Chapter 60

James and Dusty decided to stay in character for the rest of the trip.

They both decided that they needed to be as natural as they could be with each other looking as they now did. They did some more research on Hasid as their ship took them to Terra.

It was a bit painful with the delay in communications, but they were surprised at what they found. They simply downloaded every hit on his name and perused it at their leisure.

They found that social media was alive and well. Hasid hadn’t been as camera shy when he was younger; it was the last eight years of his life that was different. One of the best sources was actually tracking him through the ex-girlfriends’ media pages.

They had gleaned the names of his many girlfriends from the news and other social media articles. It had probably pissed Hasid off, but the Exes did love posting anything about him that they knew or managed to find out about him, and they posted any pictures or vids they took of him.

Quite a few of the vids had only been posted after his death, and the couple paid particular attention to any snaps taken in his later life.

Hasid had been thirty-five when he died, but he didn’t look that age, thanks to his medallion. Many people wouldn’t have put him past thirty and probably guessed that he was even younger. Dusty and James paid special attention to any pictures of him in togs or shorts.

Hasid didn’t mind showing off his body. They even found a couple of his bare arse but no X-rated pics or vids. They particularly looked for any identifying marks and quirks.

Justin studied how Hasid moved, the way he stood, his smiles and frowns, any little signs like nervous habits, and most importantly, how he interacted with others. He studied Hasid’s greetings and goodbyes, how he flirted with pretty girls, treated waiters or staff and talked to important people.

“He was a bit of a cold bastard, wasn’t he?” James commented to Dusty after one of his practice sessions.

Dusty tipped her head and replied, “Yes, it’s odd, when he spoke to me, he had more feeling in his voice. He was pissed off at me for stopping the heist, but there was a level of excitement too. It was sort of like how he flirted, but it was something else even though he was trying to scare me.”

“Can I see?” James asked.

Dusty hadn’t really shared this memory with him, and he wondered if reliving it would distress her. Dusty nodded in agreement and sent him her version of accounts from when she first got to the warehouse.

For James, it was as if he was getting a video replay from her perspective, and he was fascinated. He concentrated on Hasid’s tone of voice when he was talking to Dusty.

When he got her memories of Hasid’s face, he studied the expressions and his eyes as well as he could, considering Dusty had not seen Hasid in a good light. James shivered as he got an insight into the man as he sometimes did when he got his premonitions about people.

“He admired your spunk. You intrigued him, and yes, you excited him.” He grinned and looked at Dusty, “He was turned on by what you did and how you caught him unawares.”

More seriously, James added, “Dusty, if he hadn’t been distracted when he was feeling up your arse, you wouldn’t have got the jump on him. He knew you would shoot him if he raised the pistol; it was in his eyes. He wanted you to do it. He considered you a worthy adversary.”

James gently ran his hand down his beloved’s face. “Dusty, if he had lived, I don’t think he would have left you alone. I don’t think he wanted to break you; he just wanted you.”

“I know how he felt. You’ve had that effect on me since I first saw you. I’ve seen that effect of yours on other men even before you became a mage.”

James looked at Dusty and then frowned. A picture came to mind, and he asked Ada to find the vid again. It was a short vid of Hasid with his brother, a girl named Sail, a man they called Dafi, whom the couple didn’t know, and a man they believed was Hiram in his younger days. They were all in their late teens to early twenties.

“Shit,” James said softly as he looked at Dusty again in her Donia form.

“Her, you are a version of her if she had lived. She is slimmer in the vid than you appear now. Dusty, she slept with him, Dafi.”

He pointed to the man in the halted vid that they didn’t recognise. “They are who Hasid killed. He loved her, and she betrayed him, like Patty told you. Ada, play that other vid where Hasid and Hiram are graduating,” James asked his brace’s AI.

As they watched, James gasped. “Oh shit! Look at his eyes; they are almost dead-looking, aren’t they? He is smiling and joking, but it’s all an act. He has that look in nearly every other shot of him after that vid. It must be after he killed them. I think something broke in him.”

Dusty looked at the other information they had about Hasid.

“His profile says that he joined the American Marines straight from college. That would be the six-year period we have little to nothing about him. What’s the bet he was trained to become an assassin by the Marines before he quit and went to work for his father?”

“Pretty good, I think. His records are closed. It was not long after that period that there were some mysterious deaths of several of Fiaz’s competitors and Hiram’s father.”

“It looks like they investigated Fiaz, but they couldn’t pin the deaths on him. I also think Hasid acquired the medallion during his service,” James informed Dusty.