Redemption by Cara Carnes Read Free Book Online

head.”
    “What?”
    “You heard me.” Adrik’s breath trailed across her cheek. “The NAH attacked The Alliance encampment the day after you disappeared. A lot of your brother’s soldiers were killed. Last I heard he’s okay, though. All signs pointed to intel you provided. Your com device was found with numerous calls to NAH headquarters.”
    “That’s not possible.” She’d never used the costly device. What few credits she received went directly to provisions and munitions for the cause. “I wouldn’t even know how to contact them.”
    Adrik removed the wrist scanner. “I think we’ll commandeer these credits to cover the destruction you created.”
    She reached for him. “Those credits are mine. I earned them.”
    “How, Mira? What exactly did you do to earn these credits?” He scanned them and whistled. “You must be real good to earn this much.”
    “I earned them.” Fear and determination kept her focused. “Give my scanner back.”
    “Not until you tell me what you did to earn them.”
    “I survived,” she whispered.
    Adrik cursed, his gaze sweeping across her. “How did you get here?”
    “I walked.”
    “From where?” Peyton asked.
    “They dropped me in the middle of nowhere. I passed out a few times, but I think it was five, maybe six days ago.”
    “You expect us to believe you walked, alone, in Hell’s Highway for six days and survived?” Giles asked.
    “Yes.” She’d been terrified. “I hid during the night and walked during the day, when I knew the succubae would be asleep.”
    “Interesting.” Marek walked over to the water and poured a glass. She licked her lips and tracked his motions as he drank the full glass. She eyed the scanner, then the pitcher.
    “The credits are yours if you help me return to the facility and get the other Impures out. Until the mission is complete, you provide me food and water.” She watched Adrik. She had no idea how many credits she’d earned.
    “What are these people to you? The ones you claim are still being held?”
    “I promised I’d get them out.”
    Adrik held out the device. “With the credits you have here, you could buy their freedom.”
    “I doubt that.” Doctor Covali wouldn’t let any of them go, especially Deimos. He’d endured more experiments and testing than she had. She didn’t think the other prisoners had, but she’d never spent much time above ground.
    Even though Mira never figured out who Deimos was, she knew he was an Other. Paraspecies, she corrected. For some reason she didn’t fully grasp, he hadn’t trusted anyone to know he was there, alive.
    “Do you have any way to prove these mythical detainees exist?”
    She shook her head. “Names were power. Sharing meant suffering.”
    She shuddered as fractured shards of the past flickered within her mind. She’d been close to screaming everything she knew. If it hadn’t been for Deimos she would have. Somehow he’d held her together, as she had him.
    And she’d left him there.
    Alone.
    “I have no way to prove it, but there’s an NAH facility in Hell’s Playground. Someone has to do something to help those people.”
    “If it exists, it’d be a strike against the NAH if we shut it down,” Ren stated.
    “That’s a big if. She reeks of lies,” Peyton accused.
    “I’m not lying,” she ground through clenched teeth. “Believe what you want, but send someone there. They need to be rescued before it’s too late.”
    Adrik’s gaze reflected regret. Pain. Hell, she didn’t know. She wanted to tell him everything she remembered, but he didn’t need to hear what she’d undergone. He probably wouldn’t care because he didn’t believe her.
    Seven hundred and thirty two days of imagining this day and she’d never expected this reaction. He’d come around, though. He was a good man, an excellent Alpha. They’d believe her once things calmed down, but she didn’t have much time. She needed to get to Deimos. The Impures. She’d made it to