Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

run away. To cover up his crime, and have his daughter in his bed again, Gregor had the clone made in strictest secrecy, and she became the Evangeline that Finlay came to know and love. He rescued her from her father and helped her make a new life of her own. But he never knew just what he rescued her from, and Evangeline could never tell him. If he ever found out, he would murder Gregor, not giving a damn for the consequences. She couldn’t let him do that. She wanted Gregor dead, wanted it with a deep, despairing sickness of the heart, but Finlay must never know. Because it would hurt him so much.
    And perhaps because, deep down, she feared he’d never feel the same way about her again once he knew the truth. Besides, Gregor Shreck was a powerful and dangerous man, even if he had fallen from favor just lately. He surrounded himself with an army of private guards, and even Finlay Campbell couldn’t take on a whole army single-handed. She couldn’t risk losing him. Not now, not after they’d gone through so much to get here.
    Secrets. So many secrets between two people.
    And there were more. Before Gregor had disappeared behind his private army and enough corrupt influence to keep even Parliament’s hounds at bay, he’d contacted Evangeline to let her know he’d taken her best friend, Penny DeCarlo, as his prisoner. And that dear Penny would die in horrible agony if Evangeline didn’t return to him. Finlay didn’t know about that, either. She hadn’t told him. Because once again he’d go rushing off to be the hero for her sake and get himself killed. So far she’d kept Gregor at bay by various strategems, but they’d mostly run out now. Soon she would have to find a way to rescue Penny that didn’t involve Finlay, or go back to Gregor and hope to sort out some kind of deal. Either way had its dangers, but her time in the rebellion had hardened Evangeline. She was no longer the weak, helpless victim that Gregor remembered. And just maybe that was a weapon she could use against him.
    Not far away, someone else was watching Finlay Campbell. The esper Julian Skye had been Finlay’s friend and disciple ever since the Campbell rescued him from the torture cells of the Imperial interrogators. Julian still carried the scars, mental and physical, from the things that had been done to him, but he owed his life to Finlay, and dedicated that life to the Campbell’s service. The Campbell didn’t get a say in the matter. But now that Finlay had found a new life in politics, he didn’t need a warrior at his side anymore. And Julian understood nothing of politics, and cared even less.
    He was currently occupying himself by portraying himself in docudramas of his times during the rebellion.
    He’d never seen himself as an actor, but people had really liked watching him in the news footage Toby and Flynn had shot, and apparently that was enough to make you a star, if not an actor. He’d never be a major attraction, but he had an audience and a faithful following, and he made more than enough money to indulge his few vices. It helped that the memories he’d dictated to the screenwriters had been almost
    entirely fictional. The public wanted the legend, not the facts, and there was still so much of his past that he couldn’t bring himself to talk about. Very definitely including the woman who was standing not so far away from him, that petite, dark-haired oriental beauty BB Chojiro.
    He’d loved her once. Loved her, and she betrayed him to the Imperial torturers. Because he was a rebel, and because the BB in her name stood for Blue Block, the secret inner circle of young aristos conditioned to be loyal to the Families to the death and beyond. She still loved him, but she had to follow her conditioning. She had said that to him in the cell of the torturers. But now Blue Block was running the Families for their own good. And BB Chojiro was the pleasant public face of that inner circle. She had come to Parliament, as usual, to stand quietly at the back to listen to all that was said. Everyone knew that when she spoke, she spoke as the voice of Blue Block, and everyone listened. If they knew what was good for them.
    This was the first time Julian had dared to come to the Chamber. To be so close to BB Chojiro… Part of him still desperately wanted to kill her for what she’d done to him, for what had been done to him because of her. For the betrayal of everything he’d thought they had between them. And part of him