A Brother's Debt (18 page)

 Step gritted his teeth against the pain and began dragging himself towards the pistol Dollier had discarded. He had no idea whose footsteps he could hear, but just in case it was another enemy he wanted to be armed with something better than a knife.

The effort proved to be too much. The pistol might as well have been kilometres away, rather than just a few yards. He managed to pull himself only a couple of feet before the pain from his injury, combined with the loss of blood, robbed him of consciousness.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Opening his eyes slowly Step was surprised to find himself still alive. At least he assumed he was. Beneath him, instead of the hard concrete of the road he had passed out on, was a comfortable couch, and looking around him cautiously, he saw he had been brought to an office.

Several figures were either stood or sitting around the office, but it took a few moments for Step to get his eyes to focus enough to see more than outlines. When they did, he recognised the man seated at the large desk as Ettore Carboni’s associate, the man he was supposed to deliver the package to.

“Ah, Captain Velkin, I’m pleased to see you have decided to re-join us,” Luigi Fesa said when he saw Step was awake. “The doctor was concerned about the amount of blood you lost. It took my men a while to get you here, and I fear they were not as careful about their handling of you as they should have been.”

“How long have I been out?” Step asked.

“You should lay there a little longer, Captain,” Fesa said quickly, as Step started to push himself up from the couch. “The doctor was adamant that you need to rest. You were out for perhaps a little over an hour, not too long; I expected it to be quite some time before you regained consciousness. You must have a strong constitution.

“Would you like something to drink?”

“Please, some water, thank you.”

“I think we can do better than that, especially for someone who made Grange Dollier bleed.” Fesa smiled broadly. “Some wine will do you the world of good. I believe a good glass of wine is all you need to cope with anything life throws at you, and the more it throws at you, the better the vintage you need. Your injury, and the injury you caused Dollier, deserves a Verti Frate ’34.” He gestured to one of his men, who disappeared from the room.

“I take it Dollier got away.” Step ignored the doctor’s advice, passed on by Fesa, and manoeuvred himself into a sitting position, doing so as slowly and carefully as he could.

Fesa nodded. “Regrettably, yes. From what I have been told,” he gave no indication of disbelieving the report he had received, “by the time my men reached you he was too far away to be hit by anything other than a lucky shot, at least with the weapons my men were carrying. He disappeared round a corner, and wasn’t seen again, him, or the package Mr Carboni sent me.” He sighed regretfully. “Someone is likely to suffer for the loss of that package, the contents are immensely valuable. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure Mr Carboni knows it wasn’t your fault that Dollier managed to get his hands on the package.

“In fact, he is likely to be pleased with you when he hears you injured Dollier, he might even reward you. He once sent a set of Pi’Olan Golf clubs to a doctor whose incompetence nearly killed Dollier,” Fesa said with a laugh.

Step didn’t know much about golf, almost nothing in fact, but he got the impression Pi’Olan clubs were expensive, and a good gift to receive.

“He didn’t…” Step began, though he was interrupted almost immediately by the return of Fesa’s man with a bottle of wine and two glasses, which he set on the desk before his employer.

“Thank you.” Fesa rose and took up the bottle of wine, which he opened carefully before pouring a measure into each glass. “Here, try this; I think you’ll find it delightful.” He handed one glass to Step, while he lifted the other to his nose so he could sniff the bouquet. “I’m sorry, you were saying. Who didn’t what?”

Step took a sip of the wine; it had a pleasant flavour, and was just what he needed to soothe his parched throat. “Dollier,” he said after a second and third sip followed the first. “He didn’t get the package.”

“What do you mean, Dollier didn’t get the package?” Fesa wanted to know. “My men saw him run off with the box you dropped.”

“They might have done, but the box I had with me wasn’t the one he thought it was. It was a replica.” Seeing that Fesa was still looking confused Step explained. “I figured Dollier, or his men, was likely to reach here before me; he’s got access to faster ships than mine, and I was compelled to make a couple of detours along the way. I also figured if he did get here before me, he would either attempt to get on board my ship at the space port, or ambush me while I was en-route to deliver the package.

“I thought it best to have a decoy available. That’s what I brought with me, and that’s what he took, thinking it was the real package.”

“Sounds like good thinking,” Fesa said, sipping at his wine with obvious enjoyment. “But if you knew what you had with you didn’t contain what Dollier was after, why didn’t you just let him have it? You could have saved yourself getting shot, hell, you’d have made some money, my men heard Dollier’s offer.”

“If I had let Dollier just have the box he’d have suspected something was up, and probably would have checked it there and then. When he found out the box didn’t have what he was looking for he’d have had his men kill me. I was trying to avoid that. Actually I didn’t expect Dollier to be there himself; I expected it to just be some of his men.

“Had things gone the way I expected they’d have gotten a few injuries before getting the box and leaving, having decided trying to kill me wasn’t worth the cost.”

Fesa nodded as he finished off his wine and poured out a second glass. “I guess Dollier’s presence screwed up what should have been a good plan.” Step couldn’t do anything but agree with that. “Since Dollier doesn’t have the real package I have two questions, firstly, and most importantly, where is the real package, and secondly, what does Dollier have?”

“The real package is still on board my ship, I never took it from there. As for the box Dollier ran off with, Jay and I filled it with…”

Chapter Thirty-Three

“THAT LYING, CHEATING, SONOFABITCH!” Unaware he was the subject under discussion at Tamerlay House, Grange Dollier hurled the box he had taken from Step Velkin across the room angrily. He paid no heed when it struck the wall, smashing the frame on an antique painting, which tumbled to the floor amidst the collection of damaged beyond repair engine parts Step and Jay had filled the box with. The sight of the engine parts fuelled his anger and he continued to rage, throwing everything breakable that came within reach as he paced the room, not noticing when a knock sounded on the door.

“Sir, is everything alright, Sir?”

Dollier was already lifting his arm in preparation to hurl the bottle of spirits he had snatched up from the table when the question startled him. He hadn’t heard the door open, or his man enter, and he spun towards the voice, releasing the bottle at the same time. The bottle missed his man’s head by a matter of inches, shattering on the doorframe behind him. “What?!” He demanded, half wishing the bottle hadn’t missed, despite not having been aiming for his man.

“Is everything alright, Sir?” Dollier’s manservant repeated the question, his eyes taking in the damage to the room, and its contents, without comment.

For a moment Dollier glared at his manservant, infuriated by his calm manner, despite it being one of the reasons he employed him, and then he turned away and resumed his angry pacing. “I want you to get the word out; I want a bounty put on Step Velkin’s head. One hundred grand, two fifty to the man who brings him to me alive, I want to make him suffer personally.

“I’m going to make him wish he’d never set foot in this sector!”

“Yes, Sir, do you want the bounty posted across the sector, or just in this system?”

“Across the sector, what would be the point in just posting a bounty to this system, you bloody idiot?” Dollier raged. “Now get out of my sight!”

Chapter Thirty-Four

Fesa laughed loudly. “When he opens that box Dollier is going to be mad as hell, they’ll probably hear him on Febru. He’s going to be seriously upset with you over this. If I were you I’d keep as far away from him as possible, if he sees you he’s liable to reach for the nearest weapon.”

Step didn’t need Carboni’s associate to tell him that, he had known it was a likely outcome of his deception when he planned it.

“Saying that, it would be a good idea for you to leave Onegal as soon as possible, you’ll be a lot safer once you get back to Hanratty. Who knows, you might have hurt Dollier worse than we think, and he could be dead by the time you get there.” There was an almost hopeful look on Fesa’s face as he said that. “Call your friend and get him to bring the package here, I’ll organise your payment, then you can be on your way.”

Step nodded and reached into the pocket of his trousers for his communicator, which he used to contact his friend. “Jay, it’s Step.”

“How’d things go?” Jay asked immediately.

“Not bad,” Step answered. “They could have gone better, but Dollier left with the fake and I’m still alive so they could have gone worse. How did things go with you?”

“Pretty much how you predicted they would; they stopped the truck and searched it, then they searched and questioned me and the driver. I told them what we’d rehearsed and they let us go.”

“Glad to hear it. Are you back at the ship yet?”

“Yeah, when are you getting here? Zi is antsy and it’s bugging the crap out of me, she’s worried about you, and wanting to know what’s going to happen to her.”

“I’ll be there in a while. There’s been a change of plans though; I need you to bring the package to Tamerlay House. You should be able to find it easy enough.”

“Sure, do you want it right now?”

“Yeah. One other thing, I’ll be leaving as soon as I get back to the ship, so you’d best make up your mind whether you want to stick with me or not.”

Chapter Thirty-Five

“You’ll understand if I feel the need to check this before you go,” Fesa said, unlocking the box Jay had delivered.

“Of course.” Step smiled at Fesa’s caution. “You don’t want to find out after I’ve gone that you’ve been tricked like Dollier.” He did his best to conceal his curiosity as Fesa lifted the lid from the box and began unpacking the contents. Despite his attempt at disinterest he was paying enough attention to see Fesa remove a portable data reader, the kind used for sensitive information with a DNA scanner attached for reading data crystals with encrypted contents. Also placed carefully on the desk was a data crystal in a protective case, a small locked box, whose exterior gave no hint as to what it held, and a glass vial containing what appeared to be a small quantity of blood.

“Well everything appears to be in order,” Fesa said after he had unpacked everything, and taken a quick look inside the locked box, being careful to do so without revealing its contents to anyone else. “You have done very well, Captain, congratulations, you have definitely earned your money. You’ve earned this as well.” From a drawer in his desk he took out an object and tossed it over to Step, who gave a quick gasp of pain as he automatically reached out a hand to catch it.

The object, when Step looked down to see what it was he had caught, turned out to be a roll of credit notes. He didn’t unwrap the roll and count it there and then, but the denomination of the outer note, and the size of the roll, suggested to him it amounted to at least a couple of thousand credits. “Thank you!” He was more than a little surprised, not to mention gratified.

“Consider it a bonus, and a bit of compensation for your injury, you’ve earned it. Now, if you’ll forgive me, I have some business to attend to, and as I said, it would be best if you get off the planet as soon as possible to avoid any further run-ins with Grange Dollier.”

“Of course.” Rising to his feet Step placed the wineglass he was holding on the small table at the arm of the couch and made for the door, where one of Fesa’s men was waiting to show him and Jay out.

“I’m sure Mr Carboni will find plenty of work to keep a man as resourceful as yourself busy, but if you should find yourself back here, and in need of work, do get in touch. I can always find work for someone like you.”

Chapter Thirty Six

“Well, Jay, have you decided what you’re going to do?” Step asked as the two of them settled into the cab they’d called once out of Tamerlay House.

“If it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll stick with you for a while longer. I’ve only known you for a week or so, but it’s the most exciting week I’ve had in a long time.”

“Are you sure? Today’s excitement has almost certainly made Dollier even angrier with me than he was before; staying with me runs the risk of putting your life in danger. I’m already stuck with the risk, but you don’t have to be.”