Star Raiders (26 page)

When they reached
Lady Hawk
’s hatch, Shyanne started toward
Liberty
.

Greyson stopped her. Years of training and mental conditioning had made it difficult, painful even, but to save his son and the woman he loved, he found the strength to tel her about his UTD. Her face remained impassive as she listened.

She had no idea what it cost him to reveal ASP’s most careful y guarded secret.

“Once it’s removed,” he told her, “I’l use this injector to plant it inside you.

When you reach Dempster’s ship, activate it and I’l track you. Do you understand?”

“Yes. Do what you have to. But make it quick.”

He could tel she was using every fiber of her being to maintain her self-control.

She stuck out her arm but her whole body strained toward
Liberty
, standing ready. “First, you make sure Rian is safe.”

He placed the scalpel in her palm and lifted his shirt to expose his chest and stomach. “You’l have to take the UTD out. Make a cut just below my rib cage.

Here.
Not too deep.
Reach in with your fingers. It’l feel like a grain of rice. Grab it and pul it out.”

Horror flickered across her face as her fingers gripped the handle of the scalpel. “I can’t cut you!”

“There’s no one else and no time. Ten minutes until Dempster wants his answer.” He leaned back against
Lady Hawk
’s hul and gritted his teeth. “Do it quick. But seriously, don’t cut too deep. Just about a centimeter beneath the muscle.”

He didn’t tel her that removing the UTD without an extractor put his life at risk.

One slip with the scalpel posed horrible consequences, the worst of which was he could bleed to death internal y. He just had to pray she didn’t nick the artery that ran just beneath.

Icy hot pain flared under his ribs, but he didn’t flinch. Her fingers pushed inside him. Cold sweat beaded on his brow. He swal owed a groan.

“I can’t feel it,” she murmured. Tears spiked her lashes as she looked up at him.

“Cut a little deeper. You haven’t pierced far enough through the muscle.” His voice came out as a strained rasp.

Blood smeared her hands and dripped down his bel y. She staggered back a step. “I…I can’t.”

He gripped her hand with the scalpel and pul ed it against him. “You have to.” Sweat beaded on her upper lip. She nodded and pushed the scalpel deeper.

He felt something give, and his vision blurred. Her fingers delved deeper, pushing him nearer the brink of unconsciousness—

“I got it!” she cried in triumph, holding up bloody fingers.

Struggling against the urge to close his eyes and let the darkness overtake him, he snatched the UTD. It took only moments to implant under Shyanne’s skin at the base of her skul . That was the best place, as her hair would hide any scar the UTD’s internal mechanisms left as it healed the implantation incision.

“Remember, when you’re aboard Dempster’s ship, press the UTD until you feel it snap.” He took her hand in his and pressed her fingers against the invisible lump under her skin and hair. “That’l activate it, and I’l be able to track you.” Ignoring a pain under his rib cage that made breathing difficult, and the blood trickling down his bel y, he cupped her cheek in his hand. Her skin felt cold against his. “Do you understand?”

“Yes. Just take care of Rian first.” Her bloody fingers clutched his shirt in a white-knuckled grip. “Save him.”

“I promise.”

Though he knew it was wrong, unable to stop himself, he tilted his head to hers.

As their lips met, her rigid control snapped and she returned his kiss with breath-stealing passion. Heat flared between them. Pain retreated. In that moment, nothing existed beyond the two of them.

A pair of men carrying a stretcher approached, and Shyanne jerked free.

Without looking at the stil figure being carried, she turned and ran toward
Liberty
.

Greyson went to the pair with the stretcher. Taking a bandage from them, he applied it to the smal wound on his chest and then went to help load Rian onto the
Lady Hawk
. He couldn’t bring himself to watch as
Liberty
lifted off. Cold, oily tendrils of reality slithered into his mind. Shyanne had sworn she’d die before she let Dempster touch her again. Yet to save her child,
their
child, she was headed wil ingly into her worst nightmare. He both admired and cursed her courage.

As brother and sister, he and Shyanne could never be together. Even if no one else knew, he couldn’t live with the guilt of breaking that taboo. The future stretched out long and lonely before him.

Suddenly, he laughed. The odds were against either of them surviving. He doubted Dempster would honor his word to leave Uta alone once he had Shyanne, and either way the problem of C.O.I.L. intervention loomed if Dempster wasn’t brought to justice. The burgeoning pain in his gut reminded him he was almost out of time.

Sitting on the hard metal floor, Shy shivered and hugged her chest to her knees. To keep from thinking about what was happening to Rian, she focused on her physical misery.

The cel where Dempster now confined her was cold, dark and damp. Her bones ached. Despite the discomfort, she preferred it to the luxurious cabin he’d held her in for the first two days. While there, she’d refused to bathe away the dirt and blood crusting her face, hands and arms, to wear the clothing he provided, eat his food or drink his wine. She did this because the man wouldn’t hesitate to drug her. He’d done so the last time. But it was her refusal to speak or look at him that pushed him past the limit of his meager control.

She touched the base of her skul and lightly stroked the almost imperceptible bump, her stiff lips curling upward. When she’d docked on Dempster’s ship he’d scanned her ship and her for tracking devices and hadn’t found anything.

Greyson’s UTD worked.

Her fingers itched to activate the UTD, but she snatched her hand away. Not yet. Not until they reached Dempster’s stronghold. That way, when Greyson found her—and she refused to believe he wouldn’t—Dempster’s reign of terror would come to an end. Uta would be safe, and Earth would have the proof they needed to prevent a C.O.I.L. invasion.

Her stomach growled. When had she last eaten? Four days ago. At the party.

If she’d had any spit left, her mouth would have watered at the memory of pork and beef roasted slowly over that open pit, the tantalizing smel s saturating the balmy night air. Steamed vegetables drizzled with fresh butter. Greyson laughing as he stuffed rich chocolate-frosted cake into her mouth to the partygoers’ delight. Then the fruit, cheese, chocolate and wine they’d shared. And the delights of the bedroom she’d tasted right after.

Memories flowed like melted chocolate through her, sweet and rich. Kissing, stroking, loving…they’d continued until the world dissolved into heated bliss. Of course, the next morning he’d provided only cold anger. That dead, bleak look deep in his eyes had been worse than almost anything else she’d ever seen.

Shy forced her thoughts from his emotional betrayal and focused on her current misery. Physical pain was somehow easier to deal with than mental anguish, and she had plenty of that, as Dempster had given her no water for the past few days. She had no idea if he ever would. To al eviate her thirst, she forced herself to lick the moisture condensing on the upper metal wal s of her cel . She gagged at the foul, oily taste.

Hours crept by. The door final y swung open. She blinked at the glare of light spil ing into the room. Hands gripped her arms and jerked her upright. Without a word, Dempster dragged her out of the cel .

He led her to a shuttle ship, clearly intending to take her planet-side. Which planet, she had no idea. She hoped it was his lair.

Dazed and weak, she staggered when he shoved her toward a seat. “Strap yourself in. You’re a mess and you stink.” He wrinkled his nose. The scar on his cheek pul ed his lip upward in a mockery of a smile. “I’l have no more of your sil y games. In my home you’l bathe and eat or I’l have you cleaned and force fed.” During the trip down, Shy’s stubborn silence seemed to feed Dempster’s darkening mood. Though she sensed he wanted to speak, he said nothing more.

She ignored his irate glances and focused on the ship’s controls and the coordinates for the planet. If she didn’t feel so dizzy, she might even have tried to wrest control of the shuttle from him.

When they landed, he escorted her to another luxurious suite of rooms, ones like the first she’d been offered aboard his battle cruiser. She stood in the middle of the biggest while he paced.

“Why do you persist in fighting me? You can’t win.” He stopped in front of her.

She lifted her hand to the back of her neck but didn’t lift her gaze. Her fingers rubbed the UTD, wondering if they were at their final destination.

He grabbed her chin and forced her face up to his. “You’l look at me when I speak, bitch.”

Yes. It was time. She could no longer wait. But as she pushed hard against the lump, sharp pain stabbed back at her. She hoped it had worked. “You’re insane.”

“Perhaps.” He chuckled, and the obsession in his eyes as he looked at her sent a shiver down her spine. She took a step back.

“Ever Kedar’s little princess,” he went on. “So strong. So secure in his love. So sure of her place. The place you stole from me!” Dempster paced once more in front of her.

“I never wanted your place in Kedar’s life,” Shy snapped. “I never knew about his activities until he was captured. I was no threat to you.”

“But you were, my dear. Your very existence threatened everything I’d worked for. You distracted Kedar from the business. Made him think about going legit. If he’d done that, what would have been left for me?”

“What are you talking about?” Shy hissed.

“Until his son was born, Kedar looked on
me
as his son. And then—”

“What’s that got to do with me?” Shy interrupted. “My brother died years ago.” Dempster looked furious. “Died? No, he didn’t. Despite al my efforts, he stil lives. And you—”

“My brother is alive?” She couldn’t stop herself from asking. Other questions flooded her mind, too. To keep from babbling, she bit her tongue. Asking Dempster anything further would gain her nothing but pain.

The man burst into laughter, the maniacal sound of which chil ed her to her soul. “It took me five years to poison her against Kedar,” he said. “To get her to leave him.”

Shy blinked. Who the hel was he talking about?

“But even after she was gone, taking her brat with her, Kedar didn’t turn back to me. For five long years he spent al his time and energy searching for those two.

When he located them, I knew what I had to do. Once the boy was dead, your father would be mine again.”

She pressed her back against the wal . The man was total y deranged.

He shoved his face close to hers. Saliva sprayed her cheeks as he hissed,

“The incompetents I sent to do the job failed. The bitch died, but Greyson survived.

Out of Kedar’s reach and mine, which was fine—but then you arrived.” Knowledge punched her in the gut. “Wh-what are you saying?” Greyson was Stewart Kedar’s son, her brother? Bile choked her. Had Greyson known al along?

No. He couldn’t have! Now she understood his rejection. Somehow he’d just learned the truth—a truth he believed she’d known. His reaction to this news made more sense than his rejecting their son. “He’s my brother?” Dempster’s rage faded. He giggled. The high-pitched and girlish sound warned Shy he teetered on the brink of something more terrifying than mere insanity. “You
are
dense, girl. You have no brother,” he answered. “Greyson is Kedar’s son, but he’s not your brother because you are not Kedar’s daughter.”

“I’m not?” Shy’s head spun in confusion.

Stil , when she thought about it…the news that she wasn’t Kedar’s daughter held no horror for her. It didn’t even surprise her very much. Despite her love for the man, and despite his affection for her, deep inside she’d always felt distanced from him. And they looked nothing alike. When she was younger the gap between them had made her strive harder to earn his love and respect. After his arrest and Greyson’s betrayal, she’d celebrated the difference, deciding to make her own way, determined never again to give her heart to another.

Of course, she’d failed. Despite her efforts she couldn’t total y evict Kedar from her memory, and now Rian held her heart. As did her crew and the people of Uta. And Greyson. Most of al Greyson.

As Dempster moved away and began to pace again, she straightened.

“Whose daughter am I?” she dared to ask.

He paused and turned to face her. The look of satisfaction in his cold eyes warned her of what was coming. “Your parentage doesn’t matter. You’re mine now.”

“I’l never be yours. My crew wil come for me. They’l save me like they did the last time, and you’l be destroyed like the space scum you are.” Even to her own ears, her words sounded like false bravado. Only the faint sting at the back of her neck gave her any hope at al .

Dempster laughed. “No, this time no one wil be coming to rescue you.” He stalked closer, triumph gleaming in his eyes. “The battle is lost. Your crew is defeated, destroyed.
Independence
and Uta are no more. As soon as you landed on my ship, I blew them apart. There’s nothing left, and as the victor I claim the spoils. You’re mine.”

The pain at the back of her head disappeared beneath the agony exploding in Shy’s heart. Pain and rage darkened her vision. Rian. Greyson. Everyone she knew, everyone she loved was gone? Dead?

“No!” Her fingers curled into claws and she launched herself at Dempster.

Chapter Eighteen

Greyson used his ship’s stealth mode to dock
Lady Hawk
unnoticed at Carter’s ELF outpost; what he was about to ask from his onetime friend went wel beyond taking care of rescued slaves, and if he and Carter were caught, what little was left of the man’s career and possibly his life could be forfeit. Also, with or without Carter’s cooperation, Greyson was determined to succeed. He had to patch in to ASP’s UTD tracking system. Shyanne’s life depended on that.