Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
She looked normal, felt mostly normal.
Eos looked at herself in the mirror as she pulled on her black cargo pants and an olive-green shirt. A quick twist and her hair was back in its usual ponytail. Okay, maybe she didn’t feel quite back to normal.
She pressed a hand to her jumpy belly. Her time on Lucifa lurked in the back of her head, but what she and Dathan had done in that bath blazed at the front.
Suva, she’d never felt passion like that. She’d expected hot, sweaty, and pleasurable. Not intense and soul destroying.
But he hadn’t wanted her enough to make love to her.
Reaching up, she tightened her hair tie, ignoring the hard knot in her chest. He’d done her a huge favor. Any intimacy with Dathan Phoenix would be temporary. She knew she was just part of this adventure.
When the next adventure—and the next woman—came along, he’d be off.
She wanted more than that. She deserved more than that.
Enough thinking of Dathan Phoenix. Soon they’d reach Beta7. They needed a plan on how to uncover the colony.
When she stepped into the main part of the ship, she wondered if she had “Dathan just gave me a fantastic orgasm” written all over her face.
Her gaze was drawn to him. He stood at the doorway into the cockpit, a Sync in hand. His head snapped up, his gaze unreadable. But then she saw a flare in the blue and it made her tingle.
She deliberately looked away.
“Eos?” Niklas stood over a holo-table—a smaller version of what they had in Mission Control on Khan. “If you’re feeling better, how about you help me go over these records on the treasures of the New Louvre?”
She nodded, grateful for the distraction, and before long was immersed in the records.
“Some of these I’ve never seen before.” She tapped the table, looking at the scanned records. “Where did you get these? They should be in the Institute Archives.”
Niklas coughed. “How about we leave it at, you don’t want to know?”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine.” She studied his serious face. He was more rugged than Dathan, with a squarer jaw and a more studious look to him. “You really don’t miss the Institute?”
He paused, considering. “I thought I did at first. Mainly I was just angry.” His gaze flicked up to hers. “And no, I don’t want to talk about what happened. Let’s just say I had a falling out with the powers that be.”
“You’re better off without the narrow-minded bastards,” Dathan said.
Eos had always wondered what having a brother or sister would be like. Looking at the Phoenix brothers made her realize it was something special. They might be rogues, but whatever happened, they were there for each other. No matter what.
Niklas shrugged. “Besides, I’ve seen some pretty amazing things I would never have seen if I’d stayed at the Institute. I got to hold a starglobe in my own hands.”
Her mouth dropped open. “No.”
“Yes.” He looked down at the holo-table. “And I plucked an Egyptian canopic jar from the rubble of Selene City on Genysis.”
She stilled. “A canopic jar? From the New Louvre collection?”
“Yep.”
“Had to be a fake.”
“I authenticated it myself. The comet collision survivors said a man came to Genysis long ago and had it with him. He claimed to be a descendant from Earth, but they never believed him.”
“What happened to the jar?”
“We sold it.”
Her head jerked up. “What?”
He shrugged again. “To the Xi’an Museum. We need to eat and fuel our ship. I can’t keep everything.”
She tapped a finger against the holo-table. At least the Xi’an was a reputable establishment. “Okay, well, let’s see what else we might find hidden at Star’s End.”
She lost track of time. The records Nik had pieced together were impressive. Realizing how much closer she was to the treasure made her tremble. If she found it…the Institute would come crawling back to her. Groveling over their mistake not to back her expedition.
And she’d finally hold pieces of the history her mother had dedicated her life to piecing back together.
But even absorbed by history, she never lost track of Dathan. She felt so attuned to him, and every time he moved, she was aware. When he wasn’t looking, she watched the flex of muscles under his shirt.
“Beta7’s coming into view.”
Zayn’s voice jolted Eos. She spun and saw Dathan and Nik already moving into the cockpit.
Heart in her throat, she stepped forward.
Dathan’s shoulder bumped hers. “What do you think, Doc?”
The first thing she noticed was the planet. Amoris was a beautiful blue-gray with spectacular rings. Then she saw Beta7.
It was beautiful, too. The small moon was covered in bright-red sand. It glowed like a rubia from the mines in southern Vedia. “I can’t believe we’re here.”
BEll’s snort echoed through the cockpit. “I never thought we’d get here either, Dr. Rai. Not with you on board. Technically, you were kidnapped twice.”
“Thanks for the reminder, you insensitive tin can,” Dathan muttered.
BEll was unperturbed. “Just stating the facts.”
“Can you run the scans, BEll?” Eos moved closer to the cockpit windows and pressed one finger to the synth-glass. “Focus on the coordinates I uploaded.”
“Already running.”
So close. She could already imagine holding the Mona Lisa fragment in her hands. Everything had been worth it.
There was a discreet ding. “Scans are finished,” BEll said.
“Display the results,” Dathan said.
“I can’t comply.”
Eos frowned. “Why not?”
“There’s nothing to display.”
The computer’s cheery voice was starting to grate. “What do you mean?”
“There are no signs of any ruins. No colony, no previous humanoid occupation.”
Eos shook her head, her stomach curdling. “Check again. You’re wrong.”
“BEll’s never wrong, Eos,” Zayn said, his face serious.
She wrapped her arms around her middle. “The mining scans showed the remnants of a colony.”
Niklas slammed his palm against one of the chairs. “Maybe they mis-labelled the scans.”
Eos held up a hand. “No—”
“Or we just saw what we wanted to see.” Dathan shook his head, mouth set in a flat line. “There’s nothing on this moon but sand. And below that, more sand.”
Dathan sat on the peak of a red dune and looked up at a sky of the purest blue.
In the distance the round ball of the sun was burning its way through the afternoon. A distant second sun followed behind like it didn’t want to be left out.
He looked down. Red sand stretched to the horizon. No mountains, no habitation, just unforgiving sand as far as he could see. And the weird, and very dead, vegetation.
The thin, twisting trunks of dead trees rose to the sky, like starving women with their arms outstretched. Small clumps of dried grass were scattered here and there.
He watched Eos march across the surface, her scarred boots kicking at the ground. He could smell her frustration.
The shuttle sat several meters away, Z leaning against it.
Niklas was also looking around, stopping every now and then to brush at the ground.
Dathan broke off a piece of grass and stuck it in his mouth.
He chewed and watched Eos kick up more sand.
She stopped and scooped up a handful, watching the tiny grains trickle through her fingers.
It hurt to get so close to what you wanted and then realize it was out of your grasp. His teeth clicked together. Damn, Eos was turning his brain to mush. Sexual frustration was riding him hard. He should have tumbled her when he had the chance.
But he’d wanted to look after her, not take advantage of her.
When he made love to Eos, he wanted her to be there because she wanted him. One hundred percent. Not because she was trying to chase away fear and bad memories.
She turned and climbed the dune. When she reached him, she shoved her hands on her hips. “It’s got to be here.”
He tugged the grass from his mouth. “Maybe the mining company sold you dud scans.”
She shook her head fiercely. “No. I know it’s here.”
“Where are your beloved facts, Dr. Rai?”
She huffed out a breath, her arms falling to her sides. “I don’t have any. Maybe I just want it too much.”
“Sit down.” He gripped her hand and pulled her down beside him. “Treasure hunts are never as easy or simple as you think. When you first start out, it’s with a bright burst of hope and excitement. But the journey takes its toll.”
“You don’t think it’s here.” She bent her legs and rested her wrists on her knees.
He studied the lovely profile of her face. “Oh, its here.”
Her head snapped around. “What?”
He chewed on the end of the grass a bit more. “Everyone has a talent. Some people are born to be pilots, some play Crossfire, others have a good hand at VelocityBall. You, Doc, have a lot of brains. Me, I can sense treasure at a stellar mile.”
She looked out at the dunes around them. “You think Star’s End is here?”
“Don’t know if it’s Star’s End, but there’s treasure.
I can feel it, like a distant heartbeat.
I can hear the wind whisper of rich secrets.
” He shrugged, heat filling his cheeks. He sounded like some bad poet.
“My father could sniff out treasure. Seems I have more of his genes than I’d like to admit. ”
Dathan felt her looking at him now, but he kept his gaze firmly on the sand.
“You didn’t get along?” she asked.
“Once, he was my hero.” God, that was a long time ago. Before Dathan had learned that life rarely gave you what you wanted. “After my mother got sick of life on a crappy desert world and left…he turned bitter.”
“You lost your mother too.” Her tone softened.
He shrugged. “I don’t really remember her. We were young. Brocken Phoenix turned to drinking instead of being a father.” Dathan sucked in a breath. “Nothing I did ever seemed to make him happy. We worked together, so I was a convenient target for his frustration.”
Eos gasped. “He hit you?”
“No. A few drunken slaps, but by the time I was fifteen I was as big as him. He learned quickly that I could defend myself.”
“Your brothers?”
“Nik was away at school. He’d gotten a scholarship. Zayn joined the Galactic Strike Wing Academy at fifteen.” Damn, they’d made him proud.
“So it was just you and your father.” Her hand pressed to Dathan’s arm.
“Some days, usually after a successful hunt, he’d be the dad I’d once known. But most of the time, the hunts went bad. He’d be drunk, wouldn’t plan, he’d take stupid risks. He’d look at me with such bitterness.”
“You reminded him of what he could have been.”
Her words startled Dathan. He’d never thought of that. He looked into her golden eyes shimmering with sympathy. For him. “Maybe. I look like him.”
“You think you’re like him?”
Dathan’s hands curled. “I’m so much like him, I hate it.”
“No.” She shifted onto her knees. “He was a quitter. It sounds like he wasn’t the father he should have been, and he never succeeded, while you’ve turned treasure hunting into a viable business. I might not always agree with your profession, Dathan, but you’re the best in the galaxy.”
He shrugged a shoulder.
She cupped his cheeks, made him look at her. “And you’d never hit someone weaker and smaller than you. All I’ve ever seen you do is look out for those who need your help.”
“Eos, I think you see things in me that just aren’t there.”
“Those street kids on Souk? And I know you overpaid Sel.” Her voice lowered. “Me.”
“Don’t try and turn me into a hero.”
She sank back. “Don’t worry, I won’t expect more than you can give.” She looked down the dune. At the place where her colony should lie. “I’ve always remembered my mother as my hero. I never learned her flaws, her weaknesses. She’ll always be perfect to me. But I know that no one is perfect.”
He stared into her golden eyes. She was right. No one was perfect. He knew that better than anyone.
“But she left her young child and took risks that stole her life.” Eos glanced at him. “And your father, he didn’t protect and love those who depended on him. They were selfish.”
Dathan rubbed a hand against his chest. Didn’t she see that he was the same?
She ran her fingers through the sand. “So, if the treasure’s here, how come BEll’s scans can’t find it?”
He stood, held out a hand and tugged her up. “Well, either BEll is broken…”
“Wouldn’t Zayn know if she was broken?”
“Yep. He’d know in an instant.” Dathan tapped the grass against his lips. “I’d say something or someone is jamming her scanning ability.”
Eos blinked. “Who?”
“My money’s on Darc.” He moved toward the shuttle. “Let’s go hunting.”
It took three hours of searching the interior and exterior hull of the Infinitas to find the nano scrambler.
Zayn had a few choice words to say, and Niklas looked mad. Dathan eyed the tiny device. “I guess Darc’s ploy to ‘kidnap’ Eos was just a distraction to get the scrambler onto the ship.”
“I carried it on?” Eos squeaked.
“Probably tagged you with it and it deployed within a certain distance to the ship.”
“She’s good.” There was reluctant admiration in Eos’ voice. “Why didn’t we detect it?”
“Because Darc is very good.” Niklas shifted and took the bug. “This doesn’t look like any tech I’ve seen before. Darc’s been stealing some military-grade stuff, I’d guess.” He crushed it under his boot.
BEll made a huffing noise. “Well, I’ve taken scans of the scrambler and am already updating the ship database. She won’t catch us with that again.”
Dathan turned to the holo-table. “Speaking of scans, BEll, run the area scans again.”
“Ruins of a colony housing approximately two thousand humanoids five meters under the sand. Some buildings appear intact.”
Eos leaned forward. “Intact? No damage at all?”
“Correct.”
“Can you detect any wood? Any gold?”
“Unable to determine due to the sand. It has an abnormally high level of the mineral xalica.”
“Nice work, BEll.” Dathan swiveled. “Time to move some sand.”
Zayn nodded. “I’ll get the Big Blower started.”
“Big Blower?” Eos asked.
“Special apparatus to blow off the sand,” Niklas said.
“Wait—” Dathan strode over to the holo-table and tapped the screen. “Blowing the sand will take approximately…forty standard hours. BEll, you said the sand had high quantities of xalica?”
“That’s correct.”
Niklas strode closer. “What are you thinking, Dath?”
“We could rig the mag-lift to attract the xalica.”
His older brother nodded. “Brilliant. We should be able to move the sand much faster.”
“It would take approximately six hours,” BEll said.
Dathan grinned. Nothing like finding a shortcut. “Let’s get to work.”