Page 145 of Alien Burn

“I won't bring Adryel to you.”

“You think he'll keep looking at you that way once he knows what you are?”

Her voice sharpened as the guard came around the table.

“You were supposed to stay where I put you.” She snatched her arm away from him. “Instead you let him trail after you. Taking your hand. Coming to your room.”

Sereya's pulse hammered against the edge of her jaw.

“I wanted him to.”

Roemary stared at her.

Sereya had imagined admitting it to someone would be embarrassing. She had not expected it to feel quite so much like opening a window.

“I wanted him to,” she repeated. “That had nothing to do with you.”

Roemary darted toward the open doorway, past his reaching hand. She thrust the display at Sereya, her thumb sliding across its face.

Sereya caught her wrist with both hands and slammed it against the table's near edge.

The communicator struck the edge. Roemary cried out. Sereya hit her wrist again, and the device fell. She kicked it toward the guard.

“Take it! She's threatening to send my location to the people who killed my family.”

The guard caught Roemary's arm as Sereya kicked the device clear.

“Both of you, move away from the table.”

Sereya let go at once. The guard twisted Roemary's arm behind her and moved her toward the inner wall.

“She's unstable,” Roemary said. “You saw her attack me.”

He ignored her and called for restraints, keeping his body between them. Sereya pressed her palms against her skirt. They were shaking so hard she could feel the cloth move.

He had the communicator. Roemary couldn't send it now.

Sereya almost laughed.

Then the visitor room lights went out.

The emergency lamps came on red.

A shout came from the service end of the corridor. Sereya heard a weapon discharge, then the crash of a body against metal.

The guard released Roemary and lunged back to the doorway, pulling Sereya behind him. Two figures in maintenance coats came around the corner.

“Stop there. Hands where I can see them.”

One raised a weapon. The guard fired as the male did. His shot struck the wall; the answering charge threw him against the doorframe. His comm gave a hard electronic squeal as he went down.

Sereya ran toward him.

Roemary seized the back of her dress.

“That was expensive,” she said in her ear.

Sereya drove her elbow back. It connected with something soft, and the grip loosened. She got one hand to the door before the second male caught her around the waist.