Riley Bajer looked like he tried to kick deer in the face. Not a weak tap either— he was the unmedicated ADHD double flying mule kick type of guy. I couldn’t ask for a better XO. He once took off at a dead sprint in the middle of Bangkok. Later that night we found him with a busted nose and split lip belting Shania Twain with a small Thai man who apparently had a vicious right hook and zero conniptions on stiffing foreigners during unsanctioned poker games.

Problem was that Riley was a chicken killing dog, and I had just inherited Tyson family farms. I was a loose captain— it’s good for moral on short to medium trips, but I wasn’t loose enough that I felt comfortable playing 50/50 with losing a $25 Million dollar job.

Riley had been a gun runner in his relative youth. He had a precious talent for attracting danger— and escaping it unscathed. The FARC had let him play soldier with them for six months before they decided he was too ready to spray and pray. Hard to fight for the cause when someone on your own team might accidentally turn your legs into spaghetti bolognese.

No one wants to ever kill their dog. But sometimes you have to do it. That’s what the contracting organization had said anyway.

“Terminate Mr.Bajer before the contract starts and you’ll fulfill the requirements for the job.”

What a load of horseshit. Anybody with a mean dog knows there’s nobody else you want in your corner when the world turns to shit.

I didn’t become a captain because I toss my crew away and I wasn’t going to start now.

I walked into the mess hall to find Riley sitting at the table. He looked up at me while chewing his latest curried concoction.

“What’s up, cap?”

“Bajer, there are some details on the new contract I need to go over with you.”

“Good details?”

“Bad. They’re asking me terminate you before we start the job.”

“Ha!” Riley barked and curry flew from his mouth. “You really pick jobs from the dumbest sons a bitches out there, cap.”

“You’re not worried?” I shifted as I looked over my personal wrecking ball. Half the man was scarred and pitted with memories of past battles.

“About you offing me? No, I would have only worried if they gave the job to Kilner with the same conditions. But you? Savior to the lost and damned? Get real.”

“Huh.”

“So what’s our game plan? Regular execution and special ops team to contain the threat?”

“Corporate seek and destroy? It’ll be something like that. They won’t see it coming.”

“I don’t know. They picked you specifically for this job. And wanted you to off me of all people on the crew. I’m betting they want you come after them. They probably know the infamous Captain Callan Adair takes his loyalty to the grave. So, they gave you a shovel to dig it.” I narrowed my eyes at the big man.

“It’s disconcerting when you start stringing sentences together like this. Might make the others think your violence isn’t mindless.”

“Mindless? You got me wrong, cap. It’s personal— that’s what worries the others,” he took another bite of food and chewed for a couple moments. “There’s a cost to it. The difference between me and the rest of the crew is that I don’t mind paying it.”