Page 37

Nothing. Our bond untraceable.

The rain kept falling. Cold. Relentless. Someone called my name. Wade, maybe, but the sound was already distant.

Then everything went dark.

16

ANGEL

I opened my eyes to glaring lights, winced, and slammed them shut. Tears burned at the corners from the brightness. I shaded my face with my hand, giving myself time to adjust as I processed the sounds and smells around me.

A sterile bite of chemicals like preservatives and bleach, made me think hospital. But beyond the buzzing of the overhead lights, I heard nothing at all. Not even the distant shuffle of footsteps. No voices. No squeaking carts or beeping machines.

Strange.

I tried to push myself up. My right arm wouldn’t cooperate, it hung like dead weight, numb fingers attached to dark lines now crawling past my elbow and winding toward my shoulder like something growing. I used my left arm instead, propping myself on the edge of a metal table.

The morgue.

Had they thought I was dead?

They’d stripped off my jacket, holster, and boots, but left everything else. Not the usual process for a corpse. Though I was grateful not to find myself in a body bag. Or worse, dissected.

Across the room, the zombies were chained to tables. Each partially covered with a cloth, toes with tags sticking out one end, grim gray faces on the other. Again, not normal.

What the hell?

I swung my legs over the side of the table. At least they’d left me my socks as the cold floor was hard enough without bare feet. But alone in this room with nothing except the dead? That was beyond weird.

How long had I been out?

I dug in my pocket for my phone. Gone.

Figures.

Was this some sort of military punishment? Leaving me in the morgue? I hopped off the table, had to take a few seconds to steady myself as the room swam and swirled, then slowly made my way to the door.

Locked.

What the ever-loving hell?

I turned to search for other exits, but this was the morgue below our SED building. There were none. One way in, one way out. Just a room full of lockers for the dead and a handful of occupied tables.

Why me and the zombies?

They lay motionless. Gray. Sunken skin. Clothes torn but modern enough for me to peg them as newly dead. At least these weren’t charred like the last batch my team had examined.

I glanced up at the cameras. All active. Focused on the room as usual.

Is this a test?

It had to be. They thought my mate bond to Jude gave me his power? Even with him mostly dead? Technically, I’d made the zombies let go of the guy in the alley. An accident on my part. Then they’d gotten back up to help Jude repair the Veil.

I bit back a curse.

How much had everyone seen? Just the zombies and the shrinking tear? After I’d already made them comply.

Fuck.