She put on the choke quickly and mercilessly, cutting off both his breath and his blood. His face went red as she felt a knife repeatedly slam and skitter off the plating and fiber mesh in her undershirt. Her smile was as dark as her lips.
“If I kissed you, it would be too easy.”
“Not…my type…anyway.”
“Give up, old man. You lost.”
“Taught you…everything you know,” he sputtered. “Didn’t teach you…this.”
“I wanted a second opinion,” she answered. “So I trained at some other schools. And I’m keeping your ship.”
He bucked and struggled, but even a man as strong and tough as Delphi Kloda couldn’t live without oxygen. There was something satisfying in the way his knowing, judgmental eye bulged in surprise and fear, and she toyed with the idea of letting him live just so she could taunt him. But she couldn’t help remembering the bedtime stories he’d told her as a child, how he’d hunted men down for betraying him. Leave an enemy alive and you’ll never stop looking over your shoulder, he’d told her. That’s how I lost my eye. Didn’t try it again. He’d tapped the black leather patch and winked, and she’d laughed and swore she never would.
But he just had, hadn’t he?
And now…she wanted to. But she wouldn’t. Because she knew better than anyone what Kloda could do when he wanted something. This man had killed everyone she’d gotten close to, people whose names she’d purposefully forgotten. He might’ve even killed Orri already—she wouldn’t know until she got back to the Sparrowhawk at the spaceport. She had to end Kloda before he found a way to escape. Closing her eyes, she cranked the choke, hard, crushing his windpipe and snapping his neck.
He’d betrayed her. But he’d saved her first.
She closed his eye and stood, tall and proud. Perhaps he’d sought to forge her into the perfect weapon, but the sharpening had been her own doing.
Time to finish the job.
Chapter 11
Bazine didn’t know much about narglatches, but she knew how to kill one with Kloda’s blaster from ten meters away. Like his master, the cat was a predator of single-minded will, and she didn’t trust him any more than she trusted Kloda. When the beast’s chest stopped moving, she skidded down the embankment and flipped open the panniers. Soon she had her blade, her throwing knives, her blaster…and the case.
After climbing out of the crater, she headed for her speeder. Thanks to Orri’s instruction and a dead man’s cache, it was simple enough to fix the wires Kloda had cut and get it back in working order. It was almost funny—he’d taught her to trust no one but him, and yet it was the knowledge she’d gained from other teachers that had allowed her to best him.
When she’d put all the guts back together, she flipped the panel closed and fired up the speeder. Satisfaction washed over her, hearing it hum to life and putting the apidactyl hive far behind her.
She thumbed the button behind her ear.
“This is—”
“Bazine? Is that you?”
She flicked the button back off. It wasn’t the modulated voice of her employer on the long-range comm. It was Orri on her wrist comlink, sounding dazed. She smiled, just a little. So there was one person—someone she maybe liked just the smallest bit—whom Kloda hadn’t gotten around to killing.
“Yes, Orri. It’s me.”
“What happened? I can’t remember. Did you…kiss me?”
She gifted him with a chuckle. “No. I did not kiss you.”
“But you did something. I have this sore spot on my…” He cleared his throat. “Never mind. Where are you?”
“I’m on my way back to the ship. Should be there in a few hours. Don’t try to leave. Just have a cup of caf and some food and don’t do anything stupid.”
There was a long pause. “So you went on the job without me.”
He sounded despondent, like a child who’d dropped sweets in the sand.
“You didn’t miss anything. I’ll fill you in later.”
“Did you find our guy?”
Bazine could only shake her head. Our guy. Like it was something they were doing together. Like they were equals. Like he wasn’t an inconvenience and a fool.
“Yes, I got our guy.”
“How’d the baffleweave work? Undetectable, right?”
“Goodbye, Orri.” She blocked the channel. She had real work to do.
As she steered back toward Vashka City and the Sparrowhawk—now her ship—she turned on the autopilot and pulled the metal case into her lap. It looked like it had been dragged through a war, peppered with dents and scratches and a few black marks that had to be deflected blasterfire. Dark grime was packed into the edges as if it hadn’t been opened in decades. She saw no lock, no catch. She thought about trying to open it, going so far as running her fingers around the rim. What, after all, was so special that Kloda would come out of hiding and betray her to steal it? That he would spend years training her, raising her, just for that payoff? What would he consider “the biggest score”?
Ultimately? She didn’t want to know. She just wanted the money.
She set the case down gently and flicked the comm behind her ear to establish a long-range connection.
“It’s Bazine Netal,” she said. “I’ve got it.”
BY DELILAH S. DAWSON
Star Wars
The Perfect Weapon
Blud Series
Wicked as They Come
Wicked as She Wants
Wicked After Midnight
Hit
Servants of the Storm
About the Author
DELILAH S. DAWSON is a native of Roswell, Georgia, and the author of the paranormal romance Blud series for Pocket, including Wicked as They Come, Wicked as She Wants, and the upcoming Wicked After Midnight, as well as two previous Blud novellas, The Mysterious Madam Morpho and The Peculiar Pets of Miss Pleasance. She is also the author of the YA novel Servants of the Storm.
whimsydark.com
Facebook.com/DelilahSDawson
@DelilahSDawson
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Delilah S. Dawson, The Perfect Weapon (Short Story)
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