Dragoons honor, p.11
Dragoon's Honor, page 11
“Thought I might try my luck,” he offered, drifting inward a bit.
Again, not much. Focusing her on him, even as a floor manager nearby took a half-step back so he wasn’t in the middle of things.
Obviously, he’d been in charge until casino security had figured out where their important guest was heading.
Then set out a welcoming committee. Or a mousetrap filled with cheese.
“Hopefully, you’ll get lucky tonight,” she replied with a knowing purr.
He nodded and turned just enough that an arm swept outward didn’t caress her breasts in passing.
“So, what might there be to see, if one penetrated beyond this point?” he asked, looking past her in ways that were mostly transparent.
And fun. Flirting should always be done with deadly seriousness that didn’t take itself all that seriously in the process.
“All manner of excitement,” she replied. “Should I guide you in?”
Gods, it was fun, finding someone who could dance like this.
“I place myself in your hands, Madame Anargul,” Javier told her.
“Please, call me Amina, Prince Javier,” she replied in a throaty tone, turning and taking his elbow in hers on the opposite side from Hajna. “Let’s go see what’s possible.”
Javier grinned.
Sometimes, being the stalking horse had its benefits.
PART 5
Djamila was back on Shangdu, preparing for that raid.
This time, however, chances were incredibly low that she’d encounter someone like Farouz.
There simply weren’t that many men like him. Even better, Zakhar wasn’t jealous of sharing her with Farouz.
How lucky could one woman get?
She had dressed in something touristy again. Adrian had laid out two wardrobes for her, even though she’d been expecting to be on duty as a goon the entire time. Had he known? Had Javier? Or was this just a depth of planning that covered all options?
Djamila put that aside and considered her circumstances.
She’d picked a bar off the main casino floor rather than directly part of it. Quieter, and without a dance floor handy, so no Bollywood moments likely to break out.
Never say never, at least with Javier Aritza around.
She had something tall and green and filled with ice and not a lot of alcohol as she nursed it, ignoring people around her and watching herself and her perimeter in the mirror behind the bartender.
Again, quiet place. Not where you went if you were picking up girls, so nobody had done more than register her presence and gone back to their drinks and food. Even the bartender had mostly stayed at the other end, polishing things randomly and pouring when necessary.
She’d been here for about an hour. Long enough to have taken a bathroom break at the end of one drink before ordering a second when she got back.
Long enough to be seen.
Djamila had a bet going with herself as to what would happen tonight. Possibly nothing, because she and Javier had moved too quickly. Possibly another Farouz to upend her existence. Most likely nothing. Or at least nobody interesting enough to matter.
She was wrong.
And probably owed Javier a drachma, damn him.
Sovereign Nakhimov was huge. Utterly impossible in size, when compared to a starship. Even one as big as Excalibur.
The chances of Gustavus Nyseth randomly walking into this one while she was here were right up there with being struck by a falling meteor on the surface of a planet.
Djamila held her poise and betrayed no recognition of the man, even as the nerves on her ears and neck tracked him across the room.
Somehow, accidentally, the man ended up just down the bar from her, with a stool of polite space between them.
She watched him in the mirror order a whiskey neat in a lowball glass, then drink half of it on arrival.
The bulk made more sense, if he was consuming that many calories without sufficient exercise. She’d watched him drink during dinner as well, but it had been under controlled circumstances.
Stewards, delivering wine and glasses on their schedule, and keeping the folks around the table from getting drunk.
He didn’t move like a man impaired now.
Fortifying?
They locked eyes in the mirror. Held the stare. Held it longer. He dropped his eyes first.
Djamila held the smile inside, where that other person savored it.
The woman on the surface was an off-duty killer enjoying a drink in a quiet bar.
Nothing more.
You’ll believe that, won’t you?
Oh, the things Afia, of all people, had taught her.
“You were with Prince Javier at dinner?” he finally said, in a tone midway between certainties.
Djamila nodded.
“Bodyguard?” he continued, still speaking in a voice that only she could follow, unless the bartender stood between them.
That one had moved to the far end. Out of the firing line, as it were.
Again, she nodded. All part of the cover.
“Ex-military?” he pressed politely.
“Concord for ten, then private practice,” she offered.
After all, she’d spent enough time around Zakhar and Javier to understand the Concord way of doing things. And Nyseth/Qadir hadn’t been in the Concord fleet to know any better.
“I’m Gustav,” he offered, smiling in a polite, encouraging manner.
“Jamie,” she replied with a nod.
Nobody had called her that in thirty years, once she was taller than every man she knew who wasn’t a relative. Then they’d listened when she corrected them to Djamila.
Still, cover identity. And something she would answer to if called. Or if he’d somehow gotten a look at her identcard record.
That piece of paper was mostly lies, but had enough truths that nobody could easily catch her out.
Gustav held out a hand and she shook it. Firm grip, without dominance games that men liked to play with each other.
And she was stronger than he was. The softness of his skin suggested a man who hardly ever undertook physical activities. Hers had been compared to aged leather, but that was the number of callouses she had from holding pistols, rifles, and melee implements in her daily training.
“You’re currently off duty, Jamie?” the man asked in a tone she decided she should classify as hopeful.
“He hired three women as personal bodyguards,” she nodded. “Plus a half-dozen men that the Khatum assigned for various purposes. Generally unnecessary on board this ship, so most of us are getting some needed downtime to relax.”
She watched his eyes for clues.
He wasn’t trying to seduce her, was he? Djamila was always surprised when men looked on her with lust. She was taller than almost everyone she knew. Massed more than any woman and most men. Stronger, as well. Long and wiry, rather than the lush and overstuffed that seemed to get men to panting.
Still, he had that look in his eyes. That hunger that Zakhar had, though for different reasons.
And humans came in all shapes and sizes, so she supposed that lust might, as well.
Except that he’d found her here. Now.
That suggested someone had told him where to look. And who to look for.
Would Sascha have been approached, had she headed out first? Hajna, had Javier not swapped their roles?
Either was a match for Nyseth physically, in spite of his size.
Djamila let that keep everything at an extra step of remove as she watched him for clues.
“What’s downtime look like?” he asked in a tone making no assumptions.
Djamila supposed that her demeanor didn’t lend itself well to one thinking that she might be approachable.
“Having a drink,” Djamila replied, nodding to the bar in front of her. “Quiet place, because I didn’t feel like dancing. Space away from folks I’ve been on a ship with for more than a year at this point.”
All of it true. Verifiable, by any of the crew he might have asked.
Why was he talking to her? And what was that look in his eyes?
Idly, Djamila wondered if she should have set Bethany out as bait. She was less physically intimidating, and more beautiful. Smarter AND better educated, at least on the sorts of topics most businessmen might want to explore.
Was she willing to allow this man to seduce her as a way of getting close to him?
Djamila held her stomach from rolling over at the thought. Smiled, even.
Not quite invitingly, but at least friendly.
Letting him step into whatever trap she needed to place.
This ship didn’t allow her lethal weapons, beyond her bare hands and the bar stool she sat atop. And she was only maybe seventy-five percent certain that she had recognized the man.
Not good enough to simply start hitting him right now.
She might have met a stranger that looked just like him. Everyone had such doppelgangers, according to urban legend. Someone that looked remarkably similar. After all, how many trillion humans were there in the galaxy these days?
There might even be a second Djamila Sykora out there somewhere.
Thus, scouting without an assault element.
Laying a trap, hopefully for him and not her.
“Would a touch of company be an untoward intrusion?” Gustav asked her carefully.
Djamila shrugged slightly. She was used to Javier playing characters, though it wasn’t something that came naturally to her.
Assuming a role into being and living it.
She was The Dragoon.
Tonight, however, she was predator and prey, it seemed.
“A touch,” she replied, leaving it ambiguous.
Javier intended to be on station for a week, depending, as he studied the technical and social construction of this planetoid. Djamila didn’t need to act tonight.
And it framed the boundaries of what she might allow the man. The role, not her.
She had to pretend to be interested in him in more than just an intelligence source to be emptied of content.
To help things, she moved to the chair between them. Most women had the majority of their height in their legs, so they were shorter than a man sitting.
Djamila still looked down on Gustav from closer, because her frame was even. Like a man.
Long-waisted was the term folks had used. For her, it simply meant that most of the military gear she’d ever encountered fit her, because it was generally sized for men.
“So, what do you do, Gustav?” Djamila asked, pasting a smile on her face and letting the man expound on all the things he wanted to tell her to impress a pretty girl.
Her?
Djamila supposed so, from the way he talked.
She listened.
And plotted.
PART 6
Javier had found a card table playing one of the ancient basic versions of stud poker. A game of wits, patience, and social engineering. Sascha and Hajna were both excellent players. Afia was pretty damned good. He stayed in practice.
The three men and two women who had formed up a new table with him were good. None of them were pros. Javier had to remind himself not to clean them out.
Not even quickly.
Not at all.
So he sat back in his mind and let his hands mostly play. Broke even, but even then he was a little ahead, simply because two of the players had subtle tells and didn’t realize it. He could get in or out depending on their hands.
At one point, Amina delivered him a drink, bending at the waist in such a way that Javier and the man on his right could both confirm that she had neither tattoos nor navel-piercing when her front billowed out.
Subtle, she was not, but Javier supposed that the woman was in charge, and could probably only fool around with strangers, since most of crew and staff reported to her, one way or the other.
And he’d been flirting right back at her, so it wasn’t like he was surprised she was playing.
And she was an attractive woman. Not a hardbody athlete like the one in the corner. Hajna and Sascha both danced. And ran stupid laps around various decks of the ship with Djamila and the Gunbunnies daily.
Amina was fleshier, but in all the right places. He caught her hand and kissed her wrist, just because.
Her smile was promising.
Might be useful, if he needed to pump her for information later.
Or something.
Javier let another hour pass. He was up maybe twenty percent accidentally, but the others simply weren’t in his league. Businessfolk tended to be aggressive by nature, at least the successful ones. Often sociopaths, if not worse.
That lack of empathy often handicapped them at a card table.
He wasn’t going to go broke. Hell, it wasn’t even his money at the end of the day.
Just something to pass the time.
However, he’d seen enough.
Javier rose and bowed to the other players as two of them were broke enough to have to quit shortly anyway. Might as well leave them the price of dinner and drinks.
“My friends, this has been most enjoyable,” Javier told the table. “I have, however, been sitting too long and need to get some food in me. Perhaps another time?”
He didn’t wait for anything more than nods, then turned and headed towards Hajna, herself perking up from that waking meditation thing she did on guard duty. Perfectly aware of anything and able to react instantly, but not so hyped up that she started losing focus later.
He smiled. She nodded in her role as professional curmudgeon.
Amina appeared, as if by magic, but he supposed she’d been watching from a nearby room. Or had an earpiece where folks watching screens could update her on the fly.
Most casinos did it that way.
“Hello, pretty lady,” Javier bowed deeply as she got close.
“Was the game not to your liking?” she asked as he rose again.
“Oh, the play was good,” he replied. “A bit underwhelming but a nice diversion. I find myself peckish.”
Again, she did that stepping half-turn that hooked their elbows and accidentally brushed her breast against his side.
“We can’t have that, Prince Javier,” she smiled. “Let us find you something else to sample. Did you have anything specific in mind?”
He smiled, ogling her because she obviously wanted to be ogled.
“I’m in the mood to sample,” he offered. “A bit of this, a bit of that. Try various novelties to see which is the most fun.”
Her smile wasn’t nearly as ambiguous as his language.
“There might be many options on the menu,” Amina challenged.
“Then I shall probably have to sample them all, won’t I?” he grinned. “Let us off.”
Javier could practically hear Hajna rolling her eyes behind them, but it was all a game. A distraction.
And if Amina Anargul felt like she needed to throw herself at him while he did his research, it would be positively rude to deny her, wouldn’t it?
He would let her lead for a while.
PART 7
Djamila wasn’t weary, but it had been an exhausting day, considering that she’d been aboard Excalibur when it started and hadn’t more than catnapped or meditated in roughly thirty hours. Wrung out, maybe.
She’d settled in to sip occasionally and listen to Gustav spin yarns, wondering how much of them were true, how much lies, and which had been stretched to entertain a pretty woman in a bar.
Javier’s games made more sense to her now than they had previously. The subtle linguistic dance of innuendo and sub-text. The eye contact and smiles.
She’d been careful not to make physical contact with the man at any point, lest he draw the wrong conclusions about her intent.
Djamila still wasn’t sure about his.
“You look tired,” Gustav noted.
He was on his fourth whiskey. She’d sipped at her second drink, and was barely into the third.
“Full day of duty aboard the yacht,” she nodded. “Getting ready for Sovereign Nakhimov. Then we’ve been here for something like twenty hours at this point. I was on duty for most of that, until I got loose a few hours ago and came down here.”
“And here I’ve been talking and keeping you up, presumably well past your bedtime,” he nodded. “Thank you for letting me steal a bit of your time, Jamie.”
He surprised her by sliding off his stool away from her, when Djamila had been prepared for him to brush her accidentally.
Gustav wasn’t a man for accidents. She’d been watching his words and his body language with equal intensity, and he didn’t lose control of either.
“Perhaps we’ll see each other again,” he said, nodding deeply. “You have been a most charming companion.”
“Perhaps,” Djamila replied. “Thank you.”
Mostly, she’d sat and listened. Laughed at the points where his stories demanded them. Learned the parts he wanted to share, which no doubt cast him in the best light.
“Until then,” he smiled, then turned and walked quickly away, exiting the bar without once looking back.
She wondered if she’d missed some subtle cue. Perhaps she’d been supposed to stop him from leaving? Or call him back?
Some move that gave him power over her, by expressing a need that only he could fulfill?
As if…
She was alone again. A glance at the bartender got a shrug, so maybe he’d been expecting a different outcome as well?
Djamila didn’t know.
And didn’t care all that much, except that he’d slipped out of character there at the end. Hadn’t attempted a physical seduction, when she’d been expecting…something.
Wouldn’t have taken him up on it. Not tonight. Not this role.
Maybe later, when Afia had confirmed a few things for her, one way or the other. To get closer to him if he was indeed Jabril Qadir. Or maybe to apologize for misidentifying him.
Or maybe just to do something she’d never done in her life, Farouk notwithstanding because that had been mission-specific.
Still, she gave the man a five-minute head start before taking a restroom break and setting off back to the space where Javier was ensconced.
