“Colonel, we have a problem.”

  Colonel Halav Kamick looked up from the screen on his desk. “Problem?” He arched one red-brown eyebrow and leaned back in his chair. “What’s the Patrol up to now?”

  The trim, middle-aged Guard captain standing in the doorway of Halav’s office flashed him a wide-eyed look of surprise. “You’ve already heard?”

  Halav straightened in his chair as he realized his flippant comment might be closer to the truth than he liked. He frowned at the older man. “Heard what? What’s happened, Arbiss?”

  “We got a call from Inspector Lanar at the Varen spaceport. Something’s happened to Cameron Thorne. There are Pattys in Varen. They have Thorne’s ship.”

  Halav cursed under his breath. How in hell did the Patrol manage to get their hands on the Conquest?

  “What about the guns?” he asked.

  “Unknown, sir. Lanar wasn’t sure he had a secure comm line and didn’t want to say too much until he got to the base. He should be here soon.”

  “Send him to me as soon as he arrives,” Halav ordered.

  “Will do.” The captain turned to leave.

  “Hold up, Arbiss. Does the general know about this?”

  “Yes, sir, but he’s still in Cint-Istep meeting with the Senate about that increase in funds. He says he wants you to handle this. After all, Thorne is your friend.”

  Halav nodded once, expressionless. “Very well, Captain. Dismissed.” He watched Arbiss leave, his thoughts clouded by equal amounts of anger and concern.

  He drew a deep breath. Cameron’s plan had been to deliver the guns to Cint-Istep, so why land in Varen? Something must have gone wrong on Terra. That could explain Cameron’s actions—Varen would be less likely to have any hidden Patrol forces. But recent reports suggested the United Galaxy had been moving men into many parts of Arecia to rebuild forces decimated by the Guard’s activity over the past several years. The move was undoubtedly designed to spearhead an attack on the Guard, one that would allow the United Galaxy to gain at least partial control of Arecia. Halav pursed his lips worriedly. At least this incident had given him a clue where some of the Patrol forces were hiding. He hoped that wasn’t the only good to come of it.

  * * *

  “All right, Lanar,” Halav said once the inspector settled into the chair in front of his desk, “tell us everything that’s happened.”

  “Right, Hal—er, Colonel.” Lanar shot a sidelong glance to where Captain Arbiss stood just inside the closed office door, and then returned his eyes to Halav. “I was on duty when I heard the Conquest was coming in, so I went out to see what Thorne was doing in Varen. A girl met me in the bay.”

  “A girl?” Halav asked, surprised.

  “More of a young woman, actually. Hell of a look. Said her name’s Kressa Bryant. She obviously didn’t think I knew Thorne very well, or didn’t know him herself, ’cause she hinted he was too drunk to talk.”

  “Cameron Thorne flying drunk?” Halav shook his head. “Never.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Lanar said. “She handed over the shipping docs easily enough and let Tad and me have a look around the bay. She didn’t seem to know about the guns, else she was playing it damned straight. I told her to tell Thorne I’d been by to see him, then we started to leave. That’s when the Pattys showed up. There were at least a dozen of ’em, dressed like civilians but with Patrol IDs and weapons. They knew what they were looking for, too. Took Tad and me to wait in one of their cars then moved right into the ship for the guns. They came out with the girl, but I never saw Thorne.”

  “They let you go when they were finished?” Halav asked.

  “Yeah. They gave us a bit of a hard time, threatened us, told us what would happen if anyone got word they were in Varen. That sort of thing. But they didn’t have any reason to suspect we knew anything about what they were up to, and they could hardly afford to have two inspectors suddenly disappear. Somebody might get suspicious. As soon as I got back to my office, I sent Tad to follow the Pattys, then put in the call here and came to see you.”

  “You don’t have any idea where Cameron is or what might have happened to him?”

  “I never saw him,” Lanar said. “I don’t think he was on the Conquest, otherwise the Pattys would’ve found him.”

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  “Maybe not,” Halav said. “With that ship of his, you never know what Cam might be able to do. Still, I can’t see him traveling with any girl, no matter how good looking she is.”

  “It has been over five years since Arkana, Colonel,” Arbiss pointed out. “A man can get lonely.”

  “True,” Halav said. “So let’s assume Bryant managed to win her way into Cameron’s heart, or at least into his bed. He’s not the kind of guy who’d let the Patrol walk off with his woman without putting up some kind of a fight.”

  “What if he couldn’t fight?” Arbiss asked. “What if the girl did something to him?”

  “He’s right, Colonel,” Lanar said. “She could’ve slipped a knife between his ribs and stolen his ship.”

  “Not the Conquest,” Halav said, certain Connie would never allow anything to happen to Cameron on board the ship. “Besides, Cam’s got the ship set up so only he can fly it.”

  “Maybe Bryant convinced him to let her in on a few of his secrets,” Arbiss suggested.

  Halav frowned and shook his head. “That’s just not the Cameron Thorne I know. Sure, he might find himself a woman now and then, but I can’t imagine him inviting her onto his ship and teaching her to fly it. He’s too careful, and the Conquest means too much to him.” His desk comm pinged, and he tapped it on. “Kamick here, go ahead.”

  “Colonel, we received a message from Terra. Cameron Thorne’s ship blasted out of a San Francisco port four days ago. The Patrol sent a couple of ships after it, but he outran one and disabled the other. That’s all they know.”

  “Send an acknowledgement to Terra,” Halav ordered. “Tell them we’ll take care of things from this end. Kamick out.” He looked at Lanar and Arbiss, his expression grim. “Cameron had to have been on the Conquest when it left Terra,” he said. “I can’t imagine any girl taking out a Patrol pursuit ship. She must have figured out some way to get to Cam between Terra and here, but—damn!—I can’t believe he would be so stupid.”

  “If the girl’s as good a look as Lanar says—” Arbiss began.

  Halav stopped him with a contemptuous look and returned his attention to Lanar. “You said the Patrol took Bryant, and you sent someone to follow them?”

  Lanar nodded, and Halav came to a decision. “Captain, assemble a team to take to Varen.”

  “Are you planning to rescue Bryant?” Arbiss asked.

  Halav gave a derisive snort. “Rescue isn’t precisely what I have in mind, but I do plan to find out what happened to Cameron. After that, Bryant may wish we let the Patrol keep her.”

  * * *

  The building the Patrol forces were using as a base in Varen had a posh, glitzy restaurant operating day and night out of its street-front rooms.

  A smart move on their part, Halav thought as he looked down at the structure from the one-way window of the hotel suite his team was using as a base. The presence of civilian diners prevented him from launching a frontal assault, but the building’s structural data showed a number of subterranean conduits that allowed access to two underground levels that had once contained a casino and small shopping mall. Doubtless, the Patrol forces were using those lower levels for their operation.

  He knew the Patrol would have all of the covert entrances to the building wired, but his people were working on ways around the traps. If necessary, he would order the restaurant cleared out and try a frontal attack, but he preferred to keep this “rescue” mission quiet. He wanted it to look as if Bryant escaped on her own; that way, the local Patrol forces would continue to feel secure from a Guard attack on their hideaway. Plus, the guns taken from the Conquest were probably in that building, and he did not want to give the Patrol any reason to move them before he came up with a way to get them back. Extricating Bryant with a small team would serve as a reconnaissance and dry run for that larger, more important move to come.

  His thoughts of the girl and the guns faded as one of his men, now plain-clothed like himself, entered from the suite’s bedroom.

  “We’re ready, Colonel. Any activity out there?”

  Halav stepped away from the window. “Just an average ripping night in Varen. Let’s see what you’ve come up with.”

  He followed the soldier into the bedroom where three men and a woman—all dressed in civilian clothing, as well—stood around a collapsible table littered with floor plans and maps.

  “I think we’ve got it figured out, sir,” Captain Arbiss said as Halav stepped up beside the table. “There are several small offices and storage rooms along the east wall of the building’s lowest level. I presume that’s where they’d keep any prisoners. We’ll use this tunnel to get inside.” He traced a line on one of the maps. “It used to house a large-scale pneumatic delivery system, so it’s plenty big for us to get through. We’ve checked it for snares, but there doesn’t seem to be anything we can’t get around. It looks like the Pattys were counting on no one discovering this place, or they haven’t had time to complete their fortifications.

  “Everyone’s going to carry sleep-gas pellets,” Arbiss continued, “and Calin’s got a needler hidden in that medical bag of his, and we’ve all got pulse guns, of course, but we won’t use any of them unless it’s absolutely necessary. We’ll leave some doors unlocked or open on our way out so it looks like Bryant escaped on her own.” He looked at Halav with a confident smile. “We should have the girl here to you in an hour or two.”

  Halav shot a canny look at the captain, eyebrows raised in question. “Does that mean I’m not to be included in your raid, Captain?”

  “Uh, no, sir,” Arbiss said with a sheepish look. “I mean, the general doesn’t want to risk you—”

  “I don’t care what the general wants. I never asked to be singled out for grooming as his successor.” Or rocketed up through the ranks and put in command of men a decade or more my senior, he added silently to himself. Thankfully, none of them ever complained. “If the general didn’t want me working in the field, he shouldn’t have given me this assignment.” He met Arbiss’s eyes. “That means I’m coming with you, Captain.”

  Arbiss grinned. “Happy to have you along, Colonel.”