Chapter 12 Dax
Dax
The alarm I’d set on my comms blared to life and I switched from asleep to awake in the blink of an eye.
After hours of scrolling through cargo ads, my eyelids had been heavy so I’d caught a catnap on the bridge.
Until I knew why Lacy seemed to know my ship better than I did—or until I picked up my team—I didn’t want to leave the bridge unattended unless she was secured. Or off the ship.
I stood, rolling my shoulders and running through a series of stretches. The captain’s chair wasn’t the most uncomfortable place I’d ever slept, but after four days sleeping in the captain’s quarters, my body preferred a comfortable mattress.
Despite the time I’d spent reviewing the want ads for cargo haulers, I was no closer to having a plan for cargo than I had been.
There were a lot of enticing offers, but some of them appeared too good to be true.
How the hell did you calculate what made a run profitable and what made it a waste of time and money?
That was a problem for later—later being a few hours, since I couldn’t put this off indefinitely.
Right now, I wanted a shower. The question was, did I dare leave the bridge unattended?
It should be safe enough with Lacy Dupree locked in her room.
She’d been exhausted, so I was hopeful she was still asleep.
I toggled through the screens that monitored the ship’s systems. Everything looked stable, except . . . What was that?
The chart showing the ship’s energy use was higher than it had been last night. I dug deeper into the data. The unusual draw was coming from the crew quarters. Where, surprise, my uninvited guest was.
What the hell was she doing?
The crew cabins were bare bones, not because I wanted them that way, but because I expected that my team would want to put their own stamp on the rooms. The cabins had come with the basic amenities: bed, desk, chair.
The only thing in any of the rooms that drew power, outside of the lights, was the computer terminal.
It was a dummy system, tied into the ship’s network.
I pulled up the data feed for her terminal. A black screen greeted me. “What the hell?” That shouldn’t happen.
I re-entered the command. Same result. Frowning, I pulled out the manual to make sure I was doing it correctly.
Yep, same steps. I drummed my fingers on the console. The ship’s captain—that would be me—had access to all aspects of the ship. For her to have cut my access . . .
My stomach dropped. Pretty little Lacy Dupree was proving to be a much bigger problem than expected. I’d underestimated her and I couldn’t afford to do that again.
I locked down the ship’s primary console and reset the password. When I left the bridge, I did the same.
What a pain in the ass. I hated remembering passwords.
Then I strode quickly down the corridor to the crew quarters to find out what Lacy Dupree was up to.
My steps on the metal floor were loud enough that she should have heard me coming. That didn’t stop me from pounding on the door. I may have had the key and a good head of mad, but I still had some manners. Plus, nothing good ever came from barging into a room.
But before I could knock, I heard a distorted voice. Was she communicating with someone? Had she smuggled someone else onto my ship?
Was her story about a home invasion just a complicated con to steal the Fortuna?
Yeah, that wasn’t fucking happening.
My blaster was still in its holster. I reached back and released the strap that secured it in case I needed to draw it quickly, then pressed my palm to the access panel.
“Coming in!” I warned milliseconds before I stepped through the door in a clearing position.
Lacy was nowhere in sight. I assumed she was in the shower. “Hello? Miss Dupree? Lacy?” I took a step toward the small bathroom and called out again. Then I noticed that the bathroom door was open and I couldn’t hear the shower.
What the fuck?
The dummy terminal had been moved away from the wall.
A tangle of wires—ones I assumed used to be either in the wall or curled neatly—lay on the desk, shavings of yellow plastic were scattered around them.
I spied a twist of wires that looked like she’d done something to the data feed from her room.
That was probably why I hadn’t been able to see what was on her screen.
The way she knew exactly how to finesse my ship was disturbing.
“Today I found an old archive that had a fragment of the map. It was in bad shape, possibly the worst shape of any of the pieces I’ve acquired, but I can feel in my bones that it’s important.”
I looked around for the source of that voice.
The room was empty, so it had to be coming from the terminal.
I shifted the monitor so I could see it and studied the woman on the screen.
Her gaze never wavered and I realized that this was a recording, not a live video.
That Lacy wasn’t communicating with someone outside the ship was a relief, but it still didn’t explain where she was.
The woman in the video kept talking about old libraries and star maps, but I tuned that out as I studied her face.
She shared the same eyes and nose as the woman who’d stolen my ship, but her lips were fuller and her hair was shorter, worn in a dramatic cut that accentuated her cheekbones, rather than a tangled braid. While the speaker was a generally attractive woman, Lacy was more appealing.
And that was a completely inappropriate thought to be having. I was struggling to push my interest down when the door to the room swung open.
Lacy’s eyes widened and surprise registered on her face.
My jaw dropped. I was just as surprised by her appearance. Like her actual appearance.
The bed sheet was wrapped around her body like a strapless dress, clinging close and emphasizing the curves I’d worked hard not to notice last night in the med bay. The end of the sheet was tucked into a tantalizing glimpse of shadowy cleavage.
My gaze darted back up to her face. She was watching me warily. “What are you doing in my room?”
“What are you doing out of your room?” I countered. Her constant bypassing of my ship’s systems was a huge problem.
Her lips pressed into a flat line. “Laundry.” She lifted the stack of clothes that she carried as an exhibit. A stack of clothes I’d completely missed because I’d been too busy ogling.
Now I took in the neatly folded coveralls, with her white tank top resting on top. The fact that she wore her boots with her bedsheet gown. The quirky contrast made me smile. “You could have told me you needed to do laundry.”
She shrugged and I tried not to notice the slight sway of her breasts when she did. “I took care of it.”
“How?”
“The laundry room is down the corridor. Didn’t they show you that when you bought the ship?” Her tone had that overly sweet sound that people got when they were fucking with you.
“I know where the laundry room is,” I said with a hint of irritation. “I meant . . .”
She stepped around me and headed into the small bathroom. “I’ve got to get dressed.” She closed the door in my face.
That woman. I’d get a straight answer from her one of these days.
While I waited for her to emerge, I sat down and watched the woman talking on the screen. She was dressed differently, so another video must have started. Once again she was talking about notes and flight paths and star maps.
A hand reached over my shoulder and stopped the video.
“That’s none of your business,” Lacy said, her voice thick with emotion.
I turned to face her and she was right there. Clad in clean but worn coveralls. She smelled like the ship’s soap and that indefinable, almost lack of scent that the refresher left on clothes. “Who’s in the videos?”
She quickly took a step back. “My sister.”
There was that emotion again.
“Why were you watching videos of her?” I watched her closely.
She closed her eyes, hiding a brief flash of pain. “She sent them to me.”
“Is she—” I paused. There was no delicate way to say this. “Is she dead?”
Her fists clenched and she whirled away from me. “I don’t know!” Her shoulders radiated tension.
“Does this have something to do with why you stole my ship?” I kept my voice gentle.
“Borrowed.”
I rolled my eyes but let her get away with it this time. “Is this why you borrowed my ship?”
“No. Maybe. I don’t know. Not originally.”
“What does that mean?” When she didn’t answer, I gently turned her to face me.
Her eyes were wide and filled with pain.
“What does that mean?” I repeated.
“It means she’s missing and I think that . . .” she gestured toward the screen. “That has something to do with the men who broke into my apartment.” Whatever restraint had been holding her back broke. She threw her arms around me and pressed her face to my chest.
Ok-ay.
I slowly, carefully wrapped my arms around her.
Lacy cried quietly but fiercely. She held herself stiffly, shoulders tense, her arms squeezed tight around my waist. We were pressed so closely together that her shudders reverberated through me.
I rubbed her back in soothing circles. What else was I supposed to do while she soaked my shirt with her tears?
The top of her head came up right beneath my chin, the perfect height to tuck her against me. “I’m sure your sister is fine,” I murmured into her hair. They were the most comforting words I could think of.
Lacy Dupree was a mystery. A conundrum. A problem. One wrapped in attractive packaging no matter whether it took the form of ripped coveralls or an ethereal bedsheet.
The woman was a fucking puzzle and I didn’t know how the pieces all fit.
Hell, I wasn’t even sure I had all the pieces.
Her crying slowed and her grip on my waist lessened. When she pulled away, her movements were stiff. Her hands dragged along my sides, her left passing close—too close—to my weapon.
I sensed the moment her intentions changed. When her hand brushed the blaster, her breath caught and her head tilted to the side. And I knew—I knew—that she was going to try for my weapon.
In one smooth move, I pressed my hand against the blaster, securing it to my side and shifted my right leg back. The blaster now out of her reach, she froze against me, then stepped back.
“I’m sorry. That was . . . I mean, I didn’t . . .”
Was she going to say she was just borrowing it?
I would have railed at her for attempting to steal my weapon, but one look at the tear tracks on her cheeks made me temper my tone. Sure, maybe she’d faked it all and I was a sucker. But maybe she hadn’t.
“What did you think you were going to do?” I asked gently. “I’m a highly trained soldier with several inches in height on you and probably a hundred pounds. Did you really think you could win against me?”
She took another step back, putting more space between us. “I didn’t really mean to. It was a spur of the moment thing.”
“Like my ship?”
Her cheeks flushed red. “Look, I think my sister is missing. I have to find her.” Her gaze flicked between me, the screen, and the door.
“We’re in the middle of nowhere,” I reminded her.
“On a ship,” she ground out.
“Do you know where to look?”
“Maybe,” she said after a long pause, her expression wary.
Why did I have the feeling I wasn’t going to like what she said? “Start at the beginning,” I demanded. “Why do you think she’s missing?”
“Because of that.” She gestured at the terminal. Her sister’s face was frozen on the screen, caught mid-sentence. “That’s her fail-safe. And now I have it. The only way that happens is if she misses two check-ins.”
Leaning against the wall, I crossed my arms over my chest. This sounded more like a plot from a spy movie, not real life. Then again, one woman stealing my ship sounded very much like an adventure movie too.
Knowing I was going to regret it, I asked, “Why would your sister need a fail-safe?”