the screen. She and Na’varr were on the announcement. A
quick scan of the details jerked her to a complete stop. Prince
Naesha Varrian, public enemy number one of the Andovian
Republic.

Na’varr was the man her father had
admired above all others. The pirate and the prince were the same
man. Fuck. She scanned further.

Her part of the bulletin, however,
listed her as a kidnap victim.

Kidnapped? She snorted. Obviously
kidnapping didn’t work so well when it came to her. She ignored the
rest of it and focused on her job.

It was laughingly simple to send a
command order to release the Crimson Star. Once it went through,
she changed the main system password and locked out admin controls
for all users. That would mess them up for a while. Now the
communications crystal. She opened the maintenance program. She’d
had to tweak the crystals so often on stolen equipment that she
knew every weakness in the software.

With a few tweaks she adjusted the
calibration to dangerous levels. In a few minutes it would shatter
and then they’d be good to go.

The door opened and she spun around in
time to take a full-bodied tackle. She slammed down on the ground
and her breath crushed out of her.

She noticed two things at once. Blood
poured from a wound on his forehead and she realized the man on top
of her wore the uniform of the Crimson Star. “The trai—”

A knee to her side shot agony through
her body. “Shut your mouth, bitch.”

She curled in on herself and focused on
breathing. His voice was familiar.

He gripped her hair in his fist and
hauled her head back against his shoulder. “What the hell is it
with you and escaping? Twice now you’ve cost me a fortune.” The
barrel of a gun pressed under her chin.

It was hot but not searing from the
guard’s previous shots.

She racked her brain trying to figure
out where she had heard his voice before.

“I found you on Sakura.” His hot breath
hit her cheek. “It took me almost a year to arrange for your old
man’s death. You were supposed to be my retirement
fund.”

With dawning horror, she realized where
she knew him from. He was part of Crimson Star’s supply pick-up
crew. The guy had asked her a ton of questions about Sakura and her
father. Guilt and anger warred inside her.

“Why would you do this?”

“My mission was to take down your lover
and his dog. You were a bonus.”

He’s a cat.

“When they lost you, I thought that was
it. Lucky for me, you ended up on my ship. Of course you were
fucking that animal like a bitch in heat. I took great pleasure in
hitting you both with the shock rod. Too bad, I couldn’t do
something more permanent to the captain’s pet.”

He’d been in the room with them. She
clenched her fists. This bastard had taken joy in having her father
killed, harming her man, and destroying her life. Was he going to
kill her as well? Cold rage replaced her fear. She’d make him
regret ever seeing her face.

“I guess they won’t want you anymore
since those Andovian bastards are all about purity and
shit.”

“Why would they want me in the first
place?”

“That’s a good question. I tried to
sell your ass on the black market after the raid in Sakura, but the
Andovian ambassador kicked that plan to the curb. They ran a
fucking DNA test on you for the slave auction and you triggered
their attention. Do you know how much a natural redhead goes for
these days?”

Anger receded enough for her to think.
Raesa’s ribs throbbed and his words were turning her stomach at a
rapid rate. She searched within her field of vision for anything
that could be used as a weapon.

“So why don’t you tell me what you’re
doing here?” He hauled them both up so he could see the screen.
“Communications? What were you going to do, call for help? From
who?”

Thieves and Imperials were always
underestimating her.

“I don’t understand why the Andovians
would go this far.”

“Get this…” He lowered the barrel so he
could get closer to her ear. “You’re some kind of princess or some
shit. All because of that necklace you wear.”

Princess? What the hell was he talking
about?

“But you and I know the truth, don’t
we? You stole that trinket. Hacked it the way you did this setup.
Snowed over your old man and the captain. Even that hybrid beast is
sniffing after you.”

There was no point in arguing. She
dropped her gaze to the stiletto where she’d left it on the
desk.

“I’ll bring you to the prince and he’ll
have to give me my reward.” He yanked on her hair and she
stumbled.

In a single move she grabbed the
stiletto, and brought it up. With a fierce thrust she shoved it
into his throat. Blood spurted from his wound and she yanked it
out. He slammed her against the desk. Pain exploded along her ribs.
She screamed and tumbled back. Her head hit something hard and she
dropped to the floor.

The bleeding bastard pointed the gun at
her but she couldn’t make her body react.

Her vision blurred and she heard a
gunshot from too far away.

“Raesa!” Brom shouted her name and she
smiled. He was alive.

“Brom. Raesa. Report.” Na’varr’s
command echoed in her ear. “Answer me, dammit.”

He really was a prince.

They needed to let her
sleep.

***

Raesa covered her eyes. The lights
burned.

“Raesa!” Na’varr’s yell startled her
and she tried to turn toward it but her head throbbed.

She tried to focus.

“Hellcat. Raesa.” Brom’s voice came
from behind her. “Wake up, baby.” He grabbed her around the ribs
and she cried out.

“What the hell happened?” Na’varr’s
voice was quieter than before. A blessing she’d thank him for
later. “Whose blood is this?”

Brom made a growling sound. “Some of it
is hers, but not all.”

“Give her to me.”

She wanted to beg them to stop yelling,
but couldn’t seem to make her voice work.