Page 26 of Hunting the Warlord's Daughter

Easy for Bolivarr. As much as Aral wished he were more like his brother in matters of the heart, he wasn’t.

Good thing Wren’s quest had to come first. It gave him time to plot his course withher.

“I hope everything is to your liking. If you need anything, please ask me or Kaz. Her cabin is adjacent to yours. My quarters are at the end of the corridor. Join us after you have refreshed.”

Wren nodded and plucked at her robes. “I can’t wait to throw off these clothes.”

In an instant, he pictured her standing in a drenching hydro-mist—with him, helpfully scrubbing soap over her skin to dislodge the dust of Zorabeta, clouds of steam rising as water sluiced down her body, foamy suds sliding between her breasts and her thighs, her hair, loose and wet, tangling in his fists as he kissed her—

Mawndarr!His expression studiously deadpan, he racked his body to attention and clasped his hands behind his back. “I’ll leave you to your hygiene.”

Escaping to the corridor, he indulged in a full-fledged scowl. Kaz, a towel draped over her shoulder, allowed him to storm past then poked her head in Wren’s stateroom. “He’s not really angry. Believe it or not, he’s actually shy.”

Fates alive. “Kaz!” he bellowed, and thrust a finger in the direction of her quarters. “This is a mission, not a vacation. Quit your dawdling and report to the galley—clean.”

“Aye-aye, sir!” Kaz swung her fist over her chest in a formal salute. With a bounce in her step he hadn’t seen in a very long time, she continued on her way.

* * *

On theUnity’s bridge, two hulking Space Marines snapped to attention as Admiral Bandar strode into the conference room, spine straight, hands clasped behind her slim back. Hadley followed behind her. She’d spent years matching the admiral’s no-nonsense, full-throttle pace.

Anticipation buzzed in the air as everyone took their seats for the hastily called staff meeting. Only the two Marines standing guard at the conference room hatchway showed no reaction to the excitement—their expressions stoic, calm and hard as stone.

They were to receive a briefing from Triad Alliance Headquarters in the Ring, from Prime-Admiral Zaafran himself. Rumors were flying that it concerned the warlord’s daughter.

Maybe someone’s captured her already,Hadley speculated. Reviewing the latest ship’s log items on her data-vis, she listened to conversation swirl around her.

“For fifty million queens, I can’t say the thought of going AWOL to find his daughter hasn’t crossed my mind,” admitted Commander Frank Johnson, the ship’s Terran third-in-command, to Captain Rorkken.

“For a fifty-fifty split, I’ll join you,” Rorkken lobbed back. Yet a shared, sly smile with Admiral Bandar made it obvious that he had no intention of spending his days off in anyone’s company but hers. Not even for a fortune. They were in love. Hadley’s heart felt full to bursting every time she spied the couple exchanging a lingering look or a private smile. What could she say? As a daughter of Talo, romance was bred in her bones.

As they waited for Prime-Admiral Zaafran’s signal, Bandar tapped her fingertip rapidly against the conference table. Hadley recognized the rare sign of tension only after years of working with her. Little rattled the admiral. Hadley emulated the way her spine didn’t touch the back of her chair, noting how her uniform was immaculate as always, not a wisp of her brown hair out of place. The strands wouldn’t dare. Admiral Bandar expected everyone—and everything—to fall in line. Or have a blasted good reason to not comply.

Suddenly, the large holo-vis illuminated, revealing a fit, uniformed man in his late forties. Silver frosted his brown hair. “There is a lot to cover, so bear with me,” the prime-admiral stated. “I have an update on the warlord’s daughter.”

He leaned forward, stoking the burning curiosity in the room. “As you’ve heard, the palace files are an unholy mess. The warlord wasn’t one for recordkeeping, apparently. Our investigators have faced dead ends at every turn. But thanks to new intelligence, we think we know where he hid his daughter all these years: Barokk.”

Quiet applause broke out. Hadley’s eyes widened at the images of a small, scenic, lushly forested planet with many rivers and lakes. Mountain ranges divided grassland from coastal forests. Cumulonimbus clouds boiled up over the plains, reminding her of Talo. What a lovely place.

“There is no industry there, no large-scale farming. No military presence. Only some boarding schools and the supporting infrastructure. The population was almost entirely female. The citizens of Barokk were transported to Zorabeta Refugee Camp, as part of an ongoing resettlement effort in the sector.”

The visual switched to another planet, a dusty, ochre-colored desert world. It zoomed in on an overhead view of a facility with neat rows of rectangular structures—tents—and a small space port. “We believe she arrived here with the rest of them. Or so we assume.”

Admiral Bandar’s brow arched. “This refugee woman—there shouldn’t be any guesswork about her identity. Her DNA will match the warlord’s if she’s the daughter. Did we obtain no sample from the camp? Dental records?”

“No. None of that. The camps don’t typically take samples from the refugees unless medical treatment is needed. Agents are combing through evidence on her home world and from Zorabeta, interviewing all persons of interest, but it may be too late. We’ve learned she may have already slipped through our grasp, thanks to information supplied by an unlikely source…” He paused, his tone terse. “Karbon Mawndarr.”

In the midst of an uproar at the table, Admiral Bandar’s fingertip went still. Hadley had been with her in her office the day they learned of Karbon Mawndarr’s guilty verdict.“Justice,”Bandar had said, ever so quietly. Of all the battlelords of the Drakken High Command, Mawndarr had been the most hated. Admiral Bandar had mentioned him now and again. Usually in between swears and vows to“see the monster strung up and castrated.”

Grimly, Zaafran flattened his hands on his desk. “In exchange for delaying his sentencing, he’s offered to cooperate. He alleges his son, Aral Mawndarr, is positioning himself to be the next warlord. To that end, Aral is consolidating power and has now joined with the warlord’s daughter.”

CHAPTERFIFTEEN

Disbelief shock-waved over the table.Major Caro, the security chief and Bolivarr’s direct boss, narrowed her eyes. Her reddish jaw-length curls and heart-shaped face gave her an angelic appearance, but she was an experienced and battle-hardened security officer. “Sir, I thought Aral Mawndarr was long dead,” she said. “Killed in the war.”

“That was a cover story created to protect him,” Zaafran said. “He’s worked undercover with our intelligence people for years. Since the end of the war, he’s helped track down war criminals, undercover as a BSP agent.” The glow from an overhead light illuminated the deeply etched worry lines around Zaafran’s mouth. “I sent him to find the warlord’s daughter. Logs show that he surfaced at the Zorabeta Refugee Camp as Officer Xeros Gramm, his alias.”

The visual panned over the camp—throngs of refugees, their clothing fluttering in the wind, yellowish dirt blowing.

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