Chapter 2

TWO

" I don't want to do this, Zed. I don't want to walk away in five days and spend the next four years pretending that the guys I hook up with are you."

"So we don't walk away."

Zed stared at the man staring at him. It was wrong, all wrong. His hair was too long, too blond; his green eyes too bright, too close to a neon shade rather than the gentle, calming hazel Zed had stared into more than once. This man's nose had been broken and his face scarred. It wasn't him.

Felix Ingesson.

It couldn't be him. He'd know, wouldn't he? Someone would've told Zed, would've hurdled the secrecy surrounding his status in the AEF or hunted him down after the war, despite his refusal to carry a wallet or communicate with anyone—because if Felix Ingesson was alive…

But no one had. So Felix wasn't.

Zed focused on his heartbeat rather than the emotions that wanted to overwhelm him. He steadied it, mastered it, controlled it. As tempting as it was, he didn't reach for his training. He needed the pain and the rage, the sadness and the horror. They kept him grounded.

He turned to Elias. "Lieutenant Felix Ingesson was killed in action eight years ago. What is this?"

Elias's gaze swung between Felix and Zed, uncertainty written across his face. "I don't know what you're?—"

"Zed."

Someone would have told him, damn it!

Zed ignored Felix—the man who looked like Felix—and took a step toward the captain. Had Elias's reluctance in the bar been an act? Had this been planned from the start? Had someone discovered the connection between him and Emma—the Academy—and then tried to find some leverage in that to use against him? What better choice than having someone masquerade as his dead best friend. They'd been all but inseparable since they were eight years old, from before the Academy and through their training. But they'd have to know he wouldn't fall for it, so why even try?

It didn't make sense. It was too convoluted, too unbelievable, too unreal…

Unreal.

Oh, fuck.

Zed examined the wall above Elias's head, the ceiling, the refrigerator with its guts partially hanging out. The ship smelled like a ship should, with a slight chemical tang from recycled air and circuitry. Despite the way the shadows were darker and the lights brighter than they should be—he'd gotten used to that weirdness in his vision—it all seemed real. But that was the insidiousness of insanity, wasn't it?

How much was truth? Was he actually standing on a ship? Or was he still sitting in the bar with the beer—unless that was something his brain had made up too. He remembered, then, how the label of the beer had seemed to move, writhing in place. He should have considered this. If Emma had lost it, and she was undoubtedly the strongest of their team, then he should have known he'd be falling down that rabbit hole shortly after.

"You know him, Fixer?"

Not Fixer. His name is Flick.

"You're the only one who calls me that, you know. Haven't heard it in years."

"Yeah, I do. Zander…"

He glared at the imposter. "Felix Ingesson is dead."

He'd thought he was past this, the hurt and confusion. Eight years ago, he'd known the news wouldn't be good when his relay point comms had gone unanswered for two weeks, then three. By the sixth week, he'd both dreaded checking for new ripmail and had this weird light-headed spurt of hope that Flick would've emerged from whatever black hole had sucked him in. Then news had woven through the ground forces about the loss of the McCandless. Flick's ship. It took a year for them to declare him KIA. Zed didn't remember much of that year; the following ones were filled with repetitive memories of missions and objectives and little else.

Not-Flick huffed out a breath and stepped forward, moving until he stood right in front of him. "I'm not dead."

"You're not real."

"I'm not…" He rocked back slightly. "What?"

"You're not real." Zed squeezed his eyes shut and muttered, "C'mon, Zander, wake up." His hands curled into fists at his sides.

If he couldn't get himself back under control, he wasn't of use to anyone. Worse, he'd be a danger. He refused to harm the people he'd committed his life to protecting. Otherwise, what was the point? Everything he'd given up, all his sacrifices…they had to mean something.

It's a dream. It's not real. Wake the fuck up, Zander.

Something brushed his cheek. Zed's eyes snapped open. He moved without thinking, one hand flying up to grab the man's wrist. He twisted his grip and stepped to the side, the movements for the armlock as natural as breathing.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Elias stepped around Zed, toward the man held immobile in front of him. "Let him go!"

"Ow! Fuck, Zed. You break my good arm and I will fucking throw you out an airlock, I swear to God."

He didn't know what was real. The arm in his hands felt solid. Flexing his fingers pressed flesh to bone and made the man grunt in pain. Would a hallucination do that? And if he wasn't dreaming…

Was this really Flick?

Zed let go and stepped back, staring at his hands before lifting his gaze to consider the two men in front of him. Shadows and light played across their features in a vertigo-inducing dance. Was that real? "I…I don't…"

"Damn straight you don't."

He turned to Elias just as the captain's fist slammed into his jaw.

"Fix?"

Ears roaring, Felix looked up from the man sprawled across the floor of the mess. Absurdly, he felt like saying "I'm not dead." But Elias knew that. Elias had been one of the men to bring him back from near-death. Twice.

Felix shook his head slowly. By the second gentle swing, he acknowledged the fact his thoughts would not clear until after he talked to Zed. And that was Zed on the floor, one hand stretched out across the loosened refrigerator panel. Throat tightening, Felix studied him again, noting the smudges beneath closed eyes, the furrows marking his forehead—even in repose—the hollows of his cheeks, the cords in his neck. Zander had always been a large man and he still was, but drawn, like a shadow of his former self. A darker, angrier copy.

A warm hand cupped his shoulder. Felix glanced up at Elias and thought about folding himself against his friend's chest. He'd never do it, never had. But he thought about it sometimes, when he needed someone, when he needed…

Cradling his wrist awkwardly with his gloved hand, Felix turned from Elias and Zed and slid into the booth that served as the mess dining table. He breathed out and stretched his wrist across the scratched surface to give himself something to look at, something other than the man on the floor.

Oh my God. Zander Anatolius.

"He thought I was dead."

"Who is he?" Elias asked, sliding into the booth on the opposite side.

A creep across the back of his scalp warned Felix not to give out Zed's full name. Holographic letters pulsed in his memory: Access Denied. Zed's whereabouts had been shrouded in AEF secrecy until seven months ago, when he'd been all over the newscasts. The galaxy labeled him a hero, some said he'd ended the war. He had still been impossible to contact, and then he'd disappeared completely. Now he'd rolled up using an alias to broker passage on a run-down corvette with a third-class crew.

"What did he want?" Felix asked. "What's the job?"

Elias leaned across the table and gently wrapped his fingers around Felix's wrist, just above the ring of scars that spoke of a much older injury. "Who is he, Felix?"

"An old friend." His oldest. "We…" Felix shook his head again. It was just too unreal. "We went to school together."

Elias's dark brows rose. "Really?" He then frowned at the man on the floor. "And he thought you were dead? Galaxy ain't that big."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm wondering what kind of friend gives up on a man who was captured by the enemy, tortured, imprisoned?—"

Felix pulled his wrist from beneath Elias's hand. "Eli, don't." He didn't want to go there. All that mattered was that he had lived and recovered. Mostly.

"You exist, is all I'm sayin'. Something's off. He offers us twice what we made on our last trace as a down payment, invites himself aboard, calls you a dead man and tries to break your wrist?" Elias wrinkled his nose and scoffed, the silent "What the fuck, man" echoing across the mess.

Felix shoved his right hand into his tangle of blond curls. He peered past his wrist at Elias. "Twice our last trace as a down payment?" That would be about two hundred thousand credits, which meant, yep, the man on the floor was definitely Zander Anatolius, son of the man who owned the space station where they were currently docked…and about two dozen others. Humanity's expansion into the galaxy owed a lot to Anatolius Industries, the pioneers of the sorts of space stations that were more miniature planets than just workspaces. Each Anatolius station might have its own culture and general purpose, but the philosophy behind them all was the same: they were home.

Damn it, he hadn't thought about stations like that in ages. Probably since back at the Academy, with Zed waxing poetic about his family's legacy—always focusing on the philosophy and never on the piles and piles of credits stashed in the family's bank accounts.

Felix didn't want to think about the money Zed had offered Elias, which they sorely needed. He didn't want to think about Zed, either, but knew that he would. Even if Zed woke up, walked out the door and disappeared into the press of Dardanos Station, Felix would think about him. Not for four years, as he had after they graduated from Shepard Academy. Or for more than eight after their five-day reunion, which had ended with an exchange of stupid, na?ve promises. Nope, this time—if the pattern held—it would be sixteen goddamned years until fate tossed a coin and Zander crossed his path again.

"You don't look so good, Fix."

Felix met Elias's concerned gaze. "I don't feel so good. I…" How could he possibly explain what the man on the floor meant to him? That he'd already loved and lost him twice, and had never expected to see him again. That he almost didn't want to see him again because of what it would mean. They weren't meant to be. Pain tugging at his heart, Felix dipped his forehead toward the table. The mild chill of the surface seeped into his skin, sending a shiver down his spine. "What's the job?" he mumbled.

"Wants us to track an AEF bounty."

Felix jerked his head back up. "He…what?"

Elias pushed his wallet across the table. He unfolded the flexible square of murky white and tapped the bottom half. A holographic image appeared over the top half, a captured frame from a newscast. "This AEF bounty."

The cool spot on his forehead pulsed. "Shit."

"You know her."

Felix let his head drop down again, his forehead smacking into the table. "'Nother old friend."

He hadn't seen Emma Katze since graduation from the Academy. Twelve years, or close to it. Felix had never expected to see her again, either. She'd been disappeared along with Zed about the same time Felix had packed himself into a shipping container in a bid to escape a stin POW colony. It made sense she would step back into his life on the same day Zed did.

"Does she think you're dead?"

"Prolly." His mouth didn't want to work properly.

"Why is there a large man laid out across the floor?"

Felix squeezed his eyes shut and willed his ears to close against the sound of Nessa's voice.

"He's all right, Ness," Elias said.

"He's out cold!"

"Yeah."

"You left him on the floor?"

"In case you hadn't noticed, he's kinda big."

"Is this our client?"

"Ah…maybe."

"Is that…" Nessa's voice dropped down toward the floor. "Elias, why is there a bruise on his jaw? Did Fixer hit him?"

Hoarse laughter jolted out of Felix's throat. Squinting into the tabletop, he concentrated on pointing the index finger of his gloved hand at Elias. "Eli did it."

"He got all crazy on us, nearly broke Fixer's wrist."

Felix peered over the edge of the table. Nessa knelt over Zed with an expression of cool focus. She glanced up. "Are we keeping him?"

More mad laughter tickled his throat.

Elias nudged his folded arm. "What do you say, Fix? Should we dump him on the dock and fly off with the loot or drag his sorry ass to the med bay?"

A part of him wanted to go with Plan A because Plan B might invite him to crawl into the med bay to curl up next to the man he'd loved like no other. His throat and chest constricted. Years of effort to rebuild his life, brick by solid brick, felt poised to crumble.

But a promise was a promise and he'd given his most heartfelt to Zander Anatolius. They would always be best friends, even if one was supposed to be dead and the other had been buried so deeply beneath the weight of AEF secrecy, he might as well be dead.

Then there was Emma Katze.

God help me.

"Put in him the med bay."

Elias considered himself a pretty easygoing guy. His philosophy in life was simple and borrowed from the great Lao Tzu: flow as life flows. He went against the current occasionally—a captain couldn't be a pushover. But generally he was happy just to cruise down the metaphorical river and see where he ended up. As long as his family—his crew—were happy too.

Fixer looked anything but happy at the moment. He sat beside the narrow bed they'd hauled Loop onto. Even unconscious, the bastard looked big and capable, like if someone threw a switch, his eyes would snap open and he'd fuck up whoever stood over him. Elias had tugged Fixer's chair back, out of reach of those long arms, and he figured it said something that Fix hadn't protested.

It said a lot.

War messed with men's minds. He saw evidence of it on every station, on every colony—there were always lost souls hovering about, searching for meaning, for purpose. A job, creds, drugs, something to take them away. More than the wreckage of ships and stations left behind by the stin, the rudderless men and women illustrated the cost of war. Hell, Elias had only to watch his engineer on any given day to recognize that truth. Fix functioned well, sure, but the shadows in his gaze were easy enough to see. He'd never insisted reality wasn't real, though. He'd never attacked a friendly in such a casual manner.

Whoever Loop was, he was fucked up.

Elias leaned back against the counter behind him. "I still think we should tie him up. At least until we know if he's going to go crazy on you again, Fixer."

No one messed with the man he considered his little brother.

"Like hell you're going to treat my med bay like a prison," Nessa huffed. She stared at the top of Loop's head for a moment, from her vantage point behind him, then turned to rummage through her drawers. "I can sedate him if we need to."

"And then we'll leave his ass on the dock, right?"

Though he'd given Fix the call on this one, Loop's continued presence on his ship made his shoulders hunch. The man was trouble, his job was trouble. He'd known that from the start but he'd let the credits whisper to him. They needed the money—hell, they always needed money—but he was starting to think four hundred thousand credits wouldn't be enough to make up for Loop's disruption. The man moved like someone used to combat, and someone who was damned good at it. Scary enough. Add in his connection to Fix and how upset Fix had been, and one thing was for damn sure—this asshole wouldn't hurt Fixer again.

As though he'd heard his thoughts, Loop's eyes opened. They focused on Fix, and Elias tensed. A hand on his arm stopped him from moving forward and inserting himself between their client and his engineer. Nessa followed up her gesture with a gentle shake of her head.

"You won't need the sedative," Loop said, his voice low and rough. He stared at Fix, his gaze less cloudy than it had been before. "I…They never told me. They never fucking told me, Flick. They declared you KIA after a year and I?—"

Fixer hunched and continued to fidget quietly in his chair. Fix's KIA status had been overturned, Elias knew that much. Kind of hard to own property and shit if you were dead. How had this so-called friend not known? Had Fix not been in contact with him? If he hadn't…well, that said a lot too, didn't it? It said Fix didn't want this guy in his life.

Here I come, dragging him back into it. Damn it.

Groaning, Loop pushed himself into a sitting position and leveled that steely blue gaze on Elias. He wondered if he was about to be cussed out for decking the guy, but Loop just nodded. "Thanks."

Elias glared at him. "I'll do it again."

"Good to know. Won't give you reason to."

"Yeah, right."

Nessa stepped in, all business, and shined a light in Loop's eyes. The man flinched, an odd reaction for such a massive guy.

"You don't seem any the worse for wear, Mr…" She arched her brows.

"Loop," Fix supplied.

Elias frowned. That's not what Fix had called him when they'd first stepped into the mess. Zed? Zander? Whichever, Loop obviously wasn't their client's true name, and Fixer knew it. Why would he keep it a secret? For the first time since Loop had gone nutso, a fissure of fear overpowered the indignation and anger Elias had been feeling. He needed to be able to trust Fix—and he did, with his life and the lives of everyone on his ship. But would this new addition cloud Fix's judgment?

Loop smiled at Fix. "Loop," he confirmed.

Elias filed the other names away for a moment of quiet research.

"Right." Nessa took a hold of proceedings. "Well, here's how it's going to go, Mr. Loop. You mess with my crew, you mess with me, and I have enough drugs in my cupboards to render you a vegetable for the rest of your natural life. Am I clear?"

The bastard's mouth twitched but he managed not to let a smile escape. Lucky for him. "Crystal, ma'am."

Fixer watched Loop, not leaping to his defense or offering any assurance. His left leg hadn't stopped bouncing once, though, which was a sign of his agitation. This whole situation was a mindfuck, and as much as he wanted to understand what Fix was going through, Elias couldn't really imagine it—mostly because, he suddenly realized, he didn't know enough about Fixer's past and how the man sitting on the med bay bed fit into it.

"I'll be good," Loop promised.

Elias wanted to punch him again.

Nessa poked him in the upper arm, hard. "C'mon."

"Ow. Damn it, Ness." Elias rubbed his bicep. "You know I hate?—"

"We've got supplies to secure."

Elias called up the timestamp on his wallet. Damn it, they did. He hesitated, uncomfortable with the idea of leaving Fix alone with this guy. But unless he wanted to give up another shipment—and no, it didn't pay as well as Mr. Moneybags, but it promised to be less complicated—he and Ness had to get their asses moving. Fix sure wasn't in a state to help.

He glared at the man, making his opinion clear. "You remain on this ship solely because you're a friend of Fix's, and it was his decision not to drag your ass onto the dock instead." He kept the remainder of the threat unsaid. Ness had already made it clear, anyway.

"Understood, sir."

He turned his attention to Fix and laid a hand on his shoulder. "You need me, you call me."

Elias shot one last glare in Loop's direction and headed for the door.