The False Bounty

Juno Vance owes Mara Halloran for a freighter that barely flies. The debt just jumped, the cooling system is failing, and Halloran has called in the loan: forty-eight hours to pay, or she takes the Magpie and sells off the crew.

Then the biggest bounty Juno has ever seen lands on her screen. Ash Calder. Ex-Concord navigator. Back-alley doctor. Three hundred thousand credits, enough to clear the debt, fix the ship, and keep her license.

Ash swears the warrant is fake. The paperwork says otherwise. His face is on every screen in Tallow Station, there's no law on the docks, and every runner on the station wants him first.

Juno has two days, a crew she can't afford to lose, and a prisoner who won't say what he knows. Taking him in is the easy part. Living with it is the problem.

A fast, crew-driven space opera with a slow-burn, closed-door romance. For fans of Fallen Empire and Backyard Starship.