The purple and green curve of the planet Orin smiled at the twinkling stars that filled the window of the Vicio’s cockpit. Only three hours until we landed to hire people who resembled me in an attempt to throw the law off my fugitive tail. No small feat, but one made easier by the delicious ache from being ravaged night after night by the beautiful man lying next to me.

Mase’s fingers curled against his palm in a loose fist, and the corners of his mouth tipped up in a relaxed smile. Strands of blond hair I loved to run my fingers through so much fell across one eye, down along the stubble of his strong jaw, and feathered almost to his shoulders. He looked so peaceful in sleep, even with the scars striping his perfection and often marring his memories.

I sneaked out a hand from my blanket to graze his thumb and scooted a little closer, and for the second time in my life, I realized how impossible it was not to fall in love with something that slept near me. Granted, he didn’t lay nose-to-nose with me like my roommate Moon Dragon’s slothcat Jezebel did, but the effect was still the same. It made him seem vulnerable, more real somehow I supposed, and for whatever reason, that melted every single one of my soft spots.

I should probably keep that information to myself though. How do you make Absidy Jones, fugitive ghost magnet, love you? Easy. All you have to do is sleep next to her.

But surely I wasn’t that simple, was I?

His eyelids fluttered, and as soon as his eyes, one blue and one gray, met mine, my heart stuttered.

“Hi,” he whispered.

“Hi,” I whispered back, and I was pretty sure my smile stretched to my ears and cracked my eardrums.

He answered it with a beaming one of his own. “How are you?”

“Sore.”

“Would I be a giant dick if I said I wasn’t sorry?” he asked with a smirk.

I touched my lips to his, instantly breathless with just that slight connection. “Yes.”

His gaze grew heated, and through his smirk, he slid his tongue over his teeth. “I could be gentle.”

“You could get me dead,” I said as I pushed away from him. “Randolph will murder me if I’m late again.”

Ever since he’d been forced to go off alcohol cold turkey, having totally run out of it about a week ago, Randolph was almost impossible to be in the same room with. He’d already drunk what booze hadn’t been destroyed in the stasis food pantry when the Saelis aliens had boarded the Vicio—more accurately called the Vicious. I rose from the bed, the slight chill in the air peppering my naked skin with goosebumps, and grabbed my sweatshirt from the floor.

Mase grazed his fingers over my bare ass with a groan. “Speaking of giant dicks…”

“Put yours away.” I swatted at his hand while I searched the floor for my underwear. “Breakfast first. Then maybe if you’re good, I’ll let you put your hands down my pants before we land on Orin.” I threw him a wink over my shoulder.

“That’s my favorite thing to do to you. That’s one of my favorite things to do to you,” he corrected, propping his head on an elbow to press kisses into my hip. “You won’t make me hold a potato instead?”

I threw my head back and laughed. Feozva, it felt good to be free around him, free of my haunted past to embrace my future. But his wandering hands down the backs of my thighs and his sinful mouth on my skin were awakening the fire that only he could ignite. I needed to get away from him, and fast. My underwear had somehow wound itself around the toe of his cowboy boot—symbolism, anyone?—and I hastily pulled it off.

“There will be no potato holding if you let me walk out that door in a timely fashion,” I warned.

“On one condition,” he said, grabbing my wrist before I could reach for my sweatshirt. “No underwear today, in memory of me.”

“In memory.” I snorted. “Like I need any help being reminded of you.”

Sheets rustled, then he stood next to me, his chiseled body gloriously naked. And yes, a mighty erection. He brushed the sexy mess of hair off his forehead and connected his sharp, mismatched gaze with mine. “I don’t need any help being reminded of you either. But last time you were more than a ship-length away from me, I didn’t know if I would ever see you again. This trip to Orin… I’m not looking forward to it.”

I swallowed thickly. I thought I couldn’t love this man more than I already did because of the impossible size of his heart. Stupid me. We’d been through a lot in the short amount of time we’d known each other, including being kidnapped by aliens to a haunted rogue planet called The Black. Our lives were not the regular kind.

“No aliens will be taking me away from you,” I said, pressing myself against him in a tight hug. “Nothing will ever take me away from you. I love you too much to let that happen. You’ll find an engineer, we’ll find copies of you, me, and Ellison to throw the police off all our trails, and we’ll be back together again in no time.”

Mase squeezed me right back, and I had to wonder how it would feel if I thought I’d lost him forever too. His musky smell, his laugh, the disarming things he’d say to make me laugh, the way he moved inside me—he’d become my new addiction, had seeped so completely into my soul that I spared only a fleeting thought or three to iron. More when he wasn’t by my side. Being without him terrified me as much as being without iron once had. Before now, I hadn’t allowed myself to think about it, but today we would have to split up, if only for a couple of hours. An eternity.

“I’ll go without underwear if you do too,” I said around the sudden knot of emotion lodged in my throat.

“Agreed. But only if you stay away from the engine room. It’s not safe.”

I leaned away to study him. “What?”

“Nesbit was like a tornado in there, and the barrier around the engine is broken. Don’t go back in there.”

“I haven’t been in the engine room lately.”

“You sure? I thought I saw you slip in there yesterday, but I got too distracted last night with some pretty serious body exploration to say anything about it.”

I smiled. “As in your body exploration?”

“I know my way around mine, college girl. It’s yours I’m committing to memory.” He tapped his temple. “And I don’t quite have it yet.”

“I really haven’t been in the engine room.” Not lately, anyway. I’d explored it briefly when I’d ransacked the ship for iron when Nesbit, our former engineer, had stepped out. But that seemed ages ago, not yesterday. “Maybe you saw Ellison. We look alike, you know.”

He chewed his lip, a skeptical gleam in his eyes. “Pretty sure I know the difference between the Jones sisters.”

“Maybe I infected you with my parasites, and they’re causing you to hallucinate.” I shrugged. “Oops.”

He snorted and held me close again. “We need an engineer in there. Without one, things go south fast.”

I pressed my lips to the scar slicing from above his eyebrow to his jaw. “We’ll find one.” One who wasn’t like Nesbit—a human/alien hybrid who wanted to devour the iron-eating parasites from my blood. Really, it wasn’t asking for much.

Mase’s breath sighed against the top of my ear, and I trembled at the ripple of warmth it sent down to my toes. I turned my face to his, melting into the depth of love I saw in his shuttered gaze.

He captured my lips with an urgency that spun the cockpit and roared fire through my veins within seconds. He pushed me against the closed door with a low groan, the rumble in his chest vibrating a shockwave into mine and down to my center.

I moaned and arched into him, all my aches and pains forgotten except the throbbing one between my thighs and the pinch around my heart at how much I loved this man.

“You’re not being very good,” I said, breathless. “I might make you hold that potato after all.”

“I’m no good at being good,” he rasped. Then he hiked up my legs around his waist and pushed into me in what seemed like one movement.

“Thank Feozva for that,” I said between kisses, then lost myself in the sensations of being loved by Mase Ryan.

He buried a groan in my neck, a tremor of pleasure that swept straight south to the coiled heat sitting low in my belly. I fisted my hand through his messy blond hair and dragged him back to my lips, my tongue seeking his, my body craving all of him at once. His hips thrust harder, faster, building the tension between my thighs until I felt myself begin to crumble, piece by piece, under his expert touch.

On the edge, I dug my fingernails into the backs of his shoulders, but he instantly slowed, an evil smile twitching his mouth.

“Not yet,” he growled.

I moaned in frustration, my hips bucking against his languid pumps to urge him on. But his chaste kiss silenced me, and his hands dipped lower around my ass to control my desperate movements. His heavy pants feathered my cheek as he lifted his gaze to meet mine.

I brushed his hair away from his stubbled chin, my annoyance temporarily forgotten at the way he looked at me, the way he always looked at me, with passion, love, acceptance—the same way I was sure I looked at him. One of us usually slowed down during sex to make it last, to prolong this powerful connection that threaded us together as close as two people in love could be.

“I love you, Mase,” I whispered.

He rested his forehead against mine, his beautifully scarred body quickening its rhythm. “I love you, Absidy. Always.” He moved one hand between us and trailed a path of goosebumps low, low, until he thumbed my clit.

My thighs clamped tight around him. I thumped my head into the wall as his touch powered a thrill strong enough to curl my toes and pushed me back to the brink. He slammed into me, his thumb swirling in tight circles, until stars burst into existence behind my fluttering eyelids as bright as those streaking by the ship. My loud moans carried them all away while my body clung to the sensations rolling through it. A moment later, he buried a growl into my neck as his entire body quaked against mine.

We caught our breaths, neither one of us willing to move. I would’ve stayed like this forever if I could’ve, if not for the grisly thoughts of murder I was surely inspiring in Randolph.

“I’ll love you always.” Mase pressed a kiss to my temple, and I closed my eyes with a smile at the promise in his voice.

But it quickly faded when I glanced at the clock next to the bedding on the floor. “Oh no, Mase.”

He pulled out with a reluctant nod and eased me to my feet. “Right. This crew and their inconvenient need to eat.”

“Again.” I shook my head and dived toward my clothes piled all over the floor. “It’s terribly rude. I’m sure Randolph is in the kitchen thinking the same thing.”

“Or he’s hacking at a breakfast sausage.” At my breathless laugh, he said, “Isn’t that what all chefs do when their apprentices are late?”

With my pants hiked halfway up my thighs—no underwear for me today—and the arms of my sweatshirt dangling loose around my neck, I declared myself mostly ready and leaned in to Mase for a fast peck. “I’ll see you and your breakfast sausage later.”

He grinned and opened the cockpit door. “I like this obsession we have with food and sex.”

I chuckled on my way out the door, still trying to dress myself and failing miserably in my rush. The third floor of the ship had been emptied of the many crates full of dried vegetables and grains, and now stood wide open with titanium polished to a dull shine on all sides. Like the rest of the crew, I had once been afraid of what lurked around every corner of this ship, but now my steps announced my location, my gaze trained straight ahead instead of at twisting, creeping shadows. For the first time in my life, I felt confident and happy.

Which might’ve explained why what I needed to do after breakfast seemed so reckless.

I finally made it to the second floor, through the dining room and into the kitchen, where something popped and snapped on the stove, filling the tiny space with the smell of salted meat. Randolph stood over it with his back turned, an orange Smixton College vest hugging his large frame, his shoulders set in a rigid line.

“Finally decided to show up, did you?” he growled.

“I’m sorry,” I said, retrieving a stack of plates from a cupboard. I didn’t even bother coming up with an excuse since everyone knew where I slept at night. “I’ll come with you today to help shop for food, okay?” I leaned next to the stove, careful of the snapping meat. Bacon cut from volanti pigs, from the looks of it. More dessert than breakfast, though I doubted anyone would complain. It was probably all the food we had left. “Twice the eyes, twice the arms. We’ll get it done in no time.”

He shot me a glare from under bushy eyebrows that matched his thick, dark hair. “Well, I wish we had more than volanti, but your boyfriend drank all the milk. You can’t expect me to make anything resembling a proper breakfast without milk.”

I sighed. Mase and his milk.

By the time I finished setting the table, it was already six a.m. Ellison entered the dining room first, dressed in a crisp white medical smock, and her long braided hair swung over her shoulder.

“Fine,” I said before she could say anything. I’d been fed up with her constant stream of health and wellness questions since she’d boarded two months ago. How well are your scars fading from the Saelis attack? Let me see them. Any soreness from your reset bones? Does your hair hurt while it’s growing in? I hadn’t actually heard that last question yet, but I was sure it would come any day.

Her gray gaze narrowed, then she shook her head, seeming to brush it off, and sat at the gurney we used as a table. “How about a ‘it’s so nice to see you, dear sister. I do hope you slept well.’” A flash of metal rolled across her tongue, visible long enough to flood my mouth with saliva before it vanished again.

I whirled around and slammed through the double doors into the kitchen. My insides squirmed with need, kicking and wailing for a taste of what she had—iron. Sharp and tangy, the thought of it dancing over my tongue crushed my teeth together and triggered the iron-eating parasites within me to dangle off my organs until they got more metal.

Randolph did a double take over his shoulder, then rushed to my side and guided me to the small table in the center of the kitchen. He fished a silver flask from under his vest and pushed it toward me. I took a sip of straight hot sauce because that was all the convincing my taste buds needed to switch my craving brain to something else, like the lava pouring down my throat.

“Every morning, Randolph,” I rasped.

He sipped at the flask, too, and a whole-body shudder quaked through him. We shared this morning ritual to fight off our addictions, if only temporarily, but I was glad to have him by my side for support.

My sister, a doctor who should know better, was an enabler. She’d originally pumped parasites into me because the metallic iron they fed on repelled the ghosts that had haunted me my whole life. Over the years, she’d become as addicted as I had once been. Okay, was still. I’d probably forever be a work in progress regarding iron and the safety it had once provided.

“Better?” Randolph asked, his voice rough. His eyes watered from the hot sauce.

“Yeah.” I shoved to my feet and stepped through the swinging doors into the dining room once again, doing my best to ignore everything in Ellison’s direction as I set the table.

Captain Glenn entered next, followed by Mase who winked when he saw me. Because I was a total head case for him, my anger seeped out the soles of my boots, a heated blush blooming along its path. Feozva, I was such a girl around him, though I supposed it was better than being a fourteen-year-old boy chef apprentice named James, my alter ego when I first boarded this ship more than two months ago.

“Good morning, crew,” Captain Glenn said, parking his stocky frame in the seat at the head of the gurney. His usual wide, friendly smile seemed pinched at the corners, and he wore clothes the same color as his black skin.

The sense of foreboding I had about landing on Orin multiplied considerably at his dark attire. Hopefully he wouldn’t be attending any of our funerals today.

“I suppose we should try to wrangle up a new table while we’re on Orin,” he said.

“Already on the list, Captain,” Randolph said, carrying a small platter of crispy volanti into the dining room. After I took it from him, he pointed his red-rimmed gaze at Mase. “You.”

Mase paused mid-sit, his eyebrows quirked. “Me?”

“You drank all the milk,” I said as I served the captain his breakfast first.

Mase sank down on his stool. “Ah, shit. Sorry.”

“I blame you for the lack of breakfast on this table,” Randolph barked. “Learn to drink hot sauce like the rest of us.”

Ellison’s gaze zipped to mine across the gurney. “Hot sauce?”

I waved the serving fork in the air to stop the flow of tempers and pointless questions. “He didn’t mean it. Nobody meant anything. We’ll get more milk on Orin.”

Randolph grumbled something about a nightmare breakfast, but I pulled him by the sleeve into the chair next to mine so he’d shut up and chill out. Tensions had been running a bit high lately, fueled by our various addictions and close proximity even on a big ship like the Vicious. We needed a short vacation from each other. I glanced at Mase. Some less than others.

Captain Glenn speared a strip of volanti with his fork. “I have credits for all of you from the teralingua delivery to Europa, but it’s not much, which leaves even less for food.”

“You can keep mine,” Ellison said as she unfolded her napkin.

“You’re a member of my crew,” the captain said.

Ellison spread the napkin in her lap. “Then let me help pay for food. With Absidy’s fugitive status, and my and Mase’s so-called turn on the rest of humanity, our futures are a little undecided. After Orin, we don’t know exactly where we’re going or how long it will take to get there. Please. Let me help.”

“You’re already paying to hire copies of the three of us,” Mase said, gesturing with his fork to me, him, and Ellison. “Are you sure?”

I sat between him and Randolph and dug into my crisped volanti. The hot sauce from earlier almost completely numbed its salty, overly sweet flavor.

Ellison glanced down at her plate and frowned. “If it means we don’t have to land again for a while, then yes. It’s doubtful the Ring Guild will let us pass through the rings to get back to Mayvel anyway, given that they know Mase is the pilot who made it public that he knows all their secrets when he turned traitor, so we’ll basically be adrift.”

“Lost,” Randolph murmured.

“No, not lost.” Captain Glenn bit into his volanti with a loud crunch and chewed. “Our pilot is more than capable of knowing exactly where we are. We just don’t have an exact destination after Orin.” His warm chocolate eyes flicked toward me. “But we’ll figure it out. Just like we’ll figure out how to warn the humans about the Saelis.”

I nodded and bit into my volanti, knowing full well the entire ship and its crew had risked their lives to save mine more than once since this ordeal had begun. Both Ellison and Mase had uttered a single word into their ships’ telecoms—sail, an old rebel term soldiers used when they went rogue and backed out of the Black War two hundred years ago. Some people said it meant they’d sided with the Saelis aliens and had turned their backs on humanity. Even today, people took that one word seriously, as they did with everything to do with the war that had wiped Earth from existence.

The war, we’d found out, had never ended, at least from the Saelis’ point of view. They wanted all humans to suffer the same fate as our home planet, the same fate as half their species. Saelis females had been slaughtered due to the parasites that lived under their scales—only females, since the parasite drove males mad with hunger. The parasites fed on iron, a plentiful food source since the metal made up the Saelis diet and the Saelis’ home planet was made of iron. These parasites also powered the Ring Guild’s space-bending iron rings, which created enough energy to travel the distance between solar systems faster than light. The parasites also swam through my veins, rushing a high through my body when I sucked down pieces of iron. The high was an addiction, as well as a lifesaver. I craved iron, which was the only thing that kept the malicious ghosts that had tormented me my whole life away. As I said, my life was not the regular kind.

But despite the captain’s promise that we would figure things out, I knew exactly where we needed to go after Orin. I just needed a few supplies that would help get us there. My sole concern was getting there before the Saelis did.

Mase glanced at the captain, but spoke to Ellison. “You don’t think the Ringers will ever let us back to Wix and Mayvel?”

Ellison sighed. “I mean, I didn’t ask them, but… Would you let us back through the rings knowing what we know? That the Ring Guild caused the Black War despite what our history books say?”

Mase stared across the table at Captain Glenn, who gave no indication that he’d overheard, other than ticking his gaze to the black plastic bracelet around his wrist. It was a photo album that held two digital pictures—one of his wife and one of his daughter, both of whom were hospitalized on Wix. If we couldn’t get back through the rings, he’d never see them again.

Yet another reason why we had to make the Ringers let us through, despite what we knew. The Saelis hadn’t destroyed Earth for no reason, as we were led to believe. The Ringers had brought Saelis wrath down on all humans, and I planned to remind them of that.

Captain Glenn picked up his glass of water, the slightest tremor in his hand. “Remember to keep your heads down today. We don’t need to draw any more attention to ourselves. Mase, you put out the call on the telecom for an engineer?”

Mase nodded as he inhaled his volanti. “Already have a few bites.”

“Make sure they know what they’re getting into,” the captain said. “Ellison and I will find copies of the three of you. I also need to get the ship serviced. Randolph and Absidy—”

“Captain, I think Absidy should stay on the ship,” Ellison said and patted her mouth with her napkin even though she hadn’t eaten anything. “Her face is plastered everywhere on wanted posters, and even though she doesn’t look like herself now, someone could still recognize her if they get too close.”

The hot sauce and volanti simmered with the heat firing through my veins. What in Feozva’s hell was she saying? I slammed a hand down on the gurney, making the dishes and everyone sitting around it jump.

I leaned forward, eyeballing her with a lethal glare. “Don’t talk about me like I’m not here.”

Even as I spit the words, I realized how stupid it was to let something as trivial as this set me off, but everything Ellison said or did riled me up. Maybe it wasn’t just iron withdrawal I was suffering through. All the painkillers she’d given me after the simultaneous ghost and Saelis attack had made my fresh parasites sluggish. Now, though, they screamed in agony and turned me feral.

Ellison placed her napkin on her plate and leveled me with a big sister stare from across the table. “I’m just trying to protect you, Abs. That’s all I’m ever trying to do.”

Captain Glenn stabbed his fork into the air. “She has a point, though. The fewer faces who are wanted by the police or the Ring Guild or anyone else”—he lifted an eyebrow at Mase—“the fewer chances we have of getting found out.”

I shook my head, my argument already rolling off my tongue before he’d finished. “Wait, Captain, I told Randolph I would help get the food. I’ll do what you said and keep my head down.”

“Vitamin D.” Mase straightened his long legs to the side of the gurney and folded his hands across his white thermal. “It’s a thing people need, so I hear. What’s the harm in letting her go for a little fresh air?”

I held out my arm toward him under the gurney until he took my hand in his warm grasp, my gaze locked on Captain Glenn, who glared at Mase.

“Please,” I said, hoping for a little more faith that I wouldn’t fling myself at the nearest police officer.

“This isn’t open for debate, Mason. Watch your tongue.” Captain Glenn rose from the gurney, his massive size just as intimidating as his hard stare, and threw his wadded napkin on his plate. “Sorry, Absidy. Randolph can handle the food on his own.”

I pinned Ellison with the darkest look I could summon while the captain stalked out. She pursed her lips in the most annoying way imaginable, pretending to ignore me, then followed.

“I’m getting off this ship, Mase,” I said once the door had shut behind them.

He stood, his hand still linked with mine. “Well, seeing as how I owe Randolph a favor anyway on account of my milk habit…”

Randolph scowled at the gurney, his fists squeezed tight on either side of his empty plate.

“I’m not saying to pretend that you forgot your food list, Randolph, to give the captain a head start so you can come back for my girl here.” He squeezed my hand before letting it drop and started for the door, his cowboy boots clipping over the titanium floor. Shoving the door open, he turned toward me, a smile turning up his devilish lips. “But I might be.” He winked and then he was gone.