Saul freezes.
I meet his eyes—calm, unreadable. I won’t let him see me flinch. “Chair three,” I say, nodding to the far end. “You’ll have to wait.”
He hesitates. For half a second, I think he’ll push it. But then Voltar takes one deliberate step forward. Just one. And Saul bolts.
Like a coward. Like a spy caught red-handed.
The door slams behind him so fast it almost unhinges.
Silence falls.
Dee blinks. “Well,” she says, “that was weird.”
I force a smile. Finish the cut. I laugh at a joke. I check out three customers and sweep up clippings with a smile stitched across my face like a damn mask.
But I’m shaking inside.
After closing, I find it. Nestled between two magazines on the waiting table—a compad.
Black, sleek, nondescript.
But it’s not a customer’s.
Voltar’s hand wraps around it before I can even touch it. He turns it over once. Twice. Then growls again.
“They were testing me,” I say, my voice flat.
“No,” he says. “They were testingme.Seeing if I’d protect you. If I’d… hesitate.”
“And?”
He crushes the compad in one massive hand, metal and circuits snapping like bones.
“I didn’t.”
I nod, but my blood’s turned to ice.
They know where I am.
They’re watching again.
And this time, I’m not just a loose thread.
I’m bait.
Once we’re alone, I let him have it.
“I’m not a pawn!”
My voice cracks across the walls like thunder. It echoes in the loft, slamming against the metal beams and glass fixtures, loud enough to make the dog next door start barking. I don’t care. Let the whole block hear. Maybe if I yell it loud enough, I’ll believe it.
Voltar stands in the doorway of the kitchen, arms folded, eyes calm. Too calm. That’s what makes me want to scream more.
“You’re bait,” he says, quiet. Even. “But not without backup.”
Bait. Like a worm wriggling on a hook, waiting for something sharp-toothed to bite. My hands shake, but not from fear. I can handle fear. It’s the helplessness I can’t take. The being-used. Being-seen andset out.
I whirl away from him, pacing. “You think that makes it better?”
