Home Front (Star Kingdom #7) - Lindsay Buroker Page 0,7
to the king or the service. I have committed no crimes, nor assisted anyone in committing any. It’s within my right to speak with whom I wish.”
“Not a man who’s murdered thousands of soldiers,” Meister snapped, losing his cool for the first time.
“Assisting him with a crime would be illegal. Speaking with him is not.”
“It’s always delightful to find a barracks lawyer on a ship.”
“I have work to do, Lieutenant.”
Meister came over to loom beside her, so she couldn’t miss seeing him. “For your information, I have been given the authority to arrest you and question you under a truth drug.”
Kim kept her face from showing any reactions, but a bio-scanner would have read her heart rate climbing. Sweat pricked at her armpits. What might she babble out under the influence of eslevoamytal? That she liked seeing Rache with his shirt off and liked him? Maybe that she thought she could one day fall in love with him? She hadn’t even admitted that to herself, but who knew what her subconscious mind would spew out if no restraints were in place?
“Whose authority?” She was impressed how flat and indifferent her voice came out, as if she had nothing to worry about at all. As if every soldier on this ship wouldn’t line up to shoot her if they knew her true feelings. Even Casmir thought she was crazy to care for Rache. “Ambassador Romano doesn’t have any—”
“King Jager himself.”
Kim couldn’t keep from glancing in surprise at him. “The wormhole gate isn’t working. Such a message couldn’t have gotten through.”
“It came through before the gate stopped operating. You’ve been a suspect since you disappeared from the Osprey weeks ago. Ambassador Romano, Prince Jorg, and I have been discussing your situation since we captured you.”
Captured. Was that truly what had happened? She’d thought she and Casmir—and Asger and Bjarke—were being given a ride because the Dragon had been inoperable and the shuttle they’d borrowed from Rache hadn’t had long-range capacity. Ishii had been friendly enough with her, and he hadn’t even yelled at Casmir. Had she been foolish in believing he’d been helping them?
“What do you want, Lieutenant?”
“To question you. I might have settled for doing it without drugs, since I’ve been trained to read people, but after spending ten minutes with you, I can see that you’re good at hiding your thoughts. I believe I’ll use eslevoamytal after all.”
Kim stood and faced him. He didn’t back away. She didn’t like how close they were, but with the stool behind her, she couldn’t gracefully put more space between them.
“Lieutenant,” she said, struggling not to give away how afraid she was that she would babble condemning evidence under that drug, “my family is on Odin. My father and brothers. My work is on Odin. Colleagues that I care about. You have in me someone willing to work very hard to ensure that Dubashi’s virus isn’t unleashed on Odin, and someone with the knowledge to deal with it when we find him. Very few people in this system who are qualified to work with such deadly viruses will do a damn thing to assist with what is, in their eyes, the Kingdom’s problem.”
She didn’t know that was true, but it sounded plausible. It wasn’t as if Jorg had made friends here.
“I will not stop you from working on a cure, if that’s truly what you’re doing.” Meister glanced at the display.
“How generous of you. But what I meant to imply is that I will not do this work for you if you treat me like a criminal and ignore my rights.”
“You just said your family is there. You’ll do the work even if we question you.”
“Will I?” Kim lifted her chin, hoping she was better at bluffing than she believed. She kept from wiping her damp palms on the legs of her galaxy suit—barely. The garment should have adjusted its temperature to keep her from sweating, but this was cold fear-sweat.
Meister squinted into her eyes. As uncomfortable as it was, she made herself stare back into his. Nothing in them was elucidating. He might think she was hard to read, but she was abysmal at reading other people too.
The door opened, and she jumped.
“He said to knock, Professor,” Grunburg’s voice floated in from the corridor.
“Did he?” Casmir stood in view. “You don’t usually have to knock at a coffee shop. Kim promised me a hot chocolate.”
“In that case, maybe he won’t mind.”
“Good.” Casmir ambled in, smiling broadly at Kim and Meister while ignoring the