Chapter 19
Nina had returned to her suite, and had just finished getting dressed when her phone rang. “Hello?”
“Nina Sssinclair?” a voice asked.
“Yes.”
“Thisss isss Valkri, from Reptan. I wasss planning to meet Esan for lunch but decided that thisss wasss not the life I want to lead. I will let him know I am leaving, but I believe I lossst my passsport at the gathering.”
She was glad to hear that the female was leaving on her own terms. Nina didn’t want to be the cause of another person’s pain. “Did you look for it in the arboretum?”
“I tried, but there wasss a sssign sssaying that it would be closssed for ssseveral daysss for maintenance.”
Nina didn’t know anything about maintenance. “I could call the manager of the arboretum.”
“I hate to bother anyone elssse. If you have accesss, could you go with me to open it up ssso I could sssearch for it? I believe it fell underneath the bench that Esssan and I were sssitting on.
Nina hesitated. She had this weird feeling inside that something wasn’t right, but she couldn’t pinpoint what it was. It was ridiculous — she was probably just feeling unease about seeing the Reptan after her night with Esan. As the event coordinator, she had access to the venue,, and it wouldn’t take that much time. She was filled with guilt.
“I guess I could let you in.”
“Great, I’ll meet you there in ten minutesss.”
“Okay.” She hung up and went to grab her shoes. This shouldn’t take too long. She just had to avoid any mention of Esan.
She left her suite and headed down the hallway to the elevators. Something kept bothering her about this whole thing with Valkri. Why would she wait two days after the gathering to fetch her passport? Maybe she didn’t even know it was missing until today when she decided to leave.
A few minutes later, she approached the arboretum doors. Valkri was already waiting for her. Sure enough, a paper posted on the door stated that the arboretum was closed for maintenance.
“Let me get my access card…”
“That won’t be necesssary,” someone said from behind her.
She heard the hissing sound in a man’s voice and thought maybe it was Esan. She turned to find a slightly older man with a stern expression on his face. “Who are you?”
“You’ll find out sssoon enough.”
There was only one other Reptan man on board the GCFA ship other than Esan. It had to be Esan’s foster father. “Are you looking for Esan?”
“Esssan will be looking for usss.” He held up a stun gun in his hand.
Her heart skipped a beat. “What are you doing?”
“You’re going to help usss handle Esssan.”
“I don’t know what you mean…”
“You will sssoon enough. Now get inssside the arboretum.”
She couldn’t fight both of them, so she thought she would go along until she could escape. They both seemed a little off to her. “You’re not going to get away with whatever you’re trying to do. Workers have to come in here to keep up the plants.”
“We’ve taken care of them already,” Shrake told her.
She didn’t like the sound of that. “What did you do with the workers?”
“They’re ... tied up.” Valkri laughed.
She entered the arboretum. Shrake pushed in the direction of the center pavilion. There was a chair sitting there. “Ssssit down.”
She glared at Shrake and sat down. “What do you think I could possibly help with?”
“I knew that if I came here with femalesss that Esssan didn’t choossse, he would be too dissstracted to notice when I took hisss banking card. Unfortunately, none of the passswordsss I tried worked. Valkri was sssupposssed to flirt information out of him, but didn’t have enough time to do that. She did, however, notice how the two of you looked at one another and sssussspected that you were clossse. He’ll come for you and do whatever I sssay to keep you sssafe.”
“That’s because he has honor — unlike you, asshole!”
He glared at her. “Shut her mouth. I tire of hearing her speak.”
Valkri tied her hands in front of her, then placed tape over her mouth. She watched as Valkri sashayed over to Shrake and the two of them kissed. Holy shit! Shrake and Valkri were lovers. How did this escape everyone else’s attention? Esan was going to lose his mind with rage. She prayed that Esan stayed away from this, stayed safe. Hopefully he would let security handle everything, because she couldn’t take it if anything happened to him. She realized now that she loved him. She had fallen in love with Esan.
*****
Esan left Trig to contact the IDJ. Trig wanted to have the authorities present when they took Shrake and Valkri in for questioning. Also, he wanted the IDJ to intercept the transport ship taking the other Reptans back to their home world to question them as well. Esan couldn’t believe that his foster father would have anything to do with stealing from him. As far as Esan knew, his foster parents had been well off and Shrake was a respected member of the Reptan Council. This had to be a mistake.
He entered the elevator with the idea of going back to Nina’s to tell her what was happening. After he stepped in, he pushed the button and stepped back, but just as the door was closing, a hand appeared and stopped the doors. Then a man wearing a hoodie stepped inside. The doors closed and the stranger moved to stand slightly behind him. He felt something poke into his side.
“Push the button for the top level. Don’t make any sssudden movementsss or I’ll shoot you. You will go where I tell you when I tell you. If you don’t, your human girlfriend will die.”
The stranger was Shrake. “What do you want?”
“You’re going to do exactly what I sssay. If you call out for help, I’ll kill you, then kill your human whore.”
The door to the elevator opened on Nina’s floor but neither of them moved. Other people got on and off, and the whole time, Esan was struggling against his instinct to fight Shrake. He had to get to Nina and make sure she was okay. When they reached the top level, Shrake shoved the weapon he had in Esan’s side and motioned for him to get off.
“Why are you doing thisss?” Esan asked as they approached the closed doors of the arboretum.
“You and your sssissster alwaysss thought yourssselvesss better than everyone elssse. You never appreciated the fact that I took you in when no one elssse wanted you. Ssso ungrateful. Tthen you leave inssstead of working for me. My busssinesss went under. I had to rely on the pitiful ssstipend I got from ssserving on the council. All the while, I watch you become famousss and get rich. It isssn’t fair!”
“You ssstole my bank card that firssst day when you arrived and followed me back to my sssuite.”
“Yesss.”
“You’ve been trying to pull creditsss from the banking machinesss on board thisss whole time.”
“You’re right.”
“You’ll never get away with thisss. Tthe IDJ hasss been called.”
Shrake snorted. “I’m a Reptan councilman. I can plead diplomatic immunity. The worssst they will do isss ship me back to Reptan.”
Damn, he was right. The IDJ did not have authority over Reptans because of an agreement made many years ago to not interfere. When the galactic council was recruiting, some of the alien races were resistant to working with others outside their species. A great war had began bewteen the Reptans and the other species in the galactic council. Intervention prevented the Reptans from being annailated. The Reptains agreed to join the glactic council but in return, they would have certain priviliges, one of which was diplomatic immunity.
Esan entered the arboretum and scanned the area. He spotted Nina sitting in a chair in the center pavilion. Her hands were tied in front of her and there was tape across her mouth.
“Bassstard!” Esan growled out as he rushed to Nina. He knelt down beside her, reached for the tape, and tried to gently pull it off.
“Ouch.” Nina flinched a bit.
“I’m ssso sssorry you got pulled into thisss.”
“Why are they doing this?” Nina asked.
“Money. They are trying to sssteal my money,” Esan explained. He started to untie her hands but Shrake growled with displeasure.
“Leave her handsss where they are. We have an appointment with the bank. My missstresss will remain here with the human. If I don’t come back in an hour, she will kill the girl.”
Mistress? He stood up and turned to find Valkri kissing Shrake. His anger grew along with his contempt. “You’re a good liar, Valkri.”
The female didn’t look ashamed for her behavior at all. “You were ssso easssy to manipulate. Shrake told me all about you. I knew what to sssay to get your attention. Our original plan wasss for you to come to our Reptan home world. I would win your attention and mate you, then Shrake would kill you. Your money would transssfer to me and Shrake and I would move to a more luxuriousss region.”
Shrake nodded, “That wasss our perfect plan but you had to ruin it like you ruin everything. We had to come here to the GCFA ship. When I sssaw how you watched that human bitch, I knew we had to do more than rely on Valkri’sss impresssive charmsss. I ssstole your bank card but couldn’t figure out the passscode. Now, we have you and we have leverage to get you to do what I want.”
“You’ll never get away with it.”
Shrake motioned for Esan to go with him. “We’ll sssee about that.”
Esan leaned down and kissed Nina, whispering to her ashis mouth brushed her cheek. “I’ll be back for you.”
“Pleassse come back in one piece,” she whispered back.
There was something else in her eyes, he could tell. She had more she wanted to say, but didn’t have time. He had more he wanted to say to her, too, but first, he had to do something about Shrake.