Chapter Eight
Gray
Gray had always thought the Senate complex looked smaller in person.
On the news, it dominated the skyline of New Athens, all gleaming stone and sweeping steps and crisp white pillars, an architectural promise that someone, somewhere, was in charge.Up close, though, it looked tired.The facade was still grand, but he could see the hairline cracks in the marble, the guarded tension in the security teams, the way the flags atop the building whipped in the wind like they were unsure which way to lean.
Maybe that was fitting.The whole world was balanced on a fault line this morning.
The air was cold and bright, the kind of thin, brittle chill that made his breath ghost in front of him as he and Hannah climbed the broad steps toward the east entrance.The sky above them was a clear, piercing blue, deceptively calm after the storm he’d called down over the city the night before.If someone had tuned in only now, they would never have guessed that New Athens had nearly torn itself apart twelve hours earlier.
He could still feel the echo of lightning under his skin, and the way the city’s electrical grid had sung when he and Hannah had pushed the Protogenus weapon back on itself.His power had never settled all the way after that.It still hummed low and constant in his veins like a second heartbeat.
Next to him, Hannah walked with her shoulders squared and her chin slightly lifted.If she was nervous, she wasn’t letting it show.Her fingers laced with his in an easy, unshakable grip.Their bond warmed between them, not the blinding explosion it had been when they consummated it, but a steady, sunlike heat, pulsing with awareness.He could feel her there at the edge of his thoughts.The banked coil of her power was prepared to rise the instant he needed it.A thin thread of fear ran through her, sharp and bright, but it never once pulled away from him.If anything, she clung to him harder with her mind than with her hand.
He squeezed her fingers gently, letting reassurance bleed down the bond.We’ve got this, he sent, not in words but in intent, a calm certainty wrapped around steel.
Her answer came back threaded with wry amusement and stubborn faith.We’d better,it seemed to say.You promised me breakfast after we saved democracy.
The corner of his mouth twitched despite himself.
At the base of the steps, barricades had been set up to hold back the crowd.They were already hundreds of people pressed against the metal rails, shouting, waving signs that ranged fromCURE THEM ALLtoSUPES SAVE LIVESin a chaotic mishmash of fonts and colors.News drones hovered overhead, their lenses following every movement.More cameras were anchored on tripods along the perimeter, the networks broadcasting live shots of the entrance.
The weight of those cameras were like a pressure at the back of his neck, an awareness that made his instincts want to square his shoulders and bare his teeth.He didn’t.He kept his pace even, his grip on Hannah gentle, his expression neutral.
He wasn’t here to terrify anyone.
He was here to show them who he really was.
“Spark.”Yaz waited for them at the top of the steps, already in full tactical gear, dark hair pulled back, expression sharp.Rick stood beside her, hands in the pockets of his suit, looking like someone had dropped a former special ops operative into a political drama and dared anyone to call him out on it.
“You’re late,” Yaz said, which was her way of sayingyou look like hell, and I’m glad you’re still walking.
Gray glanced at the chronometer display above the entrance.They were ten minutes early.“Traffic,” he deadpanned.
Hannah’s fingers squeezed his; he didn’t have to look to know she was trying not to smile.
Rick’s gaze flicked to their joined hands, then up to Gray’s face, and he smirked.“Good,” he said.“You’re going to need each other in there.”
Gray didn’t bother pretending otherwise.“Status?”
“Inside, the joint committee is convened,” Yaz said.“Officially it’s a ‘special hearing to reconsider the scope of the power-removal initiative.’Unofficially, half the room is here to watch you self-destruct and the other half is hoping you won’t.”
“And Pierce?”Gray asked.
Rick’s jaw tightened.“Missing since last night.But we’d be idiots to assume she’s not in play.Vera had another premonition about ‘steel teeth around a throat’ and ‘a shadow behind the law.’She says the danger isn’t just the vote.It’s what Pierce does if she loses.”
Gray let the metaphor settle in the back of his mind, a puzzle piece for later.His focus stayed on the steps ahead, the cameras, the crowd, the woman at his side.
His woman.
The thought slid through him with a quiet shock.He’d claimed her fully last night, body and power and soul, and she’d claimed him right back, her fingers fisted in his hair, her voice breaking on his name as the bond fused.The memory of her pleasure through their connection almost stole his breath even now.
Not the time, he reminded himself, feeling heat coil low in his abdomen.But the bond didn’t care about timing.It linked his arousal to her awareness in a shimmering wash.She glanced up at him, cheeks coloring faintly, eyes bright with a knowledge that made his chest tighten.
“We go in together,” Hannah said quietly.“We speak together.If they try to split us—”
“They won’t,” Gray said.“And if they do, they’ll regret it.”
