Exposed

by Tana Stone

  Dorn took a few steps into the room and spun around. “He’s gone.”

  “I don’t know why he left,” Katie said. “I told him I’d be right back with help.” She pointed to a spot on the balcony. “He was curled up right there.”

  “Maybe he went for a walk,” Mandy suggested, but her tone of voice told Katie she didn’t believe her own words.

  Katie walked past Dorn and pivoted to take in the entire room. Her gaze caught the open drawer of the bedside table, and she froze. Walking around the bed, she spotted the loose sheet of paper on the floor, and the cocktail napkin crumpled up inside the drawer. Her heart hammered in her chest. She knew now why he’d left. Dorn had found the notes she’d been taking for her exposé. Notes all about the Drexians, the space station, and him.

  He knew she was a fraud.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Zayn stumbled through the sleek modern corridors of the space station. He barely noticed passing a pair of Drexians in full uniform, or the cluster of human females giggling as they talked. His eyes were not drawn to the curved windows and the view of outer space. His mind reeled with what he’d discovered.

  Had Katie been playing him all along? How long had she been taking notes about everything she saw on the station and all the things he told her? Since the first day? After they had been together? He scowled and kept his head down as he barreled along, trying not to think about how good it had felt to be inside her, how perfect everything it seemed when it was just the two of them in the bathtub.

  It didn’t matter now. Everything between them had been in his mind. He’d imagined that the looks she gave him meant something; that she cared for him as more than just the subject of her story. It had all been lies.

  Zayn wasn’t sure where he was going, but he needed to move. He’d had to get out of that room. The thought of being there when Katie came back was unbearable. He couldn’t stand to see her knowing that she’d been using him. He wasn’t even angry with her. Not really. How could he expect someone like her to fall for a grunt like him? It wasn’t her fault she been taken and matched with him. He didn’t blame her for wanting to leave. But he also couldn’t stand the thought of being without her.

  He stopped and braced himself against the smooth wall, taking a heaving breath. Had he been walking in circles? He knew what he needed to do.

  There was nothing keeping him on the station anymore, and every reason for him to leave. His presence was a danger to everyone on board, and to Katie. She may have broken his heart, but he still felt an overpowering urge to protect her. In his mind, she would always be his, the wild redhead with the soft, green eyes and the determined look. The last thing he wanted was something bad to happen to her. Especially if he could prevent it.

  He turned around and made his way to the nearest inclinator, stepping on board and swiping his hand for the flight deck level. His leaving the ship would solve everyone’s problems. There would no longer be a threat from his implant, Katie would not have to pretend to care about a damaged soldier like him, and he would not have to live with the guilt of hurting her.

  He took long strides off the inclinator toward the flight deck, his boots echoing against the metal floor as he entered. A sense of calm settled over him as he scanned the ships and the raw metal space, breathing in the scent of burning fuel. He hadn’t flown in a while, but he knew it would all come rushing back to him as soon as he got in the cockpit.

  As he surveyed the various vessels available, a station-wide siren went off with red lights flashing overhead. He wondered if it was another malfunction, or if there was an incoming attack. When the transmission requesting all residents be on the lookout for him came across a loudspeaker, Zayn froze. An image of him was projected in the air holographically, and he recognized it as being the one taken of him when he’d enlisted. Even though it was a few years old, it still looked like him.

  So much for leaving the station undetected, he thought. At least he was out of the corridors, where he’d be easily spotted. He ducked his head as he walked across toward a dingy shuttle. Better to take something low profile, than try to nab one of the fancy new fighters.

  Before he could get on board he heard a voice calling his name. He turned out of habit.

  “That’s him,” a Vexling in silver coveralls yelled, pointing at Zayn.

  Zayn uttered a Drexian curse under his breath and bolted behind a row of metal drums. He heard footsteps pounding in his direction, and he kept running through the maze of shelving units until he reached a far door and ducked out and into the hallway. Luckily, it was devoid of people, and he ran until he reached a maintenance room, slipping inside and hiding behind a stack of metal crates. He’d have to wait until things cooled down to make his escape attempt again.

  “I escaped from the Kronock. I’ll escape from here, too,” he muttered to himself, trying to suppress his fear that they’d let him go for a reason, and that the reason was implanted at the base of his skull.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  “Earth to Katie.” The snap of Mandy’s fingers brought Katie back to reality.

  “Sorry about that.” She crumpled the loose sheet of paper and cocktail napkins into her fists. “Just picking up some trash.”

  “So where do we think he went?” Mandy asked. “I thought you said the pain in his head had almost debilitated him.”

  Katie tried to shake off the regret that was consuming her, but it had become a cold ball in the pit of her stomach. “When I left him, he looked like he was in bad shape.”

  “Then he probably didn’t go far,” Dorn said. “Maybe he just wandered out looking for you.”

  “Maybe,” Katie said, but she knew that wasn’t the case. If Zayn had read her notes, then she doubted he was out looking for her. He probably wanted nothing to do with her.

  She felt like she might throw up as the gravity of what she’d done hit her. Leaning over, her hands on her knees, she sucked in deep breaths. With her eyes closed, she could smell the faint scent of gardenia, and hear the animals moving slowly through the tall grass.

  “It’s not real,” she said under her breath.

  “What?” Mandy asked. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  Katie wasn’t okay. She was living in a fantasy world, and she’d destroyed the only real thing in it. Zayn was real and honest and brave, and she’d used him. Now he’d found out, and she knew he’d never look at her the same way again. The thought of that made her want to curl up into a ball.

  Why did he have to find those notes? She wasn’t going to use them. Not anymore. When she’d first decided to write the exposé and escape from the station, she’d barely known him. She hadn’t known how kind he was and how much he seemed to care about her. It wasn’t like she knew all that much about him now, but she knew the way she felt when she was with him, and how safe he made her feel. She didn’t need to know every detail of his past to know that he was better than anyone she’d ever been with before.

  But even with all that, she reminded herself, she’d still chosen to betray him. Maybe she just wasn’t cut out to be with anyone. All those years with her dad conning people had taken their toll. Even when she cared about someone, she couldn’t help but end up using them.

  Katie straightened. Even if he hated her guts, he deserved her help. “I’m okay. I’m just worried.”

  Mandy rubbed her back. “Don’t worry. I’m sure he’s fine.”

  “Since we still don’t know what we’re dealing with, we need to find him.” Dorn said, his green eyes narrowed with intensity. “The implant could just be harmful to him, or it could be a threat to the entire station.”

  “Should we split up and search for him?” Mandy asked.

  Dorn shook his head. “I think you should go down to the medical bay and do a little digging. We need to know why the implant wasn’t caught during his first exam, or if it was, who kept the information secret.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Katie said.

  Mandy looked con
fused. “Don’t you want to go look for Zayn?”

  “Dorn knows the station better than I do,” Katie said, trying to make her voice sound natural even though she heard the quaver and it. “I’ve only been to a few shops on the Promenade. I doubt he went there.”

  “Okay,” Mandy said with a hesitant smile. “We’ll go to the medical bay together.”

  Dorn gave a brusque nod. “And I’ll check the flight deck on level two.”

  They left the suite, hurried down the walkway, and broke off into two directions. Katie noticed that Mandy turned to watch Dorn walk away and blew him a kiss. She pretended not to notice when Dorn winked at his bride and wagged his eyebrows suggestively, but the affection between the two made her heart ache.

  Katie followed Mandy into the inclinator and let her swipe her hand over the panel to send them to the right level. She’d never been to the medical bay and wasn’t even sure where it was located.

  After descending several stories and twisting to one side, the inclinator doors slid opened, and Katie followed Mandy down the hallway to another set of double doors. She didn’t know what she’d been expecting, but the wide room didn’t look remarkably different from a hospital emergency room on Earth, that is, if you discounted the beds hovering in midair, and the squat robots zipping around at waist level.

  “If anyone asks,” Mandy said under her breath. “I’m checking you out for a stomachache. So try to look like you don’t feel so well.”

  Katie nodded and clutched her stomach as Mandy led her to the end of the room and an empty bed.

  “Hop up on there.” Mandy grabbed a metal object from a levitating tray table and pressed a button to switch it on. It glowed green and beeped as she began waving it over Katie’s midsection.

  A siren went off overhead, sending flashing red light through the room. Mandy met Katie’s eyes. “I guess Dorn really wants to find him.”

  Katie nodded, but couldn’t speak for fear her voice would crack. She listened to the announcement alerting residents to watch for Zayn and studied the holographic image hovering in the air. It looked like him—the dark hair, the blue eyes—but it must have been taken before he was captured by the Kronock, because his expression wasn’t haunted.

  “Okay,” Mandy said, louder than she needed to. “I’m just going to run this through the system.” She dropped her voice to a mumble. “I’ll be right back.”

  Katie tried to look believably ill as she sat on the hovering table. What was she doing? Why wasn’t she going to look for Zayn? Because he wouldn’t want to see her, the little voice in her head said. He knows you’re a fraud.

  Tears stung the back of her eyes. Why did he have to go and be so great and mess everything up? She was supposed to get her story, get off the station, and go back to her life on Earth. But now, all she could think about was the big Drexian with piercing blue eyes and scars on his arms. If she could get him back she wouldn’t even care about going home.

  “Do you require medical assistance?” a voice asked.

  Katie glanced around her, seeing no one speaking. “Who was that?”

  “I am Al, the virtual medical program. You appear to have an elevated heart rate. Would you like me to examine you for vascular irregularities?”

  Katie glanced up, since the voice seemed to be originating from the ceiling. “So you’re not real?”

  “I am very real.” If a computer program could sound offended, he did. “I have been programed with the combined medical knowledge of hundreds of species.”

  “Sorry,” Katie said. “I’m from Earth. We don’t have virtual doctors.”

  “I am aware of that fact,” Al said. “My friend, Bridget, is also from Earth and told me of your primitive medical treatment.”

  Katie hesitated. “You’re friends with Bridget?”

  “Affirmative. She is the reason I am here and not still languishing on a deserted colony. You have not answered my question. Do you need medical attention?”

  Katie swiped at her damp eyes as she saw Mandy walking briskly across the room toward her. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m okay.”

  “I see you met our medical AI,” Mandy said, giving jerk of her head for Mandy to follow her. “We’ll catch you later, Al.”

  Katie hopped off the bed as Al wished them both a good day in his halting voice. She let Mandy lead her out of the medical bay and into the hall.

  “So?” Katie grabbed her by the arm to stop her rapid pace. “What did you find out?”

  Mandy looked both ways, as if she was afraid someone would overhear her, but the hallway was empty. “I couldn’t find the records of the original exam. They’re gone.”

  “How can they be gone?” Katie asked. “Well, why don’t we just ask the doctor who examined him?”

  Mandy bit the edge of her thumbnail. “Well, that’s going to be a problem, since he’s not here anymore.”

  Katie shook her head. “I don’t get it? What do you mean, he’s not here anymore? Where is he?”

  “Transferred to some outpost in the middle of nowhere. The day after he examined Zayn.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Zayn crouched in the closet until the red lights stopped flashing. This was going to make getting off the station a bit more complicated. He wondered if Katie had alerted the station of his condition, or if Mandy had. He rubbed a hand across his face, feeling the slick sweat beading along his temples. It didn’t matter now, although a part of him still desperately wanted it to have been Mandy and not Katie.

  “Fool,” he scolded himself under his breath. She’d already deceived him. Why did it matter if she’d betrayed his confidence?

  He wanted to feel anger toward her. He wanted to feel rage. That, he could work with, channel into fuel. But this ache in his heart? The feeling that a part of him had been ripped out and he would never feel whole again? This did nothing but flood him with hesitation and doubt.

  It didn’t matter, he reminded himself, repeating the words in his head like a mantra. None of what he’d thought was real. None of the things he let himself imagine would happen, so he might as well get on with his plan.

  Zayn peeked into the corridor and let out a sigh of relief. Empty. The level with the flight deck and engineering was not the most heavily traveled, anyway. Only Drexian warriors and aliens working on ships needed to come here, so there wasn’t the usual stream of Vexlings and Gatazoids and humans bustling around.

  He walked quickly back to the flight deck and ducked in without being noticed. This time, he didn’t take time to assess the ships, but slipped behind a stealth fighter in the middle of an overhaul. The bulk of the dark hull hid him well, and gave him a chance to watch the movement around him.

  He’d almost decided on a stealth shuttle on the far side when a hand clamped down on his shoulder. Zayn spun and tried to land a punch to dislodge the grip, but he was dropped with a hard hit to his throat.

  He lay flat on his back, his hands around his neck, as he tried to suck in air. “Grek, that hurt.”

  “I could have shattered your windpipe.” Dorn stood over him, one arm extended.

  Zayn took his hand and allowed himself to be heaved up. “Thanks, I think.” His voice sounded hoarse. “How did you find me so quickly?”

  Dorn shrugged. “I figured out where I’d go if I was in your situation, then I came here and waited for you to arrive.”

  “You knew I’d try to leave the station?”

  “Like I said, it’s what I would do if I thought I was a threat.”

  Zayn’s hand went to the back of his neck, once again wishing he could rip the device out with his bare hands. “She told you?”

  Dorn arched an eyebrow at him. “If by ‘she’ you mean my mate, then yes. But just so you know, your mate did not want her to.”

  Zayn felt a flutter of something in his stomach, but he shook his head. “It doesn’t matter who told you. You know what I am.”

  Dorn studied him for a moment. “I know what they did to you, but none o
f us know what that means.”

  “It means they altered me, changed me, put something in me that does gods knows what.” His voice rose as he spat out the words. “For all I know, this thing in my head makes me one of them.”

  Dorn pulled him by the sleeve and behind a shelving unit as heads began to turn their way. “You aren’t Kronock. I know about the Drexian you saw when you escaped. My brother told me. But you aren’t him. You are still a Drexian warrior.”

  Zayn raked a hand through his hair. “For now. How do I know this thing isn’t set to switch on or detonate or activate me at some point? I could be a sleeper agent for the enemy without even knowing it. That’s why I have to get off the station before I hurt anyone.”

  Dorn shifted from one foot to the other. “We should really examine you further. Maybe the medical team could determine what the device is.”

  Zayn met the other man’s eyes. “That’s your mate talking, not you. You know I have to do this. I’m too much of a risk to the everyone on board.”

  Dorn grunted but didn’t respond. His pocket buzzed and he pulled out a small metal device, swiping a finger to illuminate a screen. He frowned as he read the text that appeared. “That’s not good.”

  Zayn waited for him to look up, and then raised an eyebrow of his own.

  “Mandy and Katie went to the medical bay to try to find the record of your original examination. Not only is it missing, but the doctor who examined you is no longer on the station.”

  Zayn’s chest tightened at the sound of Katie’s name, and he felt a small burst of hope that she was working with Mandy to help him. He tried to push all thoughts of her out of his mind and focus on what Dorn had told him. “What do you mean? Where is he?”

  Dorn turned his attention back to the device. “He was sent to an output on the edge of nowhere the day after you were examined.”

  “So, someone on this station knew about this, about me?” So he’d been right. Sort of. Someone high up did want him to stay on the Boat for a reason. He wondered if they’d been the ones to ensure he got a tribute bride. It would make sense.