Dark Runner: LodeStar 3.5 Read Free Page A

successful at what he did. He radiated a stealthy power.
    All right, time to open a vein—metaphorically at least. Anything to keep the ganger from learning why he was really here.  
    “Because I hate slavers,” Bronc told him, his deep voice grating. “The fuckers took my own brother, Bart. And I’ve heard rumors that Vadyal’s gang was involved. I want this bitch and all her slimy hangers-on dead . And if it takes her a long, long time to die ... if she screams and begs for it in the end ... that’s okay with me too.”
    Darkrunner’s brows rose. He nodded with what almost looked like respect. “Understood.”
    Bronc nodded curtly and turned for the door.
    “However,” the ganger said behind him, “If I find out I’ve been lied to ... there won’t be enough of you to gather for cremation. You get me?”
    Bronc looked over his shoulder. “I get you.”  
    He walked out the door with his back itching, as if there were a laser pointed at it. Probably was. And he made a quarking big target.  
    Darkrunner didn’t bother to say goodbye, but then Bronc hadn’t really expected him to. He’d given the ganger a great deal to think about.
    He walked back past the Mau guard lurking outside, through the crowded club, wincing at the intense blast of the music, the humid heat and smells of the worked-up crowd.  
    The elevator zipped him up to the landing pad on the top of the building, where his unmarked LodeStar cruiser waited. He boarded and nodded to the pilot and the four heavily armed LodeStar employees seated in the cabin.  
    He stopped just inside the door, waiting for the holovid scanner. It showed a virtual readout of his body, from head to toe. After a sec, the scanner having found no spybots planted on him, a green light flashed. Only then did Bronc move to one of the leather seats. He sank into it with a silent groan, suddenly exhausted.
    “Think he’ll go for it?” the oldest man asked as Bronc strapped in. Gray-haired and square-jawed, Rak had been with LodeStar a long time.  
    “You were listening in, what do you think?”  
    “Sounded interested to me,” Rak said as the cruiser leapt under them, rising into the black night. “His kind don’t give away much.”
    Bronc nodded. The ganger was indeed a man who didn’t reveal himself, but Bronc’s instincts said their plan was working. “I think he bit. We’ll know in a day or two.”
    “I hope he goes for it,” Opal said, looking down at the lights of the city below as the cruiser gained altitude. Stark’s attendant and bodyguard on his cruiser, the silver-haired woman had also been with LodeStar for years.
    Bronc looked down as well, his gut tightening. “I hope so too.”  
    Because somewhere down there beneath the garish lights, the streamers of fog and rain, was Logan Stark. Completely on his own, and for some strange reason, not himself. Lost, or hiding in one of the deadliest urban jungles on this planet, away from all the wealth, stature and people who could keep him safe.  
    “If Darkrunner finds Stark before we do ...”  
    Opal didn’t finish, but then she didn’t need to. If the ganger found Stark in his present state, whatever it was, it would be the perfect opportunity to finish his rival, for good.
    “We’ll know soon, one way or the other,” put in Cork, a young but sharp ex-IGSF soldier. “If Darkrunner goes for it, he’ll do it within the next day or so, don’t you think?”
    “He’ll go for it,” Rak said grimly. “The slimer won’t miss a chance to get Ms. te Nawa back. I escorted her to his club one night, and I saw the way he looked at her. You’re right about him, Bronc. He’s just the kind to think a flash move like presenting her with that Serp’s bloody corpse will get her back.”
    “Let’s hope you’re right about Ms. te Nawa, too,” Opal added darkly. “That it won’t work.”
    Bronc hoped he was right, too. When they found Stark—he wouldn’t let himself consider any alternative