Kill by Numbers: In the Wake of the Templars Book Two by Loren Rhoads Read Free Book Online

“No,” and sat up, straight-arming one of the men away from her. He hit his head on the stone floor and didn’t move again.
    Another man backed away, holding a wavering torch beam on her. That allowed her to see a third man fumbling his gun from its holster. She skipped sideways just as the gunslinger cleverly shot his companion. The fallen man’s curses were amusingly creative.
    She spun toward the one with the gun, turning a one-handed cartwheel that left her in range to kick the gun from his hand. As it flew from his grip, she twisted around and cracked her fist hard into his chest. The man dropped with satisfying speed.
    “We didn’t mean you any harm,” someone else said. His voice seemed somehow familiar. Someone she knew a long time ago … someone from when she was running? A boy’s face rose in her memory.
    “I know you.” She grimaced at the rusty sound of her own voice. “Switch on your light. I want to see your face.”
    He held the light awkwardly, pointed toward the side of his face with his off hand. Raena slipped sideways, so he couldn’t flash the light her way and blind her.
    He was no boy. Warm brown eyes nestled amidst crows-feet above a tousled red-gold beard.
    “No,” she said sadly. “You only remind me of someone I used to know.” Raena turned toward the mouth of the tomb, eager to make good the escape for which she had waited so long.
    “Where will you go?” the grave robber asked desperately, trying to slow her down. “It’s a rock out there. Barren. You can’t get off-world without our help.”
    She laughed—and recognized that the sound wasn’t entirely sane. “You’re grave robbers. You’re going to help me?”
    “We’re archaeologists,” the man lied. “We work for Gavin Sloane.”
    Her response startled her. As if the whole relationship she’d been imagining between them had been real, she asked, “Gavin? Still alive?”
    “I’m here, Raena,” Sloane said calmly. He switched on a torch, angled down at his feet.
    “Is it really you?” Raena begged.
    “It’s really me.” He crossed the room to her, engulfed her in his arms.
    She clung to Sloane as if she were drowning. His beard was scratchy against her cheek. One of his hands cupped her butt and squeezed, which seemed at odds with the pair of kisses that had been all they’d shared in the brief time they’d actually known each other. Perhaps he’d been imagining a relationship with her as well, all the time she’d been imprisoned.
    Still, she’d been a slave. She knew how to respond to the arousal of her masters. She owed her rescue to Gavin Sloane and his team of “archaeologists.” She leaned against his body, pressing her hip against his groin with an excitement more calculated than his. She got just the reaction she intended to.
    Sloane led her toward the door of the tomb. He handed her a helmet with a full-face screen. “The air is full of grit,” he warned, “bits of Templar stone. It will slice through any exposed skin.”
    She slipped the helmet on, accepted the cloak that he gave her as well. She wondered if he would kick the chocks loose as they passed the tomb’s slab, but he didn’t seal his men inside. Nor did he spare time to help with the wounded, she noticed, not even to acknowledge them or say goodbye.
    Instead, he escorted Raena to an opulently appointed yacht. Once he had her strapped safely into the copilot’s chair, he lifted the ship from the rock. At the edge of the atmosphere, he turned the yacht back toward the planet. He released a barrage of missiles, destroying the tombs and the men left behind on the planet below.
    “Thallian would have used the encampment to connect your rescue to me. He would torture Kavanaugh’s men in an effort to find you. This is kinder,” Sloane explained. “At least this is quick.”
    Raena knew the sort of agony the men would face, when Thallian tried to hunt her down. It probably was safer to kill them now. Still, she had liked