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Booster smiled. “No practically about it, Corran, we are inviting her here.”

“But you can’t do that! Even if this station were bristling with missile launchers, there’s no way we could take down a Super Star Destroyer and an Impstar deuce.”

Wedge shook his head. “I understand your protest, Corran, but you’re not privy to the plans Booster, Tycho, and I have put together for dealing with Isard and her fleet. You do know we’ve been taking her forces apart bit by bit, which certainly was part of our overall plan, but we had to make decisions about what to do if Iceheart forced our hand, and she has.”

“Then tell me what the plans are so I don’t think you’ve lost your minds.”

“Can’t do that, CorSec.” Booster flipped his datapad closed with a click. “You’re going to go out and get the convoy and bring it here. If Isard decides to act early and take our pilots hostage, she can’t torture out of you information you don’t have.”

Wedge nodded in agreement. “And I need you to lead the escort flight because Isard and her agent would not believe we were on the level if you or Tycho or I did not bring the flight in. I don’t want to cut you out like this, but the less you know, the less you can reveal.”

Corran felt his flesh tighten around little goose bumps and a wave of weariness wash over him. “I hear what you’re saying, Wedge, but are you certain this is going to work?”

Booster roared with laughter. “Certain? Certain? Of course he’s not certain. The man who would only bet on certainty has no guts.”

“I have plenty of guts, Booster, but I don’t like risking them, or my life, or the lives of my friends, if I don’t have to. Certainty, or as close as I can get to it, is what I want.”

“And you call yourself a Corellian?” The big man snorted derisively as he sat back in his chair. “No wonder you joined CorSec.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I thought it was obvious, CorSec. If you had the guts for life—if you were even to imagine yourself worthy of my daughter—you wouldn’t have spent your life in service to the Empire’s puppet. You played it safe when men with real courage were out there defying the government.”

Corran’s fatigue melted as his anger grew. “Oh, you’re going to use the smugglers are really patriots story to excuse your greed? Let me tell you something, Booster Terrik, you can think of yourself as a noble scoundrel if you want, but the fact is you were out for money when you were running shipments, nothing more. The fact that you didn’t pay taxes on what you imported, the fact that you broke laws, might mark you as some sort of protester against the government in the eyes of some, but I know the truth. You were just a criminal—not as violent or bad as some others, but a criminal just the same. And those taxes you didn’t pay were the kind of taxes that build roads, maintain spaceports, and educate kids. What you did was deny them their due, and provide the contraband that allowed organizations like Black Sun and Hutt bands to thrive on our world.”

Corran thrust a finger directly at Booster. “And as for being worthy of your daughter, I’m the worthiest man you ever met. Every gram of character you think you have, she does have. And brains, too, and courage. And even you, Booster Terrik, don’t want to see her hooking up with a man who has your morals and standards.”

Booster rose from behind his desk, his hands balled into fists. “And if you were the man you think you are, Corran Horn, you’d not have abandoned her on Thyferra.”

“Abandoned her?” Corran’s mind flashed back to his mad dash into the refresher station and his fight with the stormtroopers. I didn’t abandon her. “You want to talk abandonment? I left for five seconds to save her life. You left her for five years, Booster, or have you forgotten your vacation on Kessel?”

“A ‘vacation’ your father got for me, Horn.”

Wedge stood abruptly and posted a hand in the middle of each man’s chest. “All right, stop it. Right now.” He gave each of them