Page 165 of Override

I look around the room again, searching now, and see one tucked high near the hallway.

Taibhse follows my gaze. "I know."

He walks toward it and disconnects that one too. Then he moves into the kitchen. I can see him from where I'm sitting as he reaches above the cabinets and unplugs another.

The realization settles slowly. He's not turning them off through some system I can't see. He's physically disconnecting them. One at a time. Where I can watch him do it.

When he returns to the living room, his gaze lands on the camera pointed toward the front door.

He stops beneath it. "This one stays."

The small sense of safety beginning to grow inside me immediately retreats. He must see it happen because he lifts one hand.

"Only the door."

I look from him to the camera.

"I need to know if someone comes onto the property." His expression is completely serious. "I won't move it away from the entrance. Ever."

My stomach twists as I think about all the cameras in Ronan's house. Taibhse seems to know exactly where my thoughts have gone.

"I won't." Two words. No elaborate promise. No attempt to convince me.

I look at the camera again. Then slowly nod. "Okay."

Something in his shoulders eases. He holds out his hand. I stare at it. Less than an hour ago, I'd taken that hand without knowing anything about the man it belonged to.

Now I know even less. Somehow, I still place my hand in his. His fingers close carefully around mine. Not tight. Not pulling. Just there.

He leads me down the hallway toward the bedroom at the end. I barely make it through the doorway before he releases my hand and moves to the camera mounted in one corner.

He unplugs it. Then the one overlooking the windows. I watch both tiny lights go dark. The bedroom feels different immediately. It shouldn't. They're cameras. Pieces of plastic and wire.

But for the first time in months, I am standing in a bedroom where no one can watch me sleep. The thought hits me so hard that I have to look away.

"I'll be right back." My attention snaps to him. He must see the panic because he pauses in the doorway. "Two minutes."

"Very specific."

"Anything less would be suspicious. Anything more would be inefficient."

A startled laugh slips out of me. He stares at me for half a second, as if the sound surprised him too. Then he disappears down the hall.

The moment he's gone, reality comes crashing back.

What am I doing?

I sit down slowly on the edge of the bed and look around the unfamiliar room. My father taught me better than this. Never get into a vehicle with a stranger. Never go to a secondary location. Always know your exits. I'd failed every basic rule of self-preservation in less than an hour.

I laugh under my breath. "Dad would be so pissed."

The thought of him makes the humor disappear almost immediately. I don't know where he thinks I am. I don't know what Ronan will tell him. I don't know if anyone is looking for me.

Before I can follow that thought into the darker places it's trying to go, footsteps sound in the hallway.

Taibhse appears carrying a plain cardboard box.

I eye it suspiciously. "Is that what you're planning to ship my head and hands back to Ronan in?"