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Leo smiled against her temple.

Leo's earpiece, which had been on the chair with the jacket and the shoulder rig, across the room, clicked from the chair. It clicked twice. It clicked a third time.

Leo's head came up and looked startled.

"What."

"Avery is calling. It is an emergency.”

She was out of the bed before the second word was fully out, across the room on bare feet, and she had the earpiece in and the rig in her hand. Vivienne sat up. The linen dropped. Leo, across the room, was listening.

"Avery. Say that again."

A pause.

Leo's face in the low light shut down by half a degree.

"Where?”

A pause.

"How?”

A pause.

"Beaumont on the gate. Guérin in the kitchen. Lock the interior doors. I am two minutes."

Leo turned.

"Vivienne."

"Yes."

"Sensor on the south lower wall. Someone has hit the service lane perimeter and is inside it."

"Lara?”

"We do not know yet. Get dressed. Stay in this room. I will come back for you."

Vivienne swung her legs off the bed. The linen slid. The grandmother's photograph on the bureau caught the low light again. Leo, shoulder rig on over her bare chest, had her trousers and boots on in eleven seconds, which Vivienne, who had counted, filed. Leo came back across the room to the bed with the black shirt in one hand and buttoned it as she came.

At the edge of the bed she stopped.

She took Vivienne's face in the hand that was not buttoning and she kissed her, once, on the mouth, firm.

"Stay in this room."

"Yes."

"Door locked. Balcony sensor live. Do not open anything."

"Yes."

"Vivienne."

"Yes."

"I will be back in three minutes."