“Ah, right,” Gideon hedged. “Unfortunately, it’s not quite as simple as that.”
Darion didn’t like the sound of that. He folded his arms across his chest. “Explain.”
“The software worm is the easy part. I’ve been ready with that for weeks. I can recreate the nanobot tech too. The problem is delivery. The bots can live for approximately twenty-four hours before they begin to degrade.” He let out a sigh. “When the nanobots break up and die, they also kill both their carrier and host.”
Darion scowled. “You’re saying by this time tomorrow, both Gopnik and Touati will be dead?”
“Yeah, give or take a few minutes.”
“Madre de Dios,”Rio muttered, slapping his palms on the table and pushing out of his chair to pace. “It took this long to get a bead on Touati. How long will it take us to ID another member of Opus’s inner circle?”
“Not to mention the fact that we can’t go around making Minions out of every Opus foot soldier we find,” Chase remarked with a pointed look at Darion. He may have left his Enforcement Agency past far behind in the decades he’d been part of the Order, but there was still a rigid by-the-book sense of propriety about the male.
“I’m not making any apologies when it comes to Opus,” Darion growled. “Nor when it comes to anyone else who thinks the Order’s going to sit back and watch the world burn on our watch. Opus. The Ancient. The Atlanteans and their queen. Far as I’m concerned, they’re all on notice. We didn’t start this war, but we’re sure as fuck going to finish it.”
Assenting nods circled the room as he spoke. Even Chase finally gave in, inclining his head in agreement over the tops of his steepled hands.
“You honor him well,” the commander said. “Lucan would be damned proud to be in this room and see you now.”
Darion mentally shook off the praise, feeling undeserving. “I’d rather see him back at the head of this table again. Until that’s possible, we’re all going to do whatever it takes to win this fight. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” they all answered as one.
Just then, a roar went up from somewhere in the command center.
Everyone jolted out of their seats. Anxious gazes swung from one warrior to another at the enraged howl that echoed all around them.
“Sounds like Lucan’s gonna need another hit of Ketamine,” Kade said, his tone more grave than humorous.
Darion shook his head. “That’s not my father.”
At the same time, Nathan burst into the war room. His face was ashen, his eyes stark with fury . . . and fear.
“Jordana.” His voice shook with dark emotions. “Something’s happened to her. She’s scared as hell and I--”
A sudden charge crackled in the air of the war room then Zael dropped to the floor, materializing out of nowhere. The Atlantean soldier looked bone-weary, beaten. He lifted his head and his regret-filled gaze searched out Nathan.
“She’s gone,” he gasped. “I’m sorry. Selene has taken Jordana.”
CHAPTER 16
It hadn’t gone the way Selene had hoped at all.
She teleported back to the realm with Jordana, touching down in a luxuriously appointed chamber on the same floor of the palace as the royal living quarters. As soon as their feet touched the rug-covered marble floors, Jordana lunged at her with a furious scream.
Selene blocked her granddaughter’s clawing hands with a wave of her wrist, constructing a thin wall of light between them.
“Please, don’t fight me, Jordana.”
“Fight you?” she snarled. “I’ll kill you if you don’t let me go!”
Selene frowned, rubbing at the heaviness in the center of her chest as she stared into Jordana’s tear-filled, desperate eyes. Selene had actually thought Jordana would be relieved--even if just a little bit--to be returned to her true home. Grateful to be reunited with her sole remaining family and her own kind.
Instead, she was enraged.
Terrified, even.
Jordana’s beautiful face was filled with fear and loathing as she summoned fireballs to her palms and tried to let them fly at Selene. Tried, but failed.
