I scream her name.
Not Faith’s.
Sable’s.
Nobody comes.
Chapter 24
Sable
The lock clicks at six-fourteen. I know the time because I’ve been counting the minutes since Nadia left. Two hundred and thirty-one of them. The light through the sealed window has gone from gray to amber to the flat blue-dark of a mountain evening, and I’ve worn a track in the carpet between the bed and the wall.
Nadia stands in the doorway. She’s changed clothes since this morning—different shirt, hair re-tied—but the lines around her eyes are deeper.
“What happened?”
She steps inside. Closes the door. “Viktor gave Dr. Fell access to the containment room.”
My hands go still at my sides.
“Five minutes. Supervised. She spoke to him. By all accounts, barely said a word. Then his magic activated, the monitors spiked, and Viktor cleared the room.”
Nadia pauses, and that pause tells me more than I want to know.
“He panicked, Sable. Not like before. It wasn’t good.”
“Where’s Viktor now?”
“Conference wing. He’s still with the delegation. They’re pushing the offer hard.”
“And Viktor’s listening.”
“That’s his job.”
“Twenty-four lives for one,” I say flatly. “That’s the deal on the table.”
“That’s the deal on the table.”
I look at her. “Would he take it?”
Nadia doesn’t respond right away.
That’s the answer.
“He’s a good man,” she says.
“That’s not what I asked.”
“Twenty-four lives, Sable. Wolves and dragon-blooded in Syndicate detention. Families. Children. Viktor has a responsibility to every one of them.” Her voice is steady, careful. “I can’t tell you he won’t do it. I don’t know that he won’t do it. On paper, one life against twenty-four—”
“Don’t.” My throat is tight. “Don’t put him on paper.”
Nadia is quiet. The fluorescent light flattens the room into hard edges. Outside, a vehicle crosses the compound.
Somewhere out there, Viktor Parlance is sitting in a conference room calculating whether one man’s life is worth less than twenty-four.
“I need to talk to him.”
