The next 24 hours were busy.
Quinn began with a drive-through of the region surrounding the meet, then parked his speeder and walked around. The small but elaborate scanning equipment in the glasses he wore built up a three-dimensional map of the area and walking let him get a feel for the streets and the layout. Then it was back to Voroth's to negotiate the rental of a better class of speeder from Meriyk. He liked his own transport, but it was utterly out of place where he was going tomorrow.
Then it was back to his ship to plan some escape routes. He and Scarlet were both professionals, so he assumed things would go well. But it always paid to plan for the worst - that way, when it happened, you could cope. Satisfied, he crawled into his bunk and got some sleep. Sleep was unexpectedly fitful, filled with dreams of Scarlet. Some erotically charged, but others tinged with memory. He awoke frustrated and horny, and with the strongest sensation that he knew her from somewhere.
He would have to consider that later, though. For now, Quinn Hale needed to disappear. So he pushed himself into the tiny fresher and let the ultrasonics clean the day's dirt and grime away. Then he spent a profitable few hours altering his appearance. A hair rinse, darkening him several shades towards brown. Contacts that turned his eyes grey. Nostril and cheek pads, subtly changing the apparent structure of his face. Inserts in a pair of black dress shoes, changing his walk and posture slightly. To all of that, he added his best suit, cut loose so he could conceal a number of interesting tools and weapons of questionable legality.
Quinn Hale's career had been long and varied. "Merc" barely scratched the surface of his resume.
At the appointed hour he looked up in front of the Velvet Spire in a sleek black stretch speeder. Stepping from the driver's compartment, he looked every inch the sort of chauffeur/bodyguard that the Black Sun might employ. He strode towards the doorman. "Quipan Viss," he declared, using one of the names he'd given Scarlet. "I'm supposed to take Shadi to a party for my employers."
All of which was true. From a certain point of view.
*****
Kaydia sat in from of the vanity combing out the Shadi wig. Already dressed in the strappy dress, she spent a few more moments as herself before putting on the mask. Quinn was supposed to pick her up within twenty minutes, and after demonstrating a professional punctuality in their first two meetings, so she had no reason to suspect he would be late today. It was plenty of time to put on makeup and her wig.
She opted for a dramatic look. Bright red lips, dark intense cat eye liner, smoky eye shadow and big fake lashes. Just the kind of dolled up high end escort who would be hired to entertain a small meeting between potential business partners. The blonde wig was the last piece to complete the masquerade. She paired the provocative dress with a long leather trench coat, cinched at the waist, just barely exposing her cleavage, if one were looking hard enough. Lastly she picked up the lozenges, having had them thoroughly checked for toxins. The plan was to take them right before going into the meeting.
All that was left was to wait for Quinn to arrive.
"A QuipanViss is here for you." Came the voice over the intercom.
"I'll be right down," was her reply, replacing the contacts. Shadi had blue eyes, to go with her blonde hair. She made her way downstairs and outside, nodding approvingly at the speeder he brought.
"Shall we?' She asked, making her way to the passenger compartment of the speeder. He wasn't quite the casually handsome man she had shared dinner and banter with the night before. Underneath it all, he still was, but it was different enough that most people wouldn't pick up on it if they didn't know. She might not have picked up it if she didn't know. If she didn't have a reason to pay attention. Suddenly the gnawing feeling that they had met before came back. Had she seen him in one of his disguises? How long had he been on Mustafar? If was possible they had crossed paths before.
It probably didn't mean anything. They ran in similar lines of business, after all. As long as he wasn't gunning for her...She took a moment, accessing those abilities that she tried to keep hidden, especially around the kind of men who liked to carry lightsabers on their person. At the moment, knowing if he intended to hurt her seemed more important than concealing her ability to manipulate the force. Besides, Jedi didn't come all the way to the outer rim with no back up to do odd jobs for Cartels. That was just absurd.
There was a cold detachment about him, as she probed for emotions. A professional, in all ways, including in his mind. She closed the mental link and relaxed back into the leather, getting herself into that same professional detachment disposition, overlaid with the playful personality of a working girl.
Layers upon layer upon layers.
The meeting took place at a safehouse, where these kinds of clandestine meetings always took place. Bribing bureaucrats, intimidating law enforcement, colluding with politicians, and apparently making deals with rival cartels to divert shipments their way. At the right price. That was Shadi's job, to make one side so stupid the other got the better end of the arrangement. People, men in particular, were stupid when it came to sex, which is why she wore the Shadi mask most often. She swallowed the transmitter lozenge.
Outside the house, a Trandoshan andGamorrean stood watch, leering her as she approached. The Gamorrean was probably here for Balish Klynt, the representative of the Hutt cartel. Which meant the Trandoshan was guarding Vouru Kaish. She approached him now, stepping into Shadi's skin.
"I do believe your boss is expecting me," She announced in a sultry timbre, meeting his eyes. Trying to at least, as his eyes wandered down her figure and drank in her cleavage. She didn't to look at the Gamorrean to know he was also gawking.
"I imagine he is," the bodyguard said when he finally met her eyes again. The was a look of lust and jealousy in his eyes, yet also filled with the knowledge that she could be bought. Even by a man like him, if this deal went through. Of course everyone could be bought if one possessed the right currency.
With a nod, she was let in, and in the living quarters, she came face to face with a Quarren, Balish Klynt, while Vouru Kiash, the Falleen, sat with his back to her.
