Page 5 of Stealing Mercury (Arena Dogs #1)

Chapter Two

“You can’t be serious.” Samantha spun around to face Drake.

He and Resler sat at the table tucked into a corner of the crew common room.

Twenty-four hours into the journey and they already looked comfortable, while she was still suffering from the nerves chewing a hole through the lining of her stomach.

Drake had again dressed in all black, wearing the synth and leather like a macabre uniform.

The precise cut of the thin beard that defined his jaw provided a stark contrast to Resler’s unkempt appearance.

The man must not own a comb. A deck of silver and white lambda cards stretched across the shiny black expanse of the tabletop like an asteroid field.

Their half-eaten meals had been shoved aside to make way for the game.

“Very serious,” said Drake. “No food for the Dogs, Sam. None.” He met her glare with a calm that beat against Samantha’s outrage like water on baked coolie-clay.

One good tap and she’d explode like a shower of pottery shards.

“Come, sit.” He waved her forward with a flick of his wrist, then scooped up the cards and shuffled them. “We’ll deal you in.”

“Hey,” Resler grumbled, “I was winning.”

“Don’t be an ass.” Drake tapped the cards on the table.

Samantha rolled her shoulders and waited for their bickering to die down.

Stars, she was tired. It had been twenty grueling hours of flight prep, getting up to speed on the peculiarities of the Dove and getting them all safely into skipspace—that wonderful state that bent the laws of ordinary physics and made faster than light travel possible.

She’d spent the last four hours walking the ship, doing systems checks, and she needed sleep before she had to be back at the pilot’s station to prep for the first skip-point.

At each skip-point the ship had to drop back to normal space for the skip-field generator’s cool-down period before jumping again.

The Dove was top of the line. She could probably recalculate to a 48 hour interval between skip-points.

Unfortunately, she had to stick to the standard 36, if she wanted to end up at the rendezvous coordinates on schedule to meet Sevti’s people.

The ship was in tip-top shape, but she couldn’t boast the same.

She needed to find a bed and climb in, but first she needed fuel.

And she refused to fill her own belly until the Arena Dogs had been fed.

Their cages had built-in waste and water units, but no rations. She couldn’t let Drake’s decree stand.

Patience gone, she filled her lungs, ready to shout for their attention. “The Arena Dogs, Mr. Drake. I won’t let them go hungry.”

He flipped the triangular cards through his hands again. “It’s not your concern, Sam.”

She pinched the bridge of her nose and willed away the building headache. “As pilot, the wellbeing of everyone on board is my responsibility.”

Drake set the cards down in a tidy stack.

“They aren’t passengers.” He twisted in his seat to face her more fully.

“They’re property. And my responsibility, not yours.

But, if it will ease your mind, there’s nothing to worry about.

Roma engineered the Dogs for endurance and efficiency.

They can easily survive without food for the three-week journey. ”

That stopped her for a half a minute. He said it so casually and looked at her like he thought it made everything all right. “It might be true, but it’s also cruel. The ship is fully stocked. There’s no reason to let them suffer.”

Resler smirked, then reached over and snagged a chunk of tuber from his plate. “You should tell her.”

Drake shot the man a glare to rival the chill of space.

“Tell me what?” She considered that look and what it might mean.

If there was something, anything, she could use to break through his resolve, she’d jump at it and worry about the consequences later.

Fisting her hands on her hips, she stepped close enough to tower over the seated men. “I get it. You’re afraid.”

All expression slipped off Drake’s face. “Afraid? Of you?”

“Not me. The Arena Dogs.”

“Ha!” Drake slid off the seat then stood, forcing her to look up to hold his gaze.

Samantha resisted the urge to step back.

He leaned in, crowding her even more. “They’re afraid of me, not the other way around.”

She’d been bullied by bigger men. “You’d have to get close to the cages to feed them. I think you’re afraid they’d make a grab for you.”

He shook his head and smiled. “Did you really think I’d be that easy to provoke?”

She shrugged, impressed that he saw through her ploy. She’d have to be careful not to underestimate him again, but that didn’t mean she was ready to give up. “Prove it then. Feed them.”

The smile tightened, giving him the pinched look of a man wearing a belt synched one notch too far. “I’ve worked with them—no bars between us—for years. If I wanted to feed them, I would.”

Samantha nodded. “Sure. But I bet you had a bunch of guards there to back you up.”

He stepped forward and her muscles tensed in reaction, but he brushed past. The pop of a storage bin opening drew her around as he dug into one of the built-in containers that lined the wall.

He pulled out a protein ration bar and tossed it to her. “If you want to bet, I’ve got a better wager.”

The packaging crackled as her hand tightened. Jaw clenched, she waited for him to continue.

“You get the Dogs to take a ration bar from your hand and I’ll let them keep it.”

She shivered as the memory of the swipe one of them had taken at her flashed her back to that terror, but the memory of the man’s pain was just as clear.

And the thought of the one they called Mercury, of his breath against her wrist, created a wave of heat that chased away her fear and left her edgy and breathless.

She held the bar up. “I get one of them to take this... and they all get fed... daily.”

Drake dug back in the bin for two more ration bars, then nodded. “They each get one bar a day.”

“Deal.”

“Not so fast.” Drake shoved the bin closed. “You’re asking for a lot. I think we have to make this more challenging, and I want something out of the bargain.”

Samantha huffed her disgust, wondering if he had any intention of dealing fairly. He struck her as a man who’d have no twinge of conscious over dealing from the bottom of the deck. He might keep adding on conditions until there was no way for her to succeed. “Risking my life isn’t enough?”

“Now, Sam. We aren’t going to let our pilot die. The worst you’ll get is a few scratches. Maybe a broken bone.”

Resler got up and shoved his empty tray into the disposal. “She’s right. They could snap her neck.”

“If they did,” said Drake, “that certainly wouldn’t benefit me .”

So, they were back to that—what was in it for him. “What do you want?”

“Just your company at meals, daily. Seems fair.” His smile was friendly and open, as if he wasn’t bargaining over whether three men would go hungry.

Samantha bit her lip to contain her own less charitable smile.

Drake raised his eyebrows.

“Do you realize,” she said, “that you just put eating a meal with you on a par with risking death?”

He scowled, twisting his lips in a cruel mockery of his earlier expression. “Let’s add a time limit. Say, five minutes.”

She sighed. If this was the only alternative to letting them go without food, what choice did she have? “All right. I’ll do it.”

Resler chuckled as he headed for the door. “This should be good. I’ll get the stun-sticks.”

Stars, she hadn’t meant to give them any excuse to hurt their prisoners. “That won’t be—”

“We won’t use them,” said Drake. “Unless it’s the only way to get you out of there.” He nodded to Resler. “Meet us in the cargo-hold.” He waved a hand at the door. “After you, Sam.”

He was uncharacteristically quiet on the short walk through the pale blue corridors.

She knew the color was supposed to be relaxing.

A lot of ships used it. Maybe it helped the normal crew get along better on the long journeys, but it did nothing for the coil of tension constricting her chest. Samantha entered the code, gave the door a solid push, and led Drake into the hold.

Cargo crates stamped with the red Roma logo and locked in place with gravity clamps lined the wall to the left.

To her right, nothing stood between them and the bare metal of the loading doors and the hatch leading to the emergency cargo-drop.

In front of them, the three cages formed a barbaric row about five meters away.

Mercury and Carnage were lying quietly, but their eyes tracked her.

In the center cage, Diablo paced in small, three-step laps.

As Resler came in behind them and handed Drake a stun-stick, the Arena Dog stopped and faced them, hands wrapping around the bars. The other two didn’t even stir.

How had she forgotten how beautiful they were? She didn’t realize she was staring until Diablo’s low growl drew her gaze to his eyes. Red fire flashed in the depths.

He spoke in a voice full of teeth. “Come to taunt us?”

The question startled her. Not the question so much as his speaking at all. They’d been so silent, not even talking to each other.

“No.” She looked to Drake who nodded.

“Five minutes,” he said.

She stepped forward and held out the protein bar where they could all see. “I brought ration bars.” She smiled, but she knew her nerves showed in the tightness of her lips.

Diablo was directly in front of her. His whole body had gone on high alert the moment she’d stepped forward.

His eyes stalked her, his body twitched in readiness, drawing her attention to his sleek muscles.

She wanted to stroke a hand across his skin to ease his hurts, but the memory of his claws swiping at her face kept her from walking toward him.

Instead, she kept well out of his reach and headed for Mercury—the man who’d touched her with sensual promise.