Authors: Susan Hayes
“Yeah, yeah.
I told you, I’m retired.” She waved dismissively and then uttered a soft sigh of relief. “You guys are taking this better than I expected.”
Nikolai shook his head. “I don’t know about Ghost, but I’m still processing here. Give me another hour, by then I might have gotten over the overwhelming urge to spank your ass. Fuck. I just realized something. You’re Wraith. He’s Ghost. The universe is seriously messing with me today.”
“I told you, we were fated to find you. Even our names match.” Colin was smirking now, and Nikolai couldn’t blame him. They had Alayna, and she was worth whatever headaches pain and sacrifice it would take to address her past, so that they could have a future together.
He moved in closer beside her, close enough the subtle spice of her natural scent tickled at his nose. He loved catching a whiff of her perfume, whether it was clinging to his skin or lingering in the linens after she’d gotten out of bed. In the time she’d been with them, she’d woven herself into their lives, and Nikolai knew he was a better man for it. How long since they’d caught her coming down their stairs in the dark? He thought about it for a minute and realized that it had only been a week.
Something about that time frame caused an itch at the back of his brain, and he tried to figure out why it bothered him. It wasn’t that he’d fallen for her in such a short time. He’d never expected it to happen so fast, but it felt right. No, it was something else—
“Fuck! If you’re Wraith, then who the fuck broke into a warehouse last night? You haven’t been out of our sight in days.”
Alayna sat up quickly, her mind already ticking through a list of potential suspects and coming up with no real possibilities. “Someone broke into a warehouse last night? When? What did they take?”
“Sometime overnight, according to the reports.
They took immunity boosters. An entire case of them.” Colin shot her a rueful grin. “I spent the past few hours wondering why the hell Wraith would steal something that was slated for delivery to the very people he…uh...you are championing.”
“I wouldn’t have. Which is why I always do an intelligence gathering run before I stepped foot onto a base. I sent the information on
transpo targets on to…other interested parties and used the rest to decide what I was taking and how I was getting it over the fence.” Alayna’s heart and mind were racing. Could the other thief be the one responsible for all the missing shipments? It certainly seemed likely.
“So, who else could have done this?
You willing to give us a list?” Nik asked.
“No, I’m not giving you a list. I’m not turning over my friends to the Alliance or anyone else. Besides, I put this entire town on the blacklist last week. No one I know would have done that job.”
“There’s a blacklist?” Nik asked, one eyebrow arched in surprise.
“We’re more organized than you think.” She tipped her head and smiled sweetly at them both. “Did you really think that the only person I contacted about my situation was Sam? I let my compatriots know this place had undergone security upgrades. We don’t hit hard targets, too much risk. Plus, this is my home now.”
“How did you know about the upgrades?” Nik was getting agitated now, she could see it in the way the muscles along his jaw were clenched.
“You guys brought me on base for my med-scan, remember? That wasn’t the first time I’ve been in that building. I saw the changes myself. Plus, you’ve been talking shop at home. You can’t blame a girl for listening. You two seriously underestimated me.”
‘That’s because you didn’t tell us who you were,” Nikolai snapped.
“Actually,
Griz, she did. Well, not in so many words, but if you think about it, Alayna’s always been pretty upfront about the fact she was a thief. We never really considered what that meant, because Wraith and his crew were supposed to be guys.”
“For the record, I don’t have a crew.”
Nikolai glowered and ran a hand through his hair. “I get why you did it. But that doesn’t mean I’m happy that you were a thief. Don’t make it worse by reminding me you didn’t have anyone looking out for you while you did it. And in my defense, I may have underestimated you, but that’s because I was distracted by all the sex and sass.”
“Is that what you’re going to tell your superiors? You were distracted by my sass and my sexy ass?”
“That is not what I said, minx! And we’re not telling our superiors anything. Rumor has it, Wraith retired. Now that you’re not pilfering our stores anymore, that should be easy to prove.” He reached up and tweaked a nipple in playful retaliation.
“Yeah,
if
we figure out who the hell is still stealing from us. If it wasn’t you, then we’re going to have to start the investigation over again.” Colin groaned and flopped back onto the bed, his arm draped over his eyes.
Alayna laughed as she looked at her two glum-faced bonded. “Buck up, babes. You’ll figure it out. And I bet it won’t take you very long either.”
“You have no idea how much data we’re going to need to go over again. It’s going to take days,” Nikolai looked downright pained at the thought.
“No, it won’t. Because this time you have something you didn’t have before. You have me. Who better to catch a thief than another thief?”
Colin cracked open an eye to look up at her. “If you figure it out before we do, you can have Griz’s job.”
“Deal.”
Alayna was overjoyed that Colin would make such an offer, even in jest. She wanted to do something with her life. Something more than just be their chosen. This…could be perfect.
“No, she fucking well can’t!” Nikolai bellowed.
“Why can’t I?” Alayna asked, her stomach knotting at Nik’s denial.
“Because!
Uh, because you’re not an Alliance officer for one thing. And…uh…you’re too short.”
“You did not just try and tell me there’s a height requirement for your job, did you?
Because I’m calling bullshit.” Alayna snapped. Didn’t he understand how much this would mean to her? She could actually help her people this way.
“Fine.
Griz keeps his job. You can be a civilian advisor.”
“The hell she can. Why do you keep trying to hire our chosen, Ghost? Are you nuts? Security is dangerous work!”
Alayna opened her mouth to argue, but before she could, Colin interrupted. “So is she, or haven’t you been paying attention to the conversation? Besides, it’s pretty clear we need someone with rebel contacts to start the process of negotiating some kind of truce. I’ve been thinking about this for a while. Alayna’s perfect. Not to mention the fact that if we leave her on her own, she’s going to get her sweet little ass in trouble. This way, she’s on base, reporting to us.”
“So we can keep an eye on our minx?”
“Exactly.”
Alayna was tired of having the conversation about her future proceed without her input. “What if
she
says no? And Nikolai, why wouldn’t you want me to do this? Don’t you trust me?”
“Why would you say no, princess? This way you have a job that doesn’t involve any felonies, you can help us improve security here and at the other bases, and eventually, we can hopefully find a way to improve life for Sam and the others like him.”
At least Colin understands.
Nikolai threw up his hands. “It’s not that I don’t want you to do it, exactly. I know you’d make a hell of a security consultant. And of course I trust you. I
love
you, Alayna. But you’re our chosen, and we’re supposed to protect you, not get you a job that puts you right in the line of fire!
Damn it, that actually made sense.
It was hard to get used to having people be so protective of her. She’d spent so long on her own, proving that she could do anything she set her mind to, it wasn’t easy to wrap her head around the fact that Nik and Colin believed in her completely.
“And I love you.
Both of you. But you can’t keep me swaddled and locked away from the world, that’s not who I am. I want to help you. I want to help my people…hell, I even want to help the fucking Alliance if it makes things better.”
Nik
sighed and scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “Just promise me you’ll be careful.”
“I’ll be very careful” she vowed and started working her way out from between her men.
“And where do you think you’re going?” Colin asked her.
“Me? I have a thief to catch. You two stay here as long as you want and catch your breath, but I’m going to head down to the office, call up your files and start looking for the son of a bitch who has been impersonating me.” She bounced off the edge of the bed and onto her feet, heading for her dresser.
“You don’t have the password,” Colin pointed out.
She picked up her wrist unit and strapped it back onto her wrist before grabbing a fresh change of clothes. “You mean
, I don’t have the password…yet. There you go again, underestimating me.” She tugged on a shirt and then blew them a kiss as she walked out of the room, pants still in her hand. “See you downstairs.”
As she left, she could hear both men muttering and then
Nik said, “Civilian security advisor, Ghost? I’m not sure if you’re brilliant, or fucking insane.”
She laughed all the way down to the office.
***
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
It didn’t take long for Alayna to gain access to the guys’ computer system. By the time they joined her downstairs, she was already rummaging through their files.
“Remind me to upgrade your computer security protocols next,” she said with a grin as they walked into the room.
“If we have our way, you’re going to be helping us upgrade the protocols for the whole base,” Colin told her and Nikolai nodded.
“That should keep you busy for a while, minx.”
She loved the idea of being able to work with her bonded. It would be a way for her to make sure that the people in the badlands got the supplies they were supposed to. She became a thief to help other people. If
Nik and Colin could find a legitimate way for her to continue doing that, then she would gratefully take the opportunity.
The three of them took up positions around the office, and then got to work, throwing out ideas and brainstorming as they read through the reports and re-started the entire investigation. Along with having each other to bounce ideas off of, Alayna was enjoying using the impressive electronic toys that were now at her disposal.
There were data extrapolation programs that could work through huge volumes of information looking for any pattern they were instructed to find. An artificially intelligent operating system that seemed to anticipate her next question before she’d asked it, and what was probably her favorite feature of all, three dimensional displays of security footage that could be spun, pivoted or zoomed in on by a simple voice command.
As the hours passed it all started feeling very familiar to Alayna, as if she was back with Sam, planning their next raid, granted with far better equipment and more comfortable surroundings than she’d ever had before.
Memories assailed her and she felt a pang of guilt. She hadn’t thought much about her foster father lately. She had been so busy trying to find her footing in her new reality that she hadn’t had the time or energy for anything else. Sam would understand, of course. He had raised her to be independent, to keep her life unfettered of material things and emotional entanglements. She glanced around and grinned to herself.
So much for being unfettered.
By now, he would have gotten her handwritten message telling him what had happened. She wondered how he’d taken the news. Would he come see her, or would he pull away? He might retreat into the badlands and cut off contact. As much as she loved him, she couldn’t deny that Sam was a cantankerous, distrustful old man who had lived most of his life hating the Alliance and everything it stood for. There was a chance he wouldn’t forgive her for being careless enough to get caught.
Even if he did forgive her, she doubted he would ever understand how she could find any happiness with
Nik and Colin and a life inside the Alliance. The Alliance was the enemy, one that was too big to be taken on directly. Sam had taught her to fight more subtly. He had taught them all to use stealth, misdirection and deceit instead of confrontation. Deceit and misdirection, those two words spun round and round her mind, sweeping aside every other thought until the pieces finally clicked.
“Son of a bitch!” she yelled and stood, ignoring the pins and needles sensation that instantly attacked her legs. Damn, how long had they been sitting here, anyway?
“What have you got?” Colin asked.
“Argh!
I can’t believe I didn’t think of this already. We’ve been so busy looking for evidence that someone was in the warehouse, we didn’t consider looking to see who wasn’t there.”
“How do you find someone that isn’t there?”
Nik gave her a puzzled look.
“If I’m right, you’ll see in a moment. Computer! Call up security logs and identify the time and dates of all authorized entries into storage bay two for the past two months. Cross reference against security footage of storage bay two for those times. Use facial recognition to eliminate all cases where the person entering the building matches the access code given. Display all other cases.”
“
Processing request
.”
The silence dragged on as the computer combed through the data. Alayna didn’t know what the others were thinking, but she had her own theories about what the computer would find. Either someone was using an access code that wasn’t theirs, or their thief was an Alliance officer, likely someone with the security clearance to get in and out without anyone ever batting an eye. She was betting on the latter scenario. The air in the center of the room shimmered and all three of them stared at the images that were starting to appear.
“Now we’ve got you, you sticky-fingered bastard,” Nik said.
“Or not.”
Colin sighed as the footage revealed nothing but an empty warehouse.
“Fuck! That’s not possible. There are recorders everywhere! Why is it we can never get an image of the bastard?” Nikolai started pacing as he spoke, every word accompanied by a violent gesture of pure frustration.
Alayna ignored his outburst. “Computer, display the security logs for all cases where no facial recognition is possible.”
“Affirmative.”
Several log entries appeared, all with the same name. “Do you see what I’m seeing?” she asked, pointing to the rightmost display.
Nik
and Colin both stared at the data and then they both cursed as they saw the pattern. Every time there was an entry recorded without surveillance picking up anyone entering, the same code was used. Whoever Lieutenant B. Bolger was, he was clearly altering the recordings to delete any trace of himself. Unfortunately for him, the entry logs were recorded in a different database.
They had their man. Now, they just had to prove it.
“That sly bastard, he’s the head of Logistics. He’s the one who’s been reporting the thefts. I’m going to go arrest him, right now,” Nikolai said, still staring at the display, his expression grim.
“For what,
Griz? If we pick him up now he’ll only claim that someone faked his access code. We’re going to need more evidence. Enough to make sure he can never wriggle out from beneath the pile of charges we are going to bury him under.”
Logic.
Nikolai didn’t want to hear it. He wanted to haul the thieving, lying, dishonorable, shit up by the scruff of his neck and shake him until he confessed or his neck broke. At this moment, Nikolai wasn’t particular which one came first. He turned on his heel and headed for the door. “If I beat a confession out of him, we won’t need evidence.”
A hand landed on his arm and he spun around, ready to tell Colin to back off, but that wasn’t who had reached for him. It was Alayna. “Why are you so angry?” she asked, her query spoken so softly he barely heard her over the blood pounding in his ears.
“Because he dishonored everything the Alliance is supposed to stand for. We’re supposed to be better! Be stronger! It’s our job to protect the people, not steal from them.” Nikolai could feel the heat of his rage searing him from the inside out and he clenched his hands into fists, determined not to give in to the darkness that had been part of him for as long as he could remember. This was never something he wanted Alayna to see, and now she had witnessed his temper not once today, but twice. Shame curdled his stomach and he waited, expecting her to turn away from him. She didn’t. Instead she came closer and laid her smaller hands on his fists.
“So, all this is because the lieutenant is a lousy poster boy for the Alliance? Lover, I have bad news for you. He’s not alone. If he was, then I would have been out of a job years ago. And while this whole angry Neanderthal thing is sort of cute, I need you to calm down and help us figure out how we’re going to catch this bastard in the act.”
Colin groaned from somewhere off to one side. “You did not just call him cute. I have known Krytos in their battle form who were closer to that description than he is when he’s in a raging snit.”
“Raging snit?
Really? Keep up the smart talk, Ghost, and you’ll have to do the rest of this investigation from medical. And as for you, minx, you’re only allowed to call me cute when we’re alone, and preferably naked. I have a reputation to keep up, you know.” Nikolai tugged Alayna into his arms and kissed her hard, marveling yet again that this beautiful, glorious woman was theirs.
She kissed him back, laughing and fearless. As her arms went around his shoulders the rage inside him began to cool. She was his salvation, the only one who could quiet his demons with a touch.
The only woman in all the worlds who was not afraid of him. He softened their kiss and she sighed into his mouth, kindling the flames of a very different type of fire than the rage he’d been feeling only minutes before.
“Uh, guys? Much as I hate to forgo any opportunity to get our chosen naked again, we still need to come up with a plan to catch Bolger. So, how about you put her down,
Griz, and we get back to work.”
Nikolai broke their kiss grudgingly and then turned to glower at Colin. “We have got to do something about your priorities, Ghost. They are seriously fucked up.”
Colin shrugged. “I want to catch this pain in the ass. It occurs to me that if we handle this right, he could be blamed for
all
the thefts around here.”
“There you go again, being all logical.”
“One of us has to be. It’s a shame I got the brains
and
the good looks,” Colin said with a smirk.
“You’re mistaken there,” Alayna said and for one brief, moment Nikolai thought she was going to come down on his side. “If anyone got the looks in this relationship, it was me. And since I’m the one who figured out who was robbing your base, I think I’m claiming the brains, too.”
Nik swatted her ass before letting her go. “That’s fine with me, you can be the brains and the looks, I’ll be the brawn.”
“What does that leave poor Colin?” she asked.
“In charge of dinner, I’m starving, he’s cooking.”
Colin flipped him off.
“Smart ass. The only reason I’m going to agree to that is because I’m hungry too, and I have no desire to eat your sorry cooking.”
“I’ll cook,” Alayna offered and they both turned to stare at her in surprise. That had been something both men had noticed, but never commented on
in front of their chosen. She had never offered to cook, or take part in any of the day to day chores. Not that they expected her to, exactly. It had simply become another way that she had held herself apart from them, until now at least.
“You don’t have to do that, princess.”
“I know, but I want to. I think it’s time, you know?” Alayna had never cooked for anyone but herself or Sam. Preparing a meal for someone was a personal thing. It fostered a sense of connection, and connections had never been something she’d allowed herself. As she looked at her two bonded, she saw the appreciation in their eyes and knew they understood what this meant. This wasn’t just a meal. This was another step in her taking her place in their home, and their lives.
She really should start spacing out these milestones. Otherwise, all this emotional crap was going to make her soft.
It wasn’t until Alayna walked past a small, jumbled pile of wiring and other junk that she remembered that she had never finished installing the new security system. It was more or less done, but it still needed to be tested and activated. She’d have to see to that after dinner, because there was no way she’d be able to sleep until it was up and running. With her luck, Nikolai’s rude, crazy parents would reappear if she didn’t secure the place.
She walked into the kitchen and immediately felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Her hand went for her knife out of instinct, but there was nothing there. She silently cursed the fact that the guys had banned her from carrying it inside the house.
“You walked into the room without even looking, little girl. No wonder those big Alliance lugs caught you.” A voice came from behind her and she spun around, her every muscle tensed and her body dropped into slight crouch that lowered her center of balance.
“Sam?” The moment she said anything she felt silly, because she could clearly see that it was her foster father standing in front of her. Alayna tried to quell the surge of adrenaline pumping through her body and idly wondered if there was a recommended limit to the number of times someone went into “fight or flight” mode in a single day. “What is this?
National drop by uninvited day? What the hell are you doing here?”
“Nice to see you, too.”
“Alayna, everything all right in there?” Colin called out, she could hear footsteps thundering down the hall and seconds later her men appeared, Colin only a step or two ahead of Nik. Both men looked ready to go to war, and she was equal parts flattered at their response and horrified that yet another meet the parents moment was about to implode.
“It’s fine. I was startled, that’s all. It seems my foster father decided to check in on me and didn’t bother to knock.” She gave him a pointed look as she spoke the last words, but Sam simply shrugged one lean shoulder and remained silent. He looked older than his seventy years, a result of meager meals and long days spent out in the sand and sun of the badlands. His skin was creased with lines, though Alayna thought there were a few new ones since last time she’d seen him. His white hair was cut military short, and his blue eyes were clouded with the beginnings of cataracts that no one in the badlands had the means to repair.