Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Ria sat on the horse surrounded by darkness and the heated warmth of Zayn Phoenix.
With the natural sway of his body to direct her, she didn’t have the same jolting seat she’d suffered from during her earlier riding attempts. This time they moved in a natural rhythm with the horse.
But it was the hard, masculine body behind her that stole all her attention.
As they moved, her bottom brushed against his hard body.
His strong arms surrounded her, one of his hot palms resting on her belly, the other holding the reins.
His warm breath puffed against her hair, giving her crazy thoughts of tipping her head back and kissing him. The way he’d kissed her before.
She released a breath. Now really wasn’t the time to be fantasizing about Zayn.
They had a mission, and right now, it wasn’t going well.
Who knew where Lastite Lala had run off to?
There was every chance the Baker brothers would come after them.
Oh, and they were lost in the desert on a harsh, frontier planet.
Ria stared up into the night sky. The stars were so bright here. Like a spill of lights on a megacity world. She’d always loved stargazing, imagining zipping through the vastness of space, where anything was possible.
She frowned at the thought. That wasn’t right.
She’d rarely had the chance to study the stars.
The red glow of the Devil’s Nebula blocked out almost everything in the night sky.
And she’d been too busy with her grueling training to worry about vastness and possibilities.
Shaking off the strange thoughts, she focused ahead, trying to see through the dark.
They were climbing up a hill, on a narrow track, with scraggly trees appearing here and there from out of the darkness.
She wasn’t sure where they were headed, but the horse seemed to know where it was going. As long as the thing didn’t lead them back to Ray and Clint, she was happy. “Any idea where we’re going?”
“I thought the hills would be cooler in the day time. And we’ll have a better view from up there once the sun rises.” Zayn shifted, his body pressing firmly against hers.
She swallowed the growing lump in her throat. “Right. Sounds good.”
“Keep an eye out for somewhere decent for us to rest. We both need to get some sleep.”
She only realized then that she was feeling a little tired. She’d been trained to block out her body’s responses. Zayn shifted again, and she closed her eyes. She wasn’t having much luck blocking out her desire for this man.
Then she felt the hardness pressed into the small of her back.
“Sorry.” His tone was rueful. “Automatic response to being pressed up against a woman like this, and the damn rocking of the horse.”
Right. Nothing to do with her personally. “It’s fine.”
“Might be for you,” he muttered.
His hand moved a little on her belly, slipping one inch lower. She didn’t think he was paying any attention, but his touch was burning through her clothes, right to her skin. So, so tantalizing, just mere centimeters away from where she was growing hot and damp.
“Talk to me.” His voice sounded a little hoarse. “Distract me.”
“Talk about what?” Her voice didn’t sound much better than his.
“Anything. Tell me about growing up.”
“A boring story.” Ria drew in a breath. She didn’t often dwell on the past. “The Guild starts our training young. As soon as we can sit up, they start subliminal training. Different fighting techniques, strategy. Once we can walk, they begin the physical training.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. They abuse babies?”
She heard the horror. She knew it was hard for others to understand. She shrugged, her gaze on the stars overhead. “We have a warm bed, clothes, food. Regular medical checkups and an education.”
“So you can become their slaves. Their personal property.”
“Maybe.” She’d never thought about it like that until recently. Until she’d started to dream of something different, something more. “When we turn five, they start the assassin training. They start making us kill.”
“Jesus.” He muttered a few curses. “What about love? Did someone hug you, kiss you goodnight?”
She had no memories of anything like that. Just hazy images she knew were her own secret longings. Her silence was obviously answer enough.
He cursed again and hugged her from behind. “Everyone needs that.”
“You had that?”
The breath he released ruffled her hair. “For a while. When I was little, well, my parents were happy then. We grew up on Zerzura.”
“So you’re used to the desert?” Zerzura was a desert planet filled with ancient ruins. No wonder they’d become treasure hunters.
“Yeah. But it isn’t the harsh, rocky place Diablo is. It’s all giant sand dunes, palm-fringed oases, and an inland sea that glimmers like a jewel. My brothers and I grew up sledding down the dunes, exploring the old ruins that are scattered over the planet. Skinny dipping in the sea.”
Her chest tightened. She could imagine Zayn as a boy, racing after his older brothers. “Sounds idyllic.”
He was silent for a moment. “Then my mom left and everything changed.”
“Why’d she leave?”
“Decided a washed-up treasure hunter didn’t make a good husband and three rowdy boys were too much hard work.”
She had no idea what it was like to have a mother or to lose her, but she knew from his tone that it hurt. “I’m sorry, Zayn.”
“I had Nik and Dathan.”
“And your father?”
A stony silence. Then Zayn spoke. “Dad turned…bitter. Started to drink.” She felt him shake his head. “Shit, you don’t want to hear this.”
She swiveled as far as she could. His face was all shadows, and she felt the tension in his muscles. She gripped one hard forearm, felt his muscles flex. “I do. Tell me.”
“He started knocking us around. Dathan worst of all. Dad made us work in his junk-yard, but he was never happy.” A whispered curse.
“God, some nights we’d have to scour the streets to find what gutter he’d passed out in and drag him home.
It was about that time that I dreamed of getting away.
I used to race my beat-up, old desert speeder as fast as I could.
I wanted to fly off at interstellar speed and never come back. ”
Ria’s chest tightened. She pictured a small boy with big blue eyes full of suffering. “And a career was born?”
“A passion was born. I had a driving need to fly. I wanted to explore every inch of the galaxy and do it as fast as I could. Nik left for the Galactic Institute of Historical Preservation, and the day I turned fifteen, I was accepted into the Strike Wing Academy.”
One brother lost himself in books, the other in speed. But she heard the sorrow in Zayn’s voice. “It didn’t make you happy?”
“Oh, it made me deliriously happy. And for a while, I forgot that we’d left Dathan all alone to deal with our father.”
“Looks to me like Dathan’s done just fine for himself.”
“Yeah. Now. Finding Eos soothed something ragged in him. Dad had done a number on him, but for a while he wasn’t okay, and I won’t ever forget that Nik and I left him there.”
“Maybe being in the Guild wasn’t that much worse than family life.”
Zayn fiddled with her hair. “Families can be a challenge but my brothers…they’re always there for me. No matter what. I wouldn’t trade that for anything.”
Now siblings were something Ria didn’t know anything about.
Her fellow Guild assassins were just as likely to assassinate her if ordered.
“I always thought that at least the Guild gave me a sense of belonging. But the level of trust and loyalty I see you have with your brothers… I’ve never experienced that. ”
“Yeah, but family can drive you crazy as well.” His voice sounded lighter now. “Belonging is good, too. I had that with the Strike Wing.”
“You miss it?”
“The ships, yeah. The camaraderie, sometimes. But Nik, Dath, Malin, and now Eos, they give me that and more. But the Wing, we weren’t the same as family.
Vik used to say we were family…but it always came down to the chain of command and the rules.
She and I…we never explored our connection because it was against the rules.
And the more I think about it, I’m not sure I would have trusted Vik to pick me over her damned precious rules anyway. ”
They both fell into silence, and Ria stared hard at the trees. Then she noticed the trees were getting taller. A twinkle of light off the side of the track caught her eye. “Zayn, look.”
He peered over her shoulder. “Hot damn.” He directed the horse off the track, and they stopped at the edge of a waterhole.
It glimmered under the light of the twin moons. It wasn’t large and was fed by what looked like an underground spring that bubbled at one end. A small cave was carved back into the cliff face.
Zayn slid off the horse. Ria was pleased to see his pain was under control because he moved with his usual sleek movements. He gripped her waist and set her down. Then he was striding to the edge of the water. He slipped off his shirt as he went.
Her mouth went dry. There was enough light for her to make out the hard ridges of muscle in his back. He squatted at the edge, scooped up a handful of water and splashed it over his face. It ran down his bare chest, and she watched a trickle arrow down toward the waistband of his jeans.
She managed to get her brain functioning. “Don’t drink it. We don’t know if it’s contaminated.” She pulled the scanner from her boot and strode forward. She swung it over the pool.
His eyes had narrowed. “I thought I told you no technology.”
The scanner beeped. “Water’s drinkable.” She slipped the device back in her boot. “Lucky I’m not so hung up on rules.”
He pushed to his feet. “Lucky no one found it. I’ll scout around, collect some wood for a fire, and if we’re lucky, I might find us something to eat.”
“Okay.” She tried not to let her gaze linger on that sculpted chest.