opened his mouth. The shit he said to Brook enraged him. How fucking dare he?
“Easy,” Raze urged, putting a hand on his shoulder. “He’s a superior officer. You can’t go kick his ass.”
“He’s no superior,” Cipher growled. “He’s a piece of shit.”
“Agreed,” Raze said, his voice low, “but there are other ways of handling this.” The boss arched his brows in silent communication. “Right?”
Cipher nodded, understanding exactly what Raze meant. “Right.”
The thought of getting Reckless alone somewhere and planting his fist in the other man’s face stilled his rage. As he watched Brook climb into the tube, his heart broke a little bit. She looked impossibly small inside the chamber and so scared.
I should have been there with her.
Speeding up the footage until after he had taken her home, he slowed it down when Reckless started to lay into Chance about something. He rolled it back a few seconds and let it play.
“Don’t you ever question me in front of a patient!” Reckless pointed his finger at Chance. “And you sure as hell better never question me in front of a gash!”
Cipher’s rage flared back to life at hearing Brook referred to so crudely.
“Sir, she’s an officer’s mate. She risked her life to—”
“She’s nothing,” Reckless interrupted nastily. “She’s just some backwoods piece of trash who doesn’t deserve to breathe the same air as us. None of these women that have joined our men are worthy of our seed. They’re worse than the poppies.” He made a disgusted face. “The only good thing on that skinny tunnel rat was her mouth. It’s the only place I’d allow my seed to land.”
“Sir!” Chance recoiled. “You cannot—”
“I can do whatever the fuck I want. This is my unit. I’m the one who makes the rules here. If you don’t like it, go back to the Valiant where you soft pussies belong.”
“Fucking gladly, sir,” Chance snarled and turned on his heel. As he reached the doorway, he stopped. “You can take your other offer and shove it up your ass, sir.”
“Chance! Soldier! Get back here!” Reckless shouted after Chance, but the medic kept walking until he was out of frame.
“What other offer?” Cipher glanced at Raze who seemed just as taken aback by what they had just witnessed.
“No idea.” Jaw hardening, Raze said, “Make copies of that. Send one to me. Send another to Orion and one to Vicious.”
“On it, boss.” Cipher minimized the feed, grabbed the file, copied it and sent it to the admiral and general. He suspected Reckless would be on his way back to Prime as soon as he was discharged from the hospital.
“Wait. Where are they going?” Raze gestured to the screen where Chance had walked into frame along with another man. “Is that the dead medic?”
“Yes,” the tech answered. “Talon. He is—was—the senior medical tech on that unit.”
Cipher maximized the feed. Chance and the senior medic looked ready to confront Reckless. The audio cut out before Reckless appeared, robbing them of the chance to hear the heated conversation. The angle was too poor for Cipher to attempt to use one of the programs that read lips. The discussion grew more belligerent as all three men were pointing and shouting.
“Look at Chance’s face,” Raze said, his finger pointing at the younger man as Talon stormed after Reckless off screen. “He looks surprised.”
Cipher agreed. “Something’s not right.”
“Wait! What the hell?” Raze exclaimed as the feed went black. “Did we just lose it?”
Cipher tapped away but couldn’t retrieve any data. “It was shut off inside the room.”
“Reckless?” Raze guessed. “He walked out of view. He probably cut the audio when he saw them come back to confront him.”
“Probably,” Cipher agreed. Sitting back in his chair, he asked the obvious question. “Did those three get into a fight? Was this a workplace dispute?”
“Looks that way,” Raze said quietly. “Shit. What a mess!” He scratched the back of his head and made a face. “Get Keen over here. This is a criminal matter. It’s out of our purview.”
“You got it, boss.” Cipher keyed up his mic to relay the request. Raze stomped off to pull the team back and end the lockdown.
What followed was three hours of absolute bullshit. Cipher and the rest of SRU Alpha were forced to wait on the departure deck as Raze, Keen, the captain of the Mercy and Falcon, Orion’s newly promoted second-in-command, argued about who had jurisdiction over the case and whether Reckless and Chance could stay on the same medical ship together. Until Reckless or Chance