and put them into the recycler. The recycler was the counterpart to the synthesizer—it broke items down into energy that could be used by the ship or synth. He nodded a farewell to Veronica and Lin, then left the mess hall.
I entertained Lin for a few more minutes, but when Veronica looked like she was almost done cooking, I escaped before she could corner me and demand details. I didn’t have any details to share. I just knew that Loch drew me in like a magnet and the more time I spent with him, the more I liked him.
I told myself that it was for the best that today was his last day. It was a pretty lie.
I settled into the captain’s station of the flight deck and set an alarm on my com so I wouldn’t miss dinner. I needed to do a deep dive in the ship’s system processes to find out where the rest of the trackers were hiding. And I needed something completely mind-numbing to focus on so my body would calm down.
I pulled up a log of every onboard process that had accessed the communication array before I had shut it down after our second jump. It was a long list. Navigation alone accounted for nearly half of the calls. The navigation computers tried to access the communication array for additional information each time the plotted course updated.
It took a couple hours, but I finally started to see an access pattern emerge. And in that pattern of normal processes, the tracking processes stood out. Well, at least a few of them. I disabled the trackers I found and set the diagnostic to run again now that I knew what to look for.
“Polaris, sweep the ship and show me the locations of all transmitting devices,” I said. A 3-D model of the ship appeared over the console with red dots in most of the rooms on the lower two floors. Great. The room-by-room sweep would have to happen before I turned external communications back on. Otherwise Rockhurst would know our location as soon as the signal reached him.
I had completed the sweep of the main floor by the time my com’s alarm went off. It was tedious work but I felt better with it done. After dinner I would do the lowest level and the maintenance areas.
Fifteen minutes until we had to leave, I climbed up to the top level and entered the captain’s quarters. I washed my face and ran a brush through my hair. I didn’t have any makeup, nor any desire to wear it. Thankfully it wasn’t required—this was not a Consortium dinner, no matter how much it might feel like one.
At five minutes to seven, I went down to meet Veronica and Loch. Both were waiting for me in the cargo hold. Veronica had her face covered with a scarf, much like my own. I loaned her the extra cloak I’d bought. With the sun setting it would be getting quite cool.
Loch wore the dark clothes and cloak he’d worn earlier, and he wasn’t exactly looking excited about dinner. If Veronica’s presence surprised him, he didn’t show it. I opened the door then locked it behind us. We slid into the transport for the short trip.
Rhys’s house was separate from his business, so we didn’t have to use the creepy, unmarked door. Instead, the transport dropped us off at one of the few blocks that wasn’t dominated by a skyscraper. Individual stone houses—complete with yards!—lined the street. All were four or five stories tall, but they were clearly houses. The lot alone had to be worth two fortunes. Rhys had done very, very well for himself indeed.
Loch climbed the steps first and knocked on the door. A gray-haired gentleman in a butler’s uniform let us in. “Mr. Sebastian is expecting you. He’s in the family drawing room. Right this way, please.”
The butler led us through an opulent foyer and past a wide, real wood staircase. The drawing room doors were closed, to better show off their delicate stained-glass insets. The butler slid them open, revealing a warm room with comfortable furniture and cozy conversational seating. It was a stark contrast from the rest of the house.
“Welcome, welcome. I figured we’d all be more comfortable in here than in the formal sitting room,” Rhys said. He’d dressed for dinner in a dark, formal suit and he looked damn good in it.
I pulled the scarf from my face. “Thank you for the invitation,” I