Cora Buhlert 
Graveyard Shift [EPUB ebook] 

While docked at the civilian space station Unity for repairs, the Republic of United Planets battlecruiser Great Endeavour undertakes a trial flight with an inexperienced bridge crew. Disaster strikes and the Great Endeavour crashes into Unity’s shopping concourse, killing more than three hundred people.
A tragic accident, but in times of war, the public is not willing to accept tragic accidents. And so the Republic’s government sends its best troubleshooter, Colonel Brian Mayhew of the Republican Special Commando Forces to initiate a cover-up.
This is a novelette of 14100 words or approx. 48 print pages in the In Love and War series, but may be read as a standalone.