Contingency Plan

by Robyn Bachar

  “Tomas tripped over a power conduit and pulled the cables loose from the junction, and the housing fried. It took us three hours to fix it. Three fucking hours, Captain. And he wasn’t even supposed to be in the engine room in the first place! He just smarmed down here to ogle Becky’s ass again. Why can’t he just watch porn in his quarters like a normal person?”

  Horrified by that mental image, Lindana held her hands up in defeat. “Okay. I’ll talk to him. Anything else?”

  Maria pushed her tortoiseshell glasses up on her nose. Her glasses always seemed to be attempting escape. Lindana had once asked why she didn’t have her vision surgically repaired, and Maria had looked aghast at the suggestion that she let some hack med tech operate on her eyes. “The engine rats also voted on who we want as a new intel officer. We decided that we need a hot guy.”

  Lindana laughed, but the sound was hollow. “You know the rules. We get whoever Command sends us.”

  Their previous intel officer, Erik, had guided Lindana through her first steps as a privateer. Erik had been only a few months away from a well-deserved, cushy retirement when their last mission had gone horribly wrong and he was killed in the line of duty. His loss left a hole in the heart of the Mombasa, and Erik had also left big shoes for the new intel officer to fill. She doubted that Command had anyone in their ranks up to the task. Life was rough at the ends of civilized space, where pirates and privateers walked on the knife’s edge between three angry superpowers, and Lindana needed someone she could trust at her back.

  “I know,” Maria said. “We also have votes for a tough-yet-vulnerable lesbian and for an adventurous bisexual of any gender identity.”

  “Noted. All you can do is keep your fingers crossed.” Lindana retreated before any of Maria’s minions appeared and voted on anything else. Maria was the undisputed queen of the Mombasa’s engine room, and some battles weren’t worth fighting. Maria was a technical genius—essential for keeping the ship running. A modified freighter like the Mombasa required constant upkeep because the ship’s additions were far from factory standard. Things overheated on a regular basis, and one fried life support wire and the crew could freeze to death, or asphyxiate. There were worse ways for a privateer to die, like what had happened to Raiya...

  Lindana’s gut twisted, and she paused in an empty corridor to take a steadying breath. Don’t think about Raiya. Don’t think about Erik. Old spacers warned that death came in threes, and Lindana was braced for the next disaster. She pressed her hand against the bulkhead and the familiar thrum of the engines vibrated beneath her palm, like a heartbeat beneath the ship’s metal skin. Hold together, Mama Mo. This run of bad luck couldn’t last. A few good missions and they’d be back on top again.

  * * *

  Ryder Kalani was a mountain of a man, both taller and broader than Lindana’s older brother Tomas, who waited beside Ryder at the airlock. Ryder appeared to be once again attempting to convince Tomas to grow his hair out into dreadlocks. The look worked well on Ryder, but Lindana just couldn’t picture it on her brother. She was too used to his military buzz cut, much like her own efficient hairstyle. To Lindana long hair was a vanity, though she supposed Ryder had reason to be vain, considering how handsome the man was.

  Lindana blinked at Ryder’s full arms and armor. “Expecting trouble?”

  Ryder beamed a roguish grin. “We’re meeting the new intel officer. I want to make a good first impression.”

  “Meaning he wants to scare the poor bastard shitless,” Tomas said. “Look at him. He’s his own armored vehicle.”

  “That’s what we pay him for. And you—” Lindana poked Tomas in the chest “—better stay out of the damn engine room. That’s an order.”

  Tomas held up both hands in surrender, his expression the perfect picture of innocence. “It’s not my fault...”

  “Stow it. Let’s go before Maria and the rats get here. I don’t want Ryder to have to shoot you.”

  “Me?” Tomas said. “What did I do?” Lindana ignored his indignation and pulled the lever. A hiss escaped as the inner door whooshed open, followed by the groan of the outer door cycling.

  “Please step forward and enter the decontamination area.” The automated greeting repeated the request in Russian over the crackling, cheap speakers as the trio entered the decontam area and sealed the lock behind them. “Decontamination will commence in ten seconds. Please stand by.”

  “I hope the intel officer is a hot chick,” Ryder murmured to Tomas. Lindana rolled her eyes.

  “Seconded,” Tomas said. “It’s about time we get some hot a—”

  Lindana whipped around and glared at her brother. “Tomas Barack Nyota! Do not finish that sentence!”

  “Just because you have no love life doesn’t mean the rest of the crew can’t have one. Captain.” Tomas added her title with vinegar, as though the word was a pungent insult.

  Lindana unclenched her fists as she stomped down the urge to strangle him. She reminded herself that she loved her big brother, even when he was being an absolute jackass. “You need to update your definition of love life. If there’s a transfer of funds after the fact, love wasn’t involved in the transaction.”

  Tomas groaned. “Trust me, marriage is all about financial transactions. Misha still gets a damn percentage of my pay.”

  Lindana’s lips pressed in a stoic line as she turned back to the station airlock. She didn’t blame Misha for leaving Tomas, but Lindana would never abandon her brother—she couldn’t afford to leave him, even if she wanted to. Their entire combined savings was invested in the ship, and they funneled most of their profit back into the ship in fuel and repairs.

  “Decontamination complete. Welcome to Tortue Station. Use of energy and ballistic projectile weapons is prohibited. Our terms of service have been recently updated. Please refer to the station information file to view these updates. Enjoy your stay.”

  Ryder snorted and muttered something about updates and grenades that Lindana chose to ignore. She tugged at the hem of her uniform jacket and dusted her palms against the legs of her khaki cargo pants. She had a few knives secreted on her person but no firearms. She left heavy weaponry up to Ryder—it was what she paid him for, after all.

  The station airlocks opened and Lindana wrinkled her nose at the stale, nicotine-scented air. If only humanity had left their bad habits behind on Earth. Swiss stations like Tortue offered all manner of vice at a price. The entire place could stand a good decontamination itself, judging by the rank smell—not just smoke, but stale sweat and old vomit. Disgusting. Even the floors were slightly sticky, and Lindana made a mental note to bleach the soles of her boots after they left. Item one hundred and fifteen...

  “Drinks first or work first?” Tomas asked.

  Lindana sighed. “No work, no drinks. Let’s meet our new crew member.”

  Tortue was packed. Spacers crammed into corridors that were filled to capacity—probably past legal capacity, to be honest, but who was going to enforce it? Tortue fell into a neutral zone where the United Alliance of Democratic Nations, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and Core Colony Collective held no jurisdiction, and justice went to the highest bidder. It reminded Lindana a bit too much of area she’d grown up in on Earth, but at least the paranoia and furtive glances of suspicion were familiar.

  The trio shoved their way through the teeming crowds, located the nearest lift and headed for the admin level, following the faded signage directing them toward the United Alliance of Democratic Nations diplomatic office. It wasn’t technically an office, more like a closet with delusions of grandeur. Ryder gave the room a brief glance before Lindana entered, followed by Tomas. A bored administrative assistant manning the front desk barely bothered to look up from the puzzle game on the screen of his data terminal. “Please place your palm on the pad for identification and look into the camera for retinal scan. One a
t a time,” he added, as though an afterthought. Did other officers elbow each other out of the way for the privilege of being identified first?

  When the computer confirmed their identities they were ushered through to the rest of the suite. The hum of machinery and the whispering drone of hushed conversations filled the room. People frowned at data screens and made notes on their tablets. Boring as hell. Lindana doubted that any of them had seen combat during the war, but they had to have done something wrong to have been shipped out to serve here. Pushing paperwork on a Swiss station was one step above being sent to perform hard labor at a mining colony.

  “Captain Nyota, you are late.”

  Lindana squared her shoulders and turned her cool regard to Commander Scott, their UADN contact. He was a thin, waspish man whose face had frozen into a perpetually sour expression, and said expression was hardened by the addition of a nonregulation goatee. Commander Scott seemed like precisely the sort of asshole who bucked the rules he demanded that his subordinates follow.

  “We had engine problems,” she said. “Is our new officer here?”

  Commander Scott leveled a disapproving glare at her that deepened when Lindana refused to quail beneath it. “Yes. Allow me to introduce Lieutenant Steele.”

  The commander gestured toward a tall, slender figure who was leaning over a terminal across the room. The man was dressed in a fitted black duster—a garment that was fine and fashionable and not at all functional for life aboard a privateer ship. Or anywhere, really. In Lindana’s opinion the only reason a spacer needed a long coat was to conceal weapons, and you couldn’t conceal anything in a garment that tight. Lindana was immediately skeptical about this lieutenant’s abilities, and then he turned, and her heart stopped as their eyes locked.

  Lieutenant Steele. Gabriel Steele.

  “Son of a bitch,” she blurted out.

  The bastard had the gall to smile at her. “Lindy. You look well.”

  That voice. Just four words in his silken purr sent shivers down her spine, and her nerves sizzled to life like a malfunctioning computer system suddenly brought back online. His pale blue gaze flicked over her form, leaving heat in its wake as though his focus was a passionate, physical caress. Lindana shivered and swallowed hard, then gulped a deep breath and focused on fury instead.

  “No.” Lindana turned her ire on Commander Scott. “Absolutely not. He doesn’t set foot on my ship. Ever. Period.”

  Commander Scott gaped like a trout out of water. “Is there a problem here?”

  “If I may—” Gabriel began. Lindana cut him off with a slash of her hand, and irritation flashed through his pale blue eyes. Bastard. It was entirely unfair that he still looked like an ancient god carved from marble and noble privilege.

  “No you fucking may not. I don’t want to hear another word out of you. You—” Lindana pointed at Commander Scott. “Get me another intel officer. Stat.”

  She turned to storm out, but Tomas blocked her way, his expression bewildered. Ryder seemed equally confused, though more willing to follow his captain’s lead. Good soldier. She ought to give the man a raise.

  “Lindana, what the hell?” Tomas asked.

  For a moment she debated ordering him out of the way, but this was her big brother. Tomas was the only one who would understand the pain that spidered through her chest, as though a cargo ship had landed on top of her and was slowly crushing her to death.

  “That’s him,” she muttered.

  “Him who?” Tomas asked.

  “Academy. Senior year.” Lindana ground the words out like broken glass, and Tomas’s eyes widened. She watched the shock play out across his face, followed by the same anger that clenched Lindana’s hands into fists.

  “Son of a bitch,” Tomas echoed. He leaped across the room and punched Gabriel square in the face.

  Don’t miss RELAUNCH MISSION by Robyn Bachar.

  Available now wherever Carina Press ebooks are sold.

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  Copyright © 2017 by Robyn Bachar

  Acknowledgments

  I often joke that I’m living in a sitcom, and every time something goes right for me everything else in my life goes spectacularly wrong. As such, I was plagued with a series of unfortunate events during the production of this book, and I am eternally grateful to the people who got me through it.

  First and foremost, a GINORMOUS thank-you goes to my editor, Deb, for all of her support. (And also for my new favorite editorial note. I won’t say what it was, but it was fabulous, and I nearly spat coffee all over my monitor when I read it.)

  I’m very grateful for the support of my friends and family. My BFF Diana has been with me for every step of my writing journey, and she continues to be made of awesome. A big thank-you goes to my parents, who continue to allow me to be the madwoman in their attic. I am blessed to have their love and support.

  Also available from Robyn Bachar and Carina Press

  The Galactic Cold War series

  Relaunch Mission

  Coming soon from Robyn Bachar and Carina Press

  The Galactic Cold War series

  End Transmission

  Also available from Robyn Bachar

  Bite Me

  Just One Spell series

  The Sephra’s Tear

  Bad Witch series

  The Importance of Being Emily

  The Emily Chronicles: Poison in the Blood

  Blood, Smoke and Mirrors

  Bewitched, Blooded and Bewildered

  Fire in the Blood

  Cy’ren Rising series

  Nightfall

  Morningstar

  Sunsinger

  About the Author

  Robyn Bachar enjoys writing stories with soul mates, swords, spaceships and vampires. Her books have finaled twice in the PRISM Awards Contest for Published Authors, twice in the Passionate Plume Contest and twice in the EPIC eBook Awards. You can find Robyn online at www.robynbachar.com and on Twitter at @RobynBachar.

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  ISBN-13: 9781488028243

  Contingency Plan

  Copyright © 2017 by Robyn Bachar

  All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario M3B 3K9, Canada.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.