Элизабет Мун - Into the Fire

She pushed that memory down and lifted out the top layer of clothes. These women had their own more recent trauma to deal with. She would not impose any more of her own on them. “Here—see if any of these fit.” Inyatta and Barash could wear the exercise pants and tops; Kamat was too tall, even though she had to roll up the slacks Stella had lent her.

Not long after, new clothes arrived in the store’s own delivery van. Rafe brought the boxes and bags upstairs. Ky pulled out her own choices from the boxes and left the rest for the others. They all came down to lunch in new clothes, including Ky. With scarves wrapped around their heads, socks and shoes on their feet, with the five of them around the larger table in the downstairs kitchen, eating off the yellow-and-green-striped plates, the three fugitives looked less like refugees. While they ate, Ky continued her mental list. Wigs, or time for the women to grow out their hair. She had no idea how long it would take. And Kamat needed surgery. Possibly they all did, depending on how badly their implants had been damaged. New implants, then. But the rest of them—how much time did they have to find the rest of the survivors? How long would it take to organize a rescue? With the military obviously complicit—or some of it—who could she ask for help?

Her skullphone pinged. “Grace,” said the familiar voice. “Secure call. Now.”

Ky slipped her feet into the new ship boots she’d ordered out of habit and headed back upstairs to Stella’s office. Rafe, coming out of the living room, looked a question and she gestured: urgent call.

“Ky, where’s Stella?” Grace asked before Ky could do more than identify herself.

“At the office, I suppose.”

“Are those persons with you?”

She must mean the survivors. “Yes.”

“Don’t let them leave, for any reason, and don’t lower the house security. The situation is far worse than I thought. I have been stupid and careless; the danger is extreme. Do you know where Teague is? He’s not answering at my house.”

“He’s here. What—”

“Tell him to go back to my house and remove all of his and Rafe’s equipment. Quickly.”

“Aunt Grace, what is it?”

“That man—that captain—tried to kill me. His second yielded to interrogation. Tell Teague, Ky; keep Rafe with you. I must contact Stella immediately. I’ll call again.”

The contact ended. Ky glared at the com set. “Dammit, Grace,” she said in the silent office. “I am not your baby niece anymore. And I’m not going to sit here doing nothing.”

Out in the passage, she saw Rafe and Teague lounging near the head of the stairs, heads together. Before she could speak, Rafe’s gaze sharpened. “Trouble?”

“According to Aunt Grace, yes. Teague, she wants you—just you—to go to her house immediately and remove all of your and Rafe’s ‘equipment,’ whatever that is. She wants Rafe to stay here, and me to await further instructions.” She could hear the impatience in her own voice. “That nosy officer with the search team tried to kill her, she said.”

“Was she hurt?” Rafe asked.

“She didn’t say, but I got the distinct impression the captain is dead, since she mentioned interrogating his second.”

Rafe grimaced, then nodded. “Teague, you’d better go.”

“Pull everything? Even the internal house surveillance?”

“Yes. We don’t want any of that available to whoever this is.”

“But that will leave—”

“Just her stuff. Yes. But it’s good.”

“What about placing an external nearby?”

“Better not since she wants all our equipment gone.”

“And bring your clothes, too,” Ky said. “You’ll be staying here for a while.”

“I need the combination to the back gate,” Teague said. Ky gave it to him. Teague smiled, his rare and rather sweet smile. “This will be fun. I’m gone.” And he was running down the stairs. Ky and Rafe followed more slowly.

“What does she think it is?” Rafe asked.

“She didn’t explain. Just gave me orders. Stay inside. Don’t let our friends out. Don’t let the house security lapse. Send Teague. Keep you here. And wait for her next call.”

“You’re still annoyed with her.”

“Well, yes. You’d think I was twelve years old again and Missy Bancroft had just fallen off the roof and broken her arm. Do this, do that, wait, do the other thing. Even at twelve, I knew what to do when someone fell off a roof.”

“That really happened?”

“It did.” Ky could not help relaxing as she remembered the details. “She climbed the tree in our front yard and then jumped down onto the porch roof. I knew the roof was slippery. We all yelled at her not to. But she wouldn’t listen, and sure enough she slipped. And Aunt Grace heard us yelling and came out just in time to see Missy slide off, taking a length of gutter with her, and land in the flower bed. I jumped out of the tree—”

Rafe grinned. “You were up the tree?”

“Yes, of course.” Caught in the memory, Ky went on. “We’d started out racing each other up the tree to where the balloon had gotten stuck—”

Rafe laughed; she glared at him. “I can’t help it,” he said. “You and some other gangly tomboy clambering around in a tree…”

“She was taller than me,” Ky said. “Most of them were, the girls in that group. Daughters of my mother’s friends.”

“And you… you instigated that race up the tree, didn’t you?”

“Only because Vera Smittanger let go of the balloon string and the package tied to it. Anyway, after Missy fell off the roof, that was the end of the party. Aunt Grace told us all what to do before she even found out if we’d have done it on our own.” Ky shook her head. “At the same time lecturing us for not being young ladies now that we were approaching what she called the gateway to maturity. ”

Rafe laughed again, shaking his head. “It’s not funny,” Ky said. But it was; she could feel laughter bubbling inside. “All right, it wasn’t funny then. In hindsight—” She could see them, the group of girls all appalled by Missy’s fall, and then smarting under Grace’s lecture. “Then all the mothers came out—and we hadn’t had time to brush the leaves and dirt off our party clothes. They all got on us.” She chuckled.

“Speaking of clothes,” Rafe said. “Did you notice that your new outfit is remarkably like a uniform?”

Ky looked down at herself, the dark-blue pullover and slacks. “No, it’s not; it’s just the dark color.”

“Not entirely.” He reached out to touch her hair in its snug braid. “Admiral to the core. I like it.”

“Good,” Ky said. She leaned on him a moment. “I’d better go tell the others we’re not going anywhere.” And how was she going to plan a rescue, let alone perform one, if she was stuck inside the house?

Stella Vatta answered the call in her office at Vatta headquarters. A chill ran down her back at Grace’s first words; she realized an instant later that she had her other hand on the pistol she carried in a concealed holster under her perfectly tailored suit even as she answered the question.

“Yes, Aunt Grace. What’s happened?”

“That fellow who was at your house tried to kill me,” Grace said. “I’ve contacted Ky; Teague should be collecting all that equipment from my house and going to yours—”

“You’re sending the trouble to my house?” A flash of anger she controlled quickly. But still. First Ky, then Grace, assuming that Stella and everything she owned would be at their disposal.

“No, I’m hoping it hits mine first. Stella, I’m serious. What’s the security setting at headquarters?”