Malfunction, page 17
“Come on,” Rico muttered. “Wake up, kitten.” There was no response, and Rico swore. “Dios, she’s too far under. I need her awake.” He crossed the room, opened a drawer, and came back with a syringe. Without any warning, he pulled the top and stabbed Katia in the chest. Logan took a step forward, but Rico glanced up and growled. “Stay back. I know what I’m dealing with. You don’t.”
What the hell did that mean? But he didn’t have time to think about it, because Katia took a huge breath, her spine bowed, and she rose up from the gurney then collapsed back. She was gasping for breath, wheezing. She needed oxygen, something… Christ, he felt so helpless.
Rico took hold of her shoulders and gave her a shake. “You need to shift.”
Shift? Shift what? Why wasn’t Rico doing something more productive? He took a step forward, and Rico turned to him and growled again. Like an animal. Logan stopped. There was something going on here he didn’t understand. But she was dying. He could see that. He wouldn’t let her die.
“Shift, goddamn it,” Rico said. “You’re dying.”
Her head lolled to the side, and she looked at Logan, standing stiff by the side of the gurney. Totally fucking useless. No clue what was going on.
“You said you’d kill him if he found out.” Her voice was breathy, and Logan had to lean in to hear her words. She swallowed, forcing the words out. “Promise you won’t kill him.”
Kill who?
Me?
“Shift!”
She gritted her teeth, and he could see the physical effort it took her to get the word out. “Promise.”
Rico took a deep breath, his hands fisted at his side. Logan could almost hear the grinding of his teeth. His fear turned to bewilderment. This whole thing was surreal.
“I promise. Now fucking shift.”
She looked past Rico for a moment, and her gaze caught Logan’s. She gave a tiny shrug. “Normal is overrated anyway,” she whispered. Then she closed her eyes. Was she dying?
He stood locked in place, unable to move, his mind screaming to do something, to save her, but his body unwilling to comply. If he didn’t move then this might all go away.
“You might want to step back,” Rico said, and he shook his head.
“What’s happening?”
“Why don’t you wait and see?”
He forced his feet backward as Katia’s body arched up off the gurney. Something shivered in the air, and his skin prickled. A change was flowing over her, black fur sprouting from her skin. Her bones snapped—the noise loud in the silence—and then realigned, her face changing shape. Then her eyes flashed open, and they were no longer human, glowing bright green flecked with yellow, as they stared at him. He wanted to look away, as though that might change the reality. Maybe it wasn’t real. Maybe he’d fallen asleep and was dreaming this. Because yeah, this was the stuff of dreams…or nightmares.
It seemed to last forever but in fact took only seconds. Where Katia had lain, a huge black cat—a jaguar, he was guessing, but bigger than any he’d ever seen in a zoo—sprawled, legs hanging over the edge. Huge paws. Claws. It opened its eyes and peered at him then rolled onto its front and rose to its feet. All fucking four of them. It shook itself, the huge body rippling with muscle, then leaped down off the gurney. It gave Logan a narrow-eyed stare then cast Rico a dirty look before padding across to the corner of the room and collapsing onto its side, eyes closed.
Logan released the breath he hadn’t been aware he was holding. He blinked. The cat was still there. He cleared his throat, opened his mouth. Closed it again. “That’s Katia?” Stupid question. But his brain wasn’t functioning too well right now.
“Yeah. Cute, isn’t she? Sort of furry and…” Rico shrugged.
“Will she be all right?”
“Now she’s shifted, she’ll be fine. She’ll stay like that for a few hours, and when she shifts back, she’ll have cleared the poison from her system.”
“She’s a…?”
“Werecat. Jaguar, actually. Quite rare.” He turned away and spoke into his comm unit. “Sardi, get to the sick bay. Now.” He glanced at Logan, lips pursed. “We have a…problem.”
It occurred to Logan that Rico had promised he wouldn’t kill him—at least he was presuming he was the person Katia didn’t want killed—but maybe he would get someone else to do the job. He considered making a run for it and must have glanced at the door.
“Don’t,” Rico said.
Something else occurred to him. “Are you…?” He waved a hand toward where Katia lay sleeping.
“Hell, no.”
“But you’re not human, are you? If you’re not like her, then what are you?” Maybe he shouldn’t have asked. Maybe he really didn’t want to know.
Rico didn’t answer, just curled the corner of his upper lip in a snarl, bearing the tip of one white fang. “Guess.”
Logan’s heart stopped beating. When it started again, it was racing. “Christ,” he muttered.
Rico grinned. “Not even related.”
Someone cleared their throat in the doorway, and Logan nearly leaped out of his skin. Hell, he was jumpy. He turned slowly. A man leaned in the open doorway. Sardi, he guessed. At least at first sight he appeared to be a man. Albeit, probably the tallest man Logan had ever seen. That wasn’t what made Logan’s mouth go dry, though. He swallowed. The “man” had horns. Real, honest-to-fucking-God horns. Sticking out the top of his head. And that would make him… Logan’s mind seized up.
Rico let out a short laugh. “You know, this was almost worth it to see the expression on your face.”
Logan shook his head, trying to make his brain function again. “Yeah, right, and people usually just take you in their stride, do they?”
He gave a slow smile. “They usually don’t last long enough.”
“Balls,” he muttered.
“Sardi, this is Sergeant Logan Farrell, Katia’s new boyfriend.”
“Isn’t that nice.”
He had a low, gravelly voice that grated on Logan’s ears. Was he supposed to shake hands? He decided not. “So what happens now?”
“Well, I’m not going to kill you. I made a promise. But I don’t want you wandering around the place, either. So until Katia wakes up and can take charge of you, I’m afraid you’re off to the brig. And I need your comm unit.”
He unfastened it from his wrist and handed it over, though comming anyone had actually not occurred to him. Hell, no one would believe him anyway. “Why are you not killing me?” he asked.
Rico considered him for a few seconds then shrugged. “You saved her life. If she’d been in there any longer, she would never have come around.”
“Yeah, but the question is: why did her life need saving? What the hell happened? And if you say a malfunction, I might very well…” What? What could he do?
“I don’t have malfunctions on my ship. And I’m off to see if I can find the answer to that question right now. But one thing you might consider—if this was a murder attempt, then there’s a good chance you were also a target.” Cheerful thought. “Sardi, can you lock him up in the brig and meet me at Katia’s cabin?”
Sardi tossed him a salute. “Aye, aye, Captain.”
Did he detect more than a hint of sarcasm?
Logan followed him out of the room. He wasn’t used to people towering over him, but Sardi had a good six inches on him. Plus the horns. “So what are you?” he asked.
“Demon.”
Of course he was. “Is anyone on this ship human?”
“There are a few.” He cast Logan a sideways glance. “So you’re with Katia? You’re a brave man.”
He wasn’t sure how “with” Katia he was. Or even how “with” Katia he wanted to be. The whole changing into a cat thing was hard to take in and a lot to get his head around. Though she obviously liked him well enough not to let Rico kill him off. “I wasn’t actually aware she was a…” He couldn’t make himself say the word “werecat.”
“Ha. Like that, she’s a pussy cat. It’s her human form that’s a complete bitch.”
The day was taking its toll. Exhaustion rolling over him in waves. The brig actually sounded like a good idea right now. Maybe not so much locking him in but locking the monsters out.
Sardi opened the door and waved him inside. The cell wasn’t that much different than the cabin he’d shared with Katia. A little smaller, but it had a bed, and that was all he was interested in right now.
“How long?” he asked.
“Until Katia wakes up? Could be a few hours.” He gestured to a panel on the wall. “You can get drinks from there. And here…” He dug into his pocket and pulled out a flask. “Something to keep you company.”
Logan took it and sank down onto the bed as the door slid shut behind the…demon.
He kicked off his shoes, rested his back against the wall, stretched out his legs, unscrewed the top from the flask, and took a long swallow.
His back stung where she had clawed him. It seemed like a lifetime ago.
“I had sex with a werecat.”
Hey, he could say it. He wasn’t in denial. Not at all.
And he’d just been thinking about asking for a transfer to the Trakis Two. He’d actually considered that here was someplace he could fit in. At the thought he snorted and nearly choked on a mouthful of whiskey. Yeah, it seemed he was a misfit wherever he went.
He took one last mouthful then stretched out on the bed.
He was asleep in seconds.
No dreams.
Chapter Twenty-One
Katia had slept for nearly twenty-four hours then woken up in her cat form, curled up on the floor in the sick bay. A combination of exhaustion and needing to heal.
According to Rico, she’d nearly died. If she’d been human, she would have died. She couldn’t remember what had happened. She’d been about to shower and then…nothing. Rico was having a full analysis done on the air in the cabin, but he didn’t think it would reveal much. Whatever had been used had obviously broken down by the time they’d got into the cabin, as it’d had little effect on Logan.
Could it have been Logan?
But why? That didn’t make sense.
Plus, he’d alerted Rico. Although, at that point, he’d believed she was human and should have been already dead. And by alerting Rico, he would have shifted any suspicion from himself. Unless you were a really suspicious person like Rico. “You need to think with your head and not your—”
“Shut up,” she’d snapped. She was thinking with her head. And her head didn’t think it was Logan.
Which left Layla and Rico and whoever else was awake on the Trakis Two right now. Layla, like Logan, made zero sense. What possible motive could she have? Unless she was jealous that Logan was with her. A woman scorned? She couldn’t see her going that far.
Rico was in the clear. He’d saved her life. The adrenaline shot had woken her up. Without that, she would never have shifted, and she would be dead.
The rest of the crew? Rico was organizing a get-together so she could interview them. Maybe there was someone awake who didn’t like her. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility. She tended to piss people off. But Rico didn’t think there was anyone on the crew who would kill like that. Try and rip her throat out, maybe, but not poison. It wasn’t their way.
What if there actually was a terrorist and they had somehow got on board the Trakis Two? Could they have left the Trakis Three before it blew? Taken a shuttle? No, someone would have noticed a shuttle landing. Wouldn’t they? Maybe they’d come earlier and remote detonated whatever had blown up the Trakis Three. But according to Rico, the only shuttle that had landed on the Trakis Two in the last few decades, apart from hers and Layla’s yesterday, was the one that brought the security officer from the Trakis One.
Maybe unknown to them, they’d had a stowaway.
Unlikely.
Which left her…nowhere.
She came to a halt in front of the brig. Logan had been locked in here for over twenty-four hours. He was probably going to be pissed as hell.
And now, he knew what she was.
How was he dealing with that? She was about to find out.
She tapped the monitor screen outside the cell, and it lit up. Logan was stretched out on the bed, hands behind his head, gazing at the ceiling. For a moment, she stared. He was still dressed in the clothes he had pulled on to get ice cream for her. His uniform pants and a white T-shirt. He was stunning, and she had a flashback to how he had felt on her, in her, and heat pooled in her belly. She might as well enjoy the memories. She probably wouldn’t be getting her hands on him again anytime soon. Likely the whole cat thing might be a bit of a turn off. She tried not to analyze how that made her feel. What good would it do? She was what she was. There was no changing that, and she didn’t want to. Not really. Just for a while there, she’d felt close to Logan. Closer than to anyone since her family had been slaughtered by the werecat who had turned her.
There was no point in putting this off. She placed her palm on the panel, and the cell door slid open.
Logan turned his head, his eyes narrowing on her as she stood in the open doorway. He glanced past her as if to check if she was alone then swung his legs off the bed and sat up, running a hand through his short hair. He studied her, his eyes wandering over her body, finally returning to her face.
“You can turn into a cat,” he said.
She nodded, though it hadn’t been a question. “A jaguar.”
He pressed a finger to the spot between his eyes. “And your friend Rico is a vampire.”
“I’m afraid so.”
He shook his head then rose to his feet. “I’m starving.”
“No one brought you any food?”
“No. I thought you were dead and they were going to leave me here until the problem went away.”
She bit back a smile. “Sorry. I only just woke up. I came straight here.”
He raised an eyebrow in obvious disbelief. “Balls.”
“Okay, I had a slight detour via the galley. I was really hungry—a side effect of…shifting.” She shook her head. “Anyway, come on, we’ll go get you something to eat and we can talk.”
“Yeah, talking would be good.”
Screwing would be better. She had an overwhelming urge to shut the door behind them and drag him to the bed and lose herself in him. Forget everything for a while. But she couldn’t bring herself to take the step and close the space between them. And risk rejection. He was giving nothing away, his expression blank. And he certainly wasn’t giving off any sexy vibes. That was a first, and she could only suppose it was because of his new knowledge of her. She gave a mental shrug.
“Let’s go.”
He pulled on his shoes and followed her out of the cell. She led the way down the corridor to the galley. The room was empty, which was just as well; she didn’t think Logan was ready to meet any more of Rico’s crew yet. Best to ease him in slowly.
Her stomach churned. She never got nervous, but for some reason, she was not looking forward to this conversation. She couldn’t even face any food, which was unheard of. Instead, she sat at the table, gnawing on her fingernails while Logan helped himself to the food dispenser. He came over, hesitated, and then took the seat opposite her, placing his plate on the table. He started eating without saying a word and didn’t stop until his plate was empty. Then he got up, got two mugs of coffee, placed one in front of her, sat down again, and leaned back in his chair.
“So how safe am I?” he finally asked.
The question took her by surprise. “From me?”
“Well, not from you personally. I was thinking more of your friend with the big teeth.”
A smile curved her lips. Except she didn’t really feel like smiling. “Rico won’t harm you. Not on purpose, anyway. He promised, and while I’m not going to try and convince you he’s a nice guy, or anything even approaching a nice guy, he sticks to his word.”
“He’s not a guy at all. He’s a goddamn blood-sucking monster.”
And there it was. “So what am I?” she asked.
Shock flared on his face, eyes widening. He clearly hadn’t thought about that. Which was odd.
“Come on, Logan. You can say it. Am I a monster, too?”
He looked into her eyes. “I don’t know. Are you?”
She shrugged. “It’s not the monsters you should be worried about. While you might be safe from Rico, there is obviously someone else around who wants you gone. If you’d have been in that room with me, you’d be dead.”
“So would you.”
She nodded. “Good point. Thank you. You saved my life. I hope you’re not sorry about that.”
The shock flared again. “Hell, no. I don’t want you dead.” He put his untouched coffee down and raked a hand through his hair. “Come on, Katia, you can’t expect me to not be a little shocked by all of this. You can change into a big fucking cat and probably eat me. For all I know, you eat people regularly. It’s a lot for a guy to take in, so cut me some slack if I’m not coming across all diplomatic right now.”
“Okay. But my point was there is someone out to kill us both. They’ve tried three times now. And I’m betting there’s a good chance they’ll try again.”
“You think it’s the terrorist?”
“Who knows? It’s as good a theory as any right now. Rico went over every inch of the cabin but found nothing. We have no clue how the poison got in. And no clue even what it is. In fact, we have no clues at all.” She took a sip of coffee. “But I don’t think there’s a terrorist. I think someone wants us and the investigation to go away.”
