“I am what you’ve made me,” Sierra said. “Just like you.”
“No, you’re not,” Jeth said, flashing a glare at her. He understood that Renford had the power to hurt her with his words, even now. “You’re nothing like him.”
“You stay out of it.” Renford shifted his grip on Cora. “Then again, maybe you’re just what I need.” He turned the gun on Sierra, but looked at Jeth. “I may not be able to harm Cora, but there’s nothing keeping me from shooting her.”
“You won’t,” Jeth said, fear expanding in his chest.
“Oh, yes, I will. And you’ve no hope of returning fire. Not unless you’re willing to hit Cora.”
“You raised her, like a daughter,” Jeth said.
“She was only ever a project. A failed one at that.”
Jeth risked a glance at Sierra, but she didn’t react. She stood as still as if she were welded to the floor, same as the furniture surrounding them.
He turned back to Renford, hoping to catch him at a standstill, but Renford was still moving. Jeth struggled to keep his focus as frustration built inside him. He could feel the seconds passing. The ITA would be here soon. He reached for that calm place, the one that would let him see the shot and take it.
“Let me go, and I’ll let her live.” Renford took a step forward.
“No,” Jeth said, feeling the calm stretch over him. He began to see the pattern in Renford’s movements. He could almost track it. Predict it. Just a few more seconds.
Renford sneered. “You’re so stubborn. Just like your idiot mother. Marian never knew when to back down either.”
The calm Jeth had achieved shattered, and his hand began to tremble. Pain throbbed in his palm from holding the gun steady for so long. “What did you say?”
“Oh, that’s right. You probably don’t remember her well enough to know, do you? But trust me when I tell you it’s true. Marian Seagrave never possessed a single iota of selfpreservation. She’s lucky she’s even alive.”
“Don’t talk about my mother.”
“Why not? It’s only because of me that she didn’t get herself killed by the ITA. You should be thanking me.”
Jeth gritted his teeth so hard a lightning strike of pain flashed across his vision. “What are you talking about?”
A hideous grin stretched across Renford’s features, his eyes glinting with that perverse pleasure Jeth had seen there before. “She came to me for help, you know. When she and your father first returned from the Belgrave. We were friends once, both starting our careers with the ITA at the same time. We even went through the basic training class together. Of course that was before I became an Echo, back when I went by the name Charles.”
A rushing sound filled Jeth’s ears, making him dizzy as a vision of his mother flashed in his mind. I tried to get a message to Charles, he heard her saying. Said he would help . . . he’s not the person I thought he was.
“My mother asked you for help,” Jeth said, his hatred for the man writhing and snapping inside him like a live wire.
“Yes, that’s right.”
“You betrayed her.”
“I did what was necessary.”
Jeth’s whole body shook. It was all he could do to keep from blasting Renford. Only the risk to Cora held him back.
“She trusted you.”
“Be careful, Jeth,” Sierra said. “He’s baiting you.”
Jeth knew it, too, but there was nothing he could do to stop it. He couldn’t even dismiss it as a lie. He’d heard his mother say it.
“Yes, she trusted me,” Renford said. “But not enough to give me the location of Empyria. If she had, things would’ve turned out differently for her.” He paused. “But at least I have Cora now instead.”
As if the sound of her name had called to her in her sleep, Cora began to stir. Renford tightened his grip on her, panic in his eyes again.
Sierra took a step forward. “Let her go.”
“No!”
Cora’s eyes slid open, and she began to struggle automatically.
“Stop moving,” Renford hissed. He’d been holding her in one arm for too long, his grip weak. He jammed the barrel of his gun against Cora’s cheek, and she cried out.
All the air escaped Jeth’s lungs as he envisioned Renford’s hand slipping on the trigger. Cora pushed against him, her limbs wriggling.
Finally, impossibly, Jeth saw it. The clear shot. In his effort to still her, Renford had stopped moving.
Jeth inhaled, quick and shallow. The calm came at once, the patience his father had taught him, the surety and confidence of a well-honed aim.
Jeth slowly exhaled as he pulled the trigger.
Chapter 35
THE BULLET BOOMED OUTWARD, STRIKING RENFORD between the eyes. Then it sailed onward, leaving a trail of blood and brain matter chasing after it.
Renford seemed to fall in slow motion, taking Cora with him. She landed on top of him, cushioned by his body. Cora rolled off him at once and began to wail.
Jeth stared in horror at the sight of his little sister soaked in the blood of the man he’d just murdered.
The noise of the door being wrenched open sounded behind Jeth. He spun as Vince, Lizzie, Flynn, and Shady came through it. In the brief moment before the door closed again, Jeth saw more than fifty soldiers in the kid center beyond. The real ITA had arrived.
They’d come for Cora.
Defeat pressed down on him. They’d come so far only to fail now.