Page 117 of Auctioned to the Convicts
“Enough already! This isn’t helping anyone, certainly not Hannah. Ren didn’t do this, Ky’Li. If she got ahold of drugs, it wasn’t from him. He doesn’t have access to any. I do. Sersie does, and maybe ten others total on the planet, but not Ren.”
“He raped her.”
“I did not!” Ren shouted from his spot on the floor, his head in his hands. “I don’t think I did.” Ren lowered his head between his raised knees. “Fuck. Maybe I did. I didn’t know she was high.”
“Worry about that later,” Vaughn admonished both men. “First, we figure out what happened. The recovery drug I’m giving her isn’t working very well because it’s an umbrella drug. I need to know what she took so I can fine-tune her treatment.Beforeshe goes into heart failure again.”
“What do you need?” Ky’Li asked, his back ram-rod straight. He was in soldier mode, ready to attack, steal, infiltrate, do whatever Vaughn needed.
Vaughn would have to remember that before Dresden came down on him and broke this entire unit apart. Right now, Vaughn had to fight for Hannah. Tomorrow he’d figure out what to do about Dresden, how to protect this unit she cared about so much.
“I need answers. Where was she tonight? Who was she with?”
“Answer him, asshole,” Ky’Li ordered Ren, even as Vaughn stood between the two, acting as a barrier.
“I waited at the rail station, portside, like usual. I met her twenty-minutes after you left, Vaughn. Maybe a dozen other workers left with her. Everyone was dragging. . . Shit, she was bouncing and happy, and. . . and all over me from the moment we got in the railcar.”
“But you didn’t see her take anything?” Vaughn asked.
“She must have used at the port. Something in from a shipment, I guess.”
Sersie peered back into the bedroom, having trouble taking his eyes off of Hannah, who was still unconscious. His fears multiplied, starting to get the best of him. He’d hang on for her sake. Now wasn’t the time to lose his shit.
Ky’Li walked over to Ren, stood over him for a moment. Sersie tensed, not sure what Ky’Li would do.
“This is why she used. Us. . . fighting,” Sersie spoke up. “All she’s wanted from the beginning was for everyone to get along. To be a family, the family she never had. One that would care about her, care enough to fight for her.”
Ky’Li’s dark eyes met Sersie for a moment, and then he offered his hand to Ren. Ren just shook his head and looked down at the floor.
“Lack of inhibition. Cardiac arrest,” Vaughn said. “What other symptoms, Ren? Focus.”
“Don’t you fucking think I’d tell you if I knew anything else? She was happy, full of energy and she smelled really nice, like flowers. I had no reason to think she’d been using.”
“Flowers?” That fear gripped Sersie by his heart and nearly squeezed the life out of him. “What type?”
“What are you thinking?” Vaughn asked.
Sersie waved him off. “Umla, Ren? Was it umla?”
Ren’s head lifted, blue eyes gaining clarity. “Yes.”
Sersie picked up her clothing that Ren had dropped earlier. He tore through each article until he found what he was looking for. He showed the red stain on her collar to Vaughn.
“No drugs are entering Narkos through the port. They’releavingthrough there. Fucking Dresden is shipping it off planet.”
“Shipping what?” Vaughn said.
“NK171.”
“Fuck!” Vaughn knew the drug, not as well as Sersie, but well enough to know this was bad.
Both Ren and Ky’Li gave Sersie questioning looks.
“It’s a highly dangerous drug I developed,” Sersie explained.
“You did this to her?” Ky’Li said, his anger now directed at Sersie.
“This isn’t his doing,” Vaughn said. “Tell them the rest, Sersie.”
