Not the Man She Thought (13 page)

Her eyes darted to the door. Could she get past Brantly
before his partner came back?

She didn’t have time to find out the answer to that because
just then the door opened again. Brantly’s partner was back, along with another
man she didn’t recognize. Tall and heavily muscled, the newcomer had a cruel
look about him that made Laken take a nervous step back. Two more men stood
outside the door, their gazes appraising as they looked her up and down.

“Enak,” Brantly said, offering his hand to the big man.

“You’ve outdone yourself this time,” the man said. “She’s
beautiful. Absolutely perfect.”

Heart pounding in her chest, Laken immediately back-pedaled,
edging around the nightstand as she moved away from him. With the wall at her
back and the men blocking the doorway, though, she was trapped, and there was
nothing she could do but stand there as Enak reached out and grasped her chin.

She jerked away from him. “Don’t touch me.”

Enak laughed. “Not only beautiful, but feisty, too. Just the
way I like it. I’ll take her.”

Brantly smiled. “Excellent.”

Laken’s eyes went wide. “Like hell! You’re not taking me
anywhere.”

Enak grinned down at her. “I can do anything I damn well
please. You belong to me now, little girl.”

She shook her head. “No! You can’t do this to me!”

Enak ignored her. He glanced at the two men in the hallway
and gave them a nod. They immediately came into the room. One held some kind of
injection gun in his hand, and he shoved a cartridge of liquid in the chamber
as he walked toward her. Her eyes darted frantically toward the door again.

“M-my father is a merchant with the Federation,” she said,
desperately trying to evade the men. The one without the gun grabbed her
shoulders, holding onto her easily while the other man pressed the nozzle of
the gun against her arm. “Please. He’ll pay you whatever you want. Please...”

But the rest of her words trailed off as the drug the man
gave her made everything go black.

* * * * *

Rade clenched his jaw as he stared down at the holo-screen.
It had taken Dev a while to hack into the nightclub’s computers and even longer
to go through all the footage from the security cameras, but she had finally
managed to track down a name to go with the face. According to local police
files, his name was Grant Landers, but he had a whole host of aliases,
including names like Stanton, McCleavy and Vlanders. Worse, there was a whole
list of crimes to go with those phony names. Dev had been right. The guy was
definitely shady. And Laken had left with him. That had been nearly twenty-four
hours ago. Who knew what had happened since then?

Kam’s voice came over the ship’s com just then, interrupting
his thoughts. “ETA in ten minutes, Captain.”

Rade stared at the holo-pic of Landers for another moment,
then grabbed his personal communicator and left the cabin.

Keir, Vance, Jorn and Finn were waiting for him down in the
cargo hold. He eyed Jorn for a moment, but at the determined look on the other
man’s face, Rade said nothing. Even healing from an injury, Jorn was better
than most men in a fight.

It was a short trip to the address listed in Landers’ police
file. When they got there, Rade wondered if they had the right place. It looked
like it belonged to an upstanding, wealthy citizen, not a common thug. Then
again, Landers’ file had indicated he was currently involved in the human slave
trade, so he could definitely afford a place like this. Rade clenched his jaw
at the thought of what Landers had down to Laken. If he hurt her in any way,
Rade would leave the bastard dead in his own overpriced house.

Rade drew his weapon as he walked up to the front door. Keir
and Vance followed behind him, while Jorn went around to the back of the house.
Finn stood across the street keeping an eye out for trouble.

Glancing over his shoulder at Keir and Vance, Rade lifted
his hand and knocked on the ornate door. No one answered. Rade was debating
whether he should knock again or just kick in the damn thing when it opened a
crack. Unfortunately, the man standing on the other side of it wasn’t Landers.
Shit.

Rade started to put his gun away, but then hesitated when he
recognized the man. It was the asshole who had been trying to hit on Laken at
the club.

Tightening his grip on his weapon, Rade slammed his shoulder
into the door, knocking the man backward. Grabbing hold of the front of his
shirt, Rade shoved until the man was all the way across the foyer and wedged up
against the opposite wall. Pushing his forearm against the man’s throat, he
slowly placed the barrel of his pistol square in the center of the man’s
forehead.

“Landers,” he ground out. “Where is he?”

The man’s beady eyes clouded in confusion. Then they darted
behind Rade to where Keir and Vance were standing.

“Wh-who? I-I think you made a mistake,” he stammered. “I
don’t know anyone named Landers.”

“Like hell you don’t,” Rade snarled. He rattled off the
half-dozen aliases he remembered until recognition shown in the man’s eyes. “So
you do know him. Where is he? And don’t even think about lying to me or I’ll
shoot you right here and go looking for him myself.”

The man swallowed nervously. “Upstairs. He’s upstairs.
Second door on your right.”

Lip curling, Rade let the man go and headed for the stairs.
Keir took hold of the man and shoved him out the door, while Vance followed
Rade upstairs.

Rade moved quickly down the hallway, less concerned about
making noise than getting to Landers. When he got to the second door on the
right, he didn’t check to see if it was unlocked, but instead kicked it open
and strode inside. Lander was standing in front of a full-length mirror, and he
spun around, his hands poised in the act of unbuttoning his shirt.

Rade advanced on the other man, weapon steady in his hand as
he leveled it at Landers’ chest. “One simple question. Answer correctly, and I
won’t kill you. Where is Laken Andara?”

Landers didn’t even so much as look at the gun that Rade had
pointed at him. “There must be some misunderstanding. I don’t know any Laken
Andara.”

“Wrong answer,” Rade said. Lifting his arm, he backhanded
the man with his pistol, knocking him backward. Rade caught him before he hit
the floor and slammed him against the wall, shoving the barrel of his gun under
the man’s chin.

“You should have just answered my question,” he said. “Not
that it matters, I suppose. If you don’t give me the information, then I’ll get
it from your friend downstairs. After I kill you.”

Rade thumbed back the charging lever. The pistol began to
hum as it charged to a higher level. The move was completely unnecessary since,
but the sound had the desired effect. Landers went into grovel-mode
immediately.

“She’s not here.”

“Where is she?”

Landers hesitated. “The buyer picked her up this morning.”

Rade clenched his jaw and shoved the gun into the underside
of the man’s chin so hard that it bent Lander’s head backward. The man winced.

“That’s not an answer to my question,” Rade snarled. “Where
is she?”

“The buyer left with her hours ago,” Landers said, voice
trembling. “He lives on Yerel.”

Shit. Yerel was almost two days away, on the far side of the
system. Not only that, but it was in the opposite direction from where they
needed to be. If he went after Laken, he would almost certainly be late for his
rendezvous on Marlon Prime.

“What’s this buyer’s name?”

Landers swallowed hard. “Huden Enak.”

Rade shoved the man away with a growl. “If you’re lying to
me, I’ll be back for you. And next time, I will kill you.”

  
Turning
on his heel, Rade strode out of the room. He looked at Vance as they headed
downstairs. “Get on the com and let Kam where we’re going.”

  
Rade
swore silently. This was not the worst outcome he could have expected, but it
was pretty damn close. The only thing that kept it from being a complete
disaster was the hope that Enak wouldn’t hurt Laken while he had her on board
his ship. A scumbag like that would probably want to savor the moment until he
got back to the privacy of his home. That meant Rade only had to make up six or
eight hours of lead time. Though God knew, a lot could happen in that amount of
time.

* * * * *

Laken felt like she was drowning in a sea of confusion. She
had no idea how much time passed because there were no clocks in the small room
she was kept in, and they had taken her watch along with the rest of her
jewelry. It wouldn’t have helped anyway. She wasn’t sure she could even have read
a clock after all the drugs they’d pumped into her. She had no idea why they
kept her drugged because when she did wake up, she had no idea where she was
most of the time anyway, but every time she climbed her way out of the fog,
they would come back with another injection.

The times she was lucid, she considered trying to escape,
but then knew that was foolish, especially since she probably couldn’t even
walk ten feet without falling down. Besides, she was on a ship. Where would she
go?

  
Since
escape was out of the question, her mind turned to thoughts of rescue. To her
surprise, she didn’t imagine Mallin coming to save her, but Rade. She even
convinced herself that at any moment, he would come bursting through the door
to sweep her up in his arms and take her away to safety.

But every time the door opened, it was one of Enak’s men
with another dose of drugs.

When she finally came come out of her drug-induced haze, it
was to find herself no longer on a ship, but in a small room. It was dimly lit
by a small bulb in the center of the ceiling, but even that was enough to make
her head hurt and her eyes tear. She winced and closed them again.

A moment later, she felt a hand brush her hair back from her
face. Terrified it was Enak, she jerked upright, scrambling across the floor to
get as far away from him as she could. But it was only another woman. Blond and
pretty with blue eyes, she was around the same age as Laken.

“Who are you?” Laken asked, her voice trembling. “Where am
I?”

“My name is Pammay,” the woman said. “And you are in Enak’s
house.”

Laken looked around the room. “H-how long have I been here?”

“Not long,” Pammay said. “I saw them bring you in a few
hours ago. I came to see if you were okay.”

Laken pressed her hand to her forehead. The rapid move
across the room had cost her, and her head had started to throb again. “My head
is pounding. What did they give me?”

The girl got up and walked over to her, only to stop when
Laken scooted across the floor to get away from her.

“I’m not sure what it was, but if it was the same thing they
gave me, then it will wear off quickly,” Pammay said.

Laken’s brow furrowed. “You were drugged, too?” The other
woman nodded. “How long have you been here?”

Pammay looked away, her eyes filling with pain. “I’m not
sure, but it’s been a long time. Two years, maybe.”

Laken’s eyes went wide. “Two years. Why hasn’t anyone tried
to rescue you?”

“There was no one to know I’d been captured. It’s why Enak
picked me. He usually takes girls who won’t be missed.”

“Girls?” Laken echoed. “How many of us are there?”

“Since I’ve been here, there have been many,” Pammay said.
“Maybe six or seven besides myself. Enak grew tired of them, though, and
they’re all gone now.”

Laken frowned. “What happened to them?”

Pammay shrugged. “I don’t know. One day they were here, the
next they weren’t.”

Laken could only imagine what Enak had done to the girls
before he had gotten rid of them, and she looked at Pammay with pity. Laken
knew she would go out of her mind if she had to be at the mercy of a man like
Enak for as long as the other woman had.

“Why haven’t you tried to escape?” she asked.

“I did try. We all tried at some point. But Yerel is a slave
planet. There is no escape from here.”

Laken frowned again. She had never heard of a slave planet;
she didn’t think a place like that could exist. “But there has to be a way to
get out of here.”

Pammay’s eyes shimmered with tears. “There is no way out,
and even if we were to get away, the fate that awaits a runaway slave is much
worse than what Enak could ever do to us.”

Laken wanted to press the girl for details, unable to
believe that anything could be worse than what Enak could do to her, but it was
obvious Pammay was too terrified to talk about it. The other woman was so
scared of what might happen to her if she tried to escape that she was willing
to stay there regardless of what Enak did to her.