Doc packed the wound, wrapped it tight, and sat back on his heels with the look he got when he'd said his piece and wasn't responsible for what came next. Cap got to his feet slower than usual, one hand braced on the beam, and stood there for a moment letting his body remember how to be upright.
The warehouse had gone quiet around us. Both crews. Every man standing, all heads accounted for. Smoke had come back down off the catwalk and was sitting at Ranger's knee again like nothing had happened, which I found unreasonably comforting.
Scout was standing off to the side, cleaning off his hands, and when he caught me looking he lifted his chin just slightly. I nodded back.
Cap looked across the warehouse once, slow, counting heads the way he always did whether we were walking out of a bar or out of something like this. When he'd satisfied himself that everyone was standing, something in his face settled into something quieter.
"We're done here," he said. "DOJ moves tonight."
I didn't tellAnna when I got back.
She was awake when I slipped back into the room, sitting up in bed with her knees pulled to her chest and her hair loose around her shoulders, and the look she gave me when I came through the door was the kind of look that already knew something had happened and was deciding how hard to push.
I crossed the room and sat on the edge of the mattress and reached for her hand.
"Bee," she said quietly.
"It's almost over," I told her. "That's all I can give you right now."
She looked at me for a long moment, reading my face the way she'd gotten so good at doing over these past weeks. Then she let out a slow breath and leaned her forehead against my shoulder, and I wrapped my arm around her and held on.
Outside, I could already hear Cap's voice moving through the house, low and steady, setting the last pieces of the plan into motion.
I pressed my mouth to the top of Anna's head and held her tighter and let him work.
The Watcher had said it wouldn't matter by morning.
He was wrong.
25
ANNA
The Next Night
BOOM!
CRASH!
BANG!
SSSSS!
“David! No! Let go of him! What are you do?—!?”
I bolted upright in bed before I felt hands on me. Multiple pairs of hands. At first, I thought it was the guys. King. Dozer. It wasn’t the first time I’d been ripped out of my bed in the middle of the night for an emergency that kicked up.
“Kay, what’s?—”
A very unfamiliar voice hit my ears. “Brutus Lancaster, you’re under arrest.”
That statement shot energy through my veins like I had just mainlined a mug of coffee.
“What!?”
“Anna! Stay calm!” my brother called out from somewhere in my house.
Which meant that the hands on me weren’t him.
