“Congratulations, Mr. Murphy,” Dr. Grey rumbled, giving me another one of those grins that made me feel off kilter. “We’reveryexcited to see what you come up with in the memory therapy space. We have high expectations, but I’m confident you’ll meet them swimmingly.”
“Thank you, sir,” I breathed as I crawled out of the chair.
Luke cleared his throat and stepped back. “Now, back to The Cave you go. You can leave your old key card here; we’ll make sure it’s disposed of properly. You won’t be needing it anymore.”
“Okay, sounds good.”
“Let’s go, Milo.” Sebastian sighed, jerking his head back toward the door. “Let’s get you back to work.”
I nodded, scurrying after him and muttering quick goodbyes over my shoulder as we left the lab.
Seb was just as quiet on the walk back to MTR as he had been on our trip here, and I found myself reaching out to tug on the sleeve of his jacket hesitantly. As soon as my fingers brushed his arm, the chip seemed to burn lightly under my skin. I flinched and jerked away from him. I glanced up to find Sebastian looking down at me like… he looked like he feltsorryfor me.
“I just made a mistake, didn’t I?” I whispered. He pursed his lips and nodded.
“Yes, Milo. I told you to run, but you didn’t listen, and now there’s no escape for you.”
Ice shot through my veins, and I glanced down at the innocent little cotton ball taped to my arm.
“What do you mean?”
Sebastian shrugged.
“Why don’t you try leaving campus? You’ll find out pretty quick.”
That was all he said as he brushed his chip against the keypad that let us into MTR.
With those ominous words hanging between us, I followed him back to The Cave. I was dying to get Jay alone so I could ask him what the heck Sebastian was talking about.
Melanie was triggering the shit out of me.
She was a smart girl, but she lacked the initiative that Milo had. Working with Milo felt like I was working with an equal… Honestly, most of the time it felt like I was working with someone smarter than myself.
This felt more likementorship,if I was being kind about it.
There was a lot of hand-holding. Melanie could get to the conclusions I needed her to get toeventually,but I had to spend an annoying amount of brainpower leading her to the conclusions I expected her to be getting to on her own.
She relied on me to direct her, whereas when I was working with Milo, I could almost step back and just watch him make magic.
Milo was what I needed for a project like this. I didn’t needhelpgetting to my own solutions. I needed someone to push past what I thought the solution was and challenge me to think bigger.
Milo had barely been gone twenty minutes, and I was already a hair away from just calling it a day and dismissing Melanie altogether when the door to the elevator dinged again.
I glanced up to find Sebastian leading my man through the doors, and suddenly, all my annoyance with Melanie melted away and was replaced with concern.
Seb looked like he literally might be sick, and Milo’s cute little brows were pinched together with worry.
He was favoring his left arm, and I glanced down to find that he had a small piece of cotton taped directly over the place where I immediately knew they’d implanted a key chip.
Rage tore through me at the sight of it, and when I rounded on Sebastian, ready to demand he tell me what the fuck he wasthinkingallowing Luke to implant Milo like that, I stopped in my tracks.
There was a confusing mix of regret, fear, and…blamein his expression.
I knew anything I wanted to say to him right now would just be thrown back in my face. He’d been against me keeping Milo here from the beginning, and now he was chipped, just like Seb and I were, and it was all my fault.
Taking a slow, deep, calming breath, I turned to Melanie, who was doing her best to give Milo a look of superiority, as if taunting him with the fact that she’d managed to worm her way into my lab against my wishes.
The look on her face was the final straw.
