Mercenary Instinct (a science fiction romance) (30 page)

Even knowing that, she couldn’t help but feel
guilty as Viktor stood up, shaking his head.

“Load them up and take the shuttle back,” he
told one of the mercenaries.

“Yes, sir.”

He walked away without looking at Ankari or
the others again. She didn’t know if it was because he was shocked
and distressed by Zimonjic’s death or... if something had changed.
Maybe he realized he had made a mistake.

It had been two days since Zimonjic’s death.
Ankari hadn’t seen Viktor since then. She, Lauren, and Jamie had
been returned to the lab, again with a guard stationed outside, and
they were still receiving meals, but she had no idea if the plan to
storm Felgard’s island was still in effect, or if Viktor had
changed his mind. Maybe he would simply drop them off and leave
them to deal with the finance lord on their own. Maybe he wanted to
forget about the time they had shared and back out of his contract
with her—after all, they had only agreed to it verbally and with a
handshake, not by signing anything that would hold up under legal
scrutiny.

She missed his company and lamented that he
had never made good on his promise of “later,” but Ankari didn’t
know if she was even in his thoughts at the moment. Even if she
hadn’t had any control over Zimonjic’s actions, she felt as if she
might have disappointed him. She wasn’t sure when his favorable
opinion of her had started mattering, but somewhere along the way
it had.

A poke in the shoulder roused Ankari from her
thoughts. She was supposed to be marketing the business, not
dwelling on mercenary captains. “We should be close to Felgard’s,”
Jamie said. “Don’t you think you should find out what the plan is?
Or if there is a plan?”

“How would you suggest I do that? I’m stuck
in here with you two, talking to all the same close-mouthed
people.” Which consisted of a day guard and a night guard, neither
of who knew much about what was going on. Or, if they did know,
they weren’t answering the women’s inquiries.

“Can’t you see if the captain will talk to
you? At the least, I’d like to know if I should be trying to build
weapons or booby traps that we can take in with us, or if we’re
going to have an escort of well-armed mercenaries.”

“Do you know
how
to build weapons and
booby traps?” Ankari asked.

“Uhm. Perhaps I should have said I’d like to
know if I should be trying to
learn
how to build weapons or
booby traps.”

Ankari snorted.

“It’s too bad that man came in and took our
generator,” Jamie said. “I felt like we were close with programming
it to make an EMF charge that could interrupt a power system.”

Ankari must have been sleeping when that had
happened. She didn’t remember any equipment confiscation. Did that
mean Viktor was once again worried about them trying to escape?
Maybe he had reviewed the brig video footage and figured out what
they had been trying to accomplish that night.

“I’ll try to get a meeting with the captain
and figure out what’s going on.”

Ankari knocked on the door, having learned
before that it was kept locked. They were taken out if they needed
to use a latrine, and escorted to do so. She hadn’t asked to be
taken anywhere else to test the boundaries, but she couldn’t help
but feel like a prisoner who had simply been moved to fancier
accommodations. Maybe Viktor had changed his mind about everything
and was now thinking how much easier it would be to turn her team
over to Felgard and about how few men he would lose in such an
exchange. Maybe he was thinking about the men…and woman he had
already lost...

The door slid open.

“What?” the guard asked, as friendly and
chatty as always.

“I’d like to see the captain,” Ankari
said.

The guard shrugged and shut the door in her
face.

“That went well,” Jamie said.

“Things have changed, haven’t they?” Lauren
asked, turning her back on her work to face them.

“I think so.” Maybe they should have tried to
escape when they had been on that station. But she didn’t know when
they could have done so. There had been such a brief moment between
the time Ankari had freed herself and the time the mercenaries
charged into view. “I don’t suppose microbiologists know how to
build weapons or booby traps?”

“I... don’t know,” Lauren said. “We do have
some toxic and flammable lab components in here.”

“Why don’t you two see what you can come up
with? I’ll—”

The door opened again.

“Let’s go,” the guard said.

“To see the captain?” Ankari asked, since he
had said it in the same grim tone one might use if one was taking a
prisoner to be pushed out an airlock.

“Yes.”

Ankari gave her friends nods and followed the
guard into the corridor. It was late evening ship’s time, but she
didn’t know if Viktor would be on the bridge or in his cabin. It
occurred to her that she had never seen his cabin. She imagined
something with a dearth of chairs.

As the guard led her up a ladder and toward
the officers’ quarters rather than the bridge, Ankari found herself
slowing her pace and wiping her palms on her jumpsuit. She wondered
if Zimonjic had left a message, explaining why she had done what
she had, that she had believed she was doing the right thing for
the company. Even if she hadn’t, Viktor might have guessed. He
would regret... much, especially if Zimonjic had been a Grenavinian
native. His people seemed to mean so much to him. Ankari still
believed some of his interest in protecting her was because of her
own similar background.

“You coming, woman?” The guard had stopped in
front of a door, little different from any of the other gray doors
in the gray corridor. Thanks to Ankari’s slow pace, he had
outdistanced her by several meters.

“Yes.” She wiped her palms again, took a deep
breath, and joined him.

The guard waved his hand over a sensor.
“She’s here, sir.”

The door opened, and someone walked out, a
rangy fellow in a crisp pseudo-military uniform that seemed out of
place among the casual civilian garb the mercenaries favored. But a
Mandrake Company patch, vines curled around a sword, rode his
shoulder. “I’ll let the team know, sir,” he called over his
shoulder and stepped past Ankari, giving her a curt nod.

The guard stepped back and pointed for Ankari
to go in, his gesture making it clear he didn’t plan to enter
himself. She took another deep breath and walked inside.

A pair of three-dimensional maps floated in
the air above the friction-mat flooring, one depicting a lush green
forest complete with terrain features and roads, and the other
showing a large, wooden facility with numerous decks or boardwalks
between structures. The holograms were partially translucent, but
it took a moment for her eyes to adjust and spot Viktor through the
busy maps. He stood on the other side of the cabin, next to a bank
of fruit trees potted in a grow system, leaning against a high
desk—she had been right; there was no chair. He wore the same black
trousers and t-shirt he had donned that night in the temple. She
blushed, remembering the way she had tugged those trousers down,
her eagerness to do so. Funny how the things that came naturally
and without hesitation in the shadows of night could fill one with
awkward embarrassment during the light of day, even the artificial
light of day of a spaceship. She wondered if Viktor had chosen the
clothing intentionally, or if he simply had six black shirts and
wore them regularly.

“Good evening,” Ankari said, realizing they
had been staring at each other through the map for a long time. Or
maybe it had only seemed long.

“Ankari,” he said. Not exactly a term of
endearment. Or even a greeting.

Should she walk through the map and join him
at the desk? As she had guessed, there wasn’t a sofa, or any other
place to sit, either. Except for the bed, which was tucked in an
alcove under cupboards. One of the doors was open, revealing his
stash of battle armor. The room itself was tidy—how not when there
were so few furnishings?—with most of the decor on the walls. One
wall held a rack of old-fashioned swords and guns, one a big star
map dotted with pieces of paper with snippets of
text—quotations?—on it, and the last held framed
pictures—landscapes of snow-covered mountains, lush forests, and
green meadows along with a family portrait she itched to take a
closer look at. But she remained in place, clasping her hands
behind her back.

“I’m sorry about Dr. Zimonjic.” Ankari wanted
to add that it hadn’t been her fault, that she’d had no choice but
to go along with her, but felt like that had been her excuse for
everything from the beginning. Even if it was a legitimate one,
Viktor had probably heard it often enough to grow tired of it.

“Yes,” he said.

He was full of words tonight. If she knew him
better, knew where she stood with him right now, she would tease
him for it.

“I’m sorry to disturb you,” Ankari said. “I
can see you’re busy. I just wanted to see if we were still, er, if
you were still planning to come down with us and do something to
Felgard.”

Viktor extended a hand toward the maps. “This
is his island and a blueprint of his compound. It’s possible
they’re not accurate—there’s misinformation out there—but
Lieutenant Thomlin is good at gathering intelligence. We’ve been
making plans for the incursion.”

“Oh. Good.” Ankari should have realized that
was what she was looking at. “I wasn’t sure if you might have
changed your mind about risking your people to help us.”

“No.” Viktor tilted his head. “We made a
deal.”

“I know, but I would understand if you
decided it hadn’t been wisely made and didn’t want to go through
with it.”

Viktor walked around the holograms, his skin
brown and green and yellow for a moment as he brushed through the
edge of the terrain map. He stopped in front of her, gazing into
her eyes. “Have I... given you reason to want to break off your end
of the deal?”

“No, not at all. I mean, I haven’t seen you
much—at all—these last couple of days, and I just thought you might
have been distancing yourself because... I don’t know. You were
having regrets. Or realizing you’d made a mistake. Or wondering
what you’d been thinking. Or all of those things.”

“I’ve been preparing for the mission.” Viktor
looked thoughtfully at the map. “And, yes, thinking about things.
Mostly regretting that I approved the use of deadly force for
your... kidnapper without knowing who it was or thinking that
something aside from money might have been motivating that person.
It was my mistake. Nothing to do with you.”

“Except that if I wasn’t here, none of it
ever would have happened. Your life would still be normal.”

“As I recall, you didn’t volunteer to be
here.”

Viktor took her hands, his skin warm,
pleasant. He wasn’t sweating and nervous the way she was. The
callouses of his palms, rough against the backs of her hands, sent
a little shiver through her. This first inkling that he wasn’t mad
or disappointed with her filled her with hope, and maybe something
more. Her eyes were level with his collarbone, and when she lowered
them, she could admire the swell of muscles beneath his shirt,
remember the taste of the skin beneath it.

“No,” she whispered, “but I feel like I’ve
been trouble for you ever since we met.”

“
That
I won’t deny.”

She lifted her gaze to his face, not entirely
certain she had piqued his humor or if there was some frustration
in the admission. Maybe some of both. The corner of his mouth did
quirk up, and he rubbed the backs of her hands with his thumbs.

“I wish we could have met in different
circumstances,” Ankari said. “At some little bar on a space station
somewhere. I could have bought you dinner.”

“Would you have approached me if you saw me
in a bar?”

“It depends. How many guns would you be
wearing in a bar?”

“Two. Some daggers. Throwing knives. Bars are
breeding spots for trouble.”

“You and I must frequent different bars.”

“It’s possible.”

“Would you have approached
me
if you
saw me in a bar?” she asked, curious if he had been attracted to
her from the beginning or if her heritage or something about this
mess had caused her to grow on him.

He gazed thoughtfully at her. “I don’t
approach women in bars. Since we’re always moving around, it’s less
complicated to rent them by the hour, then leave.”

Ankari mouthed, “Rent them by the hour,” and
he winced, maybe realizing that hadn’t been the smoothest thing to
say. She decided his rough edges were charming rather than crude
and merely smiled, though she couldn’t resist teasing. “Not much of
a romantic, are you?”

“No.”

“Well, since I’ve been so much trouble for
you, let me offer a little advice that may help you save money in
the future. You’re a handsome man, Viktor. You could get women
without paying for them. Just walk up, smile, and talk to them. You
wouldn’t even have to talk that much. A few grunts would suffice.
Oh, but leave the guns with someone else when you do it. You
are
on the intimidating side at first glance. Some women
will be drawn by that, but your odds are better if you appear
vaguely approachable.”

“I’m only interested in one woman,” Viktor
said. “My new business partner. Will grunting work with her?”

“Grunting and possibly keeping something
interesting in your pocket for her to find.”

Both corners of his mouth quirked up this
time. “That’s
always
there.”

Ankari blushed. “I meant, uhm, tablets...
keys to handcuffs. Things like that.”

“You like to be handcuffed? Is this before or
after the grunting?”

Er, she was making it worse. Although he
looked positively amused by this conversation, so maybe it was
worth it. Besides, now she caught herself wondering what he might
do to her while she was handcuffed. Their previous encounter had
been so abbreviated. She knew very little about his preferences.
“Grunting is good at any time, I think. Especially if it’s an
expression of pleasure.”