Gabriel's Ghost (15 page)

Yet there was an intensity in his gaze that told me that, in spite of all the turmoil swirling around us, this unanswered question mattered as much. Or more.

Mine. Could I risk that, again? He was a man I’d known for years, yet didn’t know. Our interactions had often been colored with flirtatious innuendoes. But they’d just as often hinted at something deeper. And not just since he’d pulled me off Moabar. It was something I’d always felt. Even when he was my constant adversary. And I was his beautiful interfering bitch.

“You okay?” he asked softly.

Kingswell kicked the bulkhead again. But at least he’d stopped grunting.

“Yeah,” I said. And took a risk, chanced it. I brushed my fingers across his mouth. Watched surprise flash across his features, watched obsidian turn molten.

His hand curled around mine, his lips warm against the pulse on my wrist. Then another few inches and his lips were against my mouth, hesitantly, not like last night’s demanding kiss. But tasting, testing. Exploring.

I explored back. Heat fluttered on velvet wings around my heart.

Thump-thump-THUD-thump. Not my heart, but Kingswell’s boots.

“Damn him,” he said, but he was grinning a Sully-grin, full of confidence, like the true handsome bastard he was. “You’re distracting enough.”

“So are you.” Heat rose to my face. I touched his mouth again. A surprising warmth tumbled through my fingers, down my arm. God, how the man affected me! But I couldn’t afford further distractions.

“And we’ve still got work to do.” I pulled my hand away, keyed in a slight course change toward the jumpgate. Risked one more heated glance.

“We make a good team,” he said softly.

I returned my focus to the data on my screens. We had one last item to attend to before we hit the gate. Kingswell and the lieutenant had to be placed in the escape pod. They’d be rescued within twenty-four hours. The pods were rigged to last a week.

Of course, twenty-four hours in a small pod with Kingswell might feel like a week.

Megan Sybil Baker - 71

Sully straightened a bit, surveying the bridge in a proprietary fashion, but kept his voice soft. “Nice ship. Always liked it.”

I cuffed him lightly on the arm. “Gee, thanks.”

“I always liked her captain more.” He caught my hand, folded it in his own.

I was about to comment that hijacking freighters in my sector was a strange way of showing that when Ren came over and leaned on the other armrest. I felt as if two tall trees flanked me.

“The robe was a kind gesture,” I told him.

“She’s very afraid.”

“Bad rainbow time?”

“She believes we mean to kill her.”

“You have my permission to tell her we won’t. Will that help?” I realized Ren was on a small bridge with two people whose fearful emotions probably churned out of control. And two more who had adrenaline and hormones pumping. It probably like having four nonstop red-alert sirens blaring.

“Tell her she has my sincerest apologies, not only for her current inconvenience. But more so for the necessity of placing her in an escape pod with Captain Kingswell.” Thump-thud-thump still resounded behind me.

“I will convey that. Thank you.”

I swiveled halfway around to watch him as he knelt behind the young woman, careful not to touch her. His head angled down as he spoke to her, his words inaudible.

A few hesitant nods of the curly-haired head. Then Ren sat, silently. Praying, perhaps. Or meditating. Or just sitting.

An abrupt movement behind Sully caught my attention.

Kingswell. No longer wedged against the bulkhead. Somehow in his squirming and kicking, he’d turned. He was flat on his back and glaring at me. He grunted two sharp syllables through the gauze stuffed in his mouth. But I heard them as clearly as if he’d said them on intraship.

Berg. Gren.

The identification was absolute.

Sully clenched his fist. “Now we’ve got problems.”

* * *

Twenty-two minutes to the jumpgate’s outer beacon. We had to get Kingswell and the lieutenant strapped in the pod and jettison them before we went through. But Kingswell had recognized me, would tell Fleet that Chasidah Bergren was no longer on Moabar, but had possession of an Imperial P40. And that she had help in the form of two males, one human, one Stolorth.

If Kingswell had recognized Sully he didn’t say, or rather grunt confirmation when Ren and Sully hoisted him into the open corridor just behind the bridge. I didn’t think he would. Sully had always been my territory. Kingswell, a few years behind me in the Academy, had never worked patrol. He’d flown a desk on Starport 6 in Baris, the
Meritorious’
s homeport. That’s how I’d known him. Sucking up to the brass and pushing around thin-shouldered ensigns had taken up most of his time. Patrol duties would’ve interfere with that. And just might get his impeccable uniform dirty.

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Besides, Kingswell was too busy staring at Ren to pay much attention to Sully when they laid him on the floor of the corridor, in front of the escape pod hatch. Every training vid Fleet had on Stolorth
Ragkirils
was no doubt replaying through his mind.

My own was snagged, looping like a fractured computer program on a decision I didn’t want to make.

I couldn’t let Kingswell tell what he’d seen.

But I couldn’t kill him without destroying a part of myself.

I stood at the apex of the bridge, in front of my chair, arms folded across my chest. Kingswell glared at me from the corridor, but he was still cuffed and gagged.

Ren propped the young woman into a sitting position across from Kingswell then came back to where Sully and I stood. We talked softly, but not to hide my identity anymore.

“The news will hit Marker before we will,” Sully said. His hand on my arm was meant to be reassuring. “You know that. You know we have no choice.”

“Fifteen people, fifteen innocent people have already died because of me. Sixteen if you count the Taka. I don’t want one more.”

“You had to kill the Taka, in defense. This isn’t anything different—”

“Damn it, it is! The Taka attacked me. Kingswell’s here by happenstance. And what about the lieutenant? She doesn’t know me, but she’ll know he does. Do we put two dead bodies in the pod?” I swung away from Sully, abruptly dislodging his hand and stared out the forward viewports at a starfield that I’d always found comforting before. Now it looked cold, threatening.

I felt the heat of his body as he moved up behind me. “A trank overdose would be painless.” He ran his hands down my arms, threaded the fingers of his right hand through mine and squeezed lightly.

I shook my head. “They’re still my kills. Dirty kills. I’m not a wanton murderer. Neither are you. I don’t want us to be like them. Like the ones at Marker.”

There was a moment of silence where all I felt was Sully, breathing against my hair. My own heart pounding, angry, confused.

“There is an option,” Ren said softly.

I turned to him. Sully did the same. The gentleness on Sully’s face hardened, brows slanting. He drew in a sharp breath and pulled his hand out of mine. “No.”

Something that felt like fear prickled at my skin where his hand had held my own.

Ren’s face tilted slightly. “Are you not asking Chasidah to make a worse sacrifice? To be something she’s not?”

“It’s not remotely the same.” Sully’s answer was clipped, harsh.

“No. Her risk is greater. The option you’re giving her violates what she truly is. The option I’m suggesting does not.”

“What?” I glanced rapidly from Ren to Sully. “What option?”

“It’s not an option.”

“It is.”

“Damn you, not now!” A viciousness filled Sully’s voice. It was directed at Ren.

“What not now?” Something felt very wrong. I touched Sully’s arm but he didn’t look at me, wouldn’t take his gaze from Ren’s clouded one.

“She will eventually know.” Ren’s soft, calm voice was the complete opposite of Sully’s.

“Shut the fuck up.” Sully jerked away from me, grabbed for the back of my chair. He tried to push past Ren. But the Stolorth gripped Sully’s forearm, hard. The skin on Ren’s knuckles

Megan Sybil Baker - 73

whitened. The muscles of Sully’s arm bulged under the black fabric as he twisted back around, brought his fist up, clenched. Cold, angry fear hardened obsidian eyes into two chips of black ice.

“Risks,” Ren said softly.

Sully was breathing hard, his mouth a taut line. My heart pounded, my hands suddenly clammy. Rainbows, very dark, ugly storm-filled rainbows hung between the three of us. I couldn’t see them, but I could feel them.

Sully lowered his arm, flexed his fingers. His gaze locked on Ren’s.

I glanced at the console on my left. Fifteen minutes to outer beacon. “What option?” My voice shook.

Ren released his grip.

Sully shot a quick glance toward the corridor where Kingswell glared at us, and the curly-haired lieutenant leaned wearily against the bulkhead, an Englarian monk’s robe wrapped around her shoulders, her face pale.

He shoved his hands in the pockets of his pants, stared down at his boots for a moment. When he brought his gaze up, his eyes were shadowed again. “Mind-wipe,” he said. “Kingswell’s, and the woman’s. Their memories of all this can be erased.”

Fear slammed through me like a ship hitting a jumpgate cold. He’d lied. Ren had lied. Even blind, the Stolorth could rip minds apart, shred them. Destroy them. He wasn’t a harmless empath. He was a
Ragkiril
. I closed my eyes, willed my heart to stop hammering in my chest, ignored the nauseous feeling in my stomach.

Grabbed for facts.

I knew Ren. Granted, only for a few days but even in that short time he’d been nothing but gentle. Calm. Controlled. Logically, I had more reason to fear Sully. Known terrorist, smuggler, mercenary. A passionate, volatile man. Angry, for valid reasons, he’d said when I’d called him Gabriel. Gabriel Ross Sullivan. Poet. Warrior. Lover.

But it would be Ren doing the mind-wipe. He would be considerate, if such a thing even existed in tandem with the destruction of a mind. The thought sickened me, but Ren was right. It was the only option. It left them both alive. Murder sickened me worse.

I opened my eyes, took a steadying breath. “I need to know two things. First, is it painful?” I was concerned for the young lieutenant. She was the most innocent. Kingswell could do with a little discomfort. “Second, how much damage will it do? Turning them into vegetables is not an acceptable option.”

Sully glanced at Ren, then answered. “It doesn’t have to be painful, no. It won’t be. It’s
zral
, a memory-wipe. Not
zragkor
.”

I remembered the Stolorth words from my training.
Zragkor
. Mind-death. Hideous. Painful. Terrifying. Complete. It took a
Ragkiril’s
telepathic link to perform a
zragkor
.

But not for a
zral
. It was easy to forget the distinction between the two. Ren, blind, couldn’t do a
zragkor
. But he evidently could perform a
zral
. Still an invasion of the only thing we humans feel is totally our own: our minds, our thoughts. But it wasn’t a total emptiness, a total negation of the person. Something would remain.

I hated the words even as I said them. “You’ve got ten minutes, Ren. Twelve max.”

“I cannot do a
zral
, Chasidah.”

“But you just said....”

But he hadn’t. Sully had said. Mind wipe.

Sully.

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An abysmal, foul cold wave gripped me. I forced myself to look at the man I knew, but didn’t know at all. Gabriel Ross Sullivan.

Obsidian eyes like ice. Hands jammed in pockets. And a mind that could shatter another’s with the force of a thought, a touch.

“Ten’s all I need.” His voice was hoarse.

He spun around and strode toward the corridor.

Chapter Eleven

I sat hunched over in the command chair, elbows on my knees, my chin resting on my hands. My fingers were steepled over my mouth as if holding back words I couldn’t bear to say. Words that stabbed my mind as if they were carved out of ice.

Sully. Mind-wipe.
“He will need my help getting them into the pod.” Ren touched my shoulder.
I nodded.
“Chasidah.”
I shook my head. Chasidah wasn’t here right now. She was on a little trip, looking for

someplace warm and safe and quiet. Someplace no one would ever find her. Someplace with no

ghosts, no handsome bastards. Someplace with no mirrors, reflecting back the face of a fool. Ren left, closing the hatchway of the bridge behind him. I breathed a shuddering breath against my hands, straightened. Mechanically, I checked all

screens and monitors. We were on course for the jumpgate. All systems optimal. Good ship, a P40. A light flashed, a soft double-chime. Two minutes to jumpgate outer beacon. Where had the

time gone? Must be having fun. Three chimes. The quintessential beacon calling-card. I keyed back my answer. Hello out there. Nice to meet you. Have any minds you need destroyed? We’re having a sale. My hands shook. I clutched them to my midsection, doubled over. Took long, deep breaths. I can deal with this. Just as I accepted Ren as an empath. I can deal with this.

I straightened. We are, after all, on the same side, aren’t we? A team? Friends? Not lovers, no, not that. It’d been only a kiss or two. Nothing serious. A few overly emotional moments resulting in some playful behavior.

And besides, Sully wasn’t doing a
zragkor
. Just a blanking of a small part of memory. He

wasn’t, he couldn’t be, a
Ragkiril
. Just an empath. Like Ren, only human. And Ren’s okay. I can deal with this. I can. The hatchway cycled open, admitting the sound of footsteps. I didn’t turn around. Ren’s voice sounded gentle, like raindrops pattering against a placid stream. “They’re in the

pod. Secure. Comfortable.” I tapped the screen, brought engine controls to my keypad, decreased power. Engines cycled down past one-quarter sublight. I angled thrusters, arcing us around the beacon. I tabbed on intraship, spoke to my invisible crew. My ghosts. “Stand clear. Pod clamps releasing—”