The entire race compound suddenly goes pitch black. All the lights are out except those of the aliens around us and the wristbands on every racer. My guard looks away from me and takes up a protective stance, extending an arm across my middle.
A second later, the lights flicker back on in phases. The grounds illuminate first, then each floor of the complex.
“Okay, we’re going to have to send everyone out much earlier than planned,” the ABR announcer calls out without the enhancement of a microphone. “Please proceed to your ships for the space tour now. We will serve a meal aboard the vessels. Officers, please lock down the creatures’ wing. Give no one access until we can confirm we have the all-clear.”
“Looks like it might be safest for you to be on a ship out of here, asap.” My guard turns to me. “Let’s get you to your room so you can get your things.”
“I don’t have anything really,” I admit, but I let him lead me back inside. “Just the clothes on my back when I arrived here.”
“Why is that?” he asks.
“My life is my work. I don’t socialize because I don’t have time. I don’t need other things. I’ve lived under the rule of a man obsessed with things. I don’t want to become him.”
When we get to my room, I swipe my wristband and open my door. A hand tugs me backward.
My guard collects me in his strong arms and then cautiously steps into my room first, drawing a gun from inside his jacket. “Stay close.”
He checks the bathroom and bedroom areas as well as the closet.
I gape at the trashed room. Finding my ABR ticket crumpled on the floor, I pick it up and brush away the dirt. It feels like a crime to see it in such a condition. I tuck it in a pocket and find my regular clothes scattered on the bed, the pockets turned out.
I only had a handful of things, a tin of mints, an extra hair tie, and the one picture I have of my mom, brother, and me from when we were little and still loved one another.
“Anything you care about, grab it now,” he says.
I scramble to collect my things and follow him to my doorway.
“ABR, we have a break in, Room Six,” he reports. “They ransacked the place. I have Zariah Landing in my protection.”
“Confirmed, El—”
The lights go out again.
My guard grabs my arm and keeps me inside the shield of his body while he keeps his gun trained ahead of us.
“What’s going on?” I whisper. “Is this because of my father?”
“Could be. But I keep all options open until I have clear evidence.” He glances behind us and then keeps guiding me toward the end of the hallway. “Until I have confidence in this facility, I think you’re going to be safest on my ship.”
14: Zariah
Racers huddle up and run through hallways in the opposite direction as us. Security lights flash. My guard’s arm tightens around my waist. He shelters me in the shield of his body and guides me to a wall as two Retterwan males stumble over each other while hurrying toward their ships with everyone else.
Warm breath falls over the top of my head. My guard’s rippling body is hard, steady, and locked in around mine. The wall against my other side feels cold compared to him.
“How do I know you aren’t one of them?” I peer up at him.
He doesn’t look at me, but his eyes squint in the flashlights of the other personnel and ABR guards that guide the evacuation. “Unless you’re telepathic, there’s no way to know. So all you have is my behavior. What does it tell you?”
I think he cares more than he’s admitting to me. I’ve never worked with a private security detail that was so attentive or attractive. They’re always hard, cold, and calculated with me because I’m usually negotiating with their clients for dry goods deliveries. That’s it.
When the mob thins enough, he encourages me to keep going. We pass another six rooms and then the mingle celebration hall.
He slows me near the far end of the complex. “Be quiet and still, please. No questions.”
I grumble because I have a lot. But he looks highly alert as he eases us toward a section of private dock pads, so I keep them to myself.
He finds a screen on the wall which lights up at his touch. A heavy breathing sound makes him sling me behind him. His eyes find me in the light of the yellow screen. “Stay.”
