Page 88 of Too Guarded to Love

“Dr. Darren. You’re shaking, and you are exhausted. Give me the needle before you kill this patient.”

Olivia ignored Dr. Morgan and focused on keeping her hands steady.

“Olivia.”

“Nic.” She blinked back tears at the sound of his voice. “Scarlett told me to delay the surgery, but Harlee’s heart rate dropped.”

“Is she okay?”

“She scared us, but she’s stable now.” Despite the danger she didn’t understand, Olivia fell in love with Nic a little more for asking about Harlee first. “But I can’t delay any longer. I already dropped a sponge and hid it with my foot so it would take the surgical technologist longer to make sure we didn’t leave anything inside Harlee when we close up.”

“Quick thinking, baby.” He sucked in a breath. “Listen, you’re locked in there and we can’t open the doors without a code. Natalie gave it up when we got her into custody, but Scarlett can’t get it to work because the Diablos are jamming her access.”

Olivia stilled the needle hovering over Harlee’s skin. “The Diablos are here?”

“Yes. Someone in the operating room is on their payroll.”

She stopped herself from looking at the faces of the people around her. “Who?”

“Natalie doesn’t know, and nobody in there has shown up in any databases, but someone has a device that will send a charge to your tracker and stop your heart. When you collapse, the person has been instructed to make sure you aren’t revived.”

Forget the charge. Her heart stopped beating at the news.

“Breathe. You’re okay.”

She sucked in air. “I am breathing and I am not okay. Why do they want to kill me?”

He sighed, as if he didn’t want her to know the answer.

“Tell me, Nic.”

“Jonathan was contracted by the Diablos to infiltrate VIPER through you.”

Olivia’s blood boiled as Nic explained how Jonathan had wormed his way into her life to obtain intel for cash. “That’s disgusting.”

“I’m sorry, baby. The Diablos want what’s stored on your tracker. Once you’re dead, they plan to take you to the morgue and cut it out.”

“That’s—” Olivia shuddered.

Dr. Morgan touched the sleeve of her surgical gown. “Dr. Darren, stand down and let me finish.”

“I’m fine.” Olivia dipped her head and rubbed her clavicle with her chin.

The ortho representative appeared a few feet from her side. “Are you sure? You look pale.”

Olivia ignored whatever he said. Processing what Nic just told her and paying attention to Harlee took all her attention. “Jesus, I feel like the tracker is buzzing like the saw I used to cut Harlee’s bone. What does that mean? Am I going to explode or something?”

“No. I have a chip implanted in the back of my neck that controls my superpowers. It buzzes when I’m agitated for some reason. You might be experiencing the same thing.”

“Okay.” Knowing they shared something elemental somehow calmed her a smidge. “I can’t keep stalling much longer, Nic.”

“We have a plan, baby. See that window on the north wall? We’re coming in that way.”

She looked up. The moonlight streamed in through the pane set a few feet from the ceiling. “Did you forget to tell me that you can scale buildings?”

“Working on that capability,” Scarlett said.

“That would be fucking cool.”