Owned by Luna Voss
20
Melyta
I feel like the ground has dropped out from under me as we drive back to Barion’s mansion. All at once, in a single moment, everything that we’ve been building together is gone. If Gurtion wakes up from his coma, he’s going to know exactly who I am. And Barion won’t be able to hide me from him forever.
The life I’ve been living as Barion’s vulta is over.
Tears slip down my cheeks as I stare out the window at the city lights. This city has never wanted me, never loved me, but it was always home. And when I was with Barion, it even felt like a good home.
Over.
“It’s going to be okay,” Barion reassures me, squeezing my hand. “I’m going to make it okay.”
I nod, numb. I don’t doubt that he means it. But I also don’t know how it’s possible. How could we possibly be safe with Gurtion Dultaz alive, awake, and out for my blood?
“We could leave the planet,” I suggest tearfully. “Together. We could leave all of this behind and start a new life.”
Barion hardly answers me, staring ahead at the road. I guess he’s processing this in his own way, too.
“We could go to the other side of the galaxy,” I continue, gaining confidence in my idea. “The Dultaz Family wouldn’t be able to find us out there, right? We could find some nice subject planet and settle down. Maybe even…” I hesitate. “Maybe even start a family.”
He turns at this, and his expression looks dead. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen that kind of darkness in his eyes.
“We would never be safe,” he tells me. “Not if I came with you. Someone in my position doesn’t just walk away from this life.”
“But what if we covered our tracks really well?” I try desperately. “We could use fake names. Hide the money really well. Not leave any trail at all.”
He shakes his head, staring out the windshield. I cry silently as he takes us back to the place I’ve come to call home.
When we get back to the house, all I want is for Barion to sweep me into his arms and hold me and make everything go away. Either that, or make a plan to beat this thing. Actually, probably that second one. That would be best.
But Barion doesn’t seem like he’s in the mood to talk, or cuddle. The moment we reach the upstairs, he pulls me into the deepest kiss I’ve ever experienced. Not dominating, not even really sexual, just full of need. The kind of need I feel in my bones, that makes me want to cry. The kind of need I felt during that year we were apart.
“I love you, Melyta,” he whispers, cupping my face. “There is no life for me without you.”
And then he breaks the kiss, and his face darkens. He begins to walk back downstairs toward the garage.
“Wait!” I call, following after him and tugging on his sleeve. “Where are you going?” The thought of being without him tonight is heartbreaking.
“I’m going to do something very stupid and very dangerous,” Barion replies, not breaking his stride. Although his body language is determined, I know him well enough to detect the slight shake in his voice. I’ve never heard that before, and it fills me with fear.
“Don’t,” I plead with him. “Please, just stay with me tonight. If something happened to you…”
“It won’t,” he says with a deep breath, and it sounds like he’s trying to convince himself as much as me.
Barion climbs back into his car and I open the door to the passenger seat to join him. “Please,” I beg. “Don’t do anything stupid. Stay here with me.”
He puts his hand on the door, holding it closed. “I can’t,” he says simply. “And I need you to stay here tonight.”
I glare at him, almost hating him in that moment. It hurts that he’s shutting me out like this.
“Promise me,” he rasps, meeting my gaze with shiny eyes. “Promise me you’ll stay here, no matter what happens.”
I stare back at him, my own eyes swimming with tears. I hate this. I fucking hate it.
But slowly, I nod my head.
His face darkens. “I want to hear you say it.”
“I promise,” I whisper, feeling like I’m about to break. “Promise you’ll come back to me.”
Barion gives me a long look, and I wish so badly I could know what he was thinking behind all that brooding, resigned conviction.
Then he engages the vehicle’s hover engine and drives off, leaving me alone in the empty garage.
* * *
Barion
I can’t think about this. I certainly don’t have the space to feel.
All I can do is act.
I park my car a couple blocks away from the hospital and engage the video blocker in my pocket as I set off. The video blocker is an extremely expensive, extremely illegal piece of equipment, one that will completely obscure my image on any video camera that might record me. I won’t be able to stay off the hospital’s surveillance system entirely, but I can hide my identity. And right now, that’s enough.
A sense of grim purpose runs through me as I plug in the keycode to the hospital’s back entrance. Enough people have this code that it could never be traced back to me. I feel like I’m a ghost.
At this time of night, the hospital is thinly staffed, although the artificial lighting still glares down from overhead. It would be best if I didn’t run into anyone. Thankfully, I don’t, and am able to make my way into Gurtion’s wing unmolested by any patients or employees.
Two Dultaz Family soldiers sit outside the door to his room guarding him. I happen to know that both of them are armed, although they can’t be carrying openly inside the hospital. Both of them would also know my face. I can’t let them see me.
But problems have solutions. Dipping into a nearby bathroom, I pull out my communicator and open the app that controls the explosives I planted on two black cars in the back parking lot, cars I recognized as Dultaz Family vehicles. A message comes up on the screen:
Ready to detonate.
With a deep breath, I press the button.
A pair of explosions ring out, as loud and disruptive as I had hoped. A moment later, I hear voices, then footsteps running down the hall. Cautiously, I emerge from the bathroom, peering out in the direction of Gurtion’s room.
Fuck. One of the Dultaz soldiers is still there standing guard. I suppose it was too much to hope that they would be stupid enough to leave together. Still, one guard is something I can deal with.
“Did you hear that? What’s going on?” I call out, running in his direction.
The guard sees me, and there’s relief on his face as he recognizes me as the Family’s underboss.
“I don’t know,” he replies quickly. “Nago just went to check it out. Sounded like an explosion in the parking lot. Figured one of us should wait here and keep watch on Gurt.”
“Good man,” I say, steeling myself for what I’m about to do. “That’s why I’m here. Sarizor wants me in the room with him, just in case.”
His eyes widen. “Does that mean there’s a threat?”
I gesture in the direction of the parking lot. “Obviously.”
The guard nods, looking nervous, and turns around to open the door. Then his whole body stiffens as I push my knife into his back. He doesn’t make a sound, my hand firmly covering his mouth, as the blade slides between his ribs and into his heart. A moment later he goes limp, and I let his body fall to the floor.
I step over him, feeling cold, emotionless. He didn’t do anything to deserve his fate. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. If I thought about it too much, maybe I would hate myself. But I can’t do that. Melyta is the only thing that matters. Everything I’m doing, I’m doing for her.
Even though my heart is pounding, I feel myself possessed by an icy calm. I stride across the room to Gurtion’s bed, looking down at him for a long, searching moment. Despite everything I’ve done up until this point, this somehow feels final. Even more so than when I ran him over with my car. That was a mad rush of urgency. It wasn’t calculated like this.
Now tonight I’ve already murdered one Dultaz soldier in cold blood, and I’m about to do the same to the boss’s son. Vostra royalty, if you will. Or as royal as anything gets on a shitty little subject planet like Tarsheb 8.
Gurtion’s face is peaceful, like he’s sleeping. It’s probably the least punchable he’s ever looked. Even still, I can’t deny that this is an ignominious end for a vostrat. No one wants to die murdered in their sleep.
He shouldn’t have fucked with my woman.
Next to the bed is a medical device feeding some kind of medicine into Gurtion’s arm. There’s a knob on the side that controls the dosage, and I turn it all the way up. Immediately, the computer reading goes nuts as his vitals start to tank.
Then I hear more footsteps coming this way, along with a woman’s voice speaking quickly into a communicator: “Yeah, I see it. Probably just an equipment malfunction, but I’ll check on him. Yeah, don’t worry, I’m on it.”
It’s one of the nurses. The system must have notified her about Gurt’s condition. Fuck. By the sound of things, she’ll be here in about 10 seconds. That’s not even enough time for me to get away, much less make sure the overdose I just initiated does its job. For a moment I freeze, unsure what to do.
Then I shift into action mode. My absolute priority is that Gurt never wakes up, so I take my knife and stab him about five times in the chest. Judging from all the blood, I’d say that objective is complete. I allow the blade to drop from my gloved hand and turn my attention next to the nurse who is rapidly approaching.
She gasps as she reaches the doorway and sees the dead Dultaz soldier on the ground. I hear an item, whatever she was holding, fall to the floor.
And that’s my cue. The lights in the room are dim, and I know she hasn’t seen me yet. I start to all-out sprint for the exit, hoping to barrel past her before she notices what is happening. She looks up, a small, terrified human woman, and I plow into her, knocking her over as I book it out of the hospital. Before she has the chance to pick herself up or even scream for help, I’m through the back door and out on the street, sprinting with everything I have in the opposite direction of the parking lot. I do a quick loop around the block and then head to my car, sitting in the driver’s seat as sirens blare out and police vehicles race to the hospital.
When I look down at my fingers, my knuckles are white on the steering wheel, claws fully extended. My chest is heaving, and my forehead feels sticky with sweat. I’m an absolute mess of tension and nerves.
But it’s done. It’s done. Despite all the risks, despite everything that could have gone wrong, it didn’t. Gurtion is very, very dead this time. And I’m here in my car minding my own business, as though I didn’t have a thing to do with it.
As I’m driving home, my communicator beeps with a message:
EMERGENCY. Drop everything, come to hospital.
I sigh. It’s going to be important that I make an appearance, and put on a good show of being shocked and outraged at the attack. As the underboss, I have to be there, and I have to be deeply concerned.
It’s going to be a long night.
But fuck it. I don’t even care. Tonight, it’s as though a great weight has been lifted from my shoulders.
No one is ever going to take Melyta away from me.
No one.
