Though another hour with Dancer, enough alcohol and darkness, and he might be persuaded …
Dancer rose to his feet and walked calmly toward the group. A breeze stirred, whipping the end of his scarf out while he entered their camp.
Two of them rose with their hands on their blasters.
“Can we help you?” the largest one asked. From the way the others deferred to him, Bastien assumed he must be their leader. His was also the voice he’d heard on the link, asking for a status update.
Without a word, Dancer tossed the container in his hand at the man. It landed at his feet, on its side.
“What’s this?”
Bastien bit back a laugh. Be careful what you ask, buddy. You might not like the answer.
Dancer slid his gaze to each man around him in turn. “A gift.”
Curious, the mercenary assassin knelt and opened the bag, then cursed as he saw the assassin’s head it contained. He scrambled for his blaster.
Faster than Bastien could move, Dancer shot his three companions, before closing the distance between them. He snatched the blaster from the man’s hand and pulled it back as if he was going to hit him with the stock. “Who sent you,” he ground out between clenched teeth.
“W-w-what?”
Dropping the blaster, Dancer grabbed his shirt and shook him hard. “Who. Sent. You?”
Bastien came in, weapon drawn to make sure there was no one else in hiding. “Damn, Hauk. You’re a selfish bastard. I thought you were going to leave some for me.”
Dancer ignored him as he lowered the scarf to expose his face. With one hand, he dragged the assassin, who was now kicking and screaming, toward their skimmer.
“I’m a Boldorian! My guild brothers will swarm all over you for this!”
Dancer snorted in contempt of the threat. “Let ’em take a fucking number. Now answer my question or I’m going to start eating pieces off your body, human.” He pulled the knife from his belt and isolated the assassin’s thumb, but not before his gaze fell to the man’s forearm and a series of self-imposed marks that nauseated Bastien even more than the man’s stench. Those were an accounting for all the innocent lives the bastard had taken.
Some, Bastien noted, were for kids.
“We’ll start with this, I think,” Hauk growled.
He screamed like a bitch.
Grimacing, Bastien sucked his breath in audibly. “You know, friend, I’d tell the Andarion what he wants to know. They’re not a patient race … and they’re always, always hungry.”
Sweat poured down the assassin’s face as he gulped. “I-I-I don’t know. I just have the ID code. That’s all. I swear. You can see for yourself.”
Bastien took over covering him while Dancer yanked the assassin’s PD off his belt and turned it on.
Dancer cursed. “Cabarro? Can you read this?” He tossed it over.
Bastien took a second to look at it. “Yeah. It’s the contract for your ass. Spill-kill. Bonus for your head. Damn, Hauk. If I could spend money, I’d be tempted to end you for this amount. Fain or no Fain.”
Dancer shook his head, knowing Bastien wouldn’t dare. “Does it say who wants me dead?”
“Nah. He’s right. Just lists an anonymous ID for payment. If this armpit of the Nine Worlds had any reception, you might be able to backtrace it. But as it is…”
“See! I—” The man’s words ended with a sharp blast to his chest.
Dancer stepped over his body.
Bastien handed him the PD. “You’re one cold son of a bitch.”
Dancer jerked the assassin’s sleeve back to show the catalog of kills he’d carved into his flesh as proud tribute for all the victims he’d made.
Half of them were for women and children.
“He deserved worse.”
Bastien shot the body three more times.
Dancer arched a brow at his actions.
Shrugging, Bastien holstered his weapon. “He deserved worse.”
“Spend a lot of time in the sun, do you?”
More than he could imagine. Bastien laughed as Dancer went inside the skimmer to see if there was anything he could use to get away from any others who might come for him.
Or better yet, if they could fly it out themselves.
Unfortunately, it was low on fuel. And as he’d suspected, it was a preprogrammed skimmer used to take the assassins to and from their outer atmosphere spaceship. Which meant there were more of them waiting for this group to return.
Great. Just great. Leave it to a Hauk to rain down assassins on the head of his Ravin ass.
Bastien barely bit back a groan at this new nightmare. Out of the frying pan and into the fryer …
An alarm sounded.
“What’d you do?” Bastien asked sardonically.
Sighing, Dancer shot the control panel that housed the signal. It went instantly silent. “Must have been wired to the mission leader’s vitals. It’s an alarm to the mother ship notifying the others that they’re dead.”
Fected awesome … Bastien glared at the sky, expecting the enemy to start dropping in any second, given his luck. “How many you think are up there?”
“Don’t know. But they’re down twenty-nine men.”