He held my gaze even as he continued to stab me. “Not exactly.”
“Then that sounds exactly like we’re prisoners.” I shook my head as a bitter smile twisted my lips. “Very clever, getting us to lower our guard. Effective, too. I thought we were friends.” I’d thought Torran and I could be more, too, but I was bleeding enough without acknowledging another wound. My laugh was small and harsh, and it rang with the hurt buried deep in my soul. “Shows what I know.”
“Tavi,” Torran started.
I slashed a hand through the air. “No. You may address me as Captain Zarola or not at all.”
Something raw and bleak crossed his face before he bowed his head in acknowledgment. “Captain Zarola, it was not my intent to mislead you. I didn’t know about the empress’s plan until we returned.”
And still he’d kissed me. The knife of betrayal dug deeper, and I wanted to hurt him as much as I hurt. “You knew that you were to return with the hero of Rodeni.” I scoffed. “Surely you had some idea of my fate. And yet you promised me safe passage, knowing that it was a lie. You’ve lied to me from the beginning.”
Torran stiffened as if struck, but he didn’t deny my words. So much for the famed Valovian personal honor.
“If we rescue Cien,” Chira said, her voice fierce, “then the empress will let you go. Torran made her vow—”
“That’s enough,” Torran said.
Chira glared at him, but he stared her down. She dropped her eyes to the floor, though her expression remained furious.
Torran ran a hand down his face, then straightened. His expression turned cold and harsh, and it transformed him into the general who’d thwarted FHP forces again and again. The stark difference highlighted just how much he had relaxed around us in the past few days. Or at least how much he’d pretended to.
And I’d fallen for it. I bit my lip against the fresh wave of pain.
“FHP is denying all involvement,” Torran said at last. “They say that Commodore Morten was discharged over a year ago and that he doesn’t represent FHP interests.”
“Of course they are,” I muttered. They could be in it up to their eyeballs—and likely were—and they’d still deny everything. “What are the kidnappers demanding?”
When Torran hesitated, I laughed without humor. “Your empress is going to kill me. I deserve to know why I’m dying.”
“They want guaranteed shipping rights in Valovian space,” Nilo said, “and access through all of our wormholes.”
I rocked back on my heels. So not much then, just what we’d fought a decades-long war for, until both sides had determined that it was too costly for too little gain. The resulting peace treaty had returned us to the status quo, with neither side happy about it.
Were the Feds reevaluating that decision, or was the Valovian Empire using a convenient kidnapping to justify breaking the treaty?
Either way, war loomed on the horizon.
And an innocent seven-year-old kid was smack in the middle of it. None of us had asked for this shitty hand that life had dealt, but it wasn’t Cien’s fault that his uncle was an enormous asshole.
I met Torran’s eyes. “We’re going to find Cien. And when we do, you’re going to board Starlight with us and escort us all the way back to Bastion, where we’ll happily boot your ass out. If your empress has other ideas, then you’ll voluntarily become our hostage until we get to Bastion. Refuse and you won’t make any progress on the kidnapping at all because you’ll be too busy trying to keep us pinned down.”
“You’re not really going to help him, are you?” Lexi asked.
“No, I’m not. I’m helping the kid, and I’m helping myself, and I’m helping you all. General Fletcher can fall in a volcano as far as I’m concerned.”
“I agree to your terms, Captain Zarola,” Torran said.
“At least until some better deal comes along,” I taunted. “I’ve seen exactly how much your promises are worth.”
He flinched again.
I spun away from him and landed in the first chair I found. My ragged, bleeding wounds were dangerously close to becoming visible. “Let’s get to work,” I snapped.
“Tavi,” Kee said over the comm. The compassion in her tone was nearly enough to smash the fragile hold I had on my emotions.
“Later,” I commanded, my voice harsher than it should’ve been. I winced and stared at the display in front of me without seeing anything.
It took a few blinks, but eventually the image resolved itself into the zoomed-in picture of Commodore Morten. I stared at the face of the person I hated most in the galaxy—at least until Torran had done a bang-up job trying to steal the title.
I turned to Chira, determined to completely ignore Torran for the next ten days, and pointed at the screen. “Was this building searched?”
She glanced at Torran, but when I didn’t move my attention from her, she nodded. “Nothing was found.”
“Were their locations before this traced?”
“No. As far as we can tell, they’d been inside for a week without leaving, and the surveillance video doesn’t go back far enough to catch their entrance.”
“So they knew about the surveillance capabilities of the city. Who has that information?”
She shrugged. “Too many people to run down.”
“I want a list.” I turned to Kee. “How long until you’ll get the data from the transport?”
“I should have it by tomorrow morning,” she said. “I will let you know when it’s ready.”
I nodded my thanks. “Until then, I want you tracking Morten. The asshole isn’t as smart as he thinks he is, so he made a mistake. We just have to find it.”
“I’ll find him,” she promised.
Finally, I turned to Nilo. “I want a new brief, one that includes all of the information you have, not just the pieces you feel like sharing. You have one hour.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Or?”
“Or I start making your lives very, very difficult.” My lips curved but it was less smile and more warning.
Nilo grinned at me, unfazed. “I’ll have it ready.”
The rest of the day passed in cold silence. My heart was bleeding, and I couldn’t get it to stop, so I ignored the wound. I didn’t know how Torran had burrowed quite so deep, but it just made the betrayal sting all the more.
He tried to talk to me three times, and three times I ignored him.
Dinner was grim and quiet, and no one lingered. The door to my suite had barely closed behind me when it opened again, and Lexi stepped inside.
I summoned a wan smile. “You drew the short stick, huh?”
Her answering smile was kind. “Someone had to beard the lion.” She switched to sign language. “Do you want to leave tonight? Kee and I can get us out, even with the telekinetic.”
I shook my head. They would be expecting us to make a break for it tonight. I had no doubt that Kee and Lexi could do it, but we didn’t need to take extra risks. Torran wasn’t the only one who knew how to lull someone into lowering their guard.