Page 19

When her opponent swung at her, wide and desperate, she slipped under it, driving her fist straight up. The crack of the uppercut reached Rann from six feet away. The male’s boots left the deck. He arched through the air, going down. He didn’t get up.

Stepping back, B rolled her shoulder. She arched a brow at him. “You done with that, or are you keeping it as a security blanket?”

Rann realized he was still holding the collar-grab male off the floor. The man dangled from his fist, toes brushing the deck. He opened his hand, and the male hit the deck.

Seven men down, and she was barely breathing hard. He’d grown up in barracks full of warriors and spent years working alongside professional killers, and that uppercut would have passed muster in either company. Somebody had trained her, properly, and he wanted to know who, because whoever it was had a lot to answer for and he intended to buy them a drink.

A wet sound came from the floor behind him.

Scar-lip was still conscious, blood on his collar, one eye swelling shut.

“Joe knows where you are,” he croaked. “Joe always knows.”

The color drained out of B’s face. Stepping forward, she drove her boot into his jaw. His head rocked back with the impact and stayed there.

“Ocular implant,” she hissed, even though he hadn’t asked, and grabbed his wrist.

“We need to leave,” she said, already moving. “Now.”

He scooped up the crate as they passed. She didn’t let go of his wrist even when the service passage opened out into the transit route, and her grip was hard enough to bruise a human. She checked the junction both ways before she crossed it, which she hadn’t done on the way in.

Matching her pace, he kept his mouth shut.

Whoever Joe was, he was the reason six women had bought a charter in a hurry and wanted off this station before anyone came looking. And he’d walked onto their ship thinking he was the one with secrets.

A grin tugged at the corners of his mouth. This was the most fun he’d had in years.

5

Blythe didn’t stop dragging him until they hit the tram platform.

Her lungs burned, though they hadn’t exactly run. Not properly. They’d moved fast through the station, cutting through crowds and taking the first tram with doors open because standing still felt like painting a target on their backs.

She shoved into a seat by the emergency exit, back to the wall, where she could see the whole carriage. Rann sat beside her with the crate jammed between his boots, too big for the seat but somehow not taking up more room than necessary.

He was handy, then. Seriously handy.

He’d handled himself like the sort of man who got into fights as a hobby, except he hadn’t shown off. He’d applied brutal and bloody violence, and people had hit the deck.

The tram shuddered into motion. She watched the platform slide past through the scratched window, every passing face suddenly suspicious. A woman pushing a cargo cart. Two bored-looking security officers. A bloke with a coffee and one of those stupid plastic helmets tucked under his arm.

Joe always knows.

Her fingers tightened around the edge of the seat.

Joe had eyes everywhere. That was the whole point. He had his fingers in all the pies. He knew dock schedules, knew which inspection teams could be bribed, and whose personal comms were worth tapping. He knew where to find people who thought they’d vanished.

Like them.

“What is it?” Rann asked quietly, not looking at her.

She looked at him. His cap still sat low over those strange blue-green eyes.

“Nothing,” she said. “Not here.”

His expression didn’t change. Didn’t do that irritating thing men did where they kept poking until you either explained yourself or snapped at them. He looked out through the window, jaw tight.

Concerned.