Julian smoothly took over as Ellis settled into the background. “Indeed. Tell me what you think you know.”
She sighed. “I’ve gone over it. The simplest answer is that it has something to do with my work. Communicable diseases. Some life threatening. But none of them were of a type I’d have recommended for biological warfare if that’s what you think.”
“That’s good to know. I want you to add details like that if they occur to you. Did you get visitors from the Imperium?” Julian asked.
“Of course. It was a joint project between both the Federated Universes and the Imperium. About half of our funding came from them.”
“Like who? People who worked with you? Other doctors and researchers? People who came from the Imperialist territories to oversee grant funding distribution? Who?”
She closed her eyes and Vincenz wanted to hold her hand, the one she had in a fist in her lap.
Fuck it. He reached out and took it, unfurling her fingers and placing it between his palms.
“We had six researchers. Four from our Edge ’Verses and two from theirs. A staff of ten more as lab techs, administrative help. I was one of three researchers with an assistant. Total staff excluding security was sixteen.”
“With security?”
“Twenty-four.”
Julian didn’t look up, but Vincenz knew he found that number as interesting as Vincenz and Ellis did.
“That seems a lot. Is it a lot, Hannah?”
“I never worked in a similar situation so I can’t say other than that I found it rather odd that they’d have so many guards. The building was well protected as it was. I had to show four pieces of identification just to get in each day. But it was politics.” She shrugged and Ellis nodded. “The foundation had Imperium visitors at least several times each quarter year. Usually other researchers. Sometimes they had in-house training or lectures with guests from both sides of the ’Verses. Federation visitors on a regular basis as well.”
Julian led her around through the story. He did it patiently and gently, backing off when Hannah got angry or upset and two hours later, it was Wilhelm who held a hand up.
“Young woman, you’ve said enough for now. You must be tired and in dire need of refreshment.”
“We all are, I wager.” Julian stood. “A meal and then, Hannah, you’re fortunate enough to be free to skip all the other meetings we have to attend afterward.”
Chapter 8
“We know they have one more portal-collapsing device.”
Ellis said it without preamble once they’d come back to the table after lunch.
Daniel and Andrei also looked on via vid screen where they’d just joined the conference some moments before.
“What’s the plan?” Vincenz sipped his kava.
Wil looked carefully at Vincenz and Julian. “You two need to go and destroy it, naturally.”
This woman he’d met, Hannah, what a wild card she’d turned out to be. He didn’t miss the way his operatives took care of her, protected her. Nor did he miss the intelligence of the woman herself.
They sat on a hinge point. He knew it in his gut. Things were building up and any one of those things could change the game in a big way.
“That was my belief when I’d concluded the interrogations as well.” Julian sat back and sipped his kava. Wil had hated the necessity of using Julian in so many interrogations. Knew it took a toll on the man. But he hadn’t been lying when he’d told Julian he had a gift. He did. And because of those interrogations with prisoners of war, they’d built up a wealth of intelligence.
Normally, both these men would have jumped at the opportunity to go in and destroy the device. But Wil didn’t miss the quick check they both made toward where Hannah worked out in the garden.
“What do you think she knows?” He changed tack for the moment.
Julian took a deep breath. “I’ve gone over the logs and notes. They questioned her in a fairly narrow area. The timelines and the things they wanted to know from her seem to indicate she saw something. But their reaction in not killing her seems to indicate they needed it from her, that perhaps they didn’t know it themselves. Or that they were missing a key element.”
Wil nodded. He believed pretty much the same. “Pesch indicated several attempts to manipulate certain parts of her brain to stimulate recall.” He smiled. “Which only seems to have made her will to resist them stronger.”
“She’s an asset.” Julian leaned forward, his hands clasped in on the tabletop. “She understands Imperial culture in a way few do.” Julian looked to Vincenz, who lifted his shoulders.
“When I first met you,” he said to Vincenz, “I knew you had a path to walk. All these years you’ve proven yourself over and over to be one of our best people. You’ve got a head for formulas and for machines, which are fine skills. But now you are integral because Julian brings up an important point. You know the Imperialists. You know their motivations and the hows of what they do and why. It’s why you need to be the one to head up this mission to destroy the last remaining device. If we control all the remaining Liberiam and they have nothing left to build a device with, they can’t use them. This is the biggest weapon in their arsenal.”
“Unless this thing Hannah knows has to do with another weapon.” Daniel spoke from the vid screen.
“My father is no fool. He’s arrogant, yes. Spoiled. But he’s surrounded by smart and vicious men. They won’t have only one weapon.” Vincenz licked his lips. “There’s another lab Hannah visited before they came to take her from the foundation.”
“Do you think they might have the data we need there?” Wil asked.
“I don’t know. But I think there’s a good chance there may be some answers there. At the very least we’d be able to count things out.” Vincenz pulled at his hair as he thought it over.
“You and Julian need to head the mission. We have some intel on the location of the labs where the portal-collapsing device is being built.”
Julian huffed out a long breath and looked toward Hannah again.
Wil pretended he hadn’t seen them both look to her so frequently. And he hoped these two were the last to go and get themselves tripped up by love. At least until the war was over. “We can send her to Ravena. She’ll be safe there. You know Abbie and Carina will take her under their protection. Help her build a new life.”
Vincenz pushed to stand and began to pace. “She … she’s …”
“She needs to be with me and Vin.” Julian put his mug down and leveled a look at Wilhelm.
About time. Wil looked them both over. “Is that so? And why do you say such a thing?”
“I think whatever she knows has something to do with her work. Just as I understand how things work in the Imperium, so does she. If she knows something, she’s the best person to help us find it. I don’t know a thing about medicine and science or how to even begin to figure out what to look for. I blow stuff up.”
Wil smiled. Nicely done. He’d made the right choices with the people in his Phantom Corps. “She’s not trained for this. And this op may have nothing to do with whatever she might know.”
“We’ll take care of the backup and defense. She’s an asset here. One we can’t afford to ignore.”
“And?”
“Her entire world has been turned upside down. Her parents are dead. Her friends are dead. Her old job is gone. She has nothing here right now. Nothing but us, and we’ve made the commitment to her to be here.”
It was the most impassioned he’d seen Julian since before Marame had been killed. Hannah Black was important. A bright point in the maze of all this insanity. She had a purpose and Wilhelm Ellis didn’t like to ignore people’s fate.
“All right.”
Julian looked at him askance and he wanted to laugh. Instead he glowered.
“She’s not classified as Phantom Corps like Piper. Just know that in advance. This is a onetime thing. I don’t know why you all choose to lose your heads over a woman rig
ht at the worst possible time.”
Vincenz opened his mouth to argue and then sat back. “That’s not what this is.”
“Pull the other one, boys. Stop lying to yourselves. As for the mission? You’ll have to do both. Get that lab and the portal device. Make sure she’s got some basic weapons training. I’ve got to meet with Brandt, who is stopping by on his way out of the Imperium. Coordinate with Daniel on this. Get it done, gentlemen.”
* * *
“He seems to think we’re romantically involved with Hannah.” Julian sat at his data console pretending to read the screen, but in reality, he was thinking about Hannah.
“He’s got a touch of prescience.” Vincenz rustled around and found the card he needed.
“He knows. About you and me I mean.”
Vincenz input a series of codes before looking up, amusement clear on his face. “Not much of a secret. Is it?”
Julian grinned. “Not if anyone has eyes.”
“And after last night, ears.”
They laughed, remembering the rather loud session they’d shared while Hannah had been in the bath.
“So why do you think he made that assumption then?” Julian asked again. “You know, about Hannah.”
Vincenz put the data aside and met Julian’s gaze. “Because he’s got a touch of prescience, like I said. I see the way you look at her. I see the way you touch her, the way you hold her when she’s in our bed.”
Julian took a deep breath. “And does that bother you?”
“Yes, but not in the way you think.”
“She gets to me. There’s something about her. She moves past all my defenses and has curled up inside me.”
Vincenz nodded. “I tried thinking it was fraternal. For a while. I thought she needed protection and I have a sister so she was like that to me. I can protect her and love her, but it’s like Carina.” He snorted. “Only that’s a lie. It’s nothing like Carina.”
“No. Not even like Marame.” The guilt rose. “It’s hard, you know. Not to take my kisses deeper. I haven’t though. You know that, right? Temptation doesn’t mean anything. I wouldn’t do that to you.”
Vincenz laughed and reached across the table to squeeze Julian’s hand. “I know you haven’t. I think you and I are struggling in a similar way. She … you make me feel alive. Vibrant. There’s no holding back with you and I have no desire to anyway. But she’s there too. She’s strong and fragile all at once. It makes me want to wrap her hair around my fist. Makes me want to lick up her neck.” His faraway look sharpened as he focused on Julian again. “Makes me want her. And you. And I’ve felt like an asshole just thinking it. She’s still recovering!”
“Me too. I’ve felt like I betrayed you.” Julian breathed a little easier knowing he hadn’t been alone in this.
“So we’ve agreed then? That we haven’t? And then what?”
“And then who knows? Yes, she’s recovering, but she’s not the same as she was four months ago. She’s clearheaded about herself and her goals and needs in a way she couldn’t have contemplated before. When I’m debriefing her, I can track the strength of mind she has. The stability she’s gained. She knows her mind.” He snorted, thinking about how stubborn she could be at times.
He continued. “But for now we have a mission to plan. What we have is good. Let’s just let this play out slowly and on her schedule. She may not be interested at all.” Julian shrugged. He didn’t believe it for a second. Granted, theirs was not the ideal situation, but he knew what was in her eyes.
Indeed they had work to do.
Hannah awoke and simply relaxed for long moments, breathing in Julian’s skin as she lay on his biceps. His other arm was banded about her waist, holding her. Keeping her from floating away on bad dreams.
When she opened her eyes, it was to find Vincenz looking at her.
“Would you like to go on an adventure, Hannah Black?” he asked softly.
She thought carefully. Would she?
“What kind of adventure?”
He smiled and she wanted to simply curl into him with happiness.
“Sometimes it might be dangerous. It would involve travel.”
He made it sound like a fairy story. “Would you be there?”
“I’d ask if that was something you wanted, but I think I know the answer. Yes, with me and Julian.”
Julian’s breathing changed and she didn’t fail to note the hard cock resting against her ass. It was what happened in the morning for men, she told herself, even as her nipples hardened.
“Do you know me that well, then?”
“Sometimes.” Vincenz’s pupils swallowed nearly all the color of his eyes and her heart pounded as the moment stretched taut between them. She wanted … so much. In the months that she’d ended treatment, she’d entered into talk therapy with Dr. Pesch. The panic had long subsided and every day she gained a little more ground in her head. Enough to feel, so very fully, everything else she’d been stripped of in her time at the labs.
Foremost among those feelings was sexual desire.
And chief among the causes for that popping back into her life lay there in the bed with her. And she felt guilty about it. Yes, they’d made a place for her in their lives and in their bed. They showed each other affection in her presence in a way they never did in front of anyone else. On one hand it thrilled her to be so trusted with such a beautiful and intimate thing. They were so sexy together. And she never wanted to hurt that.
On the other, she wanted those hands on her. She wanted Vincenz to kiss her the way he kissed Julian. Well, not precisely. She found what they had together to be gorgeous. She didn’t want to replace that. She wanted to have it too. In her own way. She wanted Julian’s voice to change when he said her name. Not exactly how he did when he said Vincenz, but the change, the way it was clear he meant something to Julian simply by the way he uttered Vincenz’s name. That’s what she wanted.
Something beautiful and unique and not only with one of them.
So stupid to want such a thing. Stupid to think the way Julian touched her was more than just friendly, or to imagine the desire in Vincenz’s gaze when she moved. They were together and she would never do anything to harm that.
“Where is this adventure then?” she murmured, swallowing hard and trying not to squirm against Julian, whose response to her attempt to get up just a breath earlier had been a tightening of his hold. Which … seemed to make her molten inside. It felt so good she wasn’t sure how to respond.
“We’re off to blow things up in the Imperium.” Julian’s lips brushed against her shoulder as he settled her back against his body, and yes, yes, he was still hard.
“You’d let me blow things up?”
Vincenz grinned at her. “Would you like to blow things up?”
“A year ago I’d have denied it. But I can’t lie to either of you it seems. I would very much like to blow things up. But … you can’t take me along. I’m not one of you.”
Vincenz moved closer. So close the heat of him seemed to sear her skin through her nightdress. Probably because it tended to ride up when she slept and lodged at the top of her thighs.
“If you’d rather not, we can make arrangements for you to travel to Ravena. You’ll be safe. Protected. Far, far away from anything that’ll blow up. We’ll be back after our mission is concluded.”
“You’d send me away?”
Vincenz closed the last bit of space between them, pressing his body to her front as Julian cradled behind her. A full-body shiver of delight rolled through her along with a gasp.
“If you wanted to go, we’d make it happen.”
Julian spoke in her ear. “But we wouldn’t be happy.”
Was she completely misunderstanding this situation? Was this no more than two friends surrounding her because that’s what she needed? Was the cock at her ass really for Vincenz? Who had an answering hard-on at her belly. Each breath she took was filled with them. The warm, utterly male scent each of them carried
on his skin.
She had no words. None that she could utter and not feel like a fool anyway.
Finally, she let herself take a leap. “Take me with you.”
Vincenz brushed his lips across hers and she sighed into his mouth. Wanting so much. Needing and having no outlet.
She needed the bathing suite and some actual privacy. Because these men had created a problem and she had no choice but to fix it.
“I should go. To clean up.” That she managed to remember all the words to put into the correct order was a testament to how far the treatments had taken her.
Vincenz kissed her again and she found herself clutching the front of his shirt, the softness of the material cool against her palms. She was dizzy with him, intoxicated by the moment.
“I like the way you taste, Hannah Black.” He said this as he rolled over, bringing her atop him and then down to her feet on the floor next to the bed where she stood on shaky legs.
She blinked at them both so utterly male and satisfied in the bed. Staring at her.
Hannah had no idea what to say so she hurried from the room, closing the door behind her and leaning against it to catch her breath.
Flustered.
Her father had a word for being addled, twitterpated. Which seemed to be the perfect phrase for what she was.
Her reflection showed flushed skin, tousled hair, wide eyes and … a grin. How long had it been since a man had rendered her so witless? What chance did she have against not just Vincenz but Julian too?
Needing something to do before she broke down into hysterical laughter, she pulled her nightdress off and stepped into the water closet before making her way to the shower enclosure and letting the water rush over her skin, letting it surround and warm her.
It had been a long time since she’d been touched.
Since leaving the labs the loss of the silence and the way people actually paid attention to her had been the most difficult things to deal with. Not that she craved silence, though she had come to remember what it felt like to need time alone in the bathing suite.
Julian had brought home three little cakes of soap. Each smelled like a different sort of flower. Today she chose the one that reminded her of the landsea on Sanctu. Salt and dry earth with a hint of sweet and wild.