Beloved Stranger: Gaian Series, Book 5 (7 page)

The feeling shook her.

He blinked at her and smiled. “That was… astonishing.” He collapsed to one side of her. “Is sex always like that?”

She tried a lighthearted laugh but it didn’t come. “No.”

“No? How is this different?”

“I’m not sure I can explain. It just is.”

He seemed to accept that, or perhaps he was just too tired to question her further. Instead he pulled her closer, and she leaned into him as he settled her on the bed next to him.

Sonja was grateful for the anti-conception pill she’d taken before the marriage meet. She wouldn’t be left with a child, a permanent reminder of being in bed with Roan.

Even so, as he lay next to her, head buried in her hair, his harsh breathing evening out into what she recognized as incipient sleep, she realized she was holding him as if she really did belong to him and he to her.

After tonight there would be nothing between Roan and her, but Sonja had an odd feeling part of her would remain with him.

Chapter Five

Sonja waited until Roan’s breathing had deepened to true sleep before attempting to leave the bed. He murmured something that sounded like a protest as she slipped from beneath his arm and gently slid the leg he’d thrown over her off to one side. Once freed, she edged over to the side of the bed and waited. She wanted to see if he would wake, but his sleeping self seemed to take her loss reasonably well. One hand made a few searching motions, but when it failed to locate her, he pulled it under his chin, and then he went completely still.

She moved quickly to find the negligee robe where Roan had tossed it, and fumbling in the pocket, she found the dart.

Roan opened his eyes as she stood over him and smiled sleepily at her. His eyes widened when she raised her arm and jabbed the dart in his arm. “What?” he managed to get out before collapsing back onto the bed.

“Sorry,” she said quietly. Tamping down a sudden surge of guilt, she headed to the sanitary. Once the door was closed she worked quickly, cleaning up and dressing. From the bottom of her bag she pulled her black multipocketed pants and form-fitting shirt. The familiar garments were reassuring, particularly once she’d strapped on her favorite knives and filled her pockets with the tools she’d need for breaking and entering. From inside the deepest and most hidden compartment of the bag she pulled her stunner and set it to maximum before dropping it into the pocket at her waist.

The first place she’d need to break out of was Roan’s apartment, and she suspected that wasn’t going to be easy. She didn’t think he was the kind of man who skimped on the security of his home, particularly if he was keeping anything of value in it, such as his black market inventory. Even her lock-picking tool could have trouble.

With luck she wouldn’t need her stunner, but she wanted it handy, particularly before she got away from Roan. She hoped she wouldn’t have to use it on him. Stunners left their victims with terrible headaches, and that would be a nasty trick to play on her unsuspecting would-be husband.

After putting her hair up in her usual tight bun, she dumped the rest of her clothes back into the bag and considered what to do with it. Taking the bag would be a burden, but the skirt and blouse would make better camouflage if she had to blend in with the women here. Better to bring it along—she could always dump it later if she had to.

Equally, she considered the narrow marriage band on her wrist. The flat portion was engraved with several wavy lines running parallel to each other, and for a moment she wondered why Roan had picked that symbol. It represented Roan and the life he expected her to live as his wife, a life she could have no part of. A life she didn’t want a part of. But like the clothes, it would allow her to blend in better with the people here. With a shrug, she left it on her wrist.

Cautiously, she opened the door to the bedroom. Roan was a still figure in the bed, dimly lit by the faint glow of a single small lamp near the bed. She listened but there wasn’t any sound other than his soft breathing. She watched him for a moment, waiting to see if he was having a bad reaction to the drug, finally relaxing as it seemed he wasn’t going to have a problem. At least she wouldn’t have his death on her conscience. One curl of dark hair had fallen over his forehead, and she tucked it back. Even in a drugged sleep he was a handsome man. But he wasn’t the man for her.

She stepped away from the bed. Time to find his datastore and see if her hacking skills were up to a Gaian man’s security.

Slowly she crept through the room and to the living area, closing the door after her. One of the tools built into her lock-pick device was motion-detector checker. It read there was nothing in the room to check for movement or sound so she moved quietly into the room. Roan had a datastore set up next to the kitchen counter and a few pokes at it revealed a security screen. Still half an ear on sounds from the bedroom, she tried every trick she knew to get past it.

After a half hour she had to declare defeat. During the last six months she’d learned every encryption method the Gaians used, and whatever was running on Roan’s machine wasn’t one of them. Nothing worked, and the dart wasn’t going to keep him unconscious forever.

Whatever else happened, she needed to be out of here before he woke up. Maybe she could find a public terminal out in the main part of the bubble.

Sonja headed to the door to the outside corridor. If there were any extra security measures she needed to worry about, they would be here. Carefully she analyzed the door’s lock. There was the usual auto-deadbolt that would slam home the second someone tried to pick the lock from the outside, making opening the door virtually impossible without the unlocking key. Sonja thought of the data wand that Roan had carried and suspected she knew where he kept the key to the security on the door. She considered hunting for the wand, but she had no idea where he kept it, and with an extensive search she risked still being here when he woke.

There were other ways around even this kind of security system, and she had some of those built in to her electronic lock pick. She adjusted the tool to compensate for the auto-deadbolt and carefully used the controls on the tool to slide apart the door lock tumblers. After a few moments there was an audible click that seemed to echo in the quiet apartment, and the door slid open, revealing the corridor beyond.

For a moment, she hesitated. When he woke up, Roan would know she wasn’t the woman he’d thought her to be. There wasn’t any excuse she could use for darting him. Even so, she didn’t want to leave. Earlier she’d thought that marrying him had been a means to getting inside the colony and nothing more. She still felt that way—mostly. What had happened between her and Roan had been great…well, okay, better-than-great sex. She’d never forget the way he made her feel.

For a moment in his arms she’d been a different woman, the woman he wanted her to be, someone other than the Sonja Deems the universe was familiar with. She’d liked being that woman for a little while.

But she had a mission, and she wouldn’t let the sudden empty feeling she had at leaving Roan stop her from completing it. She didn’t want to be part of his life, and he certainly had no place in hers.

Sonja stepped through and let the door slide shut behind her. She made a point of stopping and re-securing the door’s lock behind her. She might be sneaking out on him, but she wouldn’t leave Roan unprotected.

Only when she was sure the door lock was good as new did she head down the hallway towards the lift that would take her to the ground floor. Once there she would look for a public terminal that would let her access the mine’s computer system and use her sisters’ names to find their locations.

The lift’s security seemed only directed at restricting entry on going up rather than down. Roan had had to use his data wand to access this floor from the ground, but when she entered and pushed the ground floor button, the lift readily moved and deposited her at the base of the building.

Getting back to Roan’s floor wasn’t going to be a problem since she had no plans for returning to him. Even so, an odd emptiness filled her at how each step took her farther away from him.

Sonja shook her head.
This is ridiculous!

In the past few years since losing her sisters and escaping the slavers who’d stolen her from her family’s farm, she’d joined a group dedicated to interfering with the slave traffic in the Outer Colonies. In that time she’d developed a reputation.

She was Sonja, pirate and fearsome scourge of slavers everywhere. She was known for her viciousness, and particularly her knives. There was no way a man could make her feel this way. She couldn’t be getting soft.

Her mission was to find her sisters and get them off this rock, not fall into a happily-ever-after relationship with a Gaian, of all people. Ruthlessly, she suppressed the emptiness and headed back down the path, moving quietly between the buildings. There must be a public terminal somewhere.

Several hours later, though, she was more than a little discouraged. The buildings in the area seemed to be residences with few buildings for public use. Nowhere was there an open terminal.

For a moment she wondered if perhaps she’d made the wrong decision earlier when she’d left Roan’s apartment. It wouldn’t have taken that long to get permission to use his datastore. Once she had, all she would have needed to do was wait for him to leave the apartment before leaving to find her sisters.

That would have been a better plan. So why was she just now thinking of it?

That funny empty, somewhat scary, feeling returned, and Sonja wondered if maybe she hadn’t acted precipitously because she’d been nervous about staying any longer with Roan than she had to. Maybe darting him and leaving in the middle of the night had been her way of coping with something she hadn’t the courage to deal with.

She sat on the bench outside one of the last buildings she’d searched. It had held exercise equipment, running pads, climbing walls and courts for ball games, but no computers or other kind of communications equipment. The bench sat alongside a long pool of water, probably for swimming. As throughout the bubble, trees and flowering bushes surrounded the buildings, keeping the air fresh and sweet-smelling.

The place had the feel of a high-class resort rather than a prison. Given the fact that you couldn’t leave the bubble without special equipment that she was sure would be hard to get hold of, or get to the spaceport without going through extensive security, the place was still a cage. But she had to admit it was a very comfortable cage.

She pondered what to do next. Roan had said this was a residential bubble, so maybe she would have to go to a different bubble to find the information she needed. She knew mining was the principle activity of the colony, but perhaps there was manufacturing as well. Some of the goods must be made here. Also, there had to be offices someplace.

If only she had a map of the colony so she knew what bubbles were where. Another thing she could have gotten from Roan before she’d left.

Suddenly, exhaustion dragged through her. It had been a long time since she’d slept, and even she had her limits. The strain of the marriage meet, the sleepless night before, making love to Roan—all she wanted now was a soft bed to rest in. She eyed the building behind her. Inside had been private dressing rooms and showers complete with linens. She could take a couple of towels and pile them on a metal bench in a room and get a couple hours nap until morning.

This late at night she hadn’t seen anyone about, no one to follow or ask questions of. She hadn’t seen or heard anyone since leaving Roan’s apartment. Once there were people about, she would find a way into one of the other bubbles.

Sonja was just about to move when she heard the sound of boot steps on the path behind her. Turning, she saw a pair of men in the same kind of uniforms the official at the marriage meet had been wearing, but olive-green instead of blue. One was tall and thin, the other short and somewhat round. They didn’t look happy and stood with stunners already drawn and aimed at her.

Fracking hell. That’s what she got for thinking about her temporary husband instead of paying attention to her surroundings.

The tall one spoke. “It’s after two o’clock. What are you doing out past curfew?”

“I’m sorry.” Sonja raised her hands slowly. “I’m new and didn’t know there was a curfew. I couldn’t sleep and was just taking a walk.”

“New?” The man’s hard stare moved over her slowly, up, then down. “You mean one of the brides? You don’t look the part.”

“She has a band.” His partner pointed to her wrist and the narrow band she had decided not to remove. Sonja congratulated herself for her foresight there.

The man frowned. “Yes, but when was the last time you saw a bride dressed like that?”

“I’d say she’s dressed more like a spy than a wife,” his partner said, equally non-smiling. “Maybe we should take her to the office for questioning.”

Sonja tensed. If they took her in, they’d no doubt search her and find her tools and stunner, and once that happened her cover would be blown. She considered whether she could get her hands on her stunner fast enough to disable both of them before they could get her.

Or maybe she could use her knives instead. Trouble was neither man looked like he could be taken off guard long enough for her to get to her weapons before one of them stunned her. She started to lower her hands, hoping they wouldn’t notice.