“Isn’t that Dev’s device?” He’d used it in the station to hide our heartbeats from the others. He grabbed it and put it on Trenton’s wrist before he turned to me.
With a nod, he closed the med machine. “Yes.”
That told me nothing. I put my throbbing head in my hands. “Wade, what is happening?”
“We’re going to be boarded any second, and I don’t want them finding Trenton. They won’t know he’s here if they can’t hear or sense him.” He pushed the machine into the corner. “Have a silent mode. Have a silent mode. Thank fuck.” It was like he spoke to himself.
“Wade?”
He rushed over to me. “Evander has us. They’re tugging us on board their ship. It looks like they’ve managed to construct a super ship. We thought we had all of them. It’s quite bad. My guess is that Trenton tried a maneuver that should have worked to get away from this mess, but it blew up instead because this ship sucks. They’re going to tow us on board. Listen, this is important, and I have three seconds before I risk them hearing us. Trenton is not on here. Do you understand?”
I did. “I get it.”
“Great. Whatever they do, survive.” He kissed me, hard. I’d just been puking. It should have been gross, but it was one of the sweetest kisses of my life. “I love you. Just keep living.”
Our burning ship jerked left, and Wade winced. “We’re on their cube.”
My head was thick, but I had to know how he knew this. “Has this happened to you before?”
“When they took me prisoner years ago to impersonate me on The Farm. This is what they did. What comes next will be very unpleasant. But they need you, want you. My guess is they will fix your head. I don’t know after that.”
A loud bang sounded, and a second later the cabin filled with a spray. It stunk like something sour, and Wade covered my mouth and nose with his hand before he followed with a towel. “They’re putting out the fire. It’s a substance that stinks but isn’t toxic. I’m unfortunately used to it.”
I was having a hard time following everything he said. I closed my eyes, and Wade shook me. “No, stay awake. Easier to keep you healthy if you are. Aha, they’re here. Evander Super Soldiers. Three of them. They’re headed right toward us.”
I should be scared, but the need to throw up rode me again, and it was everything I could do to breathe through my nose and try not to give into the need.
Wade rose to his full height. “Leave her alone.”
“Move, doctor. Or I’ll make this even more unpleasant for you. Where is the other one? The pilot? I was told there would be three of you. We’re bringing you and the girl to the Vice President and getting rid of him.”
I lifted my head. No wonder Wade had wanted to hide Trenton. He understood how these assholes worked.
“He died,” I managed to say. “On the planet. He didn’t make it onto the ship with us. That’s why you were able to catch us.”
“Well, that makes things even easier.”
The three Super Soldiers were huge, but I was used to it from my guys. These three were completely clean-shaven. Short black hair, big angry eyes. My guys had really altered their appearances when they’d given up the hell that these guys lived with.
“Why do you even bother with this?” I rubbed my forehead. It didn’t help the ache. “Evander is on the other side of the galaxy. Why not just let this shit go?”
Yep, I was cursing all the time now.
“Evander is our journey, our task, our home.” The one closest to me bent over so his face was very close to mine. “And those traitors that you like might have forgotten that, but we never will.”
“Hey.” Wade leaped at him. One of the men behind the one currently snarling at me, intercepted and knocked him down to the ground.
My world spun. Then blackness.
2 Into The Heart Of Darkness
The air conditioning on the Evander ship was high. Maybe I just noticed it so much as I slowly woke up because we’d been so hot on the planet. The small ship we’d attempted to escape on had been pretty warm, too. I shivered and rubbed my arms.
The movement must have caught someone’s attention, because I heard footsteps, and then the awareness of a presence staring down at me from above proved impossible to ignore. I opened my eyes and stared at a stranger.
He tilted his head and smiled at me. “You’re awake.”
It seemed I was. But I didn’t know who this was, and since we were on an Evander ship, I wasn’t sure that I wanted to be. “Apparently.”
“If you hurt her, I’ll rip out your eyeballs.” That was Wade’s voice booming in the room. I lifted my head, careful to not get close to the man staring down at me as I looked for Wade. Some glass separated him from me. As he paced back and forth on the other side of that clear partition where he observed me, worry tightened the hardness of his jaw.
“Your doctor friend likes to make threats he can’t possibly achieve.” The man near me sighed. “If I didn’t think we needed him, I’d put him out an airlock right now. I still might. It would be prudent for him to tone down his attitude.”
I forced myself to swallow so I could think. “Who are you?”
“My name is Dr. Patrick Blume. I am a Vice President of Evander Corporation and in charge of this ship. I was charged with getting a hold of you, Ms. MacKinnon, and grabbing you, I finally did. I also managed to recapture some turncoat traitors to the company, and so I imagine management will be very pleased with me when we get back through the black hole.”
They weren’t getting through that hole. It had been officially closed down. That much I’d gathered from conversations I’d heard while I was on Mars Station. Did these people not know that? Or did they have some way to bust through the closed hole that we just didn’t know yet?
As I didn’t answer him, he kept speaking. Or maybe he’d have just done that anyway. Some people liked to hear the sound of their own voices more than they required any kind of response.
“Now the trick will be to keep you alive. And I feel I have the perfect solution. Your doctor over there, he found a way to keep you kicking.” He picked up my arm. “I’m going to let him keep doing so because I believe I have the exact way to motivate you here.”
I stared at him while I considered the best way to respond. Maybe Kellan was rubbing off on me. I just wanted to beat him to death. But instead, I swung my legs over the side of the medical bed that was more like a table. “If you think for one second that I—”
He held up his hand. “I know you can zap me. We’ve seen what you can do. It was impressive. You took down a Super Soldier when we tried to get you. I must say that was incredibly surprising. No, listen first. We have your doctor here. We have a spaceship full of Super Soldiers who work for me. And we have your men here, our former Super Soldiers, locked away where I can just as easily end their lives as I can keep them safe. All of that will depend on you and how much you are willing to cooperate with me during our journey.”
Goose bumps broke out on my skin. I knew they had Wade. He was obviously stuck, or he’d be in here with me. But I couldn’t just take his word that he had everyone else. He might have already killed them. I had to understand exactly what I was dealing with before I spoke anymore to this so-called doctor who was threatening me to comply with him.