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Dora gives me a curious look. “Weird? In what way? And I really think we should talk. But tell me what’s going on with Jamef first.”
I kiss her cheek, considering. “I don’t know. He just seems really distant and not himself for the last few days. He seemed out of it when we were at the resort. I just worry something’s troubling him about our triad and he’s holding it in.”
“Jamef wouldn’t do that. He knows how important it is, to be honest.” She tilts her head, regarding me. “You want me to talk to him?”
I sigh, wondering if I’m overthinking things. Maybe I’m desperate to find something wrong because that’s what I do in my relationships—I find reasons for people to leave me, and it’s making me paranoid. “It might be in my head. Let’s give him some space today and if he wants to tell us what’s going on, he can. I don’t want to be pushy.”
“You? Pushy? Never.”
“Brat.” I pinch her rounded backside and she squeals, pulling out of my grasp with a giggle.
Her laughter quickly fades and she clasps her hands together, toying with her fingers as she does. “So, um, remember I said we needed to talk? I might have screwed the bounty up.”
“In what way?” I ask blandly, though I already know part of the answer.
Dora grimaces. “So remember how you two left earlier today and said that I should guard the ship and watch over Rhonda? And to hit the alert to notify the two of you if there was anything dangerous going on?”
Uh oh. “Yes…?”
“Well, I don’t know if it’s dangerous, but…I locked up Rhonda.” She makes a face. “And I’m pretty sure she’s really mad about it. But I had my reasons!”
“Do they involve petty jealousy? Because you will find no judgment from me.” I grin at her, holding a hand out so she can come back to my arms. “In fact, I’d be flattered if you were jealous all over again. It’s cute and it makes you really aggressive in bed.”
She rolls her eyes. “Worse. I think she’s sabotaging the ship.”
Ninety-Nine
BETHIAH
“She’s…what?”
“Sabotaging the ship.” Dora’s expression is completely serious.
I sift through what I know of Rhonda, and my memories of her. Lazy, indulgent, entitled…criminal mastermind is nowhere in there. Not even close. But maybe she’s changed a lot in the last ten years. I nod at Dora. “You saw her up to something?”
She nods. “She made a big deal of handing your boots back, right? And I kept thinking, why make a fuss other than to get me jealous, which she swears she’s not doing.”
“Which is probably a lie, but go on.” Rhonda’s favorite currency is jealousy and mistrust.
“Right. So I tried to think of reasons why she would take your boots if she swears she’s not trying to start something, and the only thing I could come up with is if she planted something on them.”
An uncomfortable prickle starts on the back of my neck.
“I couldn’t find anything on them, though, so I thought maybe I was being paranoid. But I also remembered her pretending to get dizzy in the hall, and how she hovered over one spot in particular. That made me suspicious, so while you guys were gone, I went back to that spot on the ship and looked at it hard. At first I didn’t see anything, but then I thought about how your technology is better than the ones I’m used to, and how you have the mask that makes people look like frog aliens. So I closed my eyes and ran my hands over the wall and the railing, and I felt a little something. I peeled it off and kept it.”
Dora reaches into her pocket and pulls out a tiny…something. It’s no bigger than her smallest fingernail, and when she touches it, the color ripples and changes to match her skin tone. She hands it to me and I immediately recognize it—an extremely thin listening device.
“It was stuck on the underside of the railing,” Dora tells me, and her eyes are a little frightened. “Is it a bomb?”
I grimace and crush the impossibly thin component between my fingernails, like I would squash a bug. “No. It’s for spying on people.”
She exhales in relief. “Well thank goodness for that. I was worried she was planting explosives all over the ship.”
“She wouldn’t do that,” I say thoughtfully, staring down at the listening device. “She needs a ride to wherever she’s planning on going. But she’s definitely not telling us the truth, is she?”
“Does that surprise you?” Dora nudges my foot. “I think we should check your boots again now that we know what we’re looking for.”
Ugh. She’s probably right. “In a moment. I just want to say I’m really keffing proud of you, Dora. You had a hunch and you followed it through. We’ll make a good bounty hunter out of you yet.” I lean in and give her a kiss. “Good job, fluffit.”
