He scowled at me.“They’re entrepreneurs.”
That was a nice, bland term for a bunch of criminals.“And?”
“What do you mean ‘and’?”the guy asked.
“It’s not a difficult question,” I said.“What’s their business?”
“Selling,” he said quickly.When I looked at him, unimpressed, he hurried to add, “They sell everything.But, uh, mostly ship parts.Like these.”
“How do they get the ships?”
“I dunno.They just do.”
I was pretty sure he was lying.
Tired of squatting, I stood, stretched, then pointed at the skeletal ship.“Where’d they get that one?”
If anything, the guy got even paler.“Crew got in a bar fight, so it was confiscated.”
That was a pretty broad answer.I didn’t trust it.“Who confiscated it?”
“The town.”
That wasn’t...unexpected.This place seemed to run on nothing but dust and despair.Of course, they would all be a part of it.
“Where did you get this?”Lacy pushed past me, shaking the shark toy at the man.
Dammit, Lacy.
I bounced on my toes, ready to sweep her away, but the guy lurched backward.Whether to get away from the shark or the wild-eyed woman wielding it, I wasn’t sure.Orion blocked his way, forcing him to stay in place.
“That’s...that’s not mine.It’s Bert’s.”His gaze darted around, like he was looking for Bert.Or for an escape.
She bent forward and glared at him, all while shaking the shark.“No, it’s mine.Where is the ship that it came from?Where is the crew?”
If anything, his eyes got wider.“It wasn’t our fault.No one told us that ship was off limits.Farrow was pissed when he learned that the team had taken it in.I don’t know what he did with it.Really, I don’t.”
Lacy growled, low and deep in her throat.
Holy shit.
I looked at Burn, then Mercer and Orion.Their eyes were as wide as the mechanic’s, but their expressions held respect.
“And the crew?”
“There was just one.”He held up his bound hands in a protective gesture and his voice wavered as he stared at the shark.“Bert thought she was a cop, but the way Farrow whisked her away, everyone else thought she was a hooker.”
Based on Lacy’s expression when he said that, if MAKO had actually been a shark, this guy would have been chum.
I put my hand on her shoulder and gently urged her upright.“Easy there, tiger...uh, shark.You got the answers you wanted.”
I looked at the man on the floor, surprised he hadn’t pissed himself in the face of Lacy’s fury.“Anything else we should know?”I glanced from him to Lacy, the message clear.If he didn’t answer me, he’d be answering to her.
The words tumbled out.
“Ship came in late in the day, so we figured we’d strip it in the morning.We got on board and the ship started sending out some kind of signal.We freaked out, man.We just strip the ships, nothing more complicated than that.”His gaze begged me to believe him.
I did.That explained Lacy’s data chip.
