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XANDR OPENED THE DOOR and his sister in law stepped through. He glanced at Andie and then quickly away. “We have business to attend to. Alone.”
Xandr wanted to scowl, but he kept his expression neutral. “You can speak in front of her.”
Andie laid a hand on his shoulder and rose on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “It’s okay. I’m going to find the crew and make sure everything is ready.” She was gone before he could think to stop her.
Zeesa took a chair without waiting for an invitation and looked at him with a calculating expression. “I don’t think you ever looked at me that way. I’m not sure anyone has.”
He waited for her to talk about something relevant. With Ceetr in custody, Xandr guessed that most authority was falling to Zeesa until things could be sorted out. She could make life very difficult for him if she wished.
“I don’t suppose there is anything I can say to make you stay. Anything I can... offer?”
The quality of the shower and the softness of the bed were tempting, but Mebion had long since ceased being his home. “We both know that it’s better if I go.”
She sighed. “I was almost certain you’d say that.” She pulled a small tablet out of the pocket of her robe and offered it to him. “But if you ever return, I don’t want it to be in chains. And to that end, I thought this might tempt you.”
Xandr looked at the document and then back to her, brows furrowed. “Why? How?”
Zeesa rolled her eyes. “Because we were friends and you helped me. I will file it no matter what, and you can’t stop me. Adhere to it or not, your choice. As for the how, with your dear brother gone, I’m running things for now. It will take months or more for the courts to sort out what is going on, but Ceetr has no power here anymore. If he is exonerated, well, I’ll have time to prepare.”
The Oscavian justice system was thorough, but not fast. Xandr didn’t know if his brother would ever know freedom again, but given what he’d been doing for the better part of a decade he couldn’t feel bad about that. But what Zeesa was offering was almost too much to comprehend. “You want to authorize me and my crew to hunt for slavers? Something like this is usually given to a much bigger company.” Xandr couldn’t stop looking at the tablet, reading the thin lines of text that would legitimize his entire life. He wouldn’t need to run from security, wouldn’t need to struggle from job to job finding ones that wouldn’t obliterate what few qualms he had. “What’s the catch?” He handed the tablet back before he could obsess over it any longer.
Zeesa accepted it and placed it back in her pocket. “No catch. This is payment. Let me know when your crew is ready to leave and I’ll see to it that you’re outfitted.” She stood and looked at him for a moment before leaving him alone in the room.
A new ship. A new purpose. The same crew. Could it really be that easy?
He wanted time to think about it, but he needed to see the crew more. He was the captain, but this decision couldn’t be his alone to make. It took a bit of wandering to find the crew and he shouldn’t have been surprised that they’d ended up in the garden. Space offered a lot of freedom, but it couldn’t replicate sunshine and fresh air.
Sayevi, Hayk, and Malax had joined the group at some point last night, having been summoned from Nevys’s ship after Nevys’s crew was arrested. Despite the days of imprisonment in the guest house and the night of freeing prisoners and taking on the duke, they all looked good. Andie saw him first and stood up from where she was sitting, talking with Sayevi and Keana. She grabbed his hand and pulled him towards the crew.
“So, captain, do we have another jail break in our future?”
The rest of the crew looked ready to tear the estate down brick by brick if they had to and Xandr smiled. He wouldn’t trade these people for a hundred dukedoms. “Actually, we’ve got a job. If we want it.”
That got their attention. They didn’t quite all lean in towards him, but there was a general shifting and tilting of heads. When it took Xandr too long to speak, Keana prompted him. “Well?”
“Zeesa, that is, the duchess of Mebion would like to hire us to hunt down slavers. On an ongoing basis. It’s dangerous work, but can be lucrative as we’ll be entitled to anything on the ships we capture. But this also means we’ll be registered agents of the Oscavian Empire. That’s not what any of you signed on for, so I can’t ask this of you, not unless you’re all willing. Are you?” Andie squeezed his hand but said nothing. In that moment, as he was waiting for the crew to make their opinions known, he realized what he wanted. He was tired of living life at the edge of the law, falling into scrapes and prison and barely getting by. He was no longer the kind of man who could live idly on a planet as pleasant as Mebion, but he wanted his crew safe, he wanted to build a life with Andie by his side.
“What would we do for a ship?” Sayevi asked. “Ours is stuck back on Praltez. It’s probably been picked over by the vultures at their docks.”
“A ship’s a ship.” It hurt Xandr to think of the Seventh stripped for parts, but it wasn’t the first vessel he’d captained and it wouldn’t be the last. “Part of the contract included payment to acquire and outfit a ship. We can find something meant for the job, something that won’t fall apart from a little rough flying.”
Malax grunted, though Xandr wasn’t sure whether his engineer agreed with getting a new ship or was merely acknowledging that their previous ship had been prone to falling apart.
“There’s a certain appeal to showing the Oscavian fleet how to take out slavers,” Taryn said. “And if it means we’re not pulling babysitting gigs anymore I can’t say I’d complain.”
With Taryn’s endorsement came Malax, and once the two of them were on board the rest of the crew swiftly followed. Keana grinned at him. “We’re your crew, captain. We follow where you lead.”
“Yeah, my lord, that’s right!” Sayevi laughed.
Xandr groaned. “First rule of the new ship, no mentioning my title. It’s bullshit. I’m your captain, and that’s all that matters.”
Of course that declaration led to another round of ribbing, but for the moment the crew was happy. Andie tugged Xandr away once the laughter died down and they stole into a little nook in the garden maze. She wrapped her arms around his waist and pulled him close.
“You were quiet out there,” he couldn’t help but point out. “What do you think about all of this?”
She tilted her head up and trailed kisses along his jaw. “I think as long as we’re together I’m going to be happy. And giving some pain to the kind of people who abducted me? That’s just a bonus. I love you, my lord captain.”
“Really? You too?” He shut his eyes and clenched his jaw to keep from grinning, but that didn’t last long. He stole a kiss and pulled back. “I love you, my human cavria.”
“You ready to go save the universe?” she challenged, one eyebrow raised.
Xandr kissed her again. “With you at my side? I can’t wait.”
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