“I don’t need to be relaxed,” Director Ann huffed between sips, “but thank you all the same.”
“What are we going to do? If they’ve killed him and deactivated his nanites after getting this picture, there’s nothing left. No evidence. You can be sure they incinerated the body orsomething equally horrible.” Timber shuddered and went back to rubbing her abdomen. “The poor Xalanite man—or woman.”
Director Ann put a hand on Timber’s shoulder. “Hey. He’s safe. We know this, and in another hour, you’ll be back together.”
The younger woman nodded, but she did not appear wholly consoled by this.
Leigh frowned and gestured at her aunt. “They’re both safe? N’kal and X’nit?”
Ann nodded.
“And you know this how?”
“The nanites. We can see their location and vital signs. They’re both fine right now. We got word to them to leave the intake center with some trusted allies, agents that N’kal and Timber helped after a bad car accident nearly cost the four of them their lives. Those two men owe Timber and N’kal a life debt, and I doubt that any amount of money orkrincould get them to hand our husbands over.”
My mate was smart. If she doubted the safety of the prince and the Director’s mate, then I doubted it as well. “Leigh, is there something about this that bothers you?” I asked.
“Well, think about it. That crash may have been up in Canada, but even I remember seeing it on the news. Xalanite detainee saves the lives of two Earth agents assigned to bring him in? It was all over! And now that someone knows Aunt Ann married X’nit, he’s gonna be a target. I just wonder if maybe they’re not as safe as you guys think.”
Director Ann scrubbed her suddenly pale face with her hands. “You think it’s a trap.”
Leigh shrugged. “It could be. Maybe they’re only not hurting the guys so you two think it’s safe. Maybe they have hurt them, but they’re fucking with the nanites to make the readingsshow what they want them to. I mean, nanites are just little computers, and computers can be hacked, right?”
Timber let out a choked sob.
“So, our extraction just became a potential rescue mission. Fuck. That complicates things.”
“Indeed, Ann,” I said. I crossed my arms over my chest as I pondered our next moves. “I can still stop the Xalanite vessel from landing. There is time yet.”
She shook her head. “No. We’ll need a ship if we’re going to pull this off, and nothing we have on Earth is fast enough or agile enough to get us out safely if things get hairy.”
“Does it matter how much hair our enemy has?”
Five pairs of eyes swiveled to look at me, and Leigh rubbed my arm with a sigh. “Just an expression, baby.”
I noted that the former police officers had been largely silent during this exchange. I turned to Marcus with a brow raised in question. “And the two of you? What are your thoughts on this?”
He grinned. “I think that niece of Ann’s would make a good cop. She’s got good instincts.”
“Yeah,” John said with a frown, “but unfortunately, her warning of impending doom could be right on the money. We humans may not be as advanced as Xalanites when it comes to tech, but I wouldn’t put it past us to discover a way to hack the nanites and make them show whatever they want us to see. Hell, they could probably have doctored that photo, watermark and all. It may not be anything the five of us can do, but if whoever’s behind this got hold of a smart enough coder? It’s possible.”
I wanted to refute their claims that Xalanite nanites could be altered so easily, if only to reassure Leigh that they were safe to use, but I could not deny the logic behind their claims. If a human was smart enough to infiltrate our technology, it stood to reason that they could also alter it.
Were the director’s and Timber’s mates in danger? Had they been childslept? No, that wasn’t the term … kidnapped.
“Are N’kal and X’nit where you expect them to be?” I asked the two women.
Their eyes unfocused, a look I was familiar with. Oftentimes it was easier to see what the nanites showed if one ignored their visual surroundings. When they returned to themselves, Timber and Ann shared a glance.
“Well,” Ann said slowly, “it appears so.”
Timber nodded. “Yeah. Right where they should be.”
Good. “Then that is where we will go.” I turned to exit the home, as my nanites had just informed me that our vessel would be arriving momentarily.
“Wait!” Leigh stopped me with a hand on my arm. “What if it’s a trap?”
I grinned, baring my fangs. “Then I pity the trappers.”
