Stark Surrender (21 page)

“Well … all right,” she said dubiously. “I’ll be up in a few.”

“Just leave your spider there,” Bronc called to her. “The techs will move it.”

“Spider?” Joran echoed. “What the hells are you up to?”

“Fill you in later,” Bronc said. “Go on up, Kiri.”

“Later, sis,” Kai called.

“Later, Kai.” Kiri was already opening her cockpit and releasing the safety harness. “Thanks, Bronc.”

* * *

Liss had been waited for Lode for three long, boring, nerve-wracking days and nights—or maybe more. She’d drunk a few bottles of wine while he was gone, which confused things like the passage of time.

She wondered if he was safe, then if he was even alive. ‘Cause if he was dead, would her new lover’s plan even work?

When a heavy fist pounded on the apartment door one morning, Liss sat bolt upright on the divan, her empty wine bottle falling to the floor with a rattle of recyclable material. She grimaced—this morning her head ached, her mouth was dry and tasted horrible, and she had to pee.

The pounding came again, and she shrank back in the divan. Then she remembered how Lode had showed her how to cue the com he’d given her. She used it. Two very large men stood outside the apartment. One was huge and scowling. The other had long hair, but other than that, she noted with astonishment, he looked a lot like Lode.

She scurried into the lav to do her business, thinking all the while. Then she went to the door. “What do you want?” she called.

Lode’s look-alike stepped forward. “We’re looking for a Liss? A woman who helped my brother. Is that you?”

“Lode’s your brother?” she asked.

“Yeah, that’s him. We want to thank you, ask if you need any help.”

She opened the door. The big one gave her a cool look and scanned the tiny apartment. But Lode’s look-alike smiled at her. “You helped Logan. Wanted to thank you for that.”

“He told me his name is Lode,” she said suspiciously.

He nodded. “Right. He goes by that when he’s on an op.”

Liss’ heart pounded with excitement. Lode was some kind of a secret spy? That was valuable information.

“I haven’t seen him for a few days, though,” she told them. “I’m worried about him.” She nodded to show she was sincere.

“He’s safe,” Lode’s brother said. “You come with us, we’ll take you to him. And maybe you can answer a few questions for us.”

She frowned uneasily. “I guess so.”

“Pack a bag,” he suggested. “You can spend a few nights. We have plenty of room.”

“Room where?”

“At Lode’s place,” he said smoothly. “It’s real nice. You’ll like it.”

She packed a bag for herself and showed them Lode’s duffle bag, her nerves jumping as she waited for one of them to glare at her and demand to know where the valuable necklace was. But they didn’t.

The cruiser they ushered her into was luxe, even if it was businesslike. But the hard-eyed flight attendant with short silver hair had a hard, suspicious gaze. Opal, huh—she was more like a blade than a gem. She gave Liss the creeps.

Liss tossed her hair and crossed her legs, glaring back. The woman turned away, but when they reached another building and landed, she followed Liss closely from the craft.

“I’ll show you where you’re to stay.” She led the way into an elevator, a big one with gleaming fitments and plush carpet that smelled clean, not like piss and vomit. It glided downward so smoothly Liss could barely feel it moving.

She followed the woman out into a wide passageway lined with doors and holovid screens with scenes of exotic plants and outdoor scenes, and into a compact but comfortable sitting room with a lav and sleeping alcove.

“Is this his room?” Liss asked, admiring again how clean everything was. Although it was plain as pavement. These people could stand to spend some credit glitzing the place up.

The woman gave her a strange look. “No, these are staff  quarters.”

Liss’ face burned with humiliation. How was she to know   anything about this place?

“Where’s his room?” she asked, her voice plaintive, even to her own ears. “I want to wait for him there.”

“You’ll stay here,” Opal said. “His family will be in the penthouse. You’re free to move about this level. Oh, and the building has surveillance … for your safety, of course.”

Liss peered around her, her skin crawling. Ugh, did that mean someone would be watching her all the time, even when she had to take a piss?

It was the other woman’s turn to smirk before she turned away, leaving Liss wondering uneasily if she knew somehow, how things really were between her and Lode. She touched her hair and then looked around for spybots, trying to look as if she was admiring the decor, just in case someone was spying on her.

Just wait till Lode arrived—then that old blade-face would have to smile and try to sweeten up Liss ... for a while, at least.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Kiri faced Joran Stark in a small office in the LodeStar medcenter. Someone here loved plants, she noted distractedly. Greenery lined the wall opposite the door and a small plant bloomed on the corner of the desk.

“Kiri,” Joran said gently, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, gaze on her. “I know this has been hard on you, honey. Coming here, and then Logan not being Logan ... and all that’s happened around that.”

Kiri nodded, waiting. He hadn’t called her here just to apologize for Logan’s behavior. He could have done that in the penthouse, in front of everyone else. He wanted something from her. And whatever it was, it was big. How ironic that they wanted her to help Logan when she’d finally admitted he and she were done for good, that after what he’d done to her there was no going back.

Joran’s next words confirmed her suspicions. And he spoke before she could tell him whatever they wanted her to do, she wasn’t the woman for the job.

Joran looked down at his hands, then back at her. “We need you to do one more thing for us. For Logan. And I know—” He held up one hand when she opened her mouth. “I know it will be hard for you to help him, after … everything. I get that. But, he’s back to himself again. Now, we have to get him well, at the same time keeping him—and all of us—safe from whoever did this to him.’

‘And we don’t have forever. There are big events on Frontiera that we need Logan ready for. And I mean really ready, not just as figurehead.”

“And what would those events be?” she asked, curious despite her resolve to keep her distance from Logan in all ways.

“You know about the AquaTerraCon Expedition,” he said.

Kiri nodded. Everyone who lived on Frontiera did. It was all people talked about in the coffee shop, and even the market.

“It’s big, honey. The implications for trade for Frontiera are huge—could mean jobs for the immigrants already there, and for working people who need to get out of places like this, find somewhere to raise their families with fresh air and sunshine, and good, safe schools.”

“I think I get it,” she said quietly. “Logan is important because LodeStar is funding the expedition.”

He gave her a strange look. “It’s a little more than that, Kiri. Logan rubs elbows with some pretty important beings.” Yeah, and he rubbed a lot more than that with the women, she thought bitterly.

“Prince Azuran of Aquarius is on Frontiera right now,” Joran went on. “With his retinue of dozens of nobles, and a couple of dignitaries from Pangaea and Serpentia as well. Logan was supposed to be there to meet them, host a tour of the expedition sites.”

“Starry,” she murmured, shocked. A prince and his retinue? Logan had been keeping some exalted company. And he gone from that to his squalid existence in the streets of New Seatt;e—how strange.

“We’ve arranged a holovid conference with the prince and the news reporters,” Joran said, “Along with a story about why Logan is here instead of there.”

This ought to be good. “And what’s the story?”

“LodeStar employees here were being menaced by an uber-criminal, so Logan came to work with local law enforcement, to free the city from the clutches of evil. However, on a fact-finding mission he was attacked and left for dead. He’s been in care, and is just now ready to face the public and tell his story.”

She raised her brows. “I’m impressed. Close to the truth but not too close.”

“The whole truth wouldn’t help anyone, honey.”

“I suppose not. Except that some of us have to live with it.”

He nodded, his gaze grave. “I get that … or as much as I can from what you told us. Pretty sure you held some things back to spare me and Creed.”

“There are some things that need to remain between me and Logan,” she said with dignity.

“All right, honey. You ever feel the need, though—”

“If I do, I will talk to someone.”

“All right. So, we’ll be headed home as soon as Logan is able to travel, and you can get back to your life. But for now, Logan is … he’s deeply troubled by what he did, the way he behaved when he was under the influence of that drug.”

“Just what was the influence of the drug?” she demanded. “I know nothing.”

Joran explained, and Kiri listened, feeling his words like blows to her chest. “Oh, my God,” she said. “I had no idea … that’s so evil—even worse than Zae’s ordeal. Who would do that to him?”

“We don’t know,” Joran said, his face hardening in a way that was so like Logan. “But believe me, we’ll find out.”

“But that’s for another day. Right now, Logan would like to talk to you, especially to apologize. And I know it’s only a start, but please, will you let him have that much, honey? Then maybe he can find the strength to step up and influence events on the galactic stage.” And although Joran said this last with a note of irony, his gaze was intent, sincere.

“I’ll do what I can to help,” Kiri said, straightening, and gathering her inner strength. She would need it all to face Logan again. She’d let him say his piece, and control her anger at him—for now.

But when this was over, she’d tell him what she really thought of him. He may have been under the influence of some foul drug when he kidnapped her, but surely the man he’d been then had always been a part of him, however deeply buried.

She wanted no part of that cold, violent stranger.

“Although,” she said with a frown, “What about her—Logan’s blonde? Shouldn’t she be the one to reassure him for his big performance on the galactic affairs?” He could ask her, Kiri’s forgiveness another time.

Joran gave her a strange look. ‘“Liss? Ah, I don’t think she’s really in the long term vid, honey.”

No woman was, for Logan. “Well, she’s in it now. And I’m sure she’ll want to be at his side.” And she was more than welcome to him. Kiri was ready to move on with her own life.

“What I mean is, I think they were just helpin’ each other out. More of a survival thing than anything else.”

“I’m glad that worked, for both of them.” No, she wasn’t. Just remembering Logan with the blonde made her want to smack both of them.

She wondered bitterly if the blonde realized Logan would replace her within days once he returned to his life of wealth and privilege. He might even have some woman here in HQ. And once he appeared on the news, the New Seattle beauties would be lining up to visit him on his sickbed.

Joran shook his head. “No, she can’t help with this. He’s ... he’s down, Kiri, like I’ve never seen him. Just lies there in that bed, won’t talk about it. His body is snapping back, but his emotions ... they’re a mess. The guilt is eating at him.”

“Oh, all right,” Kiri said, irritation sending her to her feet. “I’ll listen to him. Where is he?” She just wanted to get this charming interview over with—then she and Kai could make arrangements again to return to Frontiera. She hadn’t really unpacked from their first attempt to go home.

* * *

Standing outside the small office, Joran watched Logan’s woman march out of the medcenter and into the elevator that would take her up to the penthouse.

When the elevator hatch closed behind her, he allowed himself a slow smile. Damn, she was something when she was all fired up. And that was good, she’d have to be strong to stand toe to toe with Logan. No doubt if Logan had his way, she’d be doing so for a long time to come.

She was jealous as a Tyger of that blonde, which meant she wasn’t over Logan. And he’d seen the look in Logan’s good eye when Kiri was mentioned. Oh, yeah, she was just what the medtechs ordered. And if this episode meant he had a manipulative streak a bit like his big brother’s ... well, he could live with that.

Logan had meddled in his and Creed’s lives—now it was their turn. He cued his com, and spoke, his voice rich with amusement and affection.

“One pissed off wildcat, on her way to you.”

Then he broke the link and went to find his own woman.

* * *

Kiri was greeted at the door of the penthouse by Natan, who bowed politely to her, his pale green cornsilk hair waving gently around his throat. “Ms. Kiri. I was just taking a tray to Mr. Stark’s room. He is so thin after his ordeal. We must tempt his palate.”

Kiri’s eyes widened at the amount of food on the tray floating at the Pangaean’s side.

“Well, if he isn’t tempted by that, it will be a miracle,” she said. “And two coffee cups? Is someone with him now?”

If the blonde was in there, Kiri was turning right around now, because there was no way she could handle watching that woman crawl over him. She’d rather stab her eyes out with one of the gleaming sporks on Natan’s tray

“No, no,” Stark’s chef and butler said, gesturing that she should precede him through the back passageway. “I simply thought if he should happen to have a guest such as yourself, all is ready.” He indicated one of the two carafes on the tray. “Decaf.”

Kiri eyed him suspiciously. “How convenient.” First Joran begged her on bended knee to talk to Logan, and now Natan just happened to have appropriate food and drink for a feast for two.

They were both meddling. But Natan was a sweetie, so she didn’t have the heart to tell him she’d be staying only long enough to speak very briefly with his employer. Too many memories in his bedroom, all of them wickedly sensual.

But of course, Logan couldn’t be pale and wan in his bed, covers safely up to his throat. When Kiri walked into his elegant, masculine bedroom with the huge bed and real wood furnishings, he was just stepping out of his lav, only a pair of thin gray sleep pants low on his lean hips, a matching tee in his hand.

The shock of his physicality hit her in the chest, driving her breath out in a whoosh. She managed a stuttering breath to recover, and glanced up at his face, intending to look just as quickly away.

But he looked so different. He was a long way from his former self, but only a few days ago he’d been lying in an aircot, covered in bandages.

Now, the bandage that had covered half his head was gone, in its place a flesh-toned patch over his right eye socket. His face was still mottled with faint bruises, and they’d shaved his head, his glossy brown hair only a shadow on his scalp to match his whiskers.

None of these things detracted from his looks. He looked ... honed, like a warrior who’d been through a fearsome battle and persevered.

His broad shoulders, muscled arms and long torso bore livid marks, some of them bruises, some red slashes from healing cuts. And he was still thin, his ribs standing out in sharp relief, his cheekbones jutting from his drawn face.

But he was well enough to walk by himself, and to give her a look that sent a blush surging through her from head to toe … and all points in between, because that look said they’d been in this room before, in incredibly intimate ways.

“Kiri,” he said, the word a caress. As if he delighted that she was here.

“What are you doing out of bed?” she asked sharply, taking a step backward.

The door whisked shut behind her, and she turned to see that Natan had disappeared, leaving the meal tray hovering at her elbow. Alarm raising the hair on the back of her neck, she halted by the door.

“Where are you going?” Logan demanded. He lifted a hand as if to stay her, and she backed against the door, unable to stop herself. Her trepidation made her angry—at herself and at the source.

“Well, last time I saw you, you tried to strangle me.” She’d meant this to be sarcastic, but to her dismay, her voice cracked. “The time before that … we both know what happened.”

Logan flinched visibly, as if she’d struck him. His hands clenched at his sides.

“I’m sorry, kitten,” he said, his voice rough with emotion. “I’d give anything to not have done that to you.”

Kiri couldn’t think of anything to say, so she nodded. She took her hand from the door and rubbed her palms up and down her thighs. God, she was a mess—her stomach knotted, nervous perspiration dampening her palms and underarms, tears pushing at the back of her throat.

Part of her wanted to run from the room, refuse to deal with the tangle of resentment, anger and old attraction that he caused, but she might as well get this over with. Find closure, for her own sake as well as—if Joran could be believed—the citizens of Frontiera.

“Please,” Logan held out a hand to her, palm up. “Please don’t—don’t be afraid of me. I think I can stand anything but that.”

She stared at him. What else did he expect? She opened her mouth to tell him she’d listen, to just get it over with, but instead her anger and hurt poured out.

“Why wouldn’t I be afraid of you, Logan? You treated me like a—a whore. You grabbed me, you forced me to stay in that place with your other woman. You abused my trust. I let you have me, thinking it was real—but instead you’d drugged me. And then … you said such cruel things to me. You made me feel dirty, ashamed.”

His face pale, he stared at her. But then he frowned, shaking his head. “I … I guess I thought you’d be angrier that I nearly strangled you when I woke in Darkrunner’s medcenter.”

She snorted. “Oh, that was different. You were clearly out of your head. If Joran had been closest, you would’ve grabbed him.”

Logan’s mouth quirked, then he sobered instantly. “Okay. I suppose so. I’m still sorry that I hurt you. Are you—recovered from that?”