A/N: I'm baack! I'm sure you've been waiting anxiously! (:o)

Here is my next multi-chapter story (19 all together). It focuses mainly on Mal/Inara and Simon/Kaylee (my two favorite ships) and involves Inara heading back to Sihnon. Set approximately 6 months following the BDM.

I crave feedback, people, like a drug ... seriously, I've been in withdrawal since I finished posting the last series ... don't leave me hanging!

And thanks again to Leiasky, who continues to find the time to beta and give me plot bunnies! You rock, my dear.

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Best Intentions, ch. 1

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“Sir, are you sure you wanna take this job?”

Mal turned an incredulous look to his first mate and then turned back to stare out the ship’s canopy and into the black. “Are you kiddin’ me, Zo?” he asked rhetorically, noting that River had not moved her eyes from the controls since they had begun talking. “This job is serious money an’ we need the coin.”

With an inaudible sigh, Zoe answered, “I ain’t gonna disagree there, sir, but it’s also gonna take us pretty close to the Core.” She had hoped that over the past months, since Miranda, since he and Inara had gotten together that he would start acting more cautiously, not recklessly. With a hand to her brow, Zoe realized what a foolish notion that had been.

Rolling his eyes, Mal swiveled around fully in his chair and looked at his first mate. Zoe was a changed woman and that was no secret. Since Wash’s death, since Miranda, since the Reavers, there wasn’t much about Zoe that was the same. Except the look she was favoring him with now; that how-can-you-be-so-stupid-and-how-can-I-be-dumb-enough-to-follow-you look that Mal had seen plenty of times during the war and over the past seven years that they’d flown together.

But with a tight grin, he realized, she was still here, stupid or not. “C’mon, Zoe, the Core? The Alliance couldn’t find their way out of a paper bag with both hands and a flashlight right now. You know that. You think I’m gonna run ‘cause o’ t