And just like that, the hatch slams shut.
I breathe in through my nose and count each breath like a soldier, clinging to the rhythm, trying to steady myself. It doesn’t matter. The dark comes fast anyway. I black out soon enough, my head dropping to the ground before I even get the chance to see what he does five minutes later.
The funny thing about having died once is that I know exactly how much I don’t want to die again.
And I really,reallydon’t want to die again.
Iam, without question, the most inexperienced burglar out of the three of us.
Cassian and Talon both move through the world like men who have long ago stopped distinguishing between the rules worth breaking without a second thought and the ones that still demand attention. I, on the other hand, spent years cultivating the illusion of lawfulness so thoroughly that I almost believed it myself. Now, standing in the shadow of a private clinic’s east wall at dusk, dressed in black instead of my usual white coat, I feel the strangeness of this divergence settle over my skin like something borrowed, ill-fitting, and definitely not mine.
I have no practical knowledge about breaking laws the way these two do.
None.
But there’s no way I’d allow myself to fall behind. So I strip myself of the need to lead, and let Cassian take the helm. Talon’s second. I watch the way they move and replicate it as best I can.
We approach Westbridge Private Clinic from the side street, as per the recon. The sun dipped below the horizon an hour ago.The sky is a dull bruise of purple and gray, the air cool enough that our breath ghosts faintly before fading. It doesn’t feel like it out here, exposed and visible under the open sky, but this is the best time of day to break in.
We’ve already watched the janitor leave. He stepped out of the front entrance at seven twenty-nine, locked it behind him, walked to his car. His taillights vanished down the street. Lights inside the clinic went out one by one after that—automated, surely—and by seven forty-five, the building looked dead.
“East wall,” I murmur, calling out the next step.
Cassian nods. “Let’s go.”
We slip along the side of the building, avoiding the wider pool of light cast by the streetlamp near the main entrance. The east wall looms ahead, a blank expanse of white-painted concrete interrupted only by a single metal door with a small, wire-reinforced window at shoulder height.
The service entrance.
Up close, the door looks impenetrable. There’s a badge scanner to the right and a handle with a magnetic lock mechanism, no keyhole. No way to buzz someone on the other side. I stare at it and wonder how the hell we’re supposed to get in. Cassian said to leave it to him, but he didn’t disclose exactly what that meant.
He crouches in front of the badge scanner and leans in close, studying it the way I might study a scan.
“It’s a mag lock. Powered from inside. If we kill the current, it releases.”
“And the scanner?” I ask.
“Doesn’t matter if there’s nothing to read.”
Right. Perhaps that was a stupid thing to ask. I press my lips together and say nothing, feeling the faint heat of embarrassment crawl up the back of my neck. This is his operating theater, not mine.
“Smile, man,” Talon whispers, nudging my arm. “In my world, this is how people bond together.”
I stare at him. Something about the way he says it makes my skin prickle.
“I wonder what kind of world that is.”
“Not one you’d like. You can believe me on that.” Talon lifts his eyebrows and shakes his head like he’s remembering something he’d rather not, and I’m left with a strange, nagging sense of unease. How would he know what kind of world I’d like? He knows nothing about me. About what I’ve done, what I’ve swallowed, what I’ve kept buried under the mask of a nice guy. He knows nothing, and yet he sounds perfectly certain.
Cassian pulls a small flat-head from his back pocket—which I didn’t know he had—and pries off the plastic housing of the scanner before any alarm can sound. He isolates two wires, strips them with his thumbnail, and touches them together.
The magnetic lock gives a dull thunk.
“Huh,” I murmur.
That definitely looked easier than expected.
“After you, Doc,” Talon whispers, pulling the door open with two fingers and holding it like a doorman at a hotel. The grin is back. I’m starting to understand that it never really leaves.
