Page 27 of Hot Zone

“What’s this hanky-panky?” the short one asked. “It sounds fun.”

Tessa swept her hand wide to encompass the hall. “This is hanky-panky.”

The youths laughed and she sighed in relief as they stepped out into a colonnaded hall. It wasn’t just the quiet that was welcome; it was the cessation of sensory overload. Even her skin felt relief from the buzzing, heavily sexual vibrations that had jangled across it in the feasting hall.

“This way, my lady.”

“But my room is that way.”

“This is a shortcut. Trust me.”

In her military career, she’d learned two incontrovertible truths. One was that shortcuts were never short. And two, if someone told you to trust them, you never, ever should.

She stopped dead in her tracks. “I’m tired and just want to go to my room and sleep. Go back to the party. I’m done for the night.”

“I don’t think so,” one of them said, abruptly unfriendly. The two young men grabbed her by her elbows.

Two on one, she’d have eaten these guys for lunch, but out of nowhere, six more young men materialized, surrounding her like a pack of dogs. She looked over their heads for the nearest guard.

“Guard!” she called. “I need you to escort me back to my quarters. Now.”

The man started to take a step forward, but then his eyes widened. He took a look at the group surrounding her, and pointedly turned his back to face the other way, his spine rigid.

Dammit.

Gotta get them talking. Distract them. Buy time.Maybe someone else would come out and interrupt the ugly direction this was going.

“Who are you, anyway?” she asked conversationally. “I gather you all know each other.”

The youths seemed startled that she showed no fear, but actually stopped hustling her off toward the shadows behind a pillar to introduce themselves. From what she gathered, they were young princes for the most part, sons of Xerxes’s top advisors and military commanders. No wonder the guard had turned his back.

The youths laughed. But it wasn’t a pleasant sound of amusement.

She had to get her back to a wall. As close to the banquet hall as she could manage. Maybe someone would hear her cry for help and come out to investigate. Or maybe not. She recalled the young woman who’d screamed right after Tessa arrived. No one had rushed out to help her. Apparently gang-raping slave girls was socially acceptable around here. Slave girls…

As several hands grabbed at her, she drew herself up to her full height and said sharply, “Unhand me. I am a princess and you have no right to touch me. I’ll have you up on charges before Xerxes for this. And when the emperor loses the trade and food imports he’s going to get from my country, he’ll be furious. After all, he’s got an army to feed. He’ll string every last one of you up by your thumbs and flay you alive.”

That gave a few of the least drunk of them pause, but unfortunately, didn’t faze the rest. Why, oh, why had she left her dagger in her room?

Her shoulder blades bumped into uneven stone. A column. Not ideal for protecting her back, but better than nothing. She tried one last time. “Gentlemen, I’m going to tell you this once and once only. I am not some helpless female you can bully around and intimidate. I am giving you fair warning that I will do whatever it takes to defend myself. Don’t do this. Go find yourself some woman who’s willing. Leave me alone.”

Apparently, that served as an unspoken signal for the young men to rush her. Cursing under her breath, she whipped her foot out in a knee-high sweep. The move was illegal in martial arts tournaments precisely because of the damage it could cause. She clocked the closest guy on the outside of his knee, and he went down, swearing vilely.

The other youths checked, startled. But then a feral gleam entered their collective gazes. “Ahh. A fighter,” one of them crowed. “I like ’em with spirit. More fun when you break ’em to be ridden.”

Panic climbed the back of her throat. This was not going down well. Not well at all. She was way outnumbered, and nobody was coming to help her. Grim realization that she might lose, and that these men might rape her, washed over her.

Her cuff. She needed to get out of here. Except her mission would be a failure, and someone else would have to come right back and pick up where she’d left off—without the benefit of her psychic skill at locating objects. Given that the medallion piece seemed to be on the move and no longer at court, her ability was vital to this mission’s success. But rape? That was emphatically not part of the job description.

What if she blinked out of existence before the very eyes of this group? What stories would that cause? What superstitions would she start? Would she damage this culture—or more to the point, leave a modern fingerprint upon it?

Normally, Tessa didn’t hesitate in making a decision, but she truly didn’t know what to do. On one hand, she really, really didn’t want to be attacked. On the other hand, the future of mankind might rest upon her sticking with this mission.

She needed to get away from these assailants for just a second or two before she used the cuff. They were drunk enough that she ought to be able to duck around the column and activate it before they realized what had happened.

Hands grabbed at her, too many to swat away this time, buzzing around her as persistent as angry wasps. Dammit, she hated to fail.

Rising fear at the back of her throat reminded her that this was no joke, though. She could die. But then, she’d known all along that she could die on this mission. She fingered the pouch at her waist. Should she go ahead and use the cuff now?

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