“Hello, love.” Cayden’s voice calls in my ear, but I can’t look at him. My chest is too heavy, my eyes…are watering? Crying. I think I am crying. How could they take something so beautiful? Everyone should see that, everyone should be allowed to see that.
I don’t even notice I’m being pulled away before we enter another room and Cayden is sitting me down, kneeling down in front of me. “Look at me, darling. Show me those eyes.”
I can’t.
“Look at me.” His voice is sterner this time, but I can’t. I physically am unable to pull myself out of this. My breath becomes heavy, and my hands begin to shake in a way I don’t even recognise.
This isn’t fear. This is…anger? Sadness? I don’t know what’s happening to me right now.
“Shhh baby, eyes on me, focus on me,” Cayden says again. This time his voice is soft, soothing, and somehow it pulls me out of my head, forcing me to look at him.
“There you are, take a deep breath for me.”
I force myself to breathe, focusing on the feeling of the air going through my nose and filling my lungs before finally going out of my mouth as I breathe out. Cayden doesn’t move, keeping my hand in his, trying to bring me back to reality. His voice never wavers from smooth and comforting. It’s making my heart melt.
No, no. Cayden is bad. It can’t do that.
“Why would they do that?” I barely manage in a whisper, but he smiles brightly.
“I knew you would ask the right question eventually.” He takes a deep breath and sits down beside me, pulling out the phone I’ve seen him on before, but I’ve never seen one up close.
I have always wondered how they work. How you can touch the screen, and it follows your every command? Cayden uses it to open up a folder, a series of photos taken today of a group of government soldiers coming in to remove the pieces from the museum.
“They want control.” He says it so simply like I should understand a whole universe of things from the one answer, but I don’t. Only when I look at him, confused, does he continue.
“Those who live in fear are the easiest to break; those who live without it are impossible to tame.” His words echo around in my mind, but they make no sense. The government doesn’t want to tame, they want to protect. It’s the entire reason they send us to do our jobs, to protect the freedom, the peace.
“If they remove history, they can rewrite it however they want. They can teach it to the next generation, and they will teach it to the following generation. Eventually, all anyone will ever know is the version they want us to believe. And no one will question it.”
I feel an ache in my chest. I knew the new order was teaching an updated version of our history. We do have schools, just not like how they were before. But the idea of them removing history completely? I don’t know how to process it.
“They took Lauren, I don’t know if she’s dead or alive…is that something your sources can tell you? I need to know. Please, Cayden.” I manage to whisper, focusing on one problem at a time.
There’s a glimmer in his eyes as he nods, not hesitating before giving his response. “I’ll find out, love, but you can’t go out there like that. You need to calm down. And you need to tell Bella here I’m not going to kill you.”
Looking up for the first time since Cayden pulled me away, I see Bella standing behind us, her hand on the grip of her gun strapped to her thigh. She’s watching Cayden’s every move like he’s waiting to strike on me, and I smile. Of course, she’s here protecting me.
“I’m fine, Bella. I’m okay.”
She moves her hand, but doesn’t relax. I can live with that.
“You need to rein it in. Everybody out there will realise exactly who you are if they see you so emotional, and I am not really in the mood to kill a room full of people today. So please, Darlia, please trust me.”
I manage a nod, forcing a couple more deep breaths, watching as my hands stop shaking as I slowly centre myself again before standing. “I’m okay, I can do this.” I don’t know if I’m reassuring myself or him. I don’t know why I’m letting my guard down around him like this, either, but both are currently happening, and I don’t know what to do about it anymore.
“I need you to tell me something. Something I can tell them. I told them I would give them information, so I need something to work with, or they will kill me, too.”
There is one thing I’ve noticed about Cayden, and it’s that his attention is always on me. Whether out of fear or interest, I’m yet to discover, but he watches me, and I don’t think he wants me to die, so I decide to be honest.
“There’s a storage unit on the west end. Number 105.”
“What’s in it?”
“Just let them know.”
He stands, adjusting his suit jacket and collar before offering me his hand. Something inside of me makes me go all mushy at the simple action, a feeling I have never felt before. I ignore it and walk past him, out the door.
I am PX-3, a trained assassin. I will not break.
