Ghost Planet (36 page)

“Where is she now?” I asked quietly.

“She’s here. Sedated in the bedroom. I intend to detach eventually, but she could expose me. For now it’s safer to keep her close.”

I took a deep breath and fitted the pieces together. “So you’re a symbiont posing as a colonist, and you paid both Mitchell and Blake to help you find a way to detach. But you’re not ready for detachment. What is your larger objective?”

He raised his eyebrows, surprised. “You don’t see it? When all of this has played out—when we’re no longer dependent on them—we’ll force them off. Make them live on their own fucked-up world instead of fucking up ours. And when they come begging for our resources, we’ll make them pay for them.”

Mitchell and Ardagh were playing the same game from opposite ends. When they met in the middle, one of the two species would take over the planet with no care or consideration for the other. As I sat studying his face, I wondered how much of this was about ejecting the colonists and how much was about John Ardagh getting back his own. If he succeeded, his board and investors would be gone, and he’d be in a position to soak up all the profits.

“Why are you telling me all this, John?”

He rested an ankle on his knee, sighing. “Because I’m tired of doing it alone. I need a partner who can keep up with me. Despite Maria’s accomplishments here, I don’t believe she can pull off planetwide detachment. I believe
you
can. You’ve been doing it already, at Devil’s Rock.”

I shook my head, grasping for something to say that might influence such a ruthless man. “You don’t understand—” Suddenly I felt a tickling against my leg. My hand flew to the spot and something squirmed. I gave a startled squeal.

He eyed me with concern. “Are you all right?”

“I—could I use your bathroom? I feel a little ill.”

“Of course. It’s just through there. I’ll call and have our dinner sent up. Maybe that will help.”

I walked through the door he’d indicated and pushed down my pants. There was nothing on my leg, but I saw something that looked like root fibers poking out of the fabric of one of the hip pockets. I reached inside and pulled out four flower stalks.

What the hell?

It looked like some kind of herb, with clumps of tiny white flowers that grew in an umbrella shape. It reminded me of fennel. But it didn’t smell like fennel. Something tugged at my memory—a plant that was a relative of fennel, and Queen Anne’s Lace …

A
dangerous
plant. I stuck the stalks back in my pocket and washed my hands. Staring at my reflection, I took a few steadying breaths. All the color had drained from my face.

Heading back out to the living room, I found a man unloading plates from a tray onto the dining table. He finished and left the apartment without a word or glance.

“Please sit down, Elizabeth,” John called from the kitchen. “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well. Rest assured this pregnancy was not my idea.” My eyes jerked toward him. He had his back to me and was uncorking a bottle of wine. “If I didn’t need to keep Maria happy right now, I’d help you get it taken care of.”

I wasn’t sure if the planet or my own will had materialized the weapon in my pocket, but the decision of whether to use it was mine alone. I had only a few seconds. I took out the four herb stalks and dropped two onto each of our salads.

“Whose idea
was
it to get me pregnant?” I asked as I sat down at the table.

“ERP’s lead astrobiologist—a man with more grant money than sense, in my opinion. I think it was a pretty low priority for Maria until she realized it was an opportunity to both punish and control Dr. Murphy. But I was encouraged by her success with you, and I’ve awarded her a new contract to produce offspring from our detached symbionts. Reproductive ability is the next step in ensuring our self-sufficiency.” Ardagh smiled as he came to the table with the wine. “Maybe your next will be one of your own kind.”

My hands moved to my belly and I ground my teeth together.

He filled a glass for himself and glanced at me. I shook my head, and he sat down.

“I know I’ve given you a lot to think about, Elizabeth. Why don’t we relax and have dinner before we continue our discussion.”

Ardagh poured salad dressing from a small pitcher and handed it to me. My hand shook as I poured it over my own salad.

“Flowers on salad,” he said, pushing leaves around with his fork. “I don’t understand the fascination. Do you know what this is?”

He speared one of the stalks and held it up for my inspection. Fear shocked through me and my mouth went dry. I swallowed air.

“Fennel, I think.”

“Is it good?”

“Sure, I like it. Tastes like licorice.”

He stuck it in his mouth and chewed. “Not bad. But I don’t get the licorice.”

My gaze fell to my own plate. Heart racing, I set the salad aside and pulled a bowl of stew forward, forcing myself to take a few bites.

“Could you tell me what’s happened to the others they captured today?” I asked without looking at him. “A couple of them are close friends of mine.”

“As far as I know they’re fine,” he replied, sipping his wine. “There’s not enough room here to hold them indefinitely—Maria’s got them packed down in the basement—but as soon as we can arrange it we’ll ship the symbionts in the group off to join the others. We’ve started a colony for them, managed by Ardagh Agro, near one of those big wheat operations. Of course they’ll be freed eventually.”

“What about the colonists?”

“That’s trickier,” he said. I risked a peek at his salad plate and saw that it was empty. I broke into a sweat. “We don’t have a good solution yet. Unfortunately, the ones you’ve brought with you know too much for us to send them back to Earth. Maria and I agree about that, so at least for the short term, I have to find a place to house them. I’m considering sending them all back to your camp with a detail of security guards.”

“Sort of like a concentration camp.” I actually hadn’t meant to say this out loud, but I was half out of my head with fear about what would happen next.

John frowned at me. “You seem to forget, Elizabeth—they’re the oppressors on this world.”

I folded my arms and rested them on the table. “Tell me something. How do you rationalize the fact we owe our existence to them being here? Has it occurred to you there might be a
reason
for the bonds between our species? That the planet may
need
the colonists here?”

He stared at me, letting his spoon dangle as he thought about his reply. Then his face flushed deeply, and the spoon dropped to the floor.

“John?”

Ardagh’s eyes widened and he bolted upright. I launched out of my chair as he lunged across the table. He collapsed with a crash onto our dinner plates, his body thrashing and convulsing. One convulsion flipped him to the floor, and I watched in horror as the writhing intensified … and then broke off sharply.

Bile rose in my throat. I swallowed the sick feeling and picked through the remains of our dinner for the other two flower stalks, lifting them with a napkin and tucking them back into my pocket. Then I began searching the apartment for a less poetic weapon.

Suddenly I remembered Peter.

“If you’re still there, Peter, our original plan is trashed. We have to get out of here as soon as possible. I’m going to try to find the others.
Go get Garvey
. It’s time for plan B.”

I found a handgun in the drawer of a desk by the window, much like the smaller guns in our camp arsenal. Despite the fact I’d killed a person with one, I’d known next to nothing about guns until my recent education along with the others at Devil’s Rock. I remembered this one as the squarish, matte-black pistol with a violent kick. There was an extra clip in the drawer and I stuck it in my pocket.

I jumped as someone knocked on the door, three sharp raps.

“John?”

Shit, Mitchell!

The knob turned. I pointed the pistol at the door.

“John, I wonder if I could—”

Mitchell gave a cry of shock and the security guard behind her reached for his weapon as he darted forward. I aimed at his legs and pulled the trigger, and he went down yelling.

Mitchell turned and fled down the stairs and I ran after her, snatching the guard’s pistol off the floor as I passed.

She reached the bottom before I did, and I jammed the extra gun into the back of my pants and launched at her. We crashed to the floor and I hooked my arm around her neck, shoving the pistol against her temple.

“Get up,”
I growled in her ear.

“Calm down, Elizabeth,” she panted. “Think about your baby.”

“You don’t want to fuck with me right now. I killed your patron. I killed Vasco. I’m getting good at this, and I’m tired of people threatening me and my family.”

I staggered to my feet, half choking her as I pulled her up too, and she got her feet under her. At least for the moment, I seemed to have her convinced.

“Where are the stairs to the basement?”

“We have to go back to the lobby. There will be more guards.”

“Then you better call them off.”

We followed the corridor to the lobby, but before I could find the stairs, one of the guards I’d met in the forest came through the front door.

“Stop right there!” I shouted, pushing Mitchell’s head to one side with the barrel of the gun.

The guard froze, holding out his hand. “Just take it easy.”

I sidestepped along the wall, towing Mitchell with me.

As I burned through my adrenaline I began to realize how crazy this was. Me, two pistols, and two sprigs of a deadly poisonous herb, against—how many guards had Peter said? Thirty?

Another guard came in behind the first, hand reaching for his weapon.

Mitchell suddenly wrenched to one side and I lost my grip on her.

A gun went off and I felt the slug rip into my shoulder, throwing me against the wall. I yelped and slid to the floor, fire blazing in my shoulder.

Mitchell snatched up my gun. She jammed the muzzle against my head.

“Is John dead?” she demanded.

“For the moment,” I forced through gritted teeth. I could feel the other gun digging into my back, but I’d never get it fast enough.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

I glowered up at her. “You’ll find out soon enough.”

Her eyes narrowed and she muttered darkly, “You people are a malignancy.”

The world stopped spinning as I watched the infinitesimal motion of her finger on the trigger. I squeezed my eyes shut, scared and heartbroken, thinking about what would die with me, and what I was leaving behind.

“Lock her up with the others,” Mitchell ordered, lowering the gun. “I’m going to check on John.”

I didn’t even have time to start breathing again—pain flamed down my arm as the guards grabbed me and dragged me down a flight of stairs. The stairwell opened into a small room with a single door. Two security guards were at the base of the stairs and two others stood on either side of the door.

“What’s going on up there?” one called to us.

“This one tried to play hero and got herself shot. Open the door.”

One of the guards at the door moved a hand over its touchpad, shouting, “Everyone back! Anyone standing in front of this door when I open it gets a bullet!”

The other guard trained his weapon on the door, grumbling, “This is no way to confine prisoners.”

The door flew open and the men holding me thrust me inside.

Reeling from the pain in my shoulder, I plunged into such a commotion of bodies and voices I couldn’t make sense of it at first.

“Julia, she’s bleeding!”

Murphy!
Relief flooded through me like a dose of morphine.

He knelt beside me, scooped an arm under my shoulders, and lifted me gently. “What’s happened to you?” His voice was raw and urgent.

I lifted a hand to his cheek. “You’re alive!”

“Julia!” he repeated, glancing up.

“I’m here.” She sank down on my other side. “Lay her flat, Murphy.”

He lowered me gently and took hold of my hand, squeezing as Julia probed my injured shoulder. My eyes watered as the pain spiked again.

“The bullet went all the way through,” she said. “It needs to be cleaned and dressed, but at least the bleeding has stopped.”

Ian had moved beside her and she took hold of his shirt. “I need this.”

He took it off and she tore it into pieces, using it to bind the wound and fashion a makeshift sling. “This is the best I can do for now. She’ll be all right if we can get her out of here soon.”

Murphy’s hand caressed my cheek. “What are you doing here, love?” he breathed.

“Rescuing you. How am I doing?”

A smile spread over his face. But my own smile evaporated as a familiar face appeared just above his shoulder. I blinked a couple times, certain I was hallucinating.

Lex let a hand fall on Murphy’s shoulder, and I stiffened as the emotion flowed from her, through Murphy, to me. She was bitterly disappointed by my sudden appearance. I could feel how threatened she was by me—how I excited her competitive impulses. And behind that lurked something darker—this woman despised me for being unworthy of Murphy. I knew he could feel this too, and it made me feel small and humiliated.

“Give us some space, Lex,” Murphy said curtly.

She didn’t comply right away and Ian warned her, “They’re empathic when they’re together. You’re sharing all your secrets.”

Lex jerked away like she’d been burned.

Weakened by blood loss and pain, and now by uncertainty, my eyes moved over Murphy’s face. Tears of anger and confusion welled.

He bent closer to me, his expression soft. One hand slipped under me, raising me again, and the other cradled my head. He pressed his lips against mine, giving me the kind of kiss he usually reserved for when we were alone. I reached around with my good arm to clutch at his back.

“Mmm,” I sighed, as he drew back.

He supported me so I could sit up. Then he glanced at Lex. “I don’t take lightly what you sacrificed to come looking for me. But if you can’t respect Elizabeth, we can’t be friends.”