*
Bastien drew up short as he saw the carnage in front of him. He’d been aware of the invaders near his home for days now. A huge-ass Andarion warrior with a teen male and a human female had come in first. Bastien had been trying his best to figure out why the two Andarions had a young human woman with them.
At least until the other blond human female had been dropped off. She’d made straight for them.
Then he’d assumed they must be a family on some kind of screwed-up vacation. Though why anyone would want to take a break in this fected heat and desolate desert, he couldn’t imagine.
But then, Andarions were a screwed-up race with some peculiar ideas on comfort that he couldn’t even begin to fathom. He’d marked this new group off as harmless and had left them alone, only checking their location from time to time to make sure they didn’t come near his base.
Until he’d seen and heard the firefight that’d resulted in enough bodies to make a League assassin cream his pants.
The dead were Bolodorians from the looks of their craft and uniforms. A group of incas—freelance assassins. Lowlife scum who made his flesh crawl. But for once, they hadn’t been interested in him or his bounty. They appeared to have been exclusively after the Andarion family.
Something verified as he watched the warrior searching the twenty-five bodies he’d taken down with minimal effort and heard a radio go off on one of them.
“Hiller? You there, copy?”
The warrior paused to listen, then picked up the link closest to him. “Yeah.”
Bastien was impressed. Took balls to answer an enemy’s comm. Kudos to the beast.
“Did you get him? I don’t hear no more fighting.”
“Yeah,” he repeated.
“Fucking awesome. Don’t forget to bag the head with the DNA sample. We get twice the payout for it. See you in a few.”
Yeah, the Andarion didn’t seem to share that sentiment since it was his head they were calling for. Bastien couldn’t blame him for that. It’d wreck his day too. Look on the Andarion’s face said he was pissed off to be their target. And that if he laid hands to any more of these guys, he would be about as charitable as Bastien should he ever be lucky enough to get his ex-wife’s neck in his hands.
Intending to wait until the Andarion finished and moved on so that Bastien could search the bodies for supplies, he continued to watch the warrior through the scope of his sniper’s rifle.
As the Andarion moved out of his viewer range, Bastien stepped in closer, making sure not to lose sight of him.
The moment he did, the Andarion jerked his blaster out and aimed it straight at his head.
“Don’t,” Bastien growled, switching his targeting laser on with his thumb to warn the Andarion that he was already aimed at the warrior’s heart.
Assured mutual destruction.
The Andarion didn’t flinch or move as he kept his own dot clearly centered between Bastien’s eyes. If he wasn’t wearing his shooting goggles, that light would have burned out his vision and left him blind. “One twitch, human, and I promise you’ll be dead before I will.”
Bastien refused to back down or let his words rattle him. Honestly? He’d heard worse threats from his mother for leaving the toilet seat up in her personal bathroom.
So he kept his own dot right where the Andarion’s heart was. But he also knew that a lengthy standoff would give the Andarion’s family time to move in behind him. Better to defuse the situation and let him know Bastien wasn’t a threat than risk an injury.
With his left hand held up, he moved slowly forward. “Ditto.”
The Andarion scowled as he raked a look over Bastien’s ragged clothing that said he’d figured out Bastien was alone and not in much position to be a big threat to him.
Other than the blaster he held.
He could only imagine what the Andarion must think. Bastien’s clothes were worn out. And though he had his hair tied back, away from his eyes, it was long and ragged from where he’d been keeping it cut with a blunt knife. He always meant to request shears from Jullien or Unira, but somehow he forgot about it whenever he talked to them. Those brief breaks in loneliness made him forget a lot of things.
His cheek itched, reminding him of how scraggly his beard was, too. Yeah, he probably looked like a reject from some psych ward.
After a few seconds, a slow smile of appreciation spread across the Andarion’s face. “So are we going to stand here all day, weapons drawn? I’m game if you are.”
His humor caught Bastien off guard. He relaxed a tiny degree, as the Andarion’s demeanor and manner reminded him a lot of his old friend Fain Hauk. Only a mighty War Hauk could be this relaxed and nonchalant with a blaster trained on him.
Or an idiot.