Aurora Rising: The Complete Collection (82 page)

His skycar was parked behind the house. He rounded the corner to see it shrouded in shadows cast by the decorative trees. He would have jogged to it—he needed to hurry—but the bag on his shoulder felt so damn heavy and he was out of breath from the panicked, rushed packing.

A man stepped out of the shadows behind the driver’s side of the car. Coffee-colored hair framed a stark, cold face…his features seemed as if they had been etched by Death itself.

Jaron froze for half a second before scurrying backward and feeling for the wall with his free hand. “Wh-what do you want?”

The man’s lips curled upward a centimeter. Jaron had never witnessed a more terrifying sight. “I’m sorry, Mr. Nythal, but we can’t have you talking.”

The assassin. It must be. Son of a….

His head shook furiously. “I won’t talk, I swear. I’m getting out of here. I’ll go to Pandora—no, I’ll go to New Babel—they’ll never find me! I’m leaving right now, see?” He held up the bag for dramatic effect. “Just let me go.”

“I cannot. The authorities are onto you, and once they have you they will break you. Our bosses won’t allow that to happen.”

The bag slid from Jaron’s grip and tumbled to the ground as he flattened against the wall. There was nowhere to go, no way to escape from the killer who approached him one quiet, calm step at a time. “Please, I beg you, I won’t—”

It didn’t even occur to him to fight back when the blade came up and sliced open his throat in one fluid motion.

Matei Uttara activated his personal concealment shield and slipped the blade hilt in its case. He left the patio via the pathway which led out into the affluent neighborhood.

The cyan-tinged late afternoon sunlight shone far too brightly for his taste. He didn’t care for risking a hit in broad daylight…but his contact had been specific on the topic. Time was short.

And it pleased him to be rid of his little white pawn. The man had been one of only three people who could conceivably lead someone to him. Now the number was two, and both of those individuals were far more savvy and clever than Jaron Nythal.

He didn’t count the alien, because it was irrelevant. He would need to find the alien in order to kill it, and he did not believe he could do so. And if he couldn’t, no one could. Besides, he harbored the sneaking suspicion that should his alien be removed from the equation, another was likely to take its place.

He reached the nearest levtram station in minutes, as the neighborhood was near the Cavare city center, and dialed down the strength of the concealment shield while he blended into the moderate crowd taking the tram bound for the spaceport.

Admittedly, executing the hit early did serve an additional purpose. He was on a tight schedule. His next and possibly last act in this chess match would be on the EAO Orbital above Earth in three days, which left little margin for error. He possessed a fast ship, but Earth was a considerable distance away. Thankfully he had procured the materials required the day before.

It would be a difficult op as well. Space stations were notoriously challenging due to their confined space and lack of refuge or hidden exits, and the Orbital occupied a class all itself. His chosen ID shouldn’t present any problems, but smuggling explosives onto an Alliance governmental installation in space, orbiting Earth and under heightened war-time security constituted a different matter.

Still, he would get it done. Then he planned to head west.
Far
west. Perhaps Atlantis or Ceres. He’d prefer to skate all the way west to the frontier on Nyssus, except he needed to be able to move rapidly should Marano or Solovy reemerge. Wherever he landed, he intended to find a good seat, kick back and enjoy the show.

He didn’t particularly care who won. The Alliance was using him, the Federation was using him, Zelones was using him, the aliens were using him. He was happy to do all their bidding. And when they began to turn on one another, he was happy to abet that as well.

He merely wanted to foment the rising tide of anarchy, then watch the galaxy burn to ashes.

I
NTELLIGENCE
D
IVISION
H
EADQUARTERS

“Ms. Marano, I’m Graham Delavasi, Director of Intelligence.” He extended his hand; the woman sitting at the table leveled an icy glare at him in response. Unfazed, he gave her a friendly smile. “Is there anything I can get you? Coffee? A snack?”

“You can get my mother out of here.”

Taking that as a ‘no,’ he pulled the chair out from the table and sat down opposite her. “I hope we can get both of you out of here soon. As I’m sure my agents have told you, we simply have a couple of questions we hope you can answer.”

“I’ll tell you the same thing I told the last guy, I don’t care what you’re ‘director’ of. My mother doesn’t know anything. She’s fragile and not equipped to deal with this situation. She can’t help you. Let me talk to her, then get someone to take her home. Do that, and I’ll try to answer your questions.”

He had to wonder who was in charge of the interrogation, but frowned in genuine concern. “What’s wrong with your mother? Is she ill?”

“Physically? No. But mentally she’s…yes, she’s ill. She’s able to take care of herself, but barely. She gets distracted, forgets things, can’t focus. Please believe me, she doesn’t know anything about Caleb. She doesn’t even understand why they keep saying his name on the news. She can’t cope under this level of stress—you
have
to let her go.”

He regarded the woman a moment. He had reviewed her file on the way over and mentally ticked off the high points. She had earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Tellica with top honors. The school hired her two years later as a professor, but she was currently on loan to Losice University on Krysk for a year as a visiting professor. She was a single mother of a four-year old daughter, having been widowed when her husband, a botanist, died on a research expedition to an unsettled planet in Elathan’s system. She had no criminal record or any documented history of trouble.

He didn’t need the file to see she was intelligent, self-sufficient and strong-willed. Yet on this topic he read only earnest desperation in her eyes.

“Give me ten minutes.”

She shot him a guarded look and shrugged.

He left the room and slipped along the hallway to an identical one three doors down. The two-way glass in the interrogation room allowed him to observe Francesca Marano undisturbed. Tragic as the notion was, he couldn’t help but be glad Stefan wasn’t here to see her. It would have broken his heart.

The woman looked decades older than she should. Her skin appeared pallid and drawn, hair a dull, unkempt brown. Her sweater hung lopsided over sagging, defeated shoulders. But saddest of all was her eyes—wide and confused, yet somehow vacant.

A new shard of guilt crept up to join the existing guilt over Michael’s death festering in the tiny corner of his brain he allowed them. Francesca’s state was not his fault…which wasn’t the same thing as absolving him of all responsibility.

He didn’t go in the room. He had met her once years ago, briefly and in passing; she was highly unlikely to remember him, but he couldn’t take the chance. Instead he went and found Liz.

“We’re cutting Francesca Marano loose.”

“I admit she hasn’t exactly been helpful—I suspect there’s a few screws gone in her head—but we can still pursue several more avenues of inquiry.”

“We’re cutting her loose.”

She acknowledged the order with a nod. “Yes, sir.”

“Arrange her an escort home, and…” he pondered it a second “…assign a protective watch to her, but nothing overt. She doesn’t need to be aware an agent’s around.”

“You think she’s in danger?”

“I think there are a lot of things we don’t yet understand. I’m going to let her daughter speak to her while you get the protection set up.”

“I’ll start the process right away.”

He returned to the interrogation room, two steaming cups of coffee in hand, and slid one across the table as he sat. “You may not need one, but I do. War is not conducive to sleep.”

Isabela’s expression softened as she reached for the cup. “Thank you…and thank you for taking care of my mother.” Her eyes remained suspicious, however, as she took a sip then met his gaze. “I said I’ll answer your questions, and I will—but I have one first. You’re interrogating Caleb’s family…is my father here? If he’s not, don’t bother going to get him. I can assure you he doesn’t know a damn thing about any of us.”

He kept his expression scrupulously blank. “No, he isn’t.”

Her head cocked to the side, rich black curls falling to obscure half her face. “Why not? Unless you know Caleb hasn’t seen or spoken to him in twenty years. None of us have. But if you do then you knew my mother wouldn’t be of any help, yet you dragged her in here anyway.”

Yep, she was a sharp one. He clasped his hands on the table and leaned in slightly, not enough to be perceived as threatening. “Ms. Marano, I’ll try to answer your questions as well, but I need you to indulge me for a few minutes. Fair enough?”

She rolled her eyes at the ceiling and sank back in her chair. “Fine. Interrogate away.”

“Do you know where your brother is?”

“No.”

“When did you speak to him last?”

“Six days ago. I sent him a message after he was named a suspect asking if he was okay. He assured me he was, but said he might be unreachable for a while.”

“Unreachable? No one is unreachable these days.”

“Oh come on, surely you spy types possess ways to go off the grid?”

“Eh…well. Has he shared anything with you about the bombing of EASC Headquarters?”

“He said he didn’t do it—which I already knew.”

“How?”

“Because he’s my
brother
.”

Granted, it was a stupid question, if one the manual he didn’t read when joining Division twenty-two years ago said he was supposed to ask. “Of course. Has he said anything to you regarding the events of the night of September 24
^th
?”

“I just told you, he said he wasn’t responsible for the bombing.”

“Not the bombing—regarding other events occurring that night.”

Her face screwed up in perplexity. “No….”

“What about the Metis Nebula?”

He received nothing but a blank look.

“And what about with respect to Alexis Solovy?”

She laughed; it carried a hard edge, doubtless brought on by the stress of hours of detention. “No, but he didn’t have to. From what I’ve seen on the news feeds, she’s his type.”

“Which is?”

“Smart. Capable. Beautiful. A space junkie. Look, he works for you. Shouldn’t you know all this about him?”

“Yes, he did—does—but regrettably I don’t know him personally.”

She waved toward the door in frustration. “Well somebody does, don’t they? Talk to your underlings or whoever. He isn’t some mysterious, shady loner—he’s one of you guys.”

“I’m afraid his supervisor is dead. He was murdered the same night as the EASC bombing.”

That shook her. She sat up straighter in her chair, yet her eyes lowered as she considered this information. “You’re not seriously suggesting Caleb was responsible.”