CHAPTER 12
M
aris jerked awake in his bed. “Ture?”
“Darling.”
He turned to see Darling sitting in the chair Ture often slept in. “What time is it?”
“Just after one.”
He went cold with that answer. “Where’s Ture?”
“Is he supposed to be here?”
“Yeah. He was coming over after closing. He should have been here hours ago.” Maris started to climb out of bed, but Darling caught him.
“Don’t panic. Call him.” Darling handed him his link.
Maris made the call.
There was no answer. His breathing ragged, he met Darling’s worried gaze as he tried to call Anachelle who’d been closing with Ture.
Again, no one picked up.
His panic grew even more. “He wouldn’t have gone home, Dar. And even if he had, he would have answered my call.”
“Okay. You stay here in case they’re on their way, and I’ll go check the restaurant and his apartment.”
Maris desperately wanted to go with him, but Darling was right. He needed to stay in case they were in a low reception area while en route to the hospital. Satellites occasionally malfunctioned and went down...
It could be nothing. Terek might have gotten sick and they could be at a twenty-four hour pediatric clinic with him,
“Please hurry.”
Darling inclined his head to him. “You know I will. I’ll call as soon as I get there.”
Maris nodded as Darling left. Hauk came in a second later.
“What are you doing here?”
Hauk grinned. “Sitting on you while you panic. Making sure you don’t do something stupid. Are you planning to be stupid?”
“I try to avoid it.”
“Good for you. I don’t. Rather I embrace my natural stupidity with both arms.”
In spite of his panic, Maris laughed. He loved the grouchy Andarion. Hauk was always worth his weight in laughter. But still, he was worried. “They’re okay, right, Hauk?”
“Of course. You know we’re not going to let anything happen to your family.”
Maris was desperate to believe that. But as he waited to hear from Darling, he cursed himself for ever turning the monitor off. How could he have gone to sleep and left Ture alone?
Please be all right...
He’d never forgive himself if something had happened while he slept.
Time dragged until he finally saw Darling calling him. He picked up and heard a baby crying in the background. “Is that Terek?”
“Yeah.”
His stomach pitched as Darling fell silent and he heard nothing other than the baby. “What is it?”
“Is Hauk with you?”
This was bad...
“I’m right here. Why?”
“I need you to hold on to Mari for me.”
“What!” Maris snarled. “Darling, tell me what the fuck’s going on.”
When he finally spoke, his voice was tense and deep. “Anachelle is dead in the kitchen, and it’s obvious there was a bad fight here.”
“Ture?”
“No sign of him. By the looks of it, I think he was taken.”
Maris couldn’t breathe as those words slapped him hard.
“Terek seems to be fine. For some reason, they left him in his crib in Ture’s office. I’ve already got everyone on this and Jayne’s taking Terek home with her while we mobilize. We will find him, Mari, you know we will.”
But in what condition?
Terror consumed him. It was so foul and biting that it made his ears buzz. His sight dimmed as his blood rushed thick and hard through his veins. He locked gazes with Hauk. “Get your hands off me or lose them.”
“Maris—”
“Hauk . . . have you ever seen what a Phrixian can do when cornered?”
“Maris, don’t!” Darling snapped.
“If this was Zarya?”
Darling cursed. “Let him go, Hauk. He’s right. As badass as you are, in the mood Mari’s in, you’d need backup. Phrixians are like rabid animals when wounded. They’re three times as strong as normal, and don’t feel pain until their adrenaline stops rushing. Think of Nykyrian with a shot of Prinam in him.”
And right now, Maris felt nothing except the desire to rip the throat out of whoever was dumb enough to take Ture from him.
Hauk stepped back then gaped as Maris pulled the monitors off and stood without flinching. Like Darling said, he felt no pain and wouldn’t until he calmed again.
He headed to the bag Ture had brought from home and dressed. The last time Maris had felt like this was when the Resistance had kidnapped Darling. He’d been insane until they found him.
As soon as he was dressed, he returned to Hauk and stripped him of his weapons. Hauk didn’t say a word or try to stop him. He merely handed them over, one by one.
“You’re going to need a ride.”
Maris strapped the blaster to his hips. “I’ll drive.”
Hauk hesitated. “You suck at driving.”
“So do you.”
He flashed a fanged grin then surrendered his keys. “Oh yeah, I do.”
Maris headed out with Hauk and Fain flanking him. He was going to find Ture, and he planned to tear anyone with his boyfriend into small, bloody pieces.
CHAPTER 13
T
ure watched the blood dripping from his nose and mouth as it splattered against the white floor beside the chair he was tied to. He hurt so badly, he couldn’t draw a breath without his eyes tearing up.
The League officer buried a gloved hand in his hair and snatched his head back so that Ture was forced to stare up at the bastard. “Either tell us where he is or call him!”
“Fuck you.”
The soldier backhanded him again. “Answer the question, you stupid faggot!” He struck him again.
Ture laughed. “I might be gay, but you’re the one who’s going to get publicly butt-fucked when Maris gets here. He’ll tear all of you apart for what you’ve done.” For the first time in his life, he believed that. He had no doubt that Maris would come for him.
The soldier hit him again and again. Finally, he pulled back. “Had enough yet?”
Ture scoffed. “You hit like a girl. Who taught you to fight? Your decrepit grandmother?”
Shrieking, the League soldier kicked his chair, knocking him over. Ture groaned as pain slammed through his entire body.
“I’m sick of this.” The other assassin opened the door and spoke to someone in the hallway. “Bring his brother in here.”
While they waited, the assassins set him back up in the chair. Blood suffused his mouth as his vision dimmed. They’d been at this for hours. It was like being held with Zarya all over again, except this time he did know the answer they wanted.
But he’d die before he gave them Maris.
The first round of torture had been water and electrocution. Then they’d moved to drugs and purges. Choking.
Now, an old-fashioned beating.
None of it mattered as he finally understood how Zarya had managed to go through everything without speaking. And to think he’d criticized her for it.
He’d laugh at the irony if it didn’t hurt so much to breathe.
Another League soldier brought Bristol into the cell and forced him on his knees in front of Ture. His hands were cuffed behind his back and someone had gagged him. Eyes wide with fear, he tried to say something to Ture, but he couldn’t understand a single word.
The soldier who’d done most of the beating, pulled his blaster out and angled it at Bristol’s head. “Now answer the question or I’m going to paint the wall with your brother’s brain matter.”
Bristol screamed against his gag.
Ture’s stomach heaved at the threat. Time stopped as he stared into the same eyes his sister had held, and he remembered holding her hand while she took her last breath. The shrill sound of the monitors flat-lining was forever engraved in his heart. Bristol had just been a boy and Ture had held him for hours as he cried.
The assassin removed Bristol’s gag.
Tears fell down his cheeks as he sobbed. “P-p-please, Ture. Don’t let them hurt me!”
It was the same plea Anachelle had made.
Completely unsympathetic, Bristol had curled his lip at her.
“Shut that bitch up.”
They had shot her a heartbeat later. The horror of seeing her die for no reason sickened him. The fact that his own brother had told them to silence her. . . .
Unforgivable.
“I love you, Bristol,” Ture whispered.
Bristol smiled. “Then tell them where Sulle is. We can split the reward. You and me! It’s a fortune, Ture. We can both retire. We’ll never have to work again.”
Hot tears stung the cuts on his face as they fell. Ture drew a ragged breath and shook his head. “Sorry. I love Mari more.”
“I’m your brother!”
And Maris was his heart.
The League soldier sank his hand into Bristol’s hair and pressed the tip of the blaster to his temple. “I
will
do this.”
Ture had no doubt. Killing people was their specialty. “I know.”
“Ture . . . you can’t let me die.”
“I didn’t do this, Bristol. You did.” Had Bristol not called the League, wanting to claim the bounty on Maris’s life, they wouldn’t be here now.
“They’re going to kill me, big brother! Please help me!”
Ture screamed out as agony ripped him apart. He didn’t want to do this. What kind of monster consigned his own brother to death?
“One last time, cock-jockey. Where’s Sulle?”
Before he could even draw his breath, the door behind the soldier blew apart.
“I’m right here, asshole.” Maris opened fire on him and then swung his blaster to the other two in the room. Before Ture could blink, they were dead.
Ignoring Bristol, Maris ran to Ture and knelt beside his chair. His hand shaking, he brushed the hair back from Ture’s battered face. “Baby?”
“I knew you’d find me.”
Maris cut his restraints and pulled him into his arms as Darling joined them in the room. “Thank the gods you’re alive.”
“What about this one?” Hauk asked as he covered Bristol with his blaster. “Friend or foe?”
Maris helped Ture to his feet. “Ture?”
“He’s my brother.”
Hauk cut Bristol free while Maris leaned Ture against the wall and inspected his wounds.
Darling checked the corridor for more League soldiers.
Maris clicked on his link. “Caillen? Report?”
“I think we got them all on the way in. You should be free to the shuttle.”
Maris held his hand out to Ture. To his complete shock, Ture grabbed the reserve blaster from his hip and angled it up. Stunned, he couldn’t move to defend himself as the barrel pointed to his head.
Then Ture jerked it and shot behind him.
He turned to see Bristol sinking to the floor as a blaster fell from his hands.
Ture collapsed against him. “He was going to shoot you in the back with the blaster Hauk handed him to defend himself with.”
Slack-jawed, Hauk looked at Darling then Maris and finally Ture. “You said brother.”
Ture swallowed hard. “He was.”
Maris’s heart shattered at those words. For him, Ture had killed his own brother. Before he could stop himself, he opened the face shield on his helmet and kissed him.
“Guys!” Hauk shouted. “We need to get out of here while we can. Put it back in your pants. Let’s go!”
“I still have three charges,” Darling told Hauk. “It should get us to the bay.”
Maris pulled away and made sure to keep Ture by his side as they headed toward their shuttle. Like a mother hen, Darling guarded them while Hauk went first as their scout.
They were halfway there when Caillen’s voice came over the link.
“We have company, and they’re throwing us a welcome party.”
Maris flinched at the sound of blaster fire and Fain’s curses. He closed his face shield, then shrugged his blast resistant jacket off and put it on Ture. It wasn’t as much protection as he’d like, but it was better than nothing. He inclined his head to Hauk to cover them as they moved forward with Darling covering their backs.
When they reached the bay, it was crawling with League personnel. His heart hammering, Maris knew he couldn’t carry Ture with his current wounds, and Ture was in no condition to run. “Hauk? Darling? Take Ture and get him on board. I’ll draw fire.”
Darling cursed at him.
“You sure?” Hauk asked.
“Yeah.”
Ture went pale. “Mari?”
He cupped Ture’s cheek as a wave of regret washed through him.
I want to make it back to you...
But there was a lot of fire power here.
“Go with them, baby. I’ll be right behind you.”
He saw the doubt in Ture’s gray eyes as Hauk took his own jacket off. Tossing Ture over his shoulder, Hauk used his jacket to shield Ture’s legs. “On three I’m running to the shuttle with Ture,” Hauk announced to the Sentella members who were with them. “Don’t shoot us and someone open the damn door.”
“On it,” Caillen said.
Darling pulled out his bombs. “I’ll deflect them with two charges.”
Maris took one last look at Ture’s damaged face and prayed for a miracle. When Hauk hit two, Maris jerked his helmet off so that the League would know he was the primary target they were after. He set it on Ture’s head to protect him then ran into the bay before the others could stop him from doing it.
Darling’s profanity echoed in his ears as Darling tried to cover him.
“Sulle!” one of their enemies shouted before they opened fire.
Darling’s two charges went off, forcing them back temporarily.
Maris ran between ships and docked cargo, away from the shuttle, making sure that the soldiers had a clean line of sight on him.
“Damn it, Mari!” Darling shouted through the link in his ear. “Where did you vanish to? And what the fuck are you doing?”
“Protecting what I love. Don’t worry about me, Darling. I want you to launch as soon as Ture’s on board.”
Darling went into a round of Phrixian curses that would have made Maris’s father proud.
“Hauks, get Darling on that ship even if you have to shoot him. Fain, sit on his ass tight.” Maris ducked as a plasma blast whizzed by his head. “Lock it down and get out.”
Maris ran toward a large stack of boxes. Hitting his knees, he skidded around and opened fire on the soldiers who were closing in on his back. Then he jumped up and dove for cover.
And slammed against a League assassin.
Shit...
He waited for death. Until the assassin opened his helm.
It was Safir, who’d led them here to save Ture.
Maris scowled at his brother. Saf was supposed to have left already. “What are you doing?”
Saf handed him his blaster. “Use me as your shield.”
“Are you insane?”
“No. I’m repaying a blood debt. At least partially. Now, do it, Maris, or I’ll have to kill you.”
Still, he hesitated. “If I do this, you’ll lose your rank.”
“Better than losing my brother.” Saf closed his shield. “Don’t worry about me, Mari. I’ll live. Just get the others out. You know your crew will never leave you here to die and the League will never let any of you live.
Saf was right.
His heart breaking over what he had to do, Maris pulled him into a hug before he stepped around to Saf’s back and grabbed his neck. “Darling? Are you in?”
“On the ramp, looking for your stupid ass. We’re not leaving you, Mari. Ever.”
He’d been a fool to think they would. But then, that was why they were family.
Family hung together, even when it was insane to do so. They didn’t leave each other to die.
“I’m on my way.”
Saf pretended to struggle as Maris dragged him toward the ship. While assassins were trained to kill each other in a situation like this, the men in the bay were foot soldiers. They wouldn’t shoot so long as Maris held one of their own.
“I love you, brother,” he whispered to Saf.
Saf squeezed his arm to let him know he felt the same way.
Maris hesitated as he reached the ramp. Kyr would have Saf beaten and stripped of his rank for this. They both knew it. But if Saf allowed Maris to escape without injury done to him, his punishment would be death.
Pressing his helmet against Saf’s, Maris held his brother close. He wanted to take Saf with him, but that would be even worse. Then Saf would be marked for death and hunted by every assassin the League had. It’d be kinder to shoot him in the head himself than relegate his brother to that fate.
“Shoot him!” Saf yelled to the other soldiers, covering his ass.
When one of the soldiers came close enough, Darling set off his last charge.
As it erupted, Maris pushed Saf away from it and down the ramp. With a deep breath for courage, he shot Saf in the shoulder then ran the rest of the distance up the ramp.
Darling and Hauk met him at the top. Hauk slammed and held him against the steel wall as Caillen launched their ship before the ramp finished closing.
Darling held on to a strap on the opposite side.
Hauk tightened his grip on Maris. “Ture’s strapped in beside Caillen.”
Maris patted his arm. “Thank you, Hauk. For everything.”
“Any time, buddy.”
Darling held his hand out for Maris to take. They didn’t say a word to each other.
They didn’t have to.
Through thick and thin, brothers to the bitter end.
The ship turned sharply as Caillen outmaneuvered their pursuers. How Hauk managed to keep him pinned to the wall, Maris had no idea. Damn, the Andarion was strong.
As they reached escape velocity, Nykyrian, Syn, Nero, Jayne and Fain brought their fighters in to engage the smaller ships after them.
Hauk released him. Maris made his way to the bridge where Chayden provided cover fire while Caillen piloted the ship. He barely saw them as his gaze locked on Ture. Rushing to him, he sank to his knees, threw his arms around Ture’s waist and laid his head in his lap.
Ture brushed his hand through Maris’s damp hair as tears blinded him. “You ever risk your life like that again, and I’ll make Darling beat you.”
“Copy that,” Darling growled. “Only I’m allowed to be that stupid.”
Maris laughed at them. He lifted his head to see Darling going over their settings. “What happened to Saf?”
“He’s en route to the hospital and is suspended, pending investigation.”
“Don’t worry, Mari,” Nykyrian said over the line. “Kyr will have him punished, but he won’t kill him.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. He won’t trust Safir in the foreseeable future. However, he will know that one of two things happened. Either you got the drop on your brother and used him, and you’re not worth the loss of a highly trained assassin who has family loyalty to him. Or Saf helped you, and you now owe a blood debt to him.
That
, Kyr can use to trap you in the future.”
And that was why Nykyrian was still alive, even though the League wanted him dead. It was frightening how much he understood the intricacies of other species and their politics.
Darling glanced over to him and offered a smile. “We also have one of our spies covering Saf’s back. If anyone makes a move on him, we will get him out immediately. I promise you, no one’s going to hurt your brother.”
“Thank you.” Maris looked up at Ture. “Are you all right?”
“Now that you’re safe, I am.”
Maris treasured those words as he forced his thoughts away from the tragedy of the night. The League had dealt them a hard blow.