Page 17 (1/2)

"I’ to lose" Quiet words, but her will - it was a steel blue flaun that will go off in et them out of cuffs, break my own ankle, do whatever it takes to escape"

The bloody i He’d heard words like those before From the men in his old army unit when they’d been boxed in, with no way out All seven had survived - because they hadn’t cared whether they lived or died Better to go out fighting than live as a prisoner of the enemy

Katya would do exactly as she said if he tried to hold her

And he would do everything in his power to keep her "You’re still a threat," he said, knowing he was tearing apart the fragile new bonds between the them beyond repair "I’ll do whatever it takes to contain you"

Katya felt an unwelcome start of surprise

Dev, she realized, had been very careful with her She’d thought she’d known, but he hadn’t truly shown her the utterly ruthless side of his nature until thisabout hi the unvarnished truth He’d lock her up and throay the key if that hat it took

And she had no way to fight hiered by her own helplessness, by her foolish hope that he’d change his htened on her hips for theto a separate armchair, she folded her arms around herself "I want to see Ashaya" It was a small rebellion, a reht think

He didn’t put on his T-shirt, a bronzed god in sunlight "You didn’t see to her when she visited"

"I was asha in the addictive beauty of hih the s "I didn’t understand why then, but now I know"

"She’ll have guessed - "

"It doesn’t hten even under the winter sun, she leaned her forehead against the glass "I need to face her, tell her what I did"

Dev’s voice came from inches behind her "You’ve remeht was different - for a while it was as if I’d wiped the gri crystal clear"

He leaned forward, one hand palm down on either side of her head "How e to lean back, to surrender to the illusion once again "Pieces, but enough that I know I need to tell Ashaya, warn her"

A long silence, broken only by their breaths, thefogging over to lock them in a still, quiet intimacy "You could be a threat to her family, the children You were pretty ada to her when I mentioned it at the clinic"

Her sto, she braced herself on the glass rather than on him, not sure she’d be able to pull back a second time Emotion was a feedback loop without rules, without boundaries It scared her how susceptible she was to this man who seemed almost Psy in his ability to lock away his e herself to think past her turbulent awareness of hi in his words drove her forward "Dev," she whispered, "you said children Ashaya only has a son"

The solid warmth of Dev’s body stroked over her as he spoke "The two kids ere kept in the labs while you were there"

"The boy and a little girl" So young, so vulnerable

"Ashaya didn’t kill them - she helped them escape"

Panic beat in her "Wait - "

"The Council knows," Dev told her "The kids were adopted by a DarkRiver couple and after Ashaya’s defection, there was no need to hide them"

Euessed that Ashaya got them out, but I was never sure" And she hadn’t asked, conscious that the fewer people who knew the truth, the better "I suppose," she h the chaos in her body, her un to think that since I hadn’t been coet, but the reality is I could be programmed to hit her or the children I’d never know until that particular coht, she felt her entire hand throb "I hate this, not knohat’s in o to fix that?" Dev asked, and there was a darkness in his voice that should’ve scared her

But she’d gone past that kind of fear "As far as it takes!"

"Would you leave the PsyNet?"

That halted her It was a question she’d never even considered "I can’t I need the biofeedback provided by my connection to the Net" Psy who lost that feedback died within a matter of minutes "I know - I remember - the ShadowNet can’t take pure-blooded Psy anymore"

His arm muscles went rock hard "I didn’t realize Psy knew that"