“Yes,” I say. “Quiet. Fast. No flags. No syndicate signatures.”
He hesitates. “If the IHC finds out?—”
“They won’t,” I say.
“And if the Alliance?—”
“They’re busy posturing,” I say. “And if they’re not, we adapt.”
I lean forward, voice low, intimate, like I’m sharing a secret over a drink.
“Morazin is the kind of man who disappears when he becomes inconvenient,” I say. “I am not letting him vanish into a bureaucratic graveyard.”
Senn nods again, more firmly. “I can contact?—”
“I will contact,” I correct.
I open a secure channel and tag my covert operations lead.
“Set a plan,” I tell him. “I want Morazin extracted before anyone can ‘transfer’ him to a place no one can reach.”
A pause. Then: “Understood. Timeline?”
“Tonight,” I say.
He exhales. “That’s tight.”
“Make it tighter,” I say, and end the call.
When the room goes quiet again, I sit back and listen to the building around me—the distant casino music, the soft buzz of power through the walls, the faint pulse of Gur’s night through the window.
It smells like smoke and gold and lies.
I roll the Nine’s coin between my claws, feeling its edges catch, its weight stubborn and arrogant.
Jordan would hate this room. She’d hate the luxury, the implication that suffering is just something you wallpaper over. She’d see the truth under the chandeliers.
And I—gods help me—I want her to see that I’m not hiding from it.
I’m shaping it.
I press the coin flat on the desk.
“Come on then,” I whisper into the night, like the Nine can hear me. “Try to take what’s mine.”
Then I stand, because there’s no such thing as resting when you’ve declared war on ghosts.
And I go to build a trap for a man who thinks he can disappear.
CHAPTER 23
JORDAN
The surveillance node smells like burnt dust and cheap solder—like someone tried to fix a problem by yelling at it.
I’m crouched on a maintenance ledge above the Nun’s back corridors, one knee jammed against a rib of steel, fingers deep inside a black box the size of my head while a holographic schematic hovers in my face like a smug little ghost. The building hums around me—casino bass thudding faintly through layers of reinforced wall, ventilation breathing warm air that tastes like smoke-filtered perfume and fried sugar.
Down below, two Kaijen guards pretend not to watch me.
