Shades of Treason Read Online Free Page B

Now wasn’t the time or the place for this discussion. Besides, maybe she had a point. Maybe she had been only a distraction to him. He’d sometimes needed one after dealing with anomalies all day. He sure as hell had needed one after dealing with Ash.
    Off-duty spacers and soldiers crowded the room. A few men and women acknowledged his presence with a nod, but most were absorbed in conversations or focused on the wide screens that played vids of the latest news reports from around the Known Universe. When Javery, Rykus’s home world, appeared behind a reporter with a marquee that read KU Breaking News, he focused all his attention on finding a table.
    Katie eyed him as she sank into a chair near the rear wall. “The Coalition isn’t going to be able to convince Javery to join, is it?”
    “Not with my father whispering in the prime minister’s ear.”
    “Has the senate asked you to speak to him?”
    He grunted out an affirmative, then tapped on the table to bring up the menu.
    “ Have you spoken to him?” she asked.
    “Once or twice.”
    “Once or twice in the past few months? Or the past few years?”
    He looked up from the menu. “He wants the Coalition to fail, and he tried to sabotage my career.”
    “He apologized—”
    “Only after he thought I’d been killed. Caruthian brew?”
    Katie pinched her mouth shut at the abrupt subject change. Then she relaxed and said, “With radda leaf.”
    “You have capsule sickness?” he asked, his tone softening. Most people could traverse the universe on a tachyon capsule without a problem as long as they didn’t move when the capsule entered and exited the time-bend, but Katie had never been one of those individuals.
    “The leaf will help,” she said.
    So would sleep and electrolytes, but he dutifully keyed in her order and requested the same, minus the leaf, for himself. A bleep acknowledged his request and confirmed a debit from the account linked to his comm-cuff.
    “You’ve spoken with Ashdyn?” Katie asked.
    “Yes,” he said. Then he added, “It didn’t work.”
    He didn’t have to explain what “it” was. The only reason Ash was on board the Obsidian was because he was her fail-safe and should have been able to command her compliance. It was merely convenient that he was also the officer in charge of the assault on the shipyard.
    A groove formed between Katie’s eyebrows. “No one told me she’d snapped.”
    “She isn’t acting like she has,” he said. “Admiral Bayis thinks the Sariceans broke her loyalty training.”
    “They broke—” Katie cut off her words when a squat metal box on wheels rolled up with their order. Rykus passed Katie her coffee and cupped his own steaming mug between his hands, letting it heat his palms. When the bot retreated, Katie said, “You can’t break the loyalty training without breaking her mind.”
    “She isn’t showing any signs of snapping.”
    “She inexplicably murdered her team,” Katie said. “I’d say that’s a sign.”
    “The Sariceans could have gotten to her before she came to Caruth.” He pulled his coffee mug closer. “Maybe they found a way to prevent the loyalty training from taking hold.”
    Katie stirred the steaming black liquid in her mug with a straw and studied him. He met her blue eyes, kept his expression rigid and stony.
    “You think she’s innocent.” She sat back in her chair and chewed on her lower lip.
    “She’s not denying the evidence.”
    “But you don’t believe it,” she said.
    Honestly, he didn’t know what he believed. The evidence was irrefutable. It would be crazy not to see that it all pointed to Ash, but maybe that’s what bothered him. It was too obvious, and Ash wasn’t careless. If she truly was a Saricean agent, she would have covered her tracks. She knew how. If she would just explain her behavior or tell him she was framed, he might believe her. He’d at least try to help. So why the hell wouldn’t she talk to him?
    “I don’t think