by Susan Hayes
He pulled himself to his full height and stared down at her. “You don’t understand. Crews wasn’t the only one who died tonight. His wife was killed too. You’ve been out in public with us, which means you’re a target, too.”
“After one date?”
“We’re not willing to take that risk,” Dash chimed in as he joined the conversation. “Please, sweetheart. Stay here for now.”
Her mother always told her it was important to start as you intended to go on. Their concern was touching, but she wasn’t going to let anyone bark orders at her and expect her to obey. Compromise and communication were required if they were going to make this work.
“I have a better idea. What if I came with you? You can leave me at the medical center. You sent guards there, right? I’ll be perfectly safe, and I could finish reading over the last of your tests, Dash. It shouldn’t be hard to get someone to escort me home from there, either.”
Mack scowled, then sighed. “Fine. Grab your things. You can come with us.”
“Of course I can. I’m a grown woman who can make her own decisions.” Mack was naturally domineering, and that was fine, but he had to accept that as sexy as she found his confidence, that didn’t mean she was going to abdicate all say in her own life.
She turned and jogged back up the stairs without giving either of them time to say anything else.
Dash watched her go and then turned to his friend. “Stellar job, Mack. I want to keep her safe as much as you do, but did you really think that was the right approach? Sit. Stay. That’s what you tell a pet, not your girlfriend.”
“I’ve never had either of those things,” Mack pointed out.
“And it shows. When she gets back down here, do us both a favor and apologize.”
“I’m not going to say I’m sorry for trying to protect her. We lost her once, Dash. I don’t ever want to go through that again.”
Dash’s gut twisted at the thought of losing Lieksa. He and Mack had built a good life for themselves, but there had always been something missing. He believed Lieksa was the one who could fill that void. If anything happened to her, he doubted either one of them would ever recover. That didn’t give them the right to bark orders, though. “We’re never going to stop trying to keep her safe, but that doesn’t mean treating her the way we were once treated. She deserves better.”
Mack grunted in agreement. “I hate it when you’re right. Good thing it doesn’t happen all that often.”
“I’m almost always right. Clearly, you need your memory banks checked. Maybe Lieksa can run a diagnostic and figure out what’s causing your faulty recall.”
“There’s nothing wrong with my recall. I’m not the one who got himself shot in the head. Speaking of which, do you remember anything new?”
“Nothing useful. Daniels and I, heading up the last ladder to reach the catwalk. Muzzle flash of a weapon being fired at close range. No faces. No recall of how the hell the shooter got the drop on us. Now some son of a starbeast is out there taking out the members of our fraxxing task force, and I can’t remember anything helpful.” He slammed a fist into the wall, giving vent to some of his frustration.
“We’ll figure this out and put a stop to it.”
“If I could remember what happened, we might have already ended this and Crews would still be alive.”
“And if wishes were horses, then beggars would ride,” Lieksa said, appearing at the top of the stairs with her bag over her shoulder.
“Why would a beggar want to ride a horse? Eat it, maybe, but ride it?” Mack asked, making both Lieksa and Dash laugh.
“It’s a saying my mother used to repeat when I got frustrated about something beyond my control. You can’t fix your missing memories just by wishing for them, Dash, but you can get these guys before they hurt anyone else. Focus on that, and maybe the rest will fall into place.”
It was sensible advice, but he still wished there was a quick fix, some way to get out ahead of the cartel and take them down for good. “Our angel is sexy, beautiful, and smart as hell. How did we get so lucky, Mack?”
“That’s your cue. Say you’re sorry,” he added on their internal channel.
“I don’t know, but I’m glad we did.” Mack cleared his throat and turned so that he was looking up at Lieksa. “I’m sorry I tried to pull rank on you. I’m out of practice talking to people who aren’t paid to do what I tell them.”
She stared at him and burst out giggling. “How many girlfriends have you paid for, exactly?”
“What? No! None. I mean…fraxx, that’s not what I meant.”
Mack was tripping over his words as he tried to explain, and it was the funniest thing Dash had ever seen. He doubled over with laughter.
“You could help me instead of braying with laughter, you know,” Mack muttered.
“Oh, hell no. You’re on your own.” He held out his hand to Lieksa. “You ready to go, sweetheart?”
“I am.” Her words were honey-sweet as she took his hand. “You coming, Mack?”
As they left the residence, Dash was struck by two intertwined truths. Lieksa was going to make their lives far more interesting, and he would lay down his own life before he let anything happen to her.
* * * *
By the time the three of them arrived at the medical center, they had briefed Lieksa with enough details to make her understand Mack’s behavior, even if it didn’t excuse it.
Officer Crews and his wife were shot and killed only a few steps from their residence, and despite the fact they were in a busy corridor, not one witness saw the perpetrator. Whoever the murderer was, they’d managed to get close to the pair, fire off several energy bolts in rapid succession, and vanish into the crowd before anyone could react.
Violence was an ingrained part of life on the Drift, but for the most part, it was bar-brawls and pharma-fueled disruptions by platform workers and asteroid miners. Both groups came to entertainment stations like Astek, to blow off steam. The miners were especially rowdy after months out in the asteroid field with nothing to do but work and dream of their next shore leave. A calculated, cold-blooded hit, like what was done to Crews was rare. And it was made worse because he was Corp-Sec, the only law enforcement for light-years around, who were treated with at least grudging respect by almost everyone on the Drift.
If the details of what happened hadn’t been enough, the way both Dash and Mack acted on the trip to Medical had hammered the danger home. They walked with one hand on their weapons, keeping her shielded between them while they scanned their surroundings constantly.
There was a massive Corp-Sec officer guarding the main door. He was far too big to be human, and a quick glance at the barcode imprinted on his wrist confirmed her suspicions. The mountain of muscles poured into a Corp-Sec uniform was a cyborg, and one of the largest she had ever seen. He was also surprisingly scruffy looking for an officer. His dark hair fell to his shoulders, and his beard was in need of a trim.
“Sorry, folks. I’m going to have to ask you for ID before you go inside.” The officer held out a handheld scanner.
“Corp-Sec officers Mack Darian and Dash Scudo,” Mack stated and placed his hand on the device. His name and image appeared on the screen. Dash went next, but when it was Lieksa’s turn the door opened, and an infuriated Alyson arrived.
“Will you stop that? For veth’s sake, these are the two idiots who asked you to guard this place, and Lieksa is my friend. I swear to the stars above and below if you don’t stop scanning every patient trying to get into the center I’m going to stick that thing somewhere you’re going to need a surgeon to have it extracted!” Alyson finished by cursing in two different languages, neither of which Lieksa was familiar with.
“Interesting bedside manner you must have, Dr. Jefferies. If you’re vouching for the woman, then of course she can go in. And where did you learn to curse in Jeskyran?”
Mack cleared his throat. “Doc, I know you don’t like it, but he’s doing his job. The officer who
died was Len Daniel’s partner. He needs protecting, and so do you.”
Alyson frowned. “Don’t remind me that this was all your idea, Mack. And you, Dash! You know I treat everyone, including those who would rather not be scanned and identified. Everyone deserves medical treatment, and Officer Overkill and his brothers are making that impossible.”
“My name is Blade.”
Alyson uttered a strangled choking noise and shook her head. “Of course it is. Lance, Dirk, and Blade. Whoever named you and your batch brothers didn’t get enough hugs as a child.”
Blade’s lips twitched into a grin beneath his dark beard. “Seeing as how we named ourselves, I’d say your assessment is accurate enough.”
Alyson blushed. “Oh. Well then. They’re very uh…military names.”
Lieksa had to lower her head to hide her grin.
The four of them left Blade outside and headed into the medical center. “Len’s in his room. He doesn’t know anything concrete, but he suspects something’s happened. It’s hard to hide three massive Corp-Sec officers, especially when one of them is guarding his door.”
“We’ll talk to him. The guards aren’t just here for your protection. They’re to keep Len from doing something stupid, like leaving before you’ve cleared him to be back on his feet,” Dash said.
Alyson sighed. “I know. I don’t like it, but I do understand. Len should be ready to go home in two days, but he won’t be ready to go back to work for at least another two weeks. He doesn’t have a microscopic army of medi-bots to help get him back on his feet.”
“We’ll make sure he takes the time he needs.” Mack turned and smiled at Lieksa. “See you soon, angel.”
“Stay inside, please?” Dash added before kissing her.
“I won’t take any chances, I promise.” Mack spun her into his arms and kissed her, too.
“Thank you,” he murmured as he let her go.
“You’ve got enough on your plates right now. I won’t add to it.” They needed to stay focused on the threat to their team. She had intended to tell them that she was going to help Alyson find out what had been done to the female cyborgs, but now wasn’t the time. She didn’t want to lie to them, not even by omission, but they didn’t need distractions right now. She would tell them as soon as the immediate threat was dealt with, and lives weren’t at stake any longer.
“When you’re ready to go home, call one of us, and we’ll arrange an escort,” Mack told her.
“We’ll try and come ourselves,” Dash added.
They went straight to Len’s room, passing another massive Corp-Sec officer who appeared to be a duplicate of Officer Blade. The moment the door closed Alyson turned to Lieksa, eyebrows raised and a broad smile on her face.
“You make a cute trio, and I’ve never seen Mack act like that. You make him happy. It’s nice to see.”
Lieksa lowered her voice. “Thanks. Early days yet, but our first date went so well it kind of turned into a second. And a sleepover.”
“Wow. Those two didn’t waste any time, did they? Someday soon you and I are going for a drink, and you can tell me all about it.”
“You’re on, but only if you tell me why Blade and his batch brothers have you all flustered.”
Alyson groaned. “They’re not just brothers, they’re triplets. Three identical, hulking, annoying, incredibly bossy men who waltzed into my med-center and tried to take over,” she huffed in indignation and jerked her head toward the brother still standing guard outside Len’s door. “That’s Dirk. He’s the bossiest of the three.”
“That’s because I’m the oldest,” Dirk called out. Unlike Blade, he was clean-shaven, which made it easy to spot the way he was smirking as he interjected.
Alyson cursed softly and rounded on the big cyborg. “It’s not nice to eavesdrop on a private conversation. And don’t you try that old excuse about how it’s not your fault that cyborgs have superior hearing.”
Dirk actually looked surprised. “But we do.”
“True or not, it’s bad manners,” the doctor informed him, then turned to Lieksa. “Let’s go to my office.”
“I was going to suggest that. I’ve got a few more questions for you about that little project we were discussing.”
Alyson nodded and led the way to her office. Once they were behind closed doors, she burst out laughing. “I get the feeling none of them have ever been told to mind their manners before.”
“He did look surprised when you called him on it. I swear they’re all too bossy for their own good. Mack actually tried to order me to stay at his place because it might not be safe for me.”
Alyson shook her head. “If you’re serious about taking on the two of them, you’re going to need some expert advice. Cynder’s known your guys for a few years, and Zura’s married to another pair of cyborgs. You’ve already met them, right? They both visited Dash a couple of times.”
“Cynder’s the gorgeous, long-legged cyborg, right? And Zura was the quiet little half-Pheran. I remember them.”
Alyson chortled. “Zura’s only quiet until you get to know her. She manages her bossy cyborg husbands very nicely, which is why I think we need a girls’ night, soon.” Her gaze drifted to the door. “Just in case I lose my mind and do something foolish, it might be smart to get a few pointers.”
“I’d really like that. I haven’t had a girls’ night out since I got here. In fact, I really haven’t been out much at all.”
“Then leave it to me to arrange things,” Alyson said, gesturing around her office. “I need to get out of here and have some fun. Or so Cynder informed me the last time she was here.”
“She’s right. I’ve spent the last few days here, and I swear you never go home. You do need to rest sometimes, Doc.”
“I do go home. As it happens, home is one level up. The doctor who set this place up arranged the living situation for himself, and when I bought him out, I got his residence, too.”
“Nice setup. It keeps you close at hand in case your patients need you. The hospital ship I worked on had a similar setup. Living quarters were always close to our assigned wards.”
Alyson leaned forward in her chair. “I’ve been meaning to ask you about that. You tell everyone you’re a lab tech, but I saw you work on Dash, and I have to say, I’ve seen doctors with less skill than you. You’re a lot more than just a tech, aren’t you?”
She shrugged. “Lab-tech is the general term for what I was. The reality is more complicated. I repaired, designed, and installed cybernetic implants for soldiers in a hospital ship that treated our wounded. I guess I’m somewhere between a robotics engineer and a surgeon. It’s a very specialized profession, and I haven’t done it since the night I learned my subjects were human beings. These days, I really am a simple tech. I keep Astek’s fleet of in-house bots and automated systems running. Nothing life or death about it, and I know my patients can’t experience pain or fear. It’s better that way.”
With that, Lieksa shifted the topic. “I’m going back to work tomorrow, so I should be able to start looking for answers about what was done to the female cyborgs. I was hoping we could go through everything again.”
Alyson nodded and pulled out a data tablet, setting it on the desk between them before activating its holographic display. “I’m guessing it would be best if I don’t know exactly how you’re getting this information, right?”
Lieksa shrugged. “I’m not doing anything too nefarious. My security clearance is relatively good. I’m going to start with the easy places and hope I get lucky.” The odds that the information she needed was somewhere easy to find were worse than a snowball’s chance in a supernova, but she had to start somewhere. If that failed, her workshop was full of spare parts and miscellaneous tech, including a black-market data-mining widget. All it had to do was get close to the source. She had removed it from a corporate executive’s personal aid droid months ago but hadn’t gotten around to destroying it, yet.
There wasn’t much difference b
etween the widget and the cybernetic implants Dash used to scan and steal digital data. She could reactivate and install it on a maintenance bot currently waiting to be repaired. The bot had access to every level of Astek’s offices. If she could tell it what to scan for, it was her best bet at finding the answers they were looking for.
As the doctor started speaking, Lieksa focused on every word, committing them to memory. This was a chance to help the cyborgs, and take another step toward redeeming herself in the process.
CHAPTER NINE
Dash stared at Mack in disbelief. “What do you mean, you’re not coming? We’ve only seen Lieksa once this week. If you try and tell me you don’t miss her, I’ll kick your ass and call you a liar.”
Mack glanced up from his monitor and sighed. “Of course I miss her. And I didn’t say I wasn’t coming, I said I would be along in a while. I need to finalize this paperwork first, though.”
“Priorities, Mack. We need to work on your fraxxing priorities.” It was an argument that had come up more than once during the last few days. Dash wanted to spend time with Lieksa, but something was holding Mack back. He didn’t understand it. This was only going to work if the three of them were a true trio. He’d seen how it could be when everything came together, and he wanted that. He wanted what their friends Kit and Luke had with Zura, and what Cynder had found with her new husbands.
“My priority is to catch the bastards trying to kill us. Once that’s happened, I can think about Lieksa and the future. If something happened to her, I’d never forgive myself.”
“If you keep pulling away from her, there might not be a future for us. Don’t let this destroy our chance with her, Mack. If you do that, I may never forgive you.”
“Twenty minutes. Give me twenty minutes, and I’ll be there, I promise.”
“You better be.”
Dash left their shared office, stopping for a few minutes to chat with the taskforce members working in their squad room. They were all in a dark mood, full of frustration and struggling to deal with the loss of their teammate, so he ordered all of them to take a long lunch and try to relax a little. They left the building together, and on the walk out he was struck by the change in the whole department. The atmosphere these days was subdued. The friendly banter and smiles were gone, replaced by wary expressions and hushed conversations. The service for Crews and his wife the previous evening had been a quiet, private affair organized quickly and done with minimal fanfare. Crews deserved better, but anything more public would have put everyone attending at risk.