“After we jump, I need at least six hours of sleep. The last couple of days haven’t been the most restful.”
“The ship’s compensators are good enough that you could sleep now.”
“Thanks, but I’ll wait. I want to wake up in Honorius and not Serenity, if you don’t mind. And, really, even if you do.”
Ian looked irritated, but he didn’t contradict me. He led the way up to the flight deck. Persistence was a fairly modern ship with House internals capable of jumping up to two thousand light-years on its own. The FTL cooldown was a little slower than Aurora’s, but I couldn’t remember by quite how much.
Ian took the captain’s chair, so I slid into the navigator’s chair and clipped in. Ian directed the ship with obvious skill and familiarity. Our route was duplicated on my screen. We were headed for Andromeda Prime and we were about twenty minutes deep in the gate queue. Persistence lifted off with a rumble.
“How did you intercept my messages to Guskov?” Ian asked.
“Skill.”
When I didn’t say anything else, Ian laughed and tilted his head. “Touché.”
“Why did you decide to accept my help?”
“I’ve told you all along that I will do everything in my power to get Lord Ferdinand back, and it will be easier for you to infiltrate the party with me playing bodyguard than it would be for me to show up alone. If you’ve dealt with Silva before, they’ll be more likely to hear you out.”
“Does the House have a spare ship on Andromeda Prime? I’d rather not take a starliner to CCD Six if we can avoid it.”
“I’ve arranged for a fresh House ship. The starliner route shut down a couple of years ago—too many losses and not enough profit. A few mercenary squads based on CCD Six offer passage on their ships, but the timing is irregular.”
“So once we’re there, we leave on our own ship or we’re stuck for however long it takes for a merc crew to leave?”
“Yes. I’ve called in a security team to keep an eye on the ship while we’re on-planet.”
“Is that wise? Won’t word get back to Father that you’re conspiring with the enemy?”
“I trust my people,” Ian said.
I filed that tidbit away. It was good that the director of security engendered trust, right up until that trust became loyalty to him instead of to House von Hasenberg.
The signals weren’t as bad here, so I monitored the messages being sent from the ship. I sucked in a breath as pain stabbed through my head. I pulled back and tried again.
“Are you okay?” Ian asked.
“Just a headache,” I murmured. Ian was sending a flurry of messages. I did my best to keep up with them. Some went to contacts I didn’t know, setting details for the meet in Honorius.
I caught a message to Father and read it with trepidation. Ian admitted to capturing me, but before my rage could ignite, he also said I had time-sensitive information about Ferdinand that must be followed up immediately. And since he didn’t think I would make my own way home, he was taking me with him. He told Albrecht not to expect an update for a week, as we would be in deep cover.
I’m sure Father would be apoplectic when he received that message, and I smiled in spite of myself. I would’ve preferred that Father didn’t know how easily I’d been caught, but Ian had probably already told him that he was on the way to pick me up.
The rest of the messages were innocuous, so I stopped focusing and let them become background noise. I was getting better at tuning them out, but I still had a long way to go, as my throbbing head demonstrated.
While we waited for the jump, I used my com to open an encrypted connection to a secure server. I had no doubt Ian was monitoring all of the traffic that passed through the ship. The secure tunnel would slow him down, but it wasn’t foolproof. I’d need a few more layers of protection that would take some additional time before I could safely connect to HIVE or check my digital drop boxes. I added it to the mental list of things to do before I slept.
I posted a message in our sibling channel, outlining in oblique terms what had happened in the last day and what I knew so far. Ada had reported that she and the others were still digging, but had not made any real progress. Hopefully, with a little more direction, they’d have better luck.
With that in mind, I sent a separate message to Ada, Rhys, and Veronica, asking them to look into the Syndicate party in Matavara, especially anyone who might have an inside line on an invitation. I hadn’t been entirely lying when I told Ian I could get an invite—I knew of a few possibilities. But I’d take a sure thing over possibilities any day.
We made it to the front of the gate queue and smoothly jumped to Andromeda Prime. The planet glowed a distinctive red and blue on the forward video screens—it definitely was not Earth. Still . . .
“Open the shutters, please,” I said.
Ian glanced at me in confusion, then his mouth tightened in anger. “The video isn’t doctored.”
“Then it shouldn’t be a problem for me to see the planet for myself, should it?”
“Are you going to be this ridiculous the entire time?”
“Are you going to be a stubborn ass the entire time? In the time it’s taken you to argue, you could’ve already opened the shutters.”
He grumbled something under his breath, but he opened the shutters, revealing that the view of Andromeda Prime hadn’t been a video trick. The planet was even prettier through the windows than it had been on the vid screens.
“Thank you,” I said.
“You’re welcome.” He retracted the shutters as Persistence prepared to land in Honorius.
Even the fastest von Hasenberg ships wouldn’t be able to jump again in less than six hours, and that’s if Ian hadn’t jumped the ship on the way to DTD Four, which he must’ve.
Therefore, I had at least six hours where I could sleep in relative safety without worrying that the ship would deliver me to Earth while I was out. I would take advantage of that while I could. I unclipped and stood. “I’m going to grab a bunk.”
“I collected some of your clothes from Aurora. I put the bag in the first bunk, but you’re welcome to choose whichever quarters you prefer.”
The thought of Ian going through my undergarments caused a little frisson of heat to lick through me, half embarrassment, half desire. I bit my tongue before I asked him if he saw anything he liked. “Thank you,” I said. My voice came out husky and I cleared my throat before continuing, “Wake me if anything changes. Otherwise, I’ll see you in six hours.”
“Sleep well.”
“You, too.” I left the flight deck, then skipped the stairs and slid down the ladder to the middle level. I grabbed a glass of water from the mess hall, then went in search of a bed.
Chapter 12
My purse and a large, unfamiliar pack sat in the middle of the bed of the first bunk on the left. There were a half dozen crew quarters on this level with a shared bath at the end of the hall. Ian would be in the captain’s suite upstairs, which meant I wouldn’t be tempted to find out how he looked without a shirt. He might be frustrating and infuriating, but damn if he didn’t cut a fine figure.