“Got me all figured out, don’t you?” His grip on my face tightened. “But here’s the problem with your analysis, Eon. I’vealwaysknown I was broken. Since the day my mom had me on adirty Magenta floor. So maybe I wanted a mirror. Someone just as fucked-up and broken as me. And there you were. A whore pretending to be the Sky District girl she always wanted to be.”
I slapped him. Hard. The sound reverberated through the silent apartment.
“Guess we really were a match made in heaven, huh?” I shoved him, but he grabbed my wrists and tried to pin me down.
We were right back where we started—opposite sides. The cyberrunner rat and the corporate lapdog. The way we should’ve stayed.
I struggled against him, and the anger in his eyes sharpened into something deadly—until a loudthudsounded, and suddenly he was on the floor.
He groaned, clutching his head, and I scrambled back to see Taos standing behind the couch, gun raised.
The gun Cy had given me.
“E! We’ve got to get out of here. He’s the one who…” Her hands were shaking as she moved her finger to the trigger. It didn’t fire, registered to my fingerprint only. She must have hit him with it.
“Taos, calm down. Give me that.” I tried to pull the gun from her grip, but she wouldn’t let go.
“He’s the one who shot me!” she cried. “He’s the one who killed Tanaka!”
The silence that followed was deafening. Taos stopped struggling. I spun around as Cy stood up behind me.
“Tell me it isn’t true.”
I already knew the answer. Of course it had been him. Who else could it have been? Had I always known, deep down? His silence was condemning.
I raised the gun I hadn’t even realized was in my hand until it was level with his forehead.
“Tell me it isn’t true.”
“You know I’m a liar, Eon.”
Don’t. Don’t say my name like that.
He moved slowly, trying to take the gun from my hand, but I stepped back.
“Get out of here, Taos. Right fucking now.”
She bolted, surprisingly steady for someone who’d been on the edge of death last night.
Cy cautiously stepped toward me, like someone trying to coax a stray alley cat.
I let him get close, the gun now pressed up under his jaw. He brushed his fingers over my cheek, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.
His hand traced down my jaw, along my neck, then over and up my arm until it settled over mine. His fingers laced over mine—right over the trigger.
“Don’t be shy now, doll. Do it.”
His eyes were pitch black, pupils blown wide.
“Better kill me now, because if you don’t, you won’t be safe. I’ll never stop. I’ll keep coming, until I find you again. Until I can feel the pulse of you beneath me and around me.”
“You killed Professor Tanaka.”
“You’re smart. You figured that out already. Don’t use it as an excuse.”
“You killed Rook.”
He didn’t respond. But there were no more lies between us now.
