Eos’ nose scrunched. “Ha, ha. They keep everything on plas-sheets.”
Zayn whistled. “Really old school.”
“So we’ll have to go in and take the plans.” Ria felt a fizz of excitement. She’d always dreaded planning assassinations, but hunts were something different.
Eos scrolled through more data. “The Tekton have their home base inside an asteroid in the Hale Cloud.”
“Jesus.” Dathan slapped a palm against his forehead. “It’s easier to extract your own teeth than navigate the Cloud. Anything about this hunt going to be simple?”
Ria shrugged. “Probably not. That’s why I came to the Phoenix brothers and not Jonas Solomon.”
Dathan scowled. “Solomon is a hack. He’s young and all flash, not much treasure hunting.” Zayn and Niklas grumbled their agreement.
She managed to hide a grin. Men were the same, whatever their race. Eos caught her eye and grinned.
“I don’t suppose there are blueprints of the Tekton base anywhere?” Dathan asked hopefully.
“Not that I know of,” Ria said.
Eos turned back to the computer console. “Give me some time to pull up everything I can find on the Tekton and their asteroid. Nik, can you help?”
“Sure thing, Eos.” Nik’s gaze turned inward. “And I might just know someone who can help us.”
Dathan headed for the door. “I’m going to check our supplies. And hope some brilliant idea on how to infiltrate this place crashes into my head like a falling comet.”
Ria sensed Zayn come up beside her. She felt the heat off his lean body.
“I need to do some diagnostics on our ship,” he said. “Want to help?”
“Sure.”
They walked down the stairs in a silence that Ria felt like an itch on her skin. She rubbed one hand against her ridges. “I’m sorry about your friend. That I remind you of her.”
Zayn kept his gaze straight ahead. “Your eyes are the same. It’s partly the color, but it’s more than that. The way you started lighting up over the thought of this hunt.” He shrugged. “It’s the same way she lit up when planning one of our Strike Wing missions.”
“She sounds like she was pretty smart and tough.”
“The toughest. The smartest and a damn good pilot.”
Ria heard something buried deep in his tone. Something that made her feel a little sick. “You more than just liked her.”
He hunched his shoulders. “We were colleagues. Friends.”
But he’d felt more, wanted more. Ria could read it all over him.
He pulled something from his pocket. She stared at three silver birds of prey on his palm. Her calling cards.
“I believe these are yours,” he said.
Okay, he wanted to change the subject. Fine. “Keep them.”
“Why a bird of prey?”
She shrugged. “A bird of prey is a favorite icon in the Assassin’s Guild. They’re the ultimate predator, no one sees them coming.” But even as the words were out, she knew they were a lie. That silver bird had called to her and she wasn’t exactly sure why. “And something else about the birds and their talons called to me.”
He slipped the birds away. “So, you’re an assassin and good at sneaking. How do we get into this asteroid base?”
Ria focused on the new topic. “Best way is to use the utilities. Power, water, drainage.”
