ACT CASUAL.
CONTAIN.
Cassia read hers with a flick of her eyes, mouth flattening.
Ellum tilted his head, glanced over at Lung, who had gone suddenly still.
The energy feeder—Maxwell, vampire variant, former MSA—snorted, barely audible. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he muttered—to himself, to his feed, not to her.
Sophia stiffened. “What? What is it?”
“We need to take you back to headquarters,” Xen told her.
Thorne went completely still. Like daylight had hit him, and he’d turned to stone mid-pulse. His eyes flicked toward her. Toward the blood on her feet. The sweat at her temples. The confused, frightened crease between her brows. It was clear he’d be willing to fight Xen to the death before he let him take her—and a part of Xen found he would greatly enjoy that—but the silent Maukin interrupted Thorne by flashing him his phone.
Thorne read the texts, then snatched the phone from the cat-walker and messaged back: AND YOUR INTENTIONS?
Because he would fight Xen anyways, even though he knew it would be foolish to do so.
For his honor, perhaps.
Or, more likely, for love.
SURGICAL REMOVAL OF THE TRANSMITTING DEVICE.
Xen modeled the procedure across his surgical subroutines. Biocompatibility: acceptable. Risk profile: high. Viability: confirmed. It would take days to free her from the net she’d been trapped in, but he should be able to do it. And she? Shewas young. Her body had already been through the transmitter insertion and extensive plastic surgery.
It was good at healing.
85.63% CHANCE SHE’LL SURVIVE,he messaged back.
Xen could tell by Thorne’s wrist he was tempted to crush the phone in his hand. The odds were not good enough.
100% CHANCE SHE WILL DIE OTHERWISE.
Because Xen could see that, too, with his integrated tissue mapping suite. There was a switch inside her.
When Sophia ceased to be useful to whoever had Sirena, they would kill her to cover their tracks. Planned obsolescence of the cruelest sort.
Because there was more.
Beneath the transmitter node—shielded, embedded—was a charge.
Not large. Not crude.
But smart.
Shaped. Lined in reactive gel.
Enough to tear through a body.
Enough to shred steel at ten feet.
They wired it to her heart.
He was not scanning for a bomb.
But he found one there anyway.
