CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Jaime was a big believer in sex improving one’s outlook on the universe, so he chalked Rylan’s now-buoyant mood up to an excellent orgasm. They made their way to the busy dining area where the rest of the crew, minus Kaz, were at a big wooden table. Jaime’s stomach growled at all the food smells, though Rylan made a face at what looked to be a pile of tentacles on the platter in front of Mags and Bo.
“Don’t turn up your nose at the local delicacies,” Captain Garcia said, noticing Rylan’s look as they sat down. He was swirling a dark red liquid around in his glass. “That variety of cuttlefish is the planet’s chief export. Can you imagine the amount of energy involved in transporting it in frozen storage across half a dozen systems? All so the very wealthy can say they’ve had off-world seafood rather than some local vat-grown variety. Out there it costs a fortune, and here they practically give it away. It’s a savory illustration of how we attach value depending on how difficult things are to obtain.”
“It’s a little chewy,” Mags offered. She and Bo looked fresh-scrubbed and relaxed, and Jaime figured they had enjoyed one of the hotel’s rooms as well. They did smell faintly of massage oil.
Garcia sipped his glass and made an expression that echoed Rylan’s earlier one. “That was my segue into how, if we were being paid by the amount of effort involved in delivering this cargo, we would surely be able to live like kings and queens. However, as we near the conclusion to this particular venture, know that my gratitude, at least, is boundless.”
Simi rolled her eyes. “C’mon, Sebastian, stop dragging everything out. Just tell them the deets so we can get going.” She looked at Jaime. “He’s been rambling for hours about his sad love life. Then Lydia came back from her walk and wanted to talk about moss.”
“This planet has several unique varieties,” the doctor said.
Simi groaned. “Everyone else is having sex, and this is what I get stuck with.”
Jaime grinned at Simi, but beside him he could feel Rylan tense up.
“You got word from the buyers?” Rylan asked the captain.
“At long last,” Garcia nodded. “About where to meet and hand over the goods.”
Jaime glanced at Rylan, wondering if it was really so dangerous, though Rylan was the only one who seemed worried.
“So where is it?” Rylan asked, and Jaime got the feeling he was holding back more emotions than even great sex could improve.
The captain began to speak, but then his eyes narrowed. He looked past Jaime to where a man was sauntering up to their table.
“Nice coat,” the stranger said.
Jaime froze, staring up into the face of the man he’d stolen it from.
The man, Xin, dropped down into the empty chair on the other side of Jaime and smirked. “Hi, Jaime. Miss me?”
Everyone at the table was very carefully not reacting, eyes on the stranger, hands straying below the table to where Jaime knew they had guns. He was only able to stare.
Everything about Xin was sharp. High cheekbones like knife blades, angling down to emphasize the precise outline of his full lips and the pointed angles of his chin. His clothes, in varying shades of dark gray, hung elegantly off his lean body. And above all, his dark eyes, dancing wickedly under a fall of straight black hair. He was very handsome, but Jaime knew his were the kind of looks that could cut.
“Jaime,” Rylan said, and Jaime was able to drag his eyes away. Rylan’s jaw was tight. “You know this guy?”
“Oh, we know each other,” Xin said, smirk deepening as his eyes swept Jaime up and down.
“We met on Luma, weeks ago,” Jaime said, still staring. “He’s a, uh, I guess you’d call him—”
“A bounty hunter,” Xin put in smoothly.
“Cool,” Simi said from across the table.
“I’m Xin,” he said, dragging it out so his name sounded like sin. He reached over to snag a morsel of food from Mags’ plate and popped it in his mouth. She looked like she was considering skewering him with her fork. He winked at her and turned his attention back to Jaime.
“How’d you find me?” Jaime asked. His brain felt short-circuited by Xin’s unlikely arrival.
“Oh, there’s been quite a lot of chatter coming out of the Sprawl.” The slight lilt of Xin’s accent gave his words even more of a mocking air than the very clear mockery he was already putting in. “Imagine my surprise to see your face on security feeds and wanted bulletins. Commonwealth’s looking for you, Purists looking for you. Seems everyone wants a piece.” His eyes moved downwards to stare at Jaime’s crotch.
Jaime could see Rylan’s fists clench.
“Anyone looking for me?” Garcia asked, sounding almost hopeful. “Naree Yoon perhaps? Large bounty, specifying me unharmed?”
Xin leaned back in his chair. “Can’t say I’ve heard anything, mate. But then I was all fired up to reclaim my prize.”
“You captured Jaime before?” Rylan ground out.
“Briefly, but memorably,” Xin agreed. “There’s good money in turning in wizards to the Commonwealth, even better in selling ’em off to less-honest types.” His tongue flicked out to lick his lower lip. “Can’t say as I’ve decided yet what to do with you.”
“You’re not touching him.”
Xin looked at Rylan as though noticing him for the first time. “You too, eh? It is hard to resist those big brown eyes—”
“Xin!” Jaime felt sufficiently recovered to try and take control of the situation before Rylan burst a blood vessel. “What the hell are you doing? Just because you caught me once doesn’t mean you, I don’t know, have dibs.”
“Maybe I was worried about you.”
“Come on.”
“My feelings were hurt.” He pouted with full lips. “You never called.”
Slowly, each word dropping like a stone, Rylan spoke. “You had sex with Jaime. While he was your prisoner.”
Xin glanced around the table at the others in dramatic disbelief. Impassive faces stared back. “Uh, yeah. And one of my better shows, I thought. At least until this one took off. Never gave me a chance for round two.”
Rylan lunged at him in one swift movement. He caught Xin around the neck and hauled him up over the table, dragging dishes and cutlery in his wake. Rylan spun him around, slamming him into the nearest wall.
“You piece of shit! You took advantage of a prisoner.”
Xin tried to pry Rylan’s fingers from his throat. Jaime could have told him it was useless. “I’m the one who ended up in handcuffs, mate!”
“Rylan,” Jaime said, coming to his side, “it was my idea. The sex part.”
“Yeah,” Xin coughed, “totally his suggestion. If anyone got used, it was me. Hard on the ego. And the cleaning staff of the hotel got an eyeful, what with me left naked and cuffed to the bed.”
Jaime tugged on his arm, worried that Rylan was going to tighten his hand and decapitate Xin in the restaurant. Behind them, the rest of the crew was trying to reassure and wave off the staff and onlookers, though it looked like Garcia had managed to hang onto his wine glass.
Rylan looked at Jaime, rage and concern warring in his face. “You don’t have sex with prisoners because a prisoner can’t consent freely. Jaime, I’m so sorry this happened to you.”
Jaime felt like his heart was going to burst with affection for Rylan’s muscular and fierce protectiveness. “It’s okay. Really. Don’t kill him. You’d never forgive yourself.”
Rylan loosened his grip. “Wasn’t gonna kill him,” he rumbled. “Just hurt him a lot. Still can if you want.”
“You’re sweet, you know that?”
“Bloody adorable.” Xin rubbed his throat. His voice was hoarse, but he was still able to raise it to carry. “Especially as I’m being lectured on morals by a Commonwealth spy. It is Brian, right? So how much you getting for selling out your crew?”
Rylan’s hand clamped onto his throat again, cutting him off.
Garcia looked over from where he was trying to reassure a waiter. “Rylan,” he said, his voice deceptively calm, “let’s hear what the man has to say.”
“He’s a damn liar, Captain.”
Garcia sauntered towards them. “I’m an excellent liar myself, so I always like to hear how others do it. Professional interest.” Xin’s face was growing red. “Rylan?” There was steel beneath the captain’s soft voice.
Rylan released Xin and stepped back. Xin wheezed, putting his hands on his knees. Garcia waited for him to catch his breath. Jaime noticed that it seemed like everyone was waiting, and he looked nervously from Xin to Rylan and back again.
“It seemed like you had something you wanted to get off your chest?” Garcia asked Xin, who glared back.
“Like I was saying earlier,” he rasped, “there’s been a lot of chatter about him.” Xin jerked a thumb towards Jaime; Jaime tried not to flinch. “Legal networks, not-so legal networks, and downright nasty networks. But about your ship and whatever the bloody hell you’re doing? Nothing. Not just nothing, any talk gets shut down quick. Everybody you were in contact with in the Sprawl is in custody right now. Commonwealth agents swooped in.”
“So?” Garcia asked, bored. “Practically everything that goes on in the Sprawl is illegal.”
“Convenient though, innit?” Xin straightened his clothes and tried to regain his smirk as he faced Garcia. “You’re a criminal type. You know how we love to talk. And the word is that the agents doing all this work aren’t the usual sad, stuck out in the sticks types. They’re top-drawer. All under the command of one very keen up-and-comer, a Mr. Jonathan Gray.”
Jaime at this point was very used to studying Rylan, otherwise he wouldn’t have caught the slight stiffening at the mention of the name.
“I’ve heard of him,” Bo said unexpectedly. He shrugged when eyes swung towards him. “Supposed to be running most of the ops these days. That’s all I know.”
“You ever seen the man?” Xin asked. Bo shook his head. “Tall, blond hair, blue eyes.” He raised an eyebrow at Rylan. “A few years older. Less muscle, more brains, but otherwise he’s the spitting image of this one.”
Rylan laughed, but to Jaime’s ears it sounded hollow. “Someone nobody else has ever seen, who maybe looks like me. Fuck this.” He looked at Garcia. “Why are we listening to him?”
“Because I said to let him talk,” the captain snapped. “And we have been dogged by Commonwealth agents since we started this job. A job that you set up.”
Rylan’s shoulders drew back. “You know I’m ex-military. You’ve been happy to use my contacts to get jobs for months. All of those went off without a hitch.”
“Small jobs.” Lydia looked thoughtful. “A string of small, successful opportunities to get us to trust you, until you dangled the big prize.”
Jaime saw that Mags’ hand was on her gun belt. “Hey,” he said, stepping forward. “Come on, this is getting weird.”
Garcia tilted his head in Jaime’s direction. “Something else Rylan brought to us.”
Simi sucked in a breath. “No way. Not Jaime.”
Rylan gently pushed Jaime to the side, but he focused on Garcia. “You got a problem with me, deal with me. But the way I see it, maybe now that the job’s nearly done you’re looking for an excuse to cut me out of my share.”
Garcia smiled. “As I said, I’m an excellent liar and I know flailing when I hear it.” He stepped closer, not seeming at all intimidated by Rylan’s height. “You think I didn’t check into you when I hired you? Your fake papers were excellent, by the way, so very good that I didn’t mind paying extra to dig deeper. All I ever got was a name.” He waved an airy hand. “I have no problem with someone hiding their past. In fact, I expect it, so I brought you on. But imagine my surprise today when that name I paid so dearly to uncover turns out to be a familial one.” His smile grew wider, all teeth. “Hello there, Brian Gray.”
Faster than Jaime could blink, Mags’ gun was drawn, and she was pointing it at Rylan. Jaime jumped back in shock and felt Xin’s hand on his arm, steadying him. “Easy,” he whispered in Jaime’s ear.
The waiter came charging back, accompanied by what looked to be the cook. She was wielding a large cleaver. “You need to clear out of here,” she yelled. “This is a family place! No gun fights!”
“Okay, okay,” Simi said. “Everybody please calm down.”
“Who’s going to pay for the food?” the waiter demanded. “And all the plates you broke?”
Rylan and Garcia were still talking to each other, voices low and angry. Mags never moved or wavered in her aim. Simi wrung her hands, while Bo and the doctor tried to deal with the waiter and the cook. Customers at other tables added their voices in complaint.
“Your friends really do know how to cause a distraction,” Xin said in Jaime’s ear. He had one hand on Jaime’s arm, the other at the small of his back, where Jaime could feel the cold metal press of a gun. “Not a word,” Xin said as he steadily pulled Jaime backwards, winding their way towards a door. “I know that man of yours is strong, but I don’t think he’s bulletproof.”
“What are you doing?”
“Getting what I came here for.”
Jaime cast one last desperate look towards Rylan, but he didn’t dare shout for him. Instead he let Xin walk him out the door.
Outside, the air smelled of rain. But Jaime didn’t get a chance to suck in more than a quick breath before Xin yanked him around the corner of the building. He swiftly pulled handcuffs out of his pocket and yanked Jaime’s arms forward.
“This time,” he said, fastening them tightly on Jaime’s wrists, “the cuffs stay on you.”
He pulled the sleeves of Jaime’s coat down over to cover them. “Have you dragged my coat through every patch of mud in the quadrant?” Xin muttered. He grabbed Jaime’s arm and started marching him briskly along the raised wooden sidewalks. “I’ve got a shuttle in one of the coves nearby.”
Jaime dragged his feet, looking back over his shoulder, until Xin jabbed the gun sharply into his side. “You can’t kill me,” Jaime said bitterly. “How will you get your stupid bounty?”
“I still get paid even if I give you a nice, painful flesh wound.” He raised an eyebrow at Jaime’s glare and pocketed the small gun. “Don’t tell me you’re worried about him? I thought he was like me. Your escape plan.”
“I don’t need an escape plan. I’m part of the crew. And I just left Rylan in a room full of angry people with a gun pointed at him.”
“Don’t you mean Brian?” Xin asked snidely. He sighed when Jaime tried to pull away, yanking him back and making him walk faster. “Anyway, that lot aren’t the murdering types, I can tell. Well, except that one older lady. Her eyes over the barrel of a gun are probably the last thing a lot of people have seen. No, they’ll likely tie him up, hurl a lot of hurtful invective, and then dump him somewhere for the authorities to find, with little more than a bruised ego. Maybe you two will even be reunited after I drop you off with the Commonwealth.”
“What? You’re not selling me off to the highest bidder?”
“You might not believe me, Jaime, but I’m doing you a favor right now. Government protection is what you need, from the people who are after you. I’m not even making a profit once you factor in my expenses. The Commonwealth is only offering thirty percent more on top of the standard wizard finding fee for you.”
“You’re right,” Jaime said, “I don’t believe you.” The shadows were lengthening as the planet’s long day neared its end, and in the dimming light they attracted barely any attention from passers-by. “What do you mean by standard fee?”
Xin shrugged, glancing around as he turned them down another street. “It’s incentive for citizens not to kill your kind, I suppose. Turn one of you in to a Commonwealth official and get a fistful of credits. I doubt it’ll be enough to cover my fuel.”
Jaime frowned. He wanted to ask more questions, but he was also desperately worried about Rylan. “Xin, if it’s not that much money, then let me pay you.”
“You have money?” They were nearing the outskirts of town, the trees beginning to outnumber the houses.
“Not right now, but I’m supposed to be getting some.” Though Jaime had a feeling the job and the promised payday was not going to happen. “Or I can earn it. MMIs — I mean wizards can always get black market work, right?”
“Jaime, the last time we met you seduced me in order to escape. There’s not a lot of trust in our relationship.”
“I didn’t just want to escape,” Jaime admitted. “I was… lonely.” He blushed a little because it was true. And because the sex had been really good.
Xin stopped and swung Jaime around to face him. He hooked a finger under Jaime’s chin and lifted his face up. “Jaime,” he said, his voice low, “I’m not going to sleep with you again. No matter how much you beg.”
“I’m not begging!”
“Please. I don’t blame you.” He looked down at himself, then smirked up at Jaime.
Jaime rolled his eyes.
Xin slung an arm over his shoulders and started them walking again. “No, your double-crossing friend was right about one thing. I shouldn’t have done it, no matter how tempting your charms. And besides, you know what they say, fool me once…” He slowed, looking from side to side.
Jaime could only see shadows. “What?”
Xin’s gun was back in his hand. “I think we need to—”
There was a low whistle from somewhere behind them, and then people were stepping out from behind the trees — five, then six in all, only a couple women in the group. They were dressed in rough, patched clothing, and slung over their shoulders or in their hands, were rifles, looking equally patched and oft-repaired, but still deadly. They fanned out, loosely encircling Jaime and Xin, but still keeping back.
“Evening,” Xin said, with a half-smile. “Out for a stroll, are we?”
One of the men, older than the rest, with a graying beard and a limp, stepped forward. “That the wizard?” he said, staring at Jaime with hostility.
“You got the wrong idea, mate,” Xin said. “None of that here. Try asking back in town. Heard there was a commotion at Nemo’s.”
The man spat in their direction. “We received word through the infernal machines from our brothers and sisters. About the bounty hunter looking for a wizard. It seems you found your cursed prey.”
“Well, that’s a flowery way of putting it,” Xin said.
“We’re taking it.”
Jaime couldn’t help but leaning a little closer to Xin at the hatred in the man’s face.
“Listen,” Xin said. His gun was loose in his hand, not pointed at anyone in particular. “I can see you’re motivated buyers and I respect that. But I’m a businessman, too. I have prior offers for this one.”
He gestured a little too widely with his gun hand for their tastes, because five weapons were suddenly sharply trained on them. Jaime gasped, and Xin raised his hands.
“Putting it away,” he called out. “That all right with you, then? Gun goes back in my pocket, and we talk about this like civilized people?”
“Civilization was destroyed by people who created abominations like that,” the bearded man said, eyes hard on Jaime. “But we try to avoid killing true humans if possible.”
“I’m going to take that as a yes to me putting the gun away,” Xin said. With exaggerated slowness he lowered both hands and eased the gun into his jacket pocket. “Right, so I’m willing to discuss counter-offers.” The weapons stayed on them.
The man gave Xin a cold smile. “There is no discussion. We’re taking that thing, and in exchange we let you leave here alive.”
Xin let his eyes wander unhurriedly over the circle of people. Jaime could barely bring himself to look at anything; he couldn’t see a way out.
“This is a considerable loss for my business,” Xin was saying, “but I can see that minds are made up.”
“Xin.” Jaime couldn’t help himself. The word came out as little more than a whisper.
Xin shrugged as he looked at Jaime. “Sorry, but it seems like my hands are tied. I’m sure you can appreciate that.” He turned his head towards the bearded man. “Speaking of — can I get my handcuffs back?”
“No.”
“It’s not like I have an unlimited supply of them,” Xin muttered. “You’ll be wanting the key?”
“Not necessary.”
Jaime shivered.
Xin tucked his hands in his pockets and started to turn away before pausing. “He’s actually wearing my coat, you know. Let me at least take that. It’s a quality garment.”
“We’re out of patience, bounty hunter. Go if you want to live.”
“Shame.” Xin ran a hand along Jaime’s collar, straightening it out. “I always did like this coat. Ah, well. I’d wish you luck, Jaime, but it seems you’re all out.” He spread his hands as he stepped away from Jaime, and the other people closed in.
Jaime could only stare back at Xin helplessly until a rough cloth sack was yanked down over his head and he saw nothing but darkness.