“Is it another zurgle?” Kilo asks.
I ease the door open and hear two sets of thoughts. “Worse.”
The cavrinskh’s thoughts are sluggish, like it’s recently woken up. Which means it might be sluggish too. Kill it now. We can ask questions later.
Exhaling, I move inside. It takes three steps to find it. One squeeze of my trigger to kill it.
The cavrinskh was distracted enough I probably could have waited to shoot it. It wasn’t hungry, but it would have been well fed.
“How the hell did that get here?” Riann asks when he stops beside me after fighting Kilo to get inside.
“Don’t know.” I’m too busy looking at the man with half of his throat torn out, a black pool forming beneath him. “Is he one of yours?”
“It’s a CSS uniform, but it’s old. If I wasn’t paying attention, it would pass for one of ours, but… if he is one of ours and his CO didn’t immediately make him change out of that…”
“We need to figure out whatthatgoes to.” Kilo shines his light across the floor.
The arm the cavrinskh tore off is halfway across the room, a detonator still grasped in the disconnected hand.
The dying man doesn’t realize he doesn’t have it anymore. He can’t figure out why it isn’t working.
Die die die already.
I squat down to a level that makes him look down and closes most of his neck.
The blood doesn’t stop, but there’s less of it.
“You were waiting for us.”
He laughs, choking when the movement pulls more blood into his windpipe. A spark of an idea crosses his mind a moment before he says, “Sorry boss.” He looks at Riann, still choking. “I couldn’t get rid of them for you.”
Kilo looks at Riann too, face pinched in confusion. But it’smeantto be confusing. A lie with ill intent choked out by a dying man.
I shoot him in the head before he can spit any more.
Both Kilo and Riann flinch away from me.
“He was already dead. Why let him keep talking when all he was going to do was try to pit us against each other?” Standing, I scan the room. “We need to finish up down here and then we need to go back up and see who’s surprised to have us back.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO
RISK
“The Maker’s alive,”Chrys gasps as she gets into the car. “I saw him. He was talking to that waitress at the cafe. Who may or may not have tried to drug me.”
She looks at me, expectantly, as Shock turns the car away from the cafe, and I look for any sign of him.
“I don’t know if Paisley was trying to drug you, but his name is Atker.”
“You knew?”
“We only just found out,” Shock says. “He made it so the people who know who he is are afraid to speak his name.”
“He was talking to the waitress… she wants Kissu…” Worrying her lip piercings, Chrys says, “I think we need to get home and check on him.”
Shock takes us home, ignoring speed recommendations. Arc still hasn’t fixed the regulator and I know Chrys is happy for that right now.
