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It’s not as cute when you yell.
“What are these receivers even receiving?”
“It’s just like GPS,” she said as she checked the progress of Dixon’s download.
But when she looked up once more, she only saw confused expressions. “GPS works by receiving signals from satellites all around the globe, though you only need three to calculate your exact position. Snoop programs intercept this communication between the satellites and the receiver. That’s how some of my own snoop programs work when I search for GPS trackers with my palm.”
“So if you’ve ingested these tracers, you become a GPS satellite?”
“No, more like the GPS device. The tracer program behaves like a snoop and can pick up the signal. The system will locate tracers within three thousand meters.”
Dixon’s eyes suddenly widened. He jumped over the corner of Tristan’s chair and ran into his brother’s bedroom. Two boots sailed through the air, nearly pegging Tristan in the head.
“What the—”
“Don’t you get it, Tristan? Teresa Bailey just died this morning. That means the mercs might still be in New Bristol with Oskar and Rebecca. The same group that searched a city of two million souls street by street until they found Natalie.”
“So? We’ve—”
Tristan’s jaw dropped suddenly, and he scrambled from the chair. “Oh shit. We have to go. We have to go now.”
Lila yanked the cord from Dixon’s palm. “Welcome to five minutes ago.”
Chapter 27
Tristan jogged downstairs with his brother in tow, calling out orders and quickly tapping on his palm with a thunder of boots and a swish of his brown coat. Soon after, Shirley herded Maria and her people into a break room behind the shop, the little bell above the front door ringing over and over again, marking the progress of a swarm. More of Tristan’s people entered through the back alley, all approaching from various streets nearby, the back door opening and closing with little noise at all. Even more leapt from the apartments next door, entering the building through the roof. Others came from below.
It was an effort to hide their numbers from prying eyes.
; Perhaps Lila had once been prying eyes, for she’d never known that Tristan had begun taking over two apartment buildings at the end of the block. For the first time, she had a true glimpse of the size and scope of Tristan’s operation. Perhaps this was the first time a job had been worth it, or perhaps this was the first time he’d trusted her with the knowledge.
Tristan didnt just control a dozen disgruntled ex-slaves and few spies. He commanded his own militia.
Toxic swiveled her stool at Shirley’s worktable, her big brown eyes mischievous. Her thick, curly hair waved in the air, like a dandelion in a breeze. Her black skin set off her perfect white teeth like a row of pearls as she grinned, and her electric-blue coat and bright green boots belied her upbringing. “You didn’t know there were this many of us, did you?” she asked as she thrust another cable into the mountain of surrendered palms.
“Not until now,” Lila admitted, and set up another download.
“This isn’t everyone, you know. It’s just all he could pull on short notice.”
Lila said nothing and yanked a cable from a palm, adding it to the finished pile. Approximately three hundred and fifty souls served in her family’s militia on the New Bristol compound, over half of them out on patrol each day spread across three shifts. The rest were administrative staff, investigators, or officers who worked almost exclusively in the security office.
Tristan could pull an entire patrol shift on ten minutes’ notice.
What he could do with more time?
It was frightening to think about. That, and the fact that no highborn seemed to know they even existed. If the rest of the highborn knew, they might not be so dismissive of workborn needs, for if these people ever got angry enough—
But they were already getting angry, weren’t they? How else would Tristan have found so many to join his cause?
Who should she warn?
Her father? Chief Shaw? Her mother? The council?
Everyone?
No one?
