He laughed, and there was genuine amusement in the sound. “A.I.R.’s really getting sloppy if that’s what you think.”

Scowling, Cara slapped him across the face. He continued laughing. She slapped him again. Blood trickled down his mouth, onto his chin. She slapped him a third time.

“Stop,” I shouted at the screen.

“Are you jealous that I’m interested in another woman,” Erik said, seemingly unaffected by the violence, “or are you jealous because she’s a better person than you’ll ever be?”

Plain little me? Better?

Cara paled.

Erik puckered up his lips and made a kiss noise. “Tell Mia she’ll have to kill me, because I won’t tell you anything about the Onadyn, about the Ship, or about Camille.”

Oh, Erik. Don’t talk like that. They might take you up on it. My body began shaking and refused to stop.

“We’ll get the answers out of you,” Cara said, the words drawn, measured.

“Give it your best shot.”

Why do they want me to watch this? I wondered angrily. Did they think I’d turn against Erik if I saw him misbehaving? Please. They were turning me against them more and more with every second that passed.

“Oh, we will,” Cara told him softly. “We won’t kill you if we don’t get what we want. We’ll kill Camille, and you’ll get to watch.”

8

We’ll kill Camille.

They’d do it, too, I thought, my ears ringing loudly with panic. They’d do it without hesitation. Without remorse. Nothing they’d done so far had shown them to be merciful. And let’s be honest: Cara would have killed me already if she’d been allowed.

Most likely they weren’t even checking out my story. How can they, Robins? They saw what they saw and that can’t be erased.

The door to my cell opened and my heart almost stopped. Had they come to kill me already?

I heard Cara say, “Convince her to talk to us—the truth, this time.” She didn’t sound upset or guilty, she sounded smug. “Or, you two can use this time to say good-bye.”

The truth. My hands tightened into fists, causing the laserbands to burn my wrists. “I told you the truth!” I shouted, all of my emotions bubbling to the surface.

Erik was suddenly shoved inside my room. Silent, he quickly caught himself and balanced. Grinning, Cara strode in behind him. Holding a pyre-gun to his temple with one hand, she removed his laserbands with the other.

His gaze locked on me and didn’t move. Determination and relief radiated from him. And something else, something I couldn’t identify; I only knew it was intense. Hot.

I shivered, growing warm all over. He was alive and he was with me. Finally! It was one thing to see him on a screen, but quite another to see him in person. His very presence comforted me when I should have been puking.

“Why free my hands?’ Erik asked. “You up to something?” Silent, Cara backed out of the cell, the barrel of her weapon never leaving Erik. But her features were yearning, needy. She might have betrayed him after he was caught with Onadyn, but she still wanted him. And she didn’t like that she did.

Like everyone else in the world, she was helpless against her own emotions.

When she stood in the hallway, the door shut in front of her, leaving me and Erik alone. Immediately he closed the distance between us and crouched behind me. I opened my mouth to speak, but he shook his head. He even reached around and placed a hand over my lips.

“There are cameras everywhere,” he said.

“Where?” I asked when he removed the hand. I looked left and right but didn’t see a single one. I’d been filmed without my knowledge. That made me feel all the more violated.

“Everywhere. Believe me. You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah. Still breathing.”

“I’m going to rewire your bands. This may—”

“Ow!”

“—sting a bit,” he finished. “Sorry.”

I’d felt a jerk, a burn, but I was now free and no longer quite so helpless. Pulling my arms into my lap required a conscious effort. They were shaky and weak and the skin around my wrists was red and inflamed.

Moving hurt, but I twisted in the seat to face Erik. Seeing his cuts and bruises in person, those badges of pain and suffering, was like being stripped and placed in front of a hose blasting ice-cold water.

What had they done to him, to cause his eyes to blacken and his lip to split like that? He was strong, yes, but even the strongest of men could be killed. “Are you okay?”

He smiled wryly, then winced. He dabbed at the side of his lip, taking away a fresh bead of blood. “I’m better than ever.”

“Liar,” I said without heat.

He chuckled. “Caught me.”

“Erik—” I said at the same time he said, “Camille—”

Despite the dire circumstances—or maybe because of them—we laughed, taking amusement where we could it, before lapsing into silence.

“You first,” he finally said.

“I told them the truth, but they want to kill me. We’ve got to—”

He placed his hand over my mouth, effectively cutting off my next words. I eyed him with curiosity. He freed my mouth but didn’t pull away. His fingertips traced the curve of my jaw and I shivered. Nerves, I assured myself.

“They’re listening to everything we say, which is the only reason they allowed me inside your cell.” He didn’t try to quiet his tone but spoke loudly. “I used to work with them, here in this very building, so I know their tricks. They want us to talk, to reveal our secrets.”

I guess he truly had been an agent. He was strong enough, don’t get me wrong, and he was smart enough. But in my mind, he was still a high school student who strutted down the halls, who joked with Silver, and flirted with all the (socially visible) girls.

“Understand what I’m telling you?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” He’d released my bands, yeah, but with his words another wave of helplessness bombarded me. Constant surveillance was the same as being tied down. No way we could escape—and I desperately wanted to escape.

“Don’t worry,” he added. He dropped his hand, but not before he allowed his fingers to linger, to trace the seam of my lips in an act of comfort. “Everything’s going to be fine. I promised.”

Silly of me, but I wanted his hand back on my face. His touch was all the things I remembered: warm, callused, soothing. Besides Erik, no boy had ever touched me like that. I liked it; I wanted more.




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