Their apartmentalways felt like a haven to Hal. He came back to it, and to Fiona, after his long stints patrolling the border, and he found to his surprise that it was what he thought of when he thought of home.
It looked like their home had been violated though.
It had clearly been invaded, and searched, and Hal could easily guess why.
“They were looking for Eazi here first,” he said.
“Looks that way. Maybe after finding nothing here, they went to the warehouse.” Fiona was looking around with a stone face, and Hal drew her close.
“I’m sorry.”
She tucked in closer, then tipped back her head to look at him. “I wondered if they’d try here. They might have tried to look at my office, as well.”
She pulled away, and he let her go, watching as she walked through the rooms, studying the wreckage.
Nothing had been broken, he was relieved to see, but whoever had conducted the search had not made any effort to hide the fact that they had been here.
No time, he guessed.
While Fiona went to shower and change, he began setting a few things straight, and was pleased to see it hadn’t taken long to get the lounge almost back to normal before she stepped through from the bedroom.
She was wearing a jacket he hadn’t seen before, covered in tiny crystals and she was singing softly under her breath, a song he hadn’t heard before. It was in her mother tongue, and it had a gentle, sweet rhythm.
When he looked up at her there was a look on her face, a sharpness, that was in contrast to the calming melody, and he opened his mouth, then shut it at the tiny shake of her head.
“The shower’s yours,” she said.
He hadn’t planned to take a shower, but he nodded, and went to the bathroom.
Fiona came in after him, and he turned the water on.
“What song were you singing?” he asked.
She looked at him blankly for a moment, and then grinned, delighting him that he’d been able to lift the grimness from her expression.
“A song about walking on sunshine,” she said. “But that’s not why I maneuvered you into the shower.”
He blinked as he tried to connect walking on sunshine to the double entendre her words conjured up and then sobered as her expression got serious again.
“What is it?” He breathed the words out, pulling her close with his lips to her ear.
“Eazi left me a message woven into the garment bag this jacket was in. I don’t know how he got it here, but I’m guessing he ordered Jaden Tris or one of his little drones to deliver it. The message on the garment bag says the crystals are specially created to boost a comms signal. He’ll use them to contact me as soon as he can work around the comms blackout, so I need to wear it.” She lifted her face to his. “It got me thinking thatwhoever broke into the apartment might have left a lens or at least a listening device in here.”
Hal should have assumed that himself, given the apartment had been completely ransacked.
He nodded. “Seeing as I’m in here, I’ll shower, and then we can get out of here. Why don’t you carry on the clean up job while I’m in here, and keep an eye out for the lens. It might be useful to pass on misinformation if they think we don’t know it’s here.”
She nodded, leaving him to strip off his clothes, and when he came back out, he was amazed at how much she’d managed to deal with.
“Fortunately, it’s more in disarray than damaged,” she said at his expression.
“That’s something, at least.” He shrugged into his own jacket, eyed her new one again. The crystals were the same color as the dark gray fabric of the jacket itself, and were attached in a pattern that seemed to swirl around her body. “Let’s go to theIllium, I need to check in with my crew.”
Hal waited until they were out of the front door of the building before he turned to her. “Did you find anything?”
She shook her head. “But I’m absolutely sure there is something to find.”
Hal had to agree. “What about the jacket? Do you think Jaden Tris knows what it does?”
