Seduce Me in Flames (40 page)

“Someone needs to fetch that robe and have it tested. I want to know exactly what it was,” Rush said darkly.

“Justice is on her way here with it as we speak. Jet can start to run tests immediately.”

“Did you—?”

“Not my place,” Bronse said with a shrug. “It has always been your place. And I don’t hold it against you for keeping quiet. I just wish you’d been able to trust your team a little more.”

Rush nodded solemnly. “Yeah. So do I.”

Justice burst into the bay with her impeccable sense of timing. She was out of breath, having run all the way up from the landing bay. She carried a bag in one hand, which was protected by her black uniform glove.

“What in the name of the great gorked-up spirits just happened over there?” she demanded breathlessly. “The whole place is up in arms saying the empress is dead and that Ender blew her all the way to Ebbany! Do you have any idea how hard it was to get hold of this thing?” She shook the bag, which no doubt held the remains of the robe. “Her uncle declared the place a crime scene and is putting the country under martial law as we speak! That means the IM is no longer welcome, since the heir we were protecting is—hey, that’s her, isn’t it?” she said, ending her rush of words with the softly surprised question and a finger pointing at Ambrea.

“Yeah, that’s her,” Rush affirmed.

“Oh. Well, then, why are they saying she’s dead? I mean—sure, she doesn’t look so hot, but—”

“Jus,” Rush began with a sigh, “I think you might want to pull up a chair.”

“I want to know how you did it,” Balkin said with a chuckle. “Even I believed that Tarian was loyal to her. And he never struck me as the suicide bomber type. What did you pay him? What did you promise him?” Balkin’s smile faded as he began to think about it. “What did you give him, Eirie?”

“Oh, please,” she laughed at him, “I don’t flatter myself to think my pussy would tempt a man into throwing his life away for me. Not with his full knowledge, in any event. And anyway, I had nothing to do with the Tarian or the bomb that went off. My methods are somewhat more subtle.” She drifted across the room to him, her smile sweetly seductive as she touched him for what felt like the first time in ages. “This time I can honestly swear to you I had nothing to do with it. In fact, I had thought it rang more of your way of dealing with things.” She leaned against him. “Violent. Bloody. Deliciously definitive.” She kissed his lips with each word, the last one snapping his control of himself and forcing him to grab hold of her and kiss her until she was wildly breathless. It was nice to see her impassioned. Nice to see her stirred and rustled up out of her constant placidity.

“I wish I could take the credit. Especially since it seems to make you so fiery. But I can’t. It was probably some wild unknown faction we know nothing about.
Perhaps someone didn’t take too kindly to her rapidly sweeping changes and the idea of their ruler taking advice from a savage. Whatever the reason,” he practically purred against her mouth, “she’s dead and this time she won’t magically reappear with the IM at her back. And do you know what that means, my pretty love?”

“That I am going to be empress!”

“Indeed you are!” He laughed when she cried out with glee, shaking away her constantly coolly dignified veneer for a moment of dancing with delight in his arms, her light body spinning between his hands. “And screw a proper mourning. They hardly knew the bitch. I say it’s crowns for us both by week’s end.”

That made her stop her spinning dance, her body smoothing up against his seductively, her hands running deep into his hair.

“Say it clearly, Balkin Tsu Allay. You will wed me before the week is out?”

“Before the day is done tomorrow, Eirie Vas Allay.”

“Eirie Vas Allay,” she repeated softly. “Vas Allay!” She threw back her head and laughed with pure exultation.
“Eirie Vas Allay!”

Ambrea opened her eyes with a sudden blink. She coughed, her dry throat catching when she drew in a painful breath. Then Rush was there, cradling her close, pressing a cup to her lips, already knowing what she needed before she could even work up a way to give it voice. She swallowed the cool, creamy liquid, Rush forcing her to take it slow by tipping the cup in increments. He waited until she reached to push the cup away, indicating she had had her fill for the moment.

“It’s biotinate,” he explained of the beverage as he put the cup aside. “Jet says you should drink as much as possible. It helps in cell regeneration.”

Shock had robbed her memory of a lot of the particulars, but she recalled instantly what had happened.

“It wasn’t you,” she said to him, her first desire to make it clear to him she knew he hadn’t been the one to burn her. “I couldn’t understand … it didn’t make sense. I’m sorry I accused you.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said sharply. “Whatever slight you imagine I might be feeling, you’re wrong. And the only thing you ought to be worried about here is yourself, your health, and how to recover from this.”

She sat up in the diagnosis bed, pushing against him when he blocked her from moving further.

“Rush, you’re wrong,” she insisted as she resisted him. “I have all of Allay to worry about.” She saw the expression that crossed his features and latched on to it instantly. “What? What is it?”

“Apparently they think you’re dead,” he said quietly, his knuckles reaching up to sweep her hair back against her temple. “We weren’t sure we should announce otherwise while you were still vulnerable. But it’s just me, you, Jet, and Ophelia here. Lasher and Justice are standing guard. Everything you eat, drink, and touch will go through us first. Your robe was poisoned, but I guess you figured that out. It was dusted with some kind of alkali. If you’d gone underwater, you would have set off a chemical reaction and probably destroyed your flesh completely. Only the inside of the robe was treated, so it was very clear that it was meant to burn only the wearer. I was trying to remember who brought it to you.”

“Suna,” she said softly. Her eyes widened. “Oh, Rush, no. A thousand other people maybe, but not Suna.”

“I have to question her just the same,” he warned her.

“Fairly,” she demanded of him. “No wild, unfounded accusations. You will bring me proof it was her doing or I won’t hear anything against her.” Then, suddenly, she deflated, going weak in his arms, all of her weight falling
against his chest. “If it was Suna, I don’t think I could bear it.”

“You can,” he said softly into her hair. “I’ve never seen anyone with your strength. Whatever the outcome, whatever your enemies throw in your path, you will survive. And soon others will see that too. But between now and then lies a great deal of time and danger. And I … well, you should rest. There’s time later to talk.”

“On the contrary,” she said, tears welling in her eyes and using the quick touch of her fingertips to sweep away evidence of her weaker emotions. She let determination stiffen her spine once again. “Time is at a halt and I cannot afford to rest.” She pushed him away and threw her legs over the side of the bed. She seemed to falter as she did so, clearly overwhelmed by the pain and trauma of what her body had endured.

“Madam,” he said sternly, “you aren’t fit to move around.”

“And you’ve never continued to work in spite of an injury?” She knew as well as he did that they had both seen him do exactly that only a short time ago.

“This is significantly different,” he insisted, automatically helping to steady her as she slid off the edge of the diagnosis bed and tried to gain her feet. Ambrea couldn’t help but smile. He was more than strong enough to bully her back into bed if he wanted to. But despite his genuinely worried protests, he was as aware as she that every second she spent outside the court of Allay was hard-earned ground she would lose.

More important, she would lose crucial evidence. Although they had the robe to identify and track the chemicals that had been used, it was witnesses and the trail of people invariably left behind that would really lead to the identification of her betrayers.

Yet, without a single shred of evidence, Ambrea knew without a doubt where this was going to lead. There
was only one person who stood to gain with any significance from her death.

“Can I take these off?” she asked impatiently as she tugged at her bandages. She was bound like a mummy from wrists to knees. It made it difficult to move and each movement tugged on the material and made it hurt.

“Ophelia!” Rush bellowed, startling her. She blinked at him in confusion for a moment, but when a delicate-featured girl in a medical uniform popped around the open corner of the bay, she realized that this was the person he had been calling for. She looked barely old enough to be in uniform at all, never mind that of a trained, skilled medic, so Ambrea’s expression was dubious as the young woman approached her.

“You need to be at rest,” the girl named Ophelia said sternly as she walked up to Ambrea with a frown marring her very pretty features. She was as blond as Rush was, only her hair hung in hundreds of thin braids, each woven with fragile ceramic beads that looked hand-painted. Ambrea found herself wondering where she got so many of them. Everything seemed to be done via technology these days, and simple arts like this were long lost in favor of technological precision.

“I need to run my country,” Ambrea argued once she realized that the girl would be a hindrance rather than a help. Ambrea wished she had time to tease Rush for calling in the small girl to act the bully he couldn’t seem to bring himself to play—big bad soldier that he was. “Either help me or I will cut these things off myself.”

“No.” Ophelia sighed and rolled her eyes. “No need to do that.” She reached into a nearby drawer and searched for a tool of some sort, all the while muttering to herself about “type A” personalities and if she wanted to practice “real” medicine she would have to find another job. Ophelia found what she was looking for and turned back to Ambrea. She looked sternly at the empress,
effectively making Ambrea feel like an unruly child, although she was certain she had never been any such thing. “I’m only taking away what is necessary to allow you to move freely. The rest must stay in place to prevent any troublesome infections. It is imperative”—here she looked hard at Rush—“
absolutely
imperative that there is no further trauma. If there is you must return to me immediately. But I promise you, if you show up here again, I will tie your ass to the bed until I think it’s reasonably safe to leave you to your own devices. I would be doing so now, except apparently it would cause some kind of interstellar incident.”

“Thanks, Phee,” Rush said with a grin as he bent to buss her roughly against her temple and pat her heavily on the head, as if she were his ten-year-old kid sister instead of a well-trained colleague. Ophelia elbowed him off, but she was grinning widely.

Ambrea leaned back against the bed and blinked a bit dumbly at the sight of him interacting with the young woman. She had seen only a marginalized version of Rush, she realized then. Despite all of his secrets and his unwillingness to trust anyone with them, it became clear to her that it hadn’t interfered with his ability to make warm connections with others around him. Taken as a whole, he was very much connected to his IM world, and as more than just a skilled soldier. These people were his real family. Sisters and brothers, mother and father figures—everything he had always wanted or needed, albeit on his terms.

How naïve of her to think she had something to offer him that he couldn’t find anywhere else. The only thing she had been able to give him was nothing he had freely or willingly given back. Had he not been shot at, accidentally revealing his deepest secret to her, their acquaintance would have ended the moment she had stepped onto IM territory. And outside of that secret
and all the threads between them that connected back to it, what else did they really share?

As soon as Ophelia cut away the last restriction to her movement, Ambrea quickly pushed away from them, moving across the bay and trying to give herself a moment to regain control of a wildly unexplainable surge of emotion. She blinked in rapid succession, fighting the sting of tears in her eyes. Why did this upset her so much? She had known from the beginning that she was merely borrowing him from his world so he could help her in hers. And she clearly had far more complex things to worry about. Her future was nothing to be envied, nothing to tempt a man of action. Sure, there was danger now, but that would eventually ease and then all there would be was the tedium of political life. For her that was fine; for her it was a matter of destiny and responsibility. It would be everything she could ever want.

Almost.

But Rush was a man of action and danger. He lived on the edge of his own spiking adrenaline. Court life would promise him nothing but the prickliness of the occasionally perturbed politico or noble. And he had said it himself: she was thriving in that venue. Finding her own strength and footing. She could and would learn to handle them all herself.

So she really wouldn’t need him at all.

Ambrea squared her shoulders, fighting back the scream of dismay moving reflexively through her soul. She pressed brief, angry fingers into her eyes, took a breath, and then turned to face the other two people in the room.