Free Starflight by Melissa Landers

admitting, “It was a handheld stunner.”
    Neuro-inhibitors. That explained a lot.
    He shook his head in disgust, recalling the way she’d offered her hand to him after their argument on the
Zenith
. He’d actually felt too guilty to accept it, and now look. She’d trussed him up in workmen’s coveralls and plundered his credit account. His first instincts had been right. Once a felon, always a felon.
    “Kidnapping is low,” he yelled. “Even for you.”
    Her fists pounded twice against the door. “I didn’t have a choice.”
    “Save your breath.” He glanced around the room for a way to wedge the door shut. “I know who I am, and soon the captain will, too.”
    “Wait, no!”
    If he could just find a crowbar to shove through the door handle…
    “Doran, listen to me,” she shouted. “You don’t want to tell the crew who you are.”
    He grabbed a floating bungee cord and used it to tether the door handle to a nearby hook in the wall. The tension wasn’t as strong as he’d like, but it should hold long enough for him to alert the captain.
    “Remember the buzzing last night?” she went on. “That wasn’t the engine. It was a warning blast from the Enforcers. This crew is running from the law.” When he turned and prepared to launch himself toward the stairs, she added, “These are the kind of people who might ransom you.”
    Her warning stopped him cold in his tracks.
    He reached out a hand to steady himself against the door, and then he wasn’t in the ship’s engine room anymore. For a sliver of a second, he was locked inside a dark closet. The air smelled musty and metallic, like mold and blood, and there wasn’t enough of it in the tiny space. He panted for oxygen and choked on acrid smoke while the echo of his brother’s screams filled his head.
    Doran gritted his teeth and told himself it wasn’t real.
    That closet doesn’t exist anymore. It burned to the ground
.
    He opened his eyes and cemented himself in reality. He was safe.
    “You’re just saying that to save yourself,” he yelled. He couldn’t stop his voice from cracking.
    “I can prove it.” She must’ve pressed her lips to the door because she sounded close enough to stun him again. “They pulled the ship’s tracker. If you don’t believe me, go to the bridge and check. The port will be empty.”
    Doran rubbed his forehead and considered his options. He knew that criminals disabled their trackers, but that didn’t mean Solara was telling the truth. He needed to check—alone. He set off through the hallways and stairwells, flinching every time his weightless body thumped against the wall. Waking the crew was a bad idea, at least until he knew he could trust them. When he reached the top level, he gingerly slid aside the pilothouse door and shielded his face from the starlight streaming through the front window.
    Once his eyes adjusted to the brightness, he scanned the control panel until he found a red bull’s-eye with the acronym SLATS stenciled above it—Solar League Auto Tracking System. He pulled his way closer and dipped his finger into the circular depression where the tracker belonged. The port was empty, just as Solara had said.
    “Damn it,” he whispered.
    Leave it to her to book them on a ship full of fugitives.
    As much as he hated it, she was right. Revealing his identity to this crew was as smart as sticking his arm in an ore grinder. Just like the others, they’d hear the name
Spaulding
and see easy credits. His dad loved him enough to pay the ransom, but Doran wouldn’t put either of them through that hell again.
    Never again.
    Somehow he would have to let his father know he was safe, then lie low until the next outpost. His dad would send a private shuttle, maybe even pilot it himself to make sure everything was all right. That was what he’d done last year—walked right out of a shareholders meeting to fetch Doran from spring break during a mutated flu pandemic. Any other man would have sent an