Spectrum camouflage. Savan’s stomach dropped. Only the Shashin assassins used it. They were the best killers in the galaxy.
Savan edged in front of Brinn. “A good Shashin would have killed us while he was camouflaged.”
“But a good businessman analyses all his options.” The man’s voice had the exotic cadence of his species. “I was only paid to make you disappear. I can get more for you both at the slave markets of Nard Kartaan.”
Just the name of the infamous slave world turned Savan’s blood to ice. Brinn gasped and pressed close behind him.
Men were usually sold as miners or reactor slaves, and women... He looked down at the woman beside him. Women, especially beautiful ones, ended up as sex slaves on the galaxy’s lawless fringes.
“Who hired you?” He wanted to know. He needed to know. Because the assholes who’d hired a slave trader to dispose of them were going to die. Savan would damn well make sure of it.
“The Tauvi. They didn’t want you and the lovely Perman negotiator to come to an agreement on the fusion crystals.” His black gaze drifted down Brinn’s body as she leaned into Savan. “Apparently you did more than that.”
Brinn surged forward and Savan gripped her hip in warning.
The Shashin tilted his head, studying her. “Your eyes are stunning.” Calculation dripped from his tone. “You’ll fetch me quite a price on the Nard Kartaan blocks.”
Her hand fumbled for Savan’s, gripping him hard. But her voice was cutting. “I’ll kill you before we get anywhere near that scum-infested hellhole.”
Savan couldn’t see the man’s face, but he was sure the bastard was smiling.
“Such passion. That will only make your price higher.” His tone hardened. “Now, both of you on your knees.” He pulled two slim, flexible lengths of metal from his pocket.
Kartaani slave collars. Savan’s mind raced through their options. Once the collars were in place, they disrupted brain function, making the wearer compliant.
His laser blade was heavy in his pocket, but he couldn’t show his hand too soon.
Best option: attack the man and keep him occupied while Brinn escaped deeper into the caves.
“Now,” the Shashin demanded.
Brinn cast Savan a quick glance. He gave a small shake of his head. Then he wrenched the blade from his pocket.
He spun, throwing himself against the assassin.
They crashed to the ice floor. The carbine skittered across the ice.
The Shashin’s head covering skewed, displaying a flash of scaled skin covering the man’s jaw.
Savan forced his blade down, its gold laser beam close to the assassin’s face.
But the bastard was strong. Stronger than his lithe body suggested. His hands clamped around Savan’s wrists.
They grunted. Savan’s arms strained, his muscles burning. His opponent strengthened his grip, and Savan felt the bones in his wrists grinding together. Pain burned along his nerves.
“Let go of him.”
Brinn’s cool, calm voice was lethal. She crouched beside them, the large carbine pressed to the man’s temple.
The Shashin stilled. He lifted his hands.
Savan got to his feet, still clutching the blade and rubbing his sore wrists.
“Now, I’ve had a pretty rough day.” Brinn adjusted her grip on the gun. “So just do exactly what we tell you to do.”
“And why would I want to do that?”
The guy had balls, that was for sure.
Brinn jammed the carbine harder against his head. “So you don’t end up with some nasty burns. I’m the one holding the gun.”
The Shashin turned his head so the barrel pointed between his eyes. “The carbine coded only for my touch?”
Fuck. Savan surged forward.
The Shashin rolled, ripping the useless weapon from Brinn’s hand.
She tumbled back, her curses echoing off the walls. The man kicked her, slamming a foot into her belly.
With a cry, she curled in on herself.
Savan tackled him. A stream of orange fire hit the cavern wall. Ice cracked and shattered. The wall trembled.
Using a surge of strength, Savan got the man beneath him, trapping him with his heavier body weight.
“I think it might be in my best interests to just kill you both.” The Shashin managed to get the carbine jammed between them. The barrel dug into Savan’s chest.
Damn. He’d survived the cursed wars, only to die by an assassin’s gun. Fucking Tauvi bastards. Maybe he’d come back and haunt them.
“No!” Brinn’s cry reverberated in the cavern.
Savan looked up. Her face was stricken, her blue eyes shimmering. Stars, he would have given anything to have more time with her. To discover what having someone in his life was like.
To learn if love was something more than a foolish, primitive emotion, as all Rendarians believed.
He saw the Shashin smile and tensed.
Suddenly shouts and gunfire filled the cavern.
People flooded in from three of the tunnels. A blast of ice bullets impacted into the floor.
Without a conscious thought, Savan rolled off the assassin.
At the same moment, the Shashin pressed the trigger.
“Savan!” Brinn screamed.
Pain coursed through him. Scorching heat, as if he’d stepped through the crust of the lava lakes on Kebira. He pressed his hand to his side. Felt blood.
“Savan.” Brinn’s face hovered over him. Quick hands skimmed over him, applied pressure.
He groaned. The pain. He gritted his teeth and blinked back the black spots blotting his vision.
Ah, there were Brinn’s beautiful eyes. He focused solely on those frosted irises. Worry swam in their depths.
“I’m not badly hurt.”
“You’re bleeding.”
He snorted. “I’ve been shot enough to know a bad wound. Besides, a medscope will fix it right up.”
“I don’t happen to have one of those handy.” She pressed her hand harder against his side. “We’ll just have to fix you up the old-fashioned way.”
He groaned again. “That tends to hurt.”
“Baby.”
He lowered his voice. “Are you casting aspersions on my masculinity? I was in the war, you know.”
A small smile flirted around her lips. As he’d hoped, the worry dissolved away.
She dropped a quick kiss to his lips. “Hang in there and I’ll let you prove your masculinity to me later, tough guy.”
* * *
“Brinn!”
The feminine shout had Brinn looking up. She saw her cousin—ice rifle gripped in competent hands—striding toward her.
“Elin. We need a medic.”
The engineer stopped beside them. She pressed a hand to Brinn’s shoulder, gave it a hard squeeze. Brinn covered her cousin’s hand with her own.
Elin cast a cool look at Savan. “Sure you want us to save the Rendarian?”
Not long ago, Brinn would have encouraged the hatred. She looked down at the blood on her hands. It was no longer the blood of a rival, it was the blood of a man who’d risked himself for her.
The blood of a man she cared about.
She stared into her friend’s bright blue eyes. “Elin.” All her emotions were in that one word.
They’d been friends since they were children throwing snowballs at each other. Elin knew her better than anyone. Surprise flickered in her cousin’s eyes before her gaze shot to Savan. He watched them with his usual impervious face.
“Lars,” Elin called out. “Get over here and bring the medkit.”
A wide-shouldered miner crouched beside Savan and went to work on his injuries.
When Brinn sto
od, Elin grabbed her shoulders. “You okay?”
“I’m fine.” By Fria, they were finally safe. She and Savan had survived. “How’d you find us?”
“Once we’d heard you’d gone missing—” Her cousin tugged her in for a quick, fierce hug. “So glad we found you, by the way. Once we knew you were missing, we figured you’d either head to the mines or the fishing station. We have body-heat detectors set up on the mine perimeter, so we were monitoring them constantly. We picked up two signatures in the tunnels and I knew it was you.” She scowled at the assassin on his knees, hands tied behind his back and several security guards standing over him. “Then we picked up a third signature following you and got here as soon as we could.”
“He was hired by the Tauvi.” Memories rushed through her—skidding off the road, the horrible sound of the avalanche bearing down on them. She swallowed. “I need to contact the Trade Guild and have them suspend the bastards.”
Elin nodded. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”
“I wouldn’t have made it without Savan.”
Her cousin’s brow arched. “It’s Savan now, is it?”
Brinn fought the urge to fidget. “I was wrong about him, Ellie. So wrong.”
“Is that all it is?”
Brinn looked at Savan. He was sitting up now, knees bent, his bodysuit hanging to his waist, leaving his glorious chest bare. The medic worked, bandaging his side.
“I’m not really sure what it is. It doesn’t matter anyway. He’ll go back to Rendar, and my place is here on Perma.”
“Hey.” Her friend jerked her around to face her. “It’s not like you to give up. On anything. If that was in your nature, Perma would never have joined the Trade Guild.” Elin shook her head. “I might question your good sense, panting after a Rendarian, but he is a well-built one.” Elin touched Brinn’s hand. “If you want the man, then fight for him.”
A hollow feeling carved out Brinn’s chest. “It’s never that easy.”
“It can be if he’s worth it.”
Oh, he was worth it. She’d never felt this way about a man. He was strong, smart and far deeper than she’d ever imagined. And the heat between them...
She smiled at Elin. “Since when did you become a relationship guru? You never slow down enough to let a man get a hold of you.”
Her cousin sniffed. “When I find one who can keep up with me, I might let him catch me. Hasn’t happened yet.” Her voice lowered. “Doesn’t mean I wouldn’t mind finding one who looked at me the way Bardan looks at you. Rendarian or not.”
Brinn look over her shoulder. Savan was headed their way, his suit back on. There was just the slightest bulge at his side over the bandage.
“It’s good to see you again, Ms. Soland.”
“Call me Elin. I’ve been fielding some irate calls from your boss. Demanding we send search parties out looking for you in the middle of the night in a snowstorm.”
Savan slid an arm across Brinn’s shoulders. “I need to contact him, and I’m sure Brinn’s anxious to talk with her family.”
Brinn nodded. His easy show of affection made her throat tight.
Savan’s voice darkened. “And we need to contact the Guild about the Tauvi.”
“We’ll head back to the mine offices.” Elin slung her rifle strap over her shoulder. “The mine security team will look after our guest.”
The trek through the tunnels into the heart of the ice mines felt a little surreal. It was strange being with a group. Brinn had grown accustomed to it being just her and Savan.
She glanced at his broad back. Each step made her feel distance growing between them.
They reached the mine’s main caverns. The fusion crystals cast a rainbow of light across the ice walls. Many were huge, twisting in great formations from the floor to the sloped roof.
When they entered the mine buildings, heated air blasted Brinn. Elin showed them into an office.
“My humble abode.”
The only furniture was a sleek metal desk and a battered wisent-leather chair. A holo-com projector was mounted on one wall and displayed a three-dimensional image of what looked like the mine caverns. The other wall had a small ice window that framed the snow-covered mountain peaks.
“Computer controls are built into the desk. I want to make sure the prisoner is locked up tight. I’ll be back shortly.” Elin gestured. “There’s a bathroom at the end of the hall. I’ll make sure there’s clean clothing for both of you.”
The thought of a hot shower made Brinn almost moan. Heaven.
Savan sat in the chair, one hand running over the leather. “What’s this fabric?”
“The hide of a wisent. Beasts of prey that live at our northern pole,” Brinn said.
“Do you trade it?”
Ah, the old Savan was back. “No. Their population’s low. We protect them, and only a few of them are hunted each year.”
He activated the computer controls. “I need to call Kolar first.”
“And I need to call my family. I’ll find another office and then grab a shower.” Her heart missed a beat. His green eyes already looked distant. She forced a smile. “Hot water sounds better than sex right now.”
His head shot up. “I could prove you wrong.”
There was her Savan. She headed out of the room, tossing a seductive look over her shoulder. “Once you’re finished, come and join me. I bet hot water and sex is a killer combination.”
A quick call to her family included tears from her mother and angry curses from her brothers. Brinn was just relieved they no longer had to worry.
The shower was heaven, but she didn’t linger under the hot water. She wanted to be on the call to inform the Guild about the Tauvi. She wanted to see their asses fried.
After slipping into a mine uniform—navy blue cargo trousers and shirt—she headed back to the office, rubbing a towel over her still-damp hair.
She heard Savan’s deep voice, the low rumble making her smile. She leaned against the doorway and watched him.
He leaned forward, a frown on his intense face. He looked like the old Savan again.
“We’ll ensure the Tauvi are expelled from the Guild.” Kolar’s voice was as deep as Savan’s. “What about the crystals? Have you completed the deal?”
“We’ve been fighting to survive, Kolar.”
“So you haven’t secured the deal?”
“Negotiator Fjord’s promised us the crystals. We just haven’t worked out the terms yet.”
“So you succeeded in seducing the icy Negotiator Fjord? I knew it was a big task, but you are the best Rendar has to offer.”
Everything in Brinn went silent and cold.
She couldn’t feel her limbs, only felt the hard rap of her heart. Each beat hurt her chest.
She must have made a sound. Savan’s head snapped up.
He jerked to his feet. “Brinn.”
Chapter Eleven
For the first time in his life, Savan disconnected on Kolar.
The projector went blank, and silence fell, thick and sticky.
Savan felt a cold sheen on his skin, worse than anything the Perman winter had thrown at him.
He felt the same as he had the first time he went into battle. Sick with fear.
“Brinn, what Kolar—”
She held up a slim hand. “Don’t.”
Gods, the pain in her face. She was trying to hide it, might have succeeded if he hadn’t spent hours memorizing every expression that crossed her beautiful face. “Let me explain—”
“You think I want to listen?” She wrapped her arms around her middle, her words lethally quiet. “I knew Rendarians did whatever it took to get the deal. But I thought...”
Her words drifted away and helpless rage welled inside him.
<
br /> How to make her see that what they’d shared was more than he’d ever had in his life before? How to repair her trust in him? “What happened between us has nothing to do with the deal or the crystals.”
“Really?” Her arms dropped to her sides. Heat ignited behind her blue eyes. “So, your boss, the one who promised you the top negotiator job on Rendar after you secured this deal, didn’t order you to seduce me?”
Savan closed his mouth.
She pressed her lips together. “I thought so.”
“I never intended to follow his order. I just—”
She chopped a hand through the air. “You just took advantage of the opportunity. Like any good trader would. And you are the best negotiator in the galaxy.”
When she turned, Savan felt full-blown panic. He was losing her. Losing something important he hadn’t had a chance to fully explore. She was like melting ice slipping through his fingers.
“Brinn.” He couldn’t let her walk away. Everything in his being, right down to his battered soul, told him he couldn’t lose this woman. “I won’t let you go like this.” He shoved the table with one vicious thrust of his arm and headed for her.
She faced him, her arms held out in front of her like a barrier. “Don’t you even think about touching me.” A fierce whisper. “You lost that right.”
Her eyes shimmered. Tears?
Throat tight, he just stared at her, willing her to listen. But he couldn’t find any words, let alone the right words. His tongue felt too big, his lips clumsy.
He, the master negotiator, couldn’t find anything to say.
“I’ll arrange for someone to drop you back at the spaceport.” She drew herself up, her icy face exactly what she’d shown him when she first picked him up from his ship.
They were back to being rival negotiators.
“This isn’t over.” It couldn’t be. He wouldn’t let it be.
“Of course not. Our trade deal still stands.” She looked at him like she was looking right through him. “Unlike some people, honor is important to me, so I won’t back out of the deal. The crystals are yours.”
“Brinn—”
“You worked for them.” Her icy blue gaze drilled into him. “Very hard. We’ll work out the final details of the deal via holo-com. I know Rendar couldn’t have a more dedicated, ruthless head negotiator.”
A Galactic Holiday Page 28