Fated Blades (Kinsmen #3)(24)

“What the hell is this?” Lyla demanded.

“A record of your dirty deeds for the past five years.” Matias’s voice was cold. “Kickbacks, quid pro quo backroom deals, illegal campaign contributions, bribes from foreign powers. You’ve been busy.”

Drewery stared at the screens as if they were venomous snakes about to bite him.

“You’re right. You would survive the Vandal fiasco,” Matias said. “That’s why we’ll build up to it by starting with something juicier. Like the Monroe chemical spill. Three hundred and thirty-seven technicians died because the Monroe Conglomerate failed to follow their own safety protocols. And you absolved them of all responsibility during the senatorial investigation. You literally took the death benefits from widowed spouses and orphaned children, all to preserve the stock price from falling.”

Drewery clenched his fists.

Matias pretended to ponder the screen. “You might survive this one as well. After all, you were just the head of the committee, and the generous gift of stock your wife received six months later could be a coincidence. That’s why the next day we will follow it with Abbas Orbital Station. In case it’s slipped your mind, the Department of Defense used to maintain a reserve of fuel cells on one of Gameda’s moons. This reserve was designated for emergency use by the system fleet. You plied the secretary of defense with gifts and favors until she transferred control of the reserve to the Department of the Interior, and then your buddy, the undersecretary of the interior, quietly marked it as defective and sold it to Abbas at a huge discount.”

“He’s accessing our confidential files,” Lyla hissed.

“Yes. I felt that much was obvious.” Drewery stared at Matias with naked hatred. “How?”

“Cassida gifted you a lovely vintage Second Wave toaster for your collection,” Matias said.

What? Ramona turned to him. “You hacked them through a malignant toaster?”

“Yes.”

She laughed.

Matias pondered Drewery. “I knew you were dirty. You wouldn’t have offered Cassida to me if you weren’t. I wanted to protect my family and my lovely spouse from the fallout when you inevitably got caught with your pants down. While you were grandstanding and your wife was trying to remember which end of the firearm to point at the enemy, I took control of your house and dumped your data banks to a private server. I have everything, Theodore.”

“You and I are in-laws!” Drewery snarled. “If you release any of this, you’ll get splattered with the same mud. The media will go after you.”

Matias shrugged. “But unlike you, I run a clean business, and I’ve taken steps to guard myself. What was it you said? ‘I will survive this. You won’t be so lucky.’ I’ve sent the first part to my favorite reporter. She is bright and very hungry.”

Drewery grabbed an ornate, heavy statuette of some weird herbivore off his desk and hurled it at Matias. Matias stepped out of the way, and the statuette smashed into the wall.

“Today the chemical spill, tomorrow the orbital station; I’ll let you pick the third. We have so many to choose from. You might survive one, but can you survive all of them, and how many people will sit idly by waiting for you to drag them down with you?”

Drewery cursed.

“First, you’ll be an embarrassment, then a liability. Your former friends will line up to silence you. One day you will simply vanish. I must say, I’m looking forward to it, Senator.” Matias’s eyes turned dark, and she saw the shadow of death on his face. “I’ve waited for this moment for a long time.”

Drewery grabbed Lyla’s hand.

“Pack.”

“What?” Lyla stared at him.

“Pack. Do it now. We’re leaving the system.” He marched toward the doorway, dragging her with him.

“What do you mean leaving? This is our home. Cassida is here! My life is here! I have a charity dinner tonight . . .”

He pulled her out of the room, and Lyla’s voice faded.

Ramona pivoted to Matias. He stood in the middle of the room, a small smile stretching his lips.

“Was it good for you?” she asked.

“The best.” He grinned at her like a lunatic and laughed.





CHAPTER 6


Ramona opened her eyes. In front of her, a window offered a view of Dahlia wilderness. Huge feather trees spread whorls of narrow silver fronds. Technically, they weren’t trees at all, but giant grasses stretching seventy meters into the air with trunks five meters across at the base. Between them, blue-green Rada evaners, deciduous giants, thrust their massive branches to the sky, each bearing hundreds of thousands of turquoise and indigo leaves. Here and there stranglers flared among the foliage, their distinctive orange leaves and bulbous fruit blazing against the blue-green canopy. Stranglers started their lives as parasitic vines that climbed their host tree to the sunlight, draining it of nutrients and water until it withered and only the strangler remained, now a thriving columnar tree.

It took her a second to remember where she was. Her back ached. A slow soft pain washed over her hips. At least her mouth had stopped bleeding and her vision no longer blurred at the edges.

Ramona glanced at Matias in the pilot seat. She hadn’t meant to fall asleep. Her body made that decision on its own. Using seco exacted its price. The secare ate like pigs and slept like the dead, unless they were in enemy territory.