Trinary (SCAR Force: Delta Faction Book 1)

by Gaja J. Kos

  I should have expected something like this when Carrow told me the robot had served in construction. But I’d learned over the years that lowering my expectations was the only way to get through life without smashing into disappointment headfirst.

  Of course, that also left you open to the possibility of standing rooted to the spot like a bot with glitching software.

  “Yup,” Carrow said proudly, then rose and stepped beside me, gazing at the hologram like a man in love. “Every access point, every nook and cranny of every building put together in Amory’s Area 3 during the High Age. Lucinda has blueprints like this for every aspect of the construction. In every area. Fundaments. Ventilation. Sewers. Even alarms, though we know they updated those.”

  “Updated, but for the most part kept the base the same,” Donovan added.

  I nodded. The security fundamentals were usually tied to the buildings themselves—yet another layer of protection. You couldn’t just cut the power or hack into the system—at least not beyond a surface point. Every company out there with enough funds to sustain a whole fucking planet for a year or ten had multilayered security. But all of it stemmed from these plans.

  My mouth watered at the thought of all the loot we’d have access to thanks to Lucinda’s schematics.

  Carrow opened his mouth to say something, but whatever it was got lost as I pulled his sweaty form into a tight hug. “You’re a genius.”

  Donovan cleared his throat behind us.

  “You’re a fucking genius,” I repeated, earning a snort from behind. I ignored Donovan and pulled back, but didn’t let Carrow out of my arms just yet. “This will be such a game changer.”

  Carrow’s gray-blue eyes flickered to Donovan. “You really should ask him where he got Luce.”

  “All right, I’ll bite.” I sighed and let go of Carrow. He quickly went back to his beloved, who was still projecting the hologram like a good girl. “Where did you get her?”

  A slow smile spread across Donovan’s lips. “A party.”

  “You got her at a party.” I crossed my arms and quirked an eyebrow. “What kind of party?”

  That damn smile took on a dangerous edge. I snorted. Yeah, that was answer enough.

  I tipped my head in the direction of the kitchen, and Donovan leisurely followed behind. If I was right and he’d somehow managed to snag a robot during one of the kinky sex fests he liked to attend, I’d need coffee to survive the tale. I enjoyed a good orgasm and the rush of mixing things up a bit, but orgies were where I drew the line. I snagged my favorite mug depicting an artist’s render of the Vedrina trinary system from the sealed cabinet, plopped it onto the designated stand, then hit the proper combo of old-school buttons that would deliver my black coffee.

  As the machine got to work, I parked my ass against the counter and looked at Donovan. “Okay, spill.”

  He flashed me a roguish smile and raked his hand through his hair, somehow making his black waves even more scrumptious. “Yes, it was precisely the kind of party you’re thinking about. But no, the bot wasn’t an active participant.”

  That was a relief.

  I was all for sex toys, the more the merrier. But the kinds that were actually designed with sex in mind. Abusing technology somehow rubbed me the wrong way.

  Not that it stopped an entire subset of our society from doing precisely that.

  “So, what”—I grabbed the coffee as the machine gave its final beep—“you laid your eyes on the bot during the throes of an orgasm?”

  I sipped the hot nectar of life, then nearly spat it out when Donovan arched his dark brow and shrugged.

  “You’re fucking with me.” When his expression made it clear he was dead serious, I set down the cup just to be on the safe side. I shook my head. “Only Donovan Frost could find a robot during sex…”

  “The party spanned across several levels of the building,” he said simply. “No one said we couldn’t fuck in the subterranean ones, so I took my partners there for a change of scenery.”

  I snorted. “For some grime, you mean?”

  “They liked the whole industrial atmosphere in one of the rooms we started in, so I thought why not…” He moved past me to make a coffee for himself—in a pitch-black mug. The man definitely didn’t deviate from his style. “It was getting kind of crowded on the upper levels, and while you know I don’t mind an audience, I don’t particularly like loud people.”

  “You like Carrow well enough,” I muttered, then winked at his exasperated expression.

  “The sonovabitch is just lucky I got attached.” He punched the same combo of buttons as I had before. “Carrow aside, the yapping and constant flow of people was throwing me and my dick off. So I suggested exploring the lower levels.”

  “And they just had the bot stashed down there? Which building was it anyway?”

  Donovan grabbed his mug and leaned against the second counter directly opposite me. The toes of our boots touched. “The old Munroe Entertainment HQ in Area 5. The club redid the top floors, but the city owns everything below level 5. It’s not a pretty sight.”

  “Which is precisely what your partners were after.”

  He nodded from behind the steamy wisps. “We tried to get as low as we could. There wasn’t even any power down there, so all we had were the lights on our pleasurebraces. They fucking loved it. We brought some equipment with us, set up a scene—”

  “With you as the dangerous predator, I presume?” My lips stretched into a smile.

  While play like that wasn’t among my biggest turn-ons, I did enjoy seeing Donovan in his predatory mode.

  The smoldering look he shot me was all the confirmation I needed. I squirmed and pressed my thighs tighter together, then quickly occupied myself with drinking the coffee. A poor distraction, but anything was better than losing myself in the intensity of Donovan’s gaze. If I did, then we’d probably be hearing Carrow’s complaints for a second time today…

  “We played out the first part of the scene,” Donovan went on before taking a sip. “They wanted to be hunted down and turned into sex slaves. I found the first, bound them, and left them to wait for me. But when I hunted the woman, my damn light died. I took a wrong turn trying to get back, and, well…”

  “Well what?” I pressed.

  He couldn’t just trail off there, the bastard. This was better than prime-time entertainment.

  “I kind of fell into a shaft.”

  For long, long seconds, I stared at him, my cup still pressed to my lips.

  Then drowned the kitchen in barking laughter.

  “Donovan Frost, the mighty, unbeatable predator, fell down a shaft?” I choked on the combo of coffee and snickering. “Thank fuck you had pants on and didn’t harm your shaft in the process.”

  He mock-glared at me.

  “Thank you, Cairo, for that lovely thought.” He paused, his mouth a displeased line, then added, “They were cutouts.”

  That did it.

  I lost control entirely.

  Once my coughing fit stopped after a good minute or two, I wiped the tears off my face and tried to keep a straight voice. “So that’s where you found the bot?”

  “At the bottom of the shaft,” Donovan said solemnly. “In my cut-out leather pants.”

  Another laugh escaped me. I reached over and smacked his arm, nearly spilling both of our coffees. I balanced the gorgeous Vedrina cup, then leaned back against the counter again. “How did you manage to get Lucinda out? No, wait, how did you manage to get out?”

  “The woman found me. She threw down the rope I was supposed to bind her with and anchored it so I could climb up.” He threw his coffee back and obliterated it in four long swallows, then set the cup aside for the stationary bot to clean. “As for how I got Lucinda,”—he crossed his arms—“I went down again after we were done with the scene. I sent the two of them back up, telling them I’d clean up after us and that they should go enjoy themselves some more.”

  “Such a kind man.” I winked a
t him. “There was nothing else down there?”

  A hint of annoyance lined his features as he shook his head. “I checked everything. I came out of that damn hole covered in decades’ worth of dust and who knows what else, but the rest of the equipment was either useless or smashed beyond even Carrow’s capabilities.”

  “I’m pretty sure there’s an underestimation in there somewhere,” Carrow shouted from the corridor, then poked his head into the narrow kitchen. “Come on. I just heard back from my contact. We have a new heist lined up.”

  We piled out and walked back to the bridge, Carrow with a skip to his step while Donovan and I trudged behind—maybe exchanging a look or two behind Carrow’s back.

  “Do we really need another job so soon?” I asked. “Especially when we have Lucinda?”

  Carrow shot me an exasperated expression over his shoulder. His blond hair jutted in every possible direction, somehow even messier than when we’d left him on the bridge. “You’re kidding, Cairo, right? We’re talking about a pretty damn impressive haul here…”

  “How would I know?” I said dryly. “It’s not like you tell me much except which crates to load single-handedly into my ship while the dashing brains of the operation linger on the perimeter.”

  “You think we’re dashing?” Carrow waggled his eyebrows—and nearly rammed into the sliding doors when his steps took him a little too far to the left.

  Donovan muttered something under his breath that sounded a lot like “ass.”

  I tended to agree.

  Without giving me an answer, Carrow plopped himself in his chair and pulled the schematics up on the main display. Stormborn Inc.

  I whistled. “No wonder you didn’t want to tell me where we’re headed. That sonovabitch is protected tighter than your ass, Carrow.”

  “Nice one.” Donovan fist-bumped me.

  I grinned at him, then braced one arm on the back of Carrow’s ergonomic seat. The material absorbed my weight without missing a beat.

  “So what’s the deal?” What could possibly be worth a trip to Stormborn Inc.?

  I could get in, of course, but with how much we’d worked lately, a simple in-and-out job sounded far more appealing than a stealth mission where a single mistake could sound off every damn alarm in the facility. I liked a challenge as much as the next gal—but I also had a healthy appreciation for wide margins of error.

  Not even Lucinda would be able to help us out here.

  “We’ll hit it tomorrow when one of the twenty-seven security systems will be off,” Carrow said, as if we were discussing a damn grocery run.

  Donovan arched an eyebrow. “Just twenty-six left.” He clapped his hands. “Sounds like a walk in the park.”

  His tone, however, suggested it was anything but. I hid away a smile, glad that, for once, I wasn’t the only one bitching about a heist. Donovan and Carrow were thick as thieves nearly all the time when it came to our jobs, despite their everyday differences. Yeah, this was definitely a pleasant change.

  “All right, let’s say I’m considering doing this,” I ventured. “Why, when we have dear old Luce, do we need this particular heist? Come on, Carrow, use your debate club skills on me.”

  His grin was victorious. He tapped out a couple of commands on the holo-keyboard until a nine-digit number flashed on the screen.

  How much the loot was worth on the black market.

  I let out a shaky laugh while Donovan cursed, a smile on his sensual lips. Once I got my bearings together, I slapped Carrow on the back. “Next time, just lead with that, man.”

  Chapter Four

  “Told you this stuff was hot as fuck,” Carrow’s excited voice came over the comm.

  I glanced over my shoulder at the sleek black-and-red crates of various prototypes and advanced electronics’ parts freshly loaded up in my ship and rolled my eyes. “Sure thing.”

  “You could at least pretend to be thrilled, Cairo,” he chided.

  “Or you could let me do my damn job and get the load out of here,” I pointed out, then maneuvered my Slipstream beneath the hulking platform. In light of the sweat rolling down my temples, the nine-figure number was not enough to keep me in a bright and bubbly mood. Twenty-six security systems, while not a personal record, weren’t exactly optimal circumstances for a heist. Especially one where way too many variables were in place.

  Stormborn Inc. buzzed with activity twenty-four seven, which made it a less than optimal target. To make matters worse, we were doing this in the middle of a workday when the company was at full operations. Slipstream had top-of-the-line reflective shields to bend light, but it wasn’t invisible. Just a touch harder to spot.

  Not reassurance enough in my book.

  But once the afternoon hit and that twenty-seventh system came back online, Stormborn Inc. turned into a goddamn fortress.

  I kept my eyes on the sensors as the entire ship disappeared under the platform. The fit was tight—almost too tight. Thankfully, my sleek, graphite gray beauty was made for these kinds of adventures.

  “Do what you do best, Cairo,” Donovan said over the comm. His voice, as always, was a damn sinful thing that swept through the cockpit. “I’ll keep Carrow occupied so the prick won’t mess with your fragile concentration.”

  “You’re an ass, Don,” I fired back, but could hardly keep the humor from my tone.

  Still, once the fit became even tighter, I did need to employ every ounce of my focus. My Slipstream moved forward at a sluggish pace. I switched the cloaking mode and kept checking the proximity sensors as well as the stealth monitors as I crawled forward. If my shields and blockers dropped for even a split second, the alarms strewn all over the damn facility would go off—leaving me trapped under their damn landing platform.

  Not a fate I envisioned for myself with any kind of enthusiasm.

  I paused as several support beams and access doors came into sight up ahead. In the darkness and with the ship’s night-mode cloaking turned on, no one could spot me lingering in the distance. But if I ran into any workers on my way past the single, actually perilous spot on my path out, all the stealth technology in the world would mean shit.

  Like the reflective panels, the sister tech blending me with the shadows was far from infallible.

  I flicked the custom-made vintage toggle switch beside the kaleidoscope of movable floating screens to activate yet another panel, then inputted the command to kick Carrow’s long-range infrared to life. With one eye glued to the monitor and the other manually scrutinizing the spot up ahead, I waited for the scan to finish.

  No signs of life.

  Not even the approaching kind.

  Heaving a breath of relief, I powered down the scanner since the fewer electronics I had on, the sturdier the anti-detection shield, then inched forward. The tips of Slipstream’s wings passed within millimeters of the massive kavas support beams—a material heavier and sturdier than nevon, with the capability of inflicting some serious damage if I accidentally scraped against it. Beads of sweat rolled down my temples and dampened my short auburn hair, but the strain had nothing on the adrenaline zinging inside me. Pain in my ass or not, I was born for this.

  Once my ship cleared the beams, I accelerated, but kept my speed low enough to have maximum maneuverability and keep the noise from my engines down. While I’d modified this baby with a specialized silencer Carrow and I had come up with together, it only held up to twenty klicks per hour. All bets were off after that, though at least it never turned into the kind of rattlebox Carrow liked to pilot during his off time.

  An old-timer, he always said.

  But really, death trap would be more appropriate.

  He’d actually had parts of it fall off during flight…

  Smiling at the memory of how he’d been forced to call me to come pick him and the ship up when his exterior engines had gone to shit, I forced Slipstream’s belly down until only a couple of centimeters separated it from the floor. Just three more minutes of this, a swift maneuver
through the hole in the perimeter Donovan had created for me, and I could kick back and enjoy the spoils.

  Once Carrow stopped yapping about them, of course.

  I dropped my velocity once more when I reached the edge of the massive landing platform. Glaring white light presented a hulking wall after the darkness.

  But also freedom.

  I switched the night-mode to the reflective panels better equipped for handling the daylight and focused on the tiny gap of open space standing between me and the jump through the force-field fence. Visibility was utter crap down here, so I flicked on the long-range scanner again, Slipstream idling.

  The immediate vicinity was clear, but—

  “Fuck.”

  I blasted forward, straight through the neutralized segment of the barrier, and banked sharply right to get out of the open space and into the hidey-hole, courtesy of a ghastly modern sculpture. The sight up ahead sent dread spearing down my spine.

  The Devious was right where it was supposed to be.

  But so were five SCAR Force vessels.

  Chapter Five

  “Carrow. Carrow.” I smashed my palm against the flat expanse of the control panel. “Answer, damn it.”

  I tried the direct line to Donovan after, but the result was the same.

  Silence.

  My calls didn’t even patch through to the Devious, which meant they’d disabled the system entirely to keep the SCAR Force pricks from tracking the signal back to me. Fuck.

  I hovered in my hiding spot, heart thrashing against my ribs, and observed the SCAR Force vessels—four of them FF15s, not the regular planetary patrol cruisers, and one smaller KS-1. The setup reeked of an organized takedown, though for the life of me, my scrambled brain couldn’t fathom how they could have learned of the heist. The one thing we always were was careful.

  With my past, anything less than that would more than likely mean forfeiting my life.

  The FF15s attached their hooks to the Devious. Outnumbered, Carrow and Donovan didn’t fight back. And unless I wanted to end up just like them, there was nothing I could do to get them out of this mess either.