Page 16 of Star-Crossed Captive
It still seemed too unbelievable to accept. The look on Cache’s face said as much.
“I woke up in the middle of surgery,” he added. And there was Nia, frozen in shock, with him only seeing one chance for survival.
“So you took her captive.”
Tension raced down Mace’s spine. “Yes, sir.” But if he’d known about her lineage, he would have left her to die. If her bloodline was discovered, it would have been the kinder choice.
Cache’s mouth upturned for a brief second, like she resisted the urge to poke fun at him. He’d always been outspoken about captive rights, the barbarism of an indentured class propelling their economy, and wanted to abolish the system altogether.
“What would you have done if I hadn’t sent Foley and theBellicoseafter you?”
Mace met Grey’s eyes before he returned his attention to her. “That was Foley’s strike?” He had suspected as much. Foley, the commander who headed security, never had much finesse.
“He was following orders.”
“You ordered him to destroy a medical station?” Mace understood she’d given no such order, knew Foley had embraced his sadistic side.
Cache’s eyes flashed. “Watch it.”
He heard the challenge and chose to ignore it, had no desire to overthrow her position and take on all the bullshit that went with it.
“You would have been better off sending Grey.” His attempt to appease made her eyes flash again.
But Grey cut in, diffusing the tension. “That’s what I said.”
Cache took a breath, glancing between them. “I couldn’t risk losing both of you on a retrieval mission, so I sent Foley.”
He shared a glance with his friend.Good to know Cache thinks Foley expendable.Especially when they knew the commander earned his position here through his connections with Admiral Ricker, a man who shared his sadistic side.
Mace changed the subject. “What’s on the docket, Commodore?”
Cache turned to the holotable, accessing three-dimensional images of ships, data running along the glossy surface. “They’ve stopped everything in Sector Five since your mission. We can’t find any trace of them, but,” she paused, swiping her hand across the table, “we’ve received some good information about possible gun running in Sector Four, here.”
She magnified a small section of space on the edge of CORE territory. “We’re concentrating our efforts at this location since the new manufacturing plants won’t be operational for another month. We’re waiting to hear from our contact.”
“What’s this?” he asked, gesturing to a red beacon on the other side of the map.
Cache enlarged the area, her expression turning stony. “We were tracking a CORE civilian vessel heading to Sector Ten. None of our warnings were heeded. They’ve past the point of no return now. Short of locking weapons, there wasn’t anything we could do.”
Mace shook his head. He didn’t understand why anyone one would choose to go to Sector Ten voluntarily. Once a vessel went into the man-made nebula controlled by Calypsons, it never returned, basically amounting in suicide—or some sort of twisted religious pilgrimage where no one on the outside understood the end result.
Cache met his eyes. “Return to your regular duty roster tomorrow.” When he opened his mouth to say he was fine now, she added, “That’s an order.”
“Yes, sir.”
Dismissed by her nod, both he and Grey strode to the exit, then through the security checkpoint.
“I have some families to speak to,” Mace said when they stopped in front of the lift.
Grey nodded, slapping the control to call it to them. “Right beside you.”
Nia’s locket lay cool in her palm. Her heart beat a fast pace in her throat. It was time to turn the tracker on.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she glanced around the Mace’s quarters, pleased with the carnage she’d wrought. Destroying the potted plant hadn’t been enough. She’d grabbed anything she could get her hands on. After she’d eaten as much as she could from the refrigeration unit—too much because she’d gotten sick immediately after—she’d demolished the rest, hoping he wouldn’t have any food rations for the next month and would starve to death. As a precaution, she’d taken a shard of the pot to use as a weapon and it lay beside her hip.
A tiny voice in her head poked at her.He won’t hurt you. He kept you from being ransomed.
Ignoring that voice, she ran her thumb over the etched vines decorating the locket. She needed to turn it on but hesitated. As far as she could tell, there weren’t any recording devices in Mace’s quarters. But what if there were? What would happen to her if they found out what she held? Once activated, would those enforcers pound on her door? Would they think twice about shooting her, or kill her with the same swiftness as the medical officer who’d resisted?
