Chapter 13 Penny
PENNY
The skimmer went over the edge in a burst of speed, and I screamed. I couldn’t help it. The ice-cold air tore the breath from my lungs, and I held tight to the alien who I swear was trying to kill me.
The thrusters kicked in with an unhealthy whine, bouncing the skimmer off the scree-and-ice slope. Varok twisted the controls, pulling us around a rock that would have killed us both, and then struggled to right us before the violent turn threw us off the vehicle.
It’s like a rollercoaster, I told myself.
Better than thinking of it as a death trap I’d stuck us in.
The boosted power of the engine gave Varok just enough control over our descent to avoid one crash after another, but he never had a moment to relax, and I was half-certain he’d slip, killing us both.
Or the engine, deprived of cooling airflow, would overheat. That would kill us just as dead.
We leveled out with a bone-shaking jolt, crossing the road again.
I tried to remember the switchbacks we’d driven up—had there been four?
Five? I didn’t remember. Before I could think, we’d skidded over the far edge.
I screamed, the sudden drop throwing me into the air, my hands scrabbling for something to hold on to.
Varok didn’t even look. He just reached up and grabbed hold of my shoulder, pulling me back into my seat with irresistible strength. His firm grip held me tight, and I wanted to scream at him to put both hands on the controls instead of sparing one for me.
The only reason I bit back my words was that distracting him would kill us both.
Okay, no, that isn’t true. At least as important were the heat of his touch, the strength of his muscles, the electric connection sending tingles through me where his skin met mine.
Catching my breath was impossible, between the fear, the exhilaration, and the desperate need his hand awakened in me.
Again, we crossed the road. I clung on for dear life, but I didn’t need to.
Varok held me, and against his strength, the violence of the ride was nothing.
We plunged down the mountainside, avoiding barren trees and tumbled rocks, and I realized that, against all reason and despite myself, I was having fun.
It was like a rollercoaster—without control, I might as well enjoy the ride.
Even if it killed me, it was better than being torn apart and eaten.
It was almost disappointing to leave the rocky slope, at least for the moment it took our success to register. We’d survived the mountain with only a few scratches and bruises. Both of us laughed giddily as Varok released the controls and the skimmer coasted to a stop.
“Where the fuck to now?” I said once I had my desperate laughter under control. We didn’t have time to spare.
“Your plan, your choice,” Varok said, earning him another glare. He grinned at me, unrepentant. “Penny, you know Wardal as well as I do.”
I couldn’t keep my glare up, so I threw my hands in the air and cursed. “Great. Wonderful. So we’re on the loose in an abandoned city on a hostile planet, freezing, hunted by predators, with no idea where we’re going.”
“That sums it up neatly, yes. Except you forgot to mention the Hive of immortal crystalline insects hunting us. A minor oversight.”
“Does anyone actually like you, Varok?” I wrapped my arms around myself, shivering and trying to think. He laughed again, starting the skimmer moving and shaking his head.
“I’ll hide us in the alleys while we plan our next moves. It would be a pity if they saw us from the sky as they fly overhead.”
His instincts were strong. They had to be, I supposed, given how much he improvised on a heist. We reached cover seconds before a skiff flew past overhead with the barest whisper of air displacement. No chance we’d hear that coming.
“We need to find shelter,” I said. Or tried to. My chattering teeth made words difficult. “Without getting spotted.”
Whether he understood or had the same idea, Varok looked at the buildings beside the alley. Of course, we weren’t that lucky. On our left, the wall had large holes smashed through it, and I saw daylight—not much protection from fliers above us, nor from the elements.
The right looked worse. Only a single standing wall remained of the building that once stood there. This was a city of ruins, not refuge.
“Anywhere offering protection from the elements will probably have some of those predators nesting in it,” Varok mused. “Perhaps we should look for a bank vault?”
That was the hint I needed. A half-formed idea bubbled up from my subconscious, and I fumbled at my kit bag, grabbing my headset. “Debbie, show us the map of the old city.”
The headset chirped as I pulled it on, projecting a hologram in front of us.
Not a detailed map, though I’d tried to find one.
The best I’d managed was an overview, showing districts, long-outdated demographics, and a few still images.
It was, in fact, almost useless. I kept it only because it didn’t take up much space in Debbie’s memory banks.
No such thing as over-prepared, I told myself, manipulating the image with fingers that didn’t shiver. That, if I remembered my first aid training, was an extremely bad sign.
“Here, take us here.” I stabbed a finger into a district that glowed yellow, pulled out an image of a mansion by the edge of a lake.
Varok opened his mouth to ask questions, but Debbie squealed static at him, and he thought better of it.
With a glance at the sky to check for Collectors, he gunned the throttle, and our skimmer was back in motion.
I don’t remember much of the trip. Varok held me close, and his heat consumed my attention. Wrapped in his jacket, pressed tight against him, the blazing fire in his core kept me from freezing solid. It didn’t stop the cold from hurting, though.
“We’re here. Now what?” Varok had to repeat the question twice before it registered.
Looking up, I saw the ruined mansion, barely recognizable from the hologram.
Soot marred the window frames, the weight of ice brought the roof down a hundred years ago or more, and the once-beautiful gardens lay dead and frozen around it.
Behind the mansion, the lake had frozen solid, then cracked. “There’s no cover.”
“Get us inside,” I said, flexing my fingers.
Still working, and they hurt like they were on fire.
A good sign? I hoped so. Varok didn’t argue, driving the skimmer into the mansion’s entrance hall without a word.
The collapsed roof opened to the sky, and the upper levels threatened to fall at the slightest provocation.
The mansion was a death trap. Either I’d find my salvation quickly or I wouldn’t find it at all.
Just as long as the Collectors don’t spot us in the next ten minutes, we’ll be fine. Or dead. I slid down from the skimmer, stumbling over to the wall. One section had survived the disaster far better than the rest, and I grinned.
The rich and powerful never enjoyed feeling vulnerable, especially not in their own homes.
A mansion like this, almost a palace? The owners would need a secure, secret panic room.
I’d raided enough places like it in and around London to be confident that the owners, whoever they’d been, had a vault for surviving any disaster.
That wall would have blended in perfectly when the building was whole—in this ruin, its toughness gave it away.
Except I couldn’t find the mechanism. There had to be a way to open it—a lock, a DNA scanner, whatever it was, I’d hack it. All I needed was to find it.
A gigantic silver hand reached past me, and Varok took hold of the wall.
He pulled, hissing in pain at the effort, and with a scream of tortured metal, the false wall swung away to reveal the heavy door I’d expected to find.
I hadn’t expected to find it open, revealing steps leading down into the darkness below the mansion.
I didn’t pause to question that bit of luck. No scanner to fool or lock to pick? Fine, I’d worry about why later. I stepped down, only to have powerful silver hands haul me back.
“I will go first,” Varok growled, putting me back on the skimmer. “Any danger waiting below will meet an Argentian warrior, not a squishy human. Stay here.”
My hands curled into fists, my cheeks burned, and I glared at him. He wasn’t wrong, he was just being an asshole about it. “Fuck you, I’m not freezing to death while you get yourself killed.”
“One of us has to go first.”
Instead of replying, I plucked Debbie from my kit bag and threw the drone down the stairs. Images popped up in front of my eyes, a nausea-inducing spinning view of the dark stone walls as the drone steadied herself. I might have thrown her with a bit more force than strictly necessary.
Varok growled, shrugged, and turned away. “Fine. That is a better idea.”
That admission was more than I’d expected from the proud warrior, and my blush intensified. The warm glow of satisfaction almost made up for the biting cold.
“First room’s clear,” I announced, and Varok grabbed the controls. The skimmer scraped the doorframe, but once inside, it glided down into the safety of the vault below.
Maybe our movement did it, or our body heat.
Something about us triggered a sensor, and the vault doors swung shut behind us.
Vents on the wall and ceiling opened to blast warm air, and I tumbled off the skimmer to lie under one, soaking up the heat.
I didn’t care about the faint burning smell, or the hard concrete floor.
I felt warm again. That made up for everything else.
Lights flickered on, some failing, the rest too bright. I raised a hand to shield my eyes, but Varok’s shadow eclipsed everything as he stood, looking down at me with a grin so wide I thought his head might split in two.
“Comfortable?”
“Fuck you,” I said, and wished I hadn’t. The suggestion was all too easy to take literally, and his smile widened. My blush deepened, which I wouldn’t have thought possible, and I tried to tell him that wasn’t what I meant.
Isn’t it? My inner voice sounded amused, and I couldn’t think of a reply.
Neither, it seemed, could Varok. I expected a teasing quip, some innuendo, but his smile faded, replaced by a serious expression. Seconds dragged out like the rise and fall of empires, then he snarled wordlessly, turned, and walked away.
Confused and mortified, I watched him go and wondered how I’d upset him.