The Smuggler He Married

Ottoline Vega has spent six years loading other people's cargo on Waystation Hal and two years quietly fixing the schedules so her shift crew does not get docked for hours they worked. Kesh Sarabhai has spent the same six years moving goods through this station without ever once filling out the right form. When customs seizes his ship, his lawyer gives him two options: spend a year in a station cell, or marry someone with clean papers and station residency. Ottoline wants a berth on a real ship more than she wants anything. The deal is simple, written, and about as romantic as a docking permit. It lasts exactly as long as it takes for Kesh to teach her the trade routes, for her to rewrite his contracts so they actually make money, and for both of them to notice that the port they keep coming back to is not a port at all. The customs prefect is closing in. Ottoline has a paper trail that will bury him. She has never been the sort of person anyone waited for.