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It took a while to work sufficient saliva into his parched mouth to answer. “Kào.”

“Kay-oh,” the man had repeated, drawing out the sound. “A strong name. A name worthy of your spirit. I’ll let you keep it. Your surname, however, will be mine.” With that, the benevolent giant tucked Kào under a brawny arm and carried him away from Vantaar. And into a new life
.

The giant had been Moray.
Moray!
A man who’d loomed larger than life to him ever since.

Kào glanced wildly about the bridge. A few aides poked up their heads from their stations. Meeting his quelling glare, they ducked quickly back to work.

Dazed, he turned back to the screen, but it displayed only the stars; the admiral’s communication with Moray had ended, for now. But the image of his ring was seared into Kào’s mind as brutally as the brand on his neck. On that long-ago day on Vantaar it had represented imminent
death, the incarnation of a tiny boy’s nightmare: “
I know someone who’ll enjoy it more
 . . .”

A drumbeat of disbelief thundered inside Kào as he grasped for composure. He’d been taken in and raised by an Alliance turncoat who had experienced a moment of mercy, taking a little boy off-planet instead of killing him or handing him over to the Talagars.

It was more than a moment of mercy
, Kào’s conscience argued.
He raised you, cared for you, taught you morals, and right from wrong
.

Kào’s stomach rolled. His hands sweated. His thoughts swerved once more to the recent dinner he’d shared with Moray, when the man had confided that he’d been a bitter and disillusioned man for years after losing his wife and children. “When I took you home it all changed,” he’d said. “I was a man without a family. And you, Kào, a little boy who needed one.”

But how bitter was Moray? How disillusioned? Enough to betray the Alliance? He was seen by many as one of its greatest heroes. Was he in fact their greatest traitor?

“Ah,” Kào said hoarsely, pressing the back of his hand to his mouth to tamp down an almost overwhelming gag reflex. Was he supposed to love Moray or hate him? Both emotions fought for dominance. Moray had saved him, a traumatized orphan, but only after participating in the destruction of Vantaar as a thug admired for his mercilessness by a Talagar who beat defenseless children.

Every deed the commodore had accomplished over the years was now tainted by treachery in Kào’s mind. He’d saved thousands from certain death on the Ceris space station, but was it only so he could siphon off a countless number and hand them over to the Talagar Empire? By the Seeders, he’d been patrolling the Perimeter for years. How many Talagar ships had he allowed to pass through? And during the war, how many more? The idea of such duplicity
from the man he so admired sickened Kào beyond the nausea that gripped him.

How could his father have remained such a stranger to him? How? Even the worst of the Talagarian torture sessions hadn’t generated this much agony.

If he hadn’t been on the bridge, he’d be ignorant still. But he wasn’t unaware any longer. He knew what his father was. Memories didn’t lie. Moray was a slave-broker disguised as a champion, and now he planned to hand over Jordan and her people to Steeg.

She was all he’d ever wanted, and he would lose her. She and her people would meet the same horrible fate as his family. He’d been helpless on that long-ago day on Vantaar. Was he still? Anger and anguish twisted sharply together until he could no longer separate them. History would not repeat itself, he vowed.

Find Jordan. Warn her
.

A sense of urgency propelled him away from the railing.

The bridge hummed with activity as Moray, by all appearances a loyal Alliance officer, led his well-trained crew through the gauntlet of taking over the Talagar vessel. It was an elaborate ruse Moray and Steeg had concocted. Surely, Trist and the other Talagars were in on it. And who else? Kào scrutinized the faces of those who worked diligently at their stations. It was a small crew. He’d heard that many had been transferred to other ships recently. Now Kào wondered why. But those working appeared to be loyal Alliance citizens, scientists here because they wanted to explore the outer reaches of space with a famous man. Perhaps hero worship had rendered the crew blind to the traitors lurking among them.

As for the crew members of Talagarian descent, in Kào’s opinion, anyone with red eyes was suspect. But what about Moray? He wasn’t a Talagar, yet he acted like one. Certainly,
that day on Vantaar he had been ready to kill like one.

No
, an inner voice argued,
a different Ilya. Not Ilya, your loving father. Not Commodore-elite Ilya Moray, the highest-ranking officer in the Perimeter Patrol Corps. Not a humanitarian credited for saving thousands of lives over the years at the risk of his own
. But even as Kào’s heart told him one thing, reason demanded that he face the facts that had eluded him for twenty-four years.

The truth about his father.

Find Jordan. Warn her
. With emotions forcibly disabled, he stalked past Moray with the barest of nods. A heavy hand landed on his shoulder, bringing him to a halt. But only because Kào allowed himself to be stopped.

Moray’s smile was one of fatherly concern. “What’s wrong, Kào?”

He felt like that three-year-old boy again in the way the contents of his bladder screamed for release. But he had a man’s control. And a man’s pride. “I’ve spent long enough looking into the eyes of Talagars,” he said truthfully. “Now that I have the freedom to decide, I don’t care to spend another moment doing so. If you’ll excuse me, I must go.”

His father stayed in front of him, his boots planted wide. “It wasn’t wise of me to allow you to view the battleship,” he said. “The war is too fresh in your mind. Now I see it was too soon for you. My apologies.”

Moray’s tone conveyed both worry and a father’s love. Kào wasn’t sure if it was genuine or fabricated, but Moray had spoken loudly enough for the entire bridge crew to hear. It hit him that Moray might be using the impromptu forum to reassure those on the crew who weren’t directly involved in any treachery.

Find Jordan. Warn her
.

Kào shifted from boot to boot in his impatience to leave. The need to find Jordan and ensure her safety gripped him
as nothing else ever had. He saw himself fully capable of murder if his father kept him from going to her. But bringing on himself death or imprisonment would defeat his plan.
Calm
. He reached deep for composure, but a tremor wobbled his hands.

With the accuracy of proton torpedoes, the commodore’s eyes honed in on that reaction. “You’re shaking.”

“I’m tired.” Now it seemed that everyone on the bridge was watching. Sympathy filled some eyes. The rest he could tell saw him as a mentally and physically wounded ex-POW who suffered post-traumatic stress syndrome. And they were probably right. “You’re keeping me from my bed, Father.”

“You were always frank with me,” Moray persisted. “Why not now? What troubles you?”

Kào exhaled. “Steeg. I don’t trust him.” He waited, curious to see what Moray’s reaction would be.

There was no reaction. Either the man was a sociopath or he truly with all his soul believed his cause was just. Or perhaps it was both.

Moray spread his hands. “What is the admiral going to do? His weapons are disabled. Everything in our arsenal, is aimed at his bridge. He poses no threat. Steeg will soon be on his way to the detention facility on Sofu. They’re done, my boy. Through. They won’t trouble us again.”

“I must brief the refugees on the matter,” Kào said and again tried to walk past Moray. The man stopped him with three fingers on his forearm.

“Trist will brief them.”

“She hasn’t been on the job long enough. I have.”

“You’re agitated, Kào.”

“Agitated? I am not agitated!” He winced inwardly, knowing that he must sound just as Moray accused.

“Medical will give you something to help.”

The crew looked on, caring and sympathetic. Why was it that when you were trying to act sane, you came across as
anything but? Kào fisted his hands at his sides and swallowed hard.
Play along
, sudden instinct warned. Yes. He could put on a show as well as Moray, could he not? He’d been raised by a master of deception, he thought bitterly, and now it was time to use what he’d learned. It would buy him time, of which he had very little.

He winced and rubbed his head. “Ah. You’re right. I’ll see about getting myself something to help me sleep. And once I wake, I’ll search out my cold-weather gear for Sofu.” He forced a smile.

His father’s face brightened. “You’re excited about the trip.” The commodore’s hand landed on his back, and Kào did his best not to go rigid at the contact. He didn’t want the traitor touching him. It was bad enough having to speak to him in a civil manner.

But civility would save Jordan. And her people. “About our dinner tonight, sir. I don’t know if I’ll be up to it. I’d better rest for the journey to Sofu.”

“Ah. Just as well. I’ll be debriefing the admiral this evening.”

Debriefing? More like reminiscing about old raids and the latest Talagar perversions
.

“And it’s best I do that with my intelligence staff only in attendance.”

Wise choice, Father. If I’m there, Steeg won’t survive the encounter
.

“Perhaps tomorrow,” Moray said. As he walked with Kào to the exit, he shook his head sadly. “Soon enough you’ll be gone.”

“Soon enough,” Kào agreed. Moray regarded him strangely. Kào couldn’t care less. The commodore dropped his hand, tacit permission to leave. Kào clicked his heels together and strode away from the bastard.

Docking was imminent. He didn’t know where he was going to hide two hundred and eighty-seven Earthers, but a plan would come to him. It had to.

“Darth Vader’s here!”

At the sound of little Christopher’s familiar call, Jordan spun around. Kào was walking toward her with the boy nestled in his muscular arms. If it weren’t totally inappropriate and unprofessional, she would have thrown her arms around him. They were well into the evacuation. Three quarters of the people were gone. About seventy remained. And time was short, according to Trist.

“You came,” she said, relief swelling inside her.

“Darth Vader’s here,” Christopher repeated, affectionately rubbing his hand up and down Kào’s scarred cheek.

“I see that,” Jordan whispered, her throat thick. Kào dropped the boy to his feet. As he watched the child scamper away, his eyes clouded with sadness, and he appeared exhausted to the bone.

“You look like hell, Kào,” she said quietly.

Her voice seemed to call him back from somewhere far away, a painful place. “Hell?” he inquired.

“It’s an Earth expression. Technically, it means the place you go after death if you’ve lived an evil life. Eternal damnation. In other words, you burn in horrible agony for all eternity.”

Kào’s dark eyes narrowed. A muscle in his cheek jumped. “May such comeuppance await the beasts on this vessel.”

“The ones who lied to us, yes.” Jordan grabbed him by the elbow. “Talk to me on the way. We have to hurry. Trist wants us to take shelter on the airplane. So much has happened. I’ll tell you. And we’re going home!”

Outrage flared in his face. “You’re not going anywhere.”

Some of the passengers glanced their way. “Excuse me?” Jordan hissed, then waved at the line of passengers. “Are you going to tell them that? What’s happened, Kào? What’s wrong?”

“I have reason to believe that the plan isn’t to relocate you to a new home but to acquire you as slaves. There are slave-brokers aboard this ship that wish to make it so.”

Jordan’s vision dimmed as the blood left her head. “Someone wants to sell us into slavery?”

“Give us something we can
really
be scared of,” cried one of the men passing by.

The passengers around him cheered. An elderly woman raised her fist at Kào. “He’s right. We’ve heard it all. It’s just another threat to keep us quiet. Another lie. Screw ‘em! We’re going home.”

Jordan listened, open-mouthed. The passengers weren’t afraid. They were angry! She could almost understand why. They’d had to absorb one shocking revelation after another for weeks now. After a while, even the most traumatizing news lost its impact.

Kào gripped her shoulder. His voice was hoarse. Urgent. She had never seen him this way, and she began to get
worried, too. “Stop your people,” he ordered. “Call them back. Trist is sending you to your deaths.”

“No, she’s helping us. The coordinates you sent to the Science Academy, the ones entered into the official database, they don’t correspond to Earth. We found that out, and she confirmed it. The coordinates are for a planet named Kerils. It’s not in the Alliance database, either. Someone’s lying. And it’s not Trist.”

He read his translator with an appalled expression. “The holo-movie I showed you was Kerils?”

“That’s right. Not Earth. Earth is fine. No comet hit.”

He watched her intently for several heartbeats. “Treachery is indeed afoot,” he said at last. Heat radiated off his lean and powerful body. He smelled like apple soap and male perspiration, his own unique scent, pheromone rich, because it aroused her in the midst of a situation in which sexual desire had no place. “And one of the traitors is Commodore Moray.”

“Good God. Your father?”

He winced, as if the term “father” had become unpalatable. He quickly told her about his flashback. About Steeg. About a child’s terror.

Of all the revelations, she knew it was Moray’s apparent betrayal that affected him most of all. “The man who raised me, who I thought genuinely loved me and perhaps still does, embodies all I detest, Jordan. All I fought against. Now I have to stop him before he hurts anyone else. Before he hurts you.” He closed his eyes for a heartbeat, but not before she’d glimpsed a flash of raw pain.

Jordan wanted to slide her arms over his stiff shoulders and soothe away his grief. She wanted to take him to bed and love him until his thoughts centered on nothing else but how much he was cherished. But in light of the unfolding conspiracy and the danger they faced, as well as their apparent opposite stance on Trist, she wondered if she’d
ever have the chance to hold him like that again.