Starbreaker

by Amanda Bouchet

  I nodded, aware of how stiff the quick jerks of my chin must look to everyone around us. Gabe kept his smile, but he knew things weren’t what he’d hoped and wanted. He knew something was different when he looked at Shade, still wary, tense, and not far from me, and then back at me again. His hazel eyes changed, questioning.

  “Don’t leave before I come back, okay?” The smile he’d tried hard to maintain faded. “You know, if you might want me to go with you.”

  I nodded again, a flood of tears thickening my throat and battering the backs of my eyelids. My breath hitched, and I moved without thinking, launching myself at him. Everything had changed, but I was so happy to see him. Gabe was alive. I’d given up, especially recently. I’d buried him in my mind since I didn’t have a body.

  I gripped him hard, aware of how different he felt. The lanky teenager was gone. My arms barely circled this man’s torso, and his arms felt twice as thick when they came around me, folding me into him. “Thank the Powers you’re all right, Gabe. I can’t believe it.”

  He cupped the back of my head and gently rocked me. His other arm stayed wrapped around my shoulders, pulling me so close that we touched from top to bottom. I closed my eyes against his neck, just like I used to. The scent of industrial soap, metal, and icy wind filled my nostrils. He didn’t smell at all like I remembered.

  “I love you, Tess,” he said. “No matter what.”

  “I love you, too.” I squeezed my eyes shut and held him, my heart breaking into pieces that fell straight into the dark swirling void losing him seven years ago had left.

  Chapter 14

  SHADE

  She’d let him come. Gabe was on board the Endeavor. Ex-boyfriend Gabe. Companion of her youth Gabe. First love—and lover—Gabe.

  Over the course of the day, I’d ground my teeth so much they hurt. The resulting headache was crawling up the back of my scalp now. I couldn’t relax for the life of me and wasn’t sure I wanted to. It didn’t help that Tess wavered between jumpy as hell and completely shell-shocked. She didn’t flee my touch, but she didn’t reciprocate it much, either. I backed off, giving her the space she needed. For the first time since we made up, she intentionally closed herself off from me, and it scared the ever-living shit out of me. If I lost her, I lost everything.

  Fiona came back with the residents of the Unholy Stench at lunchtime so that we could all go over the plan Frank and his crew had established based on their intel. They liked to prepare, which made me like them even better. They had a good plan. Simple. Not too many variables. Efficiency would be key, and I liked that.

  What I liked less was that by adding Tess to the mix, they’d gone from nabbing one cargo attachment to four and dumped the heaviest danger onto Tess.

  She had a special way with locks—which I still didn’t understand, but she’d promised to explain to me. That meant Tess was going in. She chose Jax and me to accompany her. Frank and Caeryssa would fly in with us on my cruiser. We’d pose as the Dark Watch maintenance team whose security codes Frank had stolen. Once we were inside, we’d go straight to the spine of cargo attachments fastened to the outer wall of the spacedock and get to work.

  As Tess overrode the vacuum seals to each of the food holds we planned to take, one of us would get inside the container, close it up again, and use its built-in thrusters to maneuver it away from the spacedock. Either the Unholy Stench or the Endeavor would pick up the floating unit with a vacuum seal at one of their available exits. Starboard or back door for the Endeavor. Portside wasn’t equipped with an air lock.

  Unfortunately, we couldn’t take advantage of having super soldiers. Mwende wanted to keep a low profile and avoid being seen in a potentially compromising position. As for Merrick, his enhanced size made him stand out like a colossal thumb, and he could possibly also be recognized following his time in captivity. We were all wanted. All we could do now was take a calculated risk and send the least recognizable of us onto the spacedock.

  It was a gamble—a gamble we didn’t really need when we had a bigger mission looming. The priority remained freeing Ahern and Shiori from Starbase 12, and the days were ticking down to when Daniel Ahern’s contact would disarm the plasma-shield alarm for us. I’d already come up with and discarded a dozen ideas about how to get in and get out with our targets, but making concrete plans was proving difficult without knowing what Bridgebane might bring to the table.

  I’d signed on for sudden gambles when I chose Tess, and now I was seeing the reality of it. One risk after another. Provide for those in need. Further the rebellion. Nightchasers didn’t pass up opportunities like this. Reliable intel and relatively easy access to a fully stocked Dark Watch security hub didn’t come around that often. I got that—or I was trying to.

  During lunch, Tess and Frank decided who would go and who would stay. Neither of their crews argued with their final choices, including me. In silence, I worked to convince myself any of this should be happening in the first place.

  For our part, Merrick would fly the ship. Mwende and Gabe would man our two air locks with vacuum-seal capacities and attach the stolen food holds as soon as Merrick lined everything up.

  Frank and his crew would do the same, with Macey, Asher, and Nic all staying aboard. One to fly, and two to work the vacuum seals.

  Fiona planned to stay out of the way, but she’d have a com, like we all did. Frank had provided coms that hid behind the shell of the ear under a patch of adhesive that looked like skin. They were small and inconspicuous, even if they were outdated. We linked them to a common secure channel and could communicate with barely a mumble once they were activated.

  The main problem I had with this whole plan was leaving Tess on the Ewelock station by herself. After Frank, Caeryssa, Jax, and I all floated off in a cargo attachment to be picked up by our ships, Tess would be left alone on the Dark Watch security hub to make her way back to my cruiser, take off, and meet us again.

  For a rendezvous point, we settled on the Sector 2 planet of Nickleback—a place no one wanted to go because of the huge man-eating spiders. We chose coordinates for an uninhabited plateau in the fourth quadrant of the northern hemisphere and memorized the numbers. Once we secured the stolen goods, the acting captains would program in the coordinates and jump.

  There was no question of preprogramming in the location. If one ship got captured, the navigation log would lead the Dark Watch straight to the others. On Nickleback, we’d transfer the food into our own cargo holds, ditch the empty military containers, reload my star cruiser through the freed-up back entrance, and bring everything to Mooncamp 1 for unloading. If everything went well, Raz would have his work cut out for him.

  Tess and I were going to have to hit four different levels on the spacedock to detach four separate cargo holds. At least the stairs running up the back spine of the station between the inner and outer walls meant we didn’t need to go back to the lifts to access each new level. That would speed things up and reduce the risk of running into the-Powers-knew-who as the station repopulated. But then Tess would have to go back into the heart of the security hub to pick up the Queen Bee on the landing platform—a scenario that made me break out in a cold sweat every time I thought about it.

  Gabe seemed capable of working air locks, and his prison-miner build told me he’d be able to do his part when it came to lifting and transferring the food items. What other skills he had remained to be seen. Turning Tess into a comatose zombie whenever she wasn’t fully focused on this heist appeared to be one of them. In his favor, he seemed ready to follow Tess’s lead and defer to a crew he hoped to become a part of, probably permanently. He didn’t know the crew was in total upheaval anyway, with recent additions and devastating changes all over the place.

  Apart from me, Fiona seemed the most reticent about taking him on. The way his presence affected Tess clearly didn’t sit well with the scientist. I knew it fucking didn’t sit well wit
h me.

  A serrated weight plowed into my chest.

  “I love you, Tess. No matter what.”

  “I love you, too,” she’d whispered back.

  I curled my hands into fists, wanting to grab something and rip it in half. Those should have been my words to her. Maybe Tess would’ve given them back to me as easily as she’d given them to him. They’d passed her lips for Gabe, for the man she’d pined for and hoped to find again for seven years. What did I have on that? On that kind of devotion? A few weeks?

  After the plans were final, we went our separate ways for a few hours of downtime. I wanted to spend it with Tess, but she immediately disappeared on me, taking off to one of the food warehouses with Raz instead. I ended up on my own, tinkering with my cruiser and doing a lot of banging and muttering. It didn’t help.

  Now, I cursed under my breath as I approached the Endeavor’s bridge. Everyone had agreed to meet there for final preparations, and I still hadn’t managed to get a second of alone time with Tess.

  The retracting doors opened with a swipe of my palm. My eyes instantly found Tess even though she barely looked over at my entrance. The others were up front already, including Fiona. She looked like herself again, her lab coat buttoned up to her neck and her hair scraped away from her face in a tight ponytail that turned her cheekbones into sharp little lines. She looked severe and formidable, and Jax snuck a glance like he was fifteen and fascinated. I gave him a month until he cracked. Maybe less if Fiona wore that outfit from this morning again.

  Frank and Caeryssa were also on the bridge. They’d make the jump with us on my cruiser. The Queen Bee was ready to go.

  The door whooshed shut behind me as I moved toward the captain’s chair. Gabe’s jaw hardened when I joined Tess at her console. Ignoring his stony stare, I gave her a smile I had to push past the jealousy clawing at my throat. Here I was, and right over there was the man she’d wanted for years. It made me queasy.

  “The cruiser’s all set.” Casually, I rested my arm along the back of her chair without touching her.

  Her glance up at me was fleeting. She focused on dials and switches and checking the systems.

  I shifted my balance. “All three ships are set to arrive out of sight of the Ewelock station but within sight of one another. We’ll fly in together, which’ll look normal enough with the influx of new people to the spacedock.”

  “Thank you, Shade.” Tess’s voice couldn’t have sounded any more impersonal if she’d been a robot.

  “The personnel change going on today will mean ships all over the place. No need to worry about them picking us up on their scanners.” Frank stood with Caeryssa next to the portside window panel, letting her adjust the gun holster on his stolen Dark Watch uniform. We all wore them, courtesy of Raz. Frank asked and Raz produced. Nightchasers left more than just food at the Mooncamps.

  “The hard part won’t be getting in this time,” Caeryssa said, checking her own uniform. It was a little big on her, and she tucked the shirt in tighter. “It’ll be getting out before they realize what we’re up to.”

  Gabe moved closer, hovering on the other side of Tess. He didn’t touch her, but my hostility grew as he tried to lay claim to a part of her space, just like I had. She didn’t look at either of us and wrapped up her systems check, either not noticing or successfully ignoring the chill in the air between her ex-lover and me.

  She turned to Frank. “Asher’s flying for you guys, right?”

  Frank dipped his chin in confirmation. “The Ewelock coordinates are locked in, and he knows where to meet on Nickleback.”

  “Good.” Tess checked her watch. “We’ve got about thirty minutes before takeoff.”

  She looked around, and I followed her gaze. Everyone was organized. Dressed to blend in on the security hub. Knew their roles. We were ready.

  So why did I have this enormous knot in my chest?

  Tess stood, vacating the chair she’d been occupying and choosing to circle around it on my side rather than Gabe’s. It felt like a small victory. “The ship’s yours, Merrick.”

  Merrick took his place at Tess’s console, but it was hard to miss the frustration pinching at his features. It must suck to be a super soldier and not get in on the action.

  Tess found herself in the center of a whole group that obviously orbited around her. “Gabe and Sanaa, follow Merrick’s lead and do whatever he needs. He’s in charge of the ship until either Jax or I get back. Fiona knows the drill. If you have to leave without the cargo and without us, you leave,” she said firmly. “If for some reason Nickleback doesn’t work out for one or any of us, the ultimate rendezvous is back here, on Mooncamp 1. Sometime, somehow. For whoever can make it.”

  Fiona sat heavily on one of the side chairs that folded down from the wall. “I hate this speech.”

  My nostrils flared. I was pretty sure I hated it, too.

  “It’s not fun to think about losing, or making mistakes, or getting caught,” Tess said. “But they’re not out of the realm of possibility. Just do your jobs, stay focused, and watch each other’s backs. We’ll do our best to move quickly and be out of there in no time.”

  She looked at her crew one by one, including the two from the Stench. Her gaze landed and stayed on Gabe last. It lingered, and my gut tightened with a sharp twist.

  Tess finally turned and crouched by Bonk, giving him several long pats. Gently, she tucked Jax’s old sweater more firmly around the tabby and then straightened, glancing again at her watch. She set an alarm before looking back up. “Those of us taking Shade’s cruiser need to meet there in about twenty-five minutes. Coms go on the second we’re all off the ground and stay on. Under no circumstances do we turn them off. These are cheap, old-school generation-12 coms, so our radius is limi—”

  “Hey, don’t knock my coms,” Frank interrupted. “I nearly had to trade Caeryssa for those.” He winked at his crewmate.

  Tess cracked a smile. “Our radius is limited with these awesome coms, but the good news is that they’re discreet and small, and they can’t be used to locate the positions of other people on the channel, like you can with gen-15 coms and beyond. The bad news is, we can’t use them to electronically locate you, either. If something goes wrong and we’re still nearby, though, we can hear what’s happening and adjust. Hopefully figure things out from there.”

  Everyone nodded. It was as solid a backup plan as we were getting for this mission. My life had gone from clear, detailed, and strategic to what felt like a free-for-all with pitfalls all over the place. The lack of up-to-date gadgets and a satisfactory security net chafed. I would bring better equipment into the mix as soon as we could dock on a decent rock and shopping came up on the everchanging to-do list. As for the lack of a security net—I’d better get used to it.

  Tess finally looked at me. “Shade… Can we talk?”

  Fuck. Three little words really could stop a heart.

  I nodded. What else could I do? Beg her to look at me like she had last night? Or even just moments before Gabe showed up?

  Given the choice, I’d shove him off the ship and lock the doors before we all took off. Leave him on this dirt-patch Mooncamp and pretend I’d never seen the emotion and familiarity fusing Tess to him in that long, tight hug.

  He’d kissed her. Tess hadn’t kissed him back, but would she have, if I hadn’t pulled them apart?

  I followed her off the bridge, only a trickle of air finding a pathway into my lungs. I wouldn’t be able to breathe again until Tess understood that I’d fight for her with everything I had in me—and then some.

  She made her way to her room—our room?—waited for me to follow her inside, and then shut the door on the rest of the universe.

  Blood slammed through my veins. I turned to her, reluctant and stiff. In front of me, she shifted from foot to foot, making me even more nervous. My heart crawled toward my mouth, ch
oking me. Was this what dread tasted like? A hot burn and a tight knot that wouldn’t stop wrenching in my throat?

  “So…” She bit down on her lower lip, letting her gaze slide away from me. “Locks.”

  I stared at her, my pulse rampaging. This was about locks?

  Holy Sky Mother, I hoped so.

  “Is this when you tell me about your lock magic?” My voice came out much harsher than usual. I’d been so ready to put my fist through a wall that I hadn’t been prepared to talk.

  “Yeah, the…‘lock magic.’” Tess looked even more uncomfortable at my gruff tone.

  I cleared my throat, more than ready to go with this line of conversation. It sure as hell beat her saying she was leaving me for Gabe. “Does Frank know whatever it is? His crew?”

  She shrugged, her uneasy body language starting to worry me for new reasons now. What could make Tess this hesitant? This freaked out?

  “They’ve seen it from afar and asked questions. I’ve never explained. Just brushed it off as big skills and lots of luck.” Her nervous laugh was so unlike her that I scowled.

  She bit her lip again, grinding down with her incisor until the flesh turned white. I couldn’t even begin to understand what was going on here—and wrong—so I waited.

  “Only Jax knows the truth,” she finally said. “We’re usually a team on these kinds of heists. And soon you—if you’re interested.”

  If I’m interested? Just like that, I was back to wanting to put my fist through a wall. “Of course I’m interested.” I forced an even tone, making sure I didn’t accidentally growl at her again.

  Tess swallowed. “Yeah, but it’s…” She paled.

  Holy shit. How much bigger a secret could she have than being Quintessa Novalight? A type A1 blood source? The origin of the Overseer’s super soldiers and the lost heir to the whole fucking galactic empire?

  Not that she wanted it. No, Tess wanted to run an orphanage. And I wanted to do that with her.