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“There’s a syringe here,” Hamilton said, picking it up. “Lying next to you. Did he dose you with something?”

I looked down at his palm. The syringe was empty, but if I looked closely, I could see the dregs of a strange, silvery substance inside the chamber. My heart stopped.

“What happened after he stabbed me?” I asked Hamilton, who balked.

“He stabbed you?” he asked, outraged. “He told me to wait outside to collect you after dinner. I heard him urgently calling for a server maybe half an hour ago. Then a few minutes ago, the server came out and told me to escort you back to the house. When I came in the room, you were on the floor and Julius was gone.”

I sat up slowly, not totally trusting my apparent state of health, but there was still no pain. I felt normal. A small, rolled piece of paper dropped from my cleavage into my lap.

Cold dread raised the hairs on the back of my neck when I opened it and saw the elegant, curly script that simply read, You’re welcome.

Chapter 25

John

Iwas restless as hell by the time the day of the festival came.

Something was wrong. I could feel it in my bones, even if I couldn’t tell exactly what it was. It was making me anxious and short with people.

“Stop pacing,” Kimmy said irritably. She was sitting in the makeshift cafeteria at the White Rose garrison while I practically wore a hole in the floor, pacing around the table. “You’re gonna drive me crazy, and I need to be focused today.”

“Doesn’t it feel like something’s wrong to you?” I asked, not for the first time. “How come the Order’s been so quiet since the library bombing?”

Kimmy shrugged. “Ayanna says they have reports that they’re planning another attack later this month and are waiting on supplies. They don’t like to do raids here because it might blow the cover of their undercover people.”

I knew, based on hanging around the White Rose camp, that people here widely thought the Order were so successful because of how well they kept themselves hidden. Unlike the White Rose, they worked mostly through infiltration. Everything they did was secret, and they didn’t have a lot of leaks. It’s why it was hard to anticipate their attacks, not just for the White Rose, but for the Delta leadership, too. The Order sometimes leaked false leads, too, making it even harder to tell what they were up to.

Claire hadn’t been seen in public since I last visited her, and that more than anything was worrying me. It was rare for her to be out of the public eye for more than a day, and it’d been four without a word. There was no way for me to check on her, and according to Ayanna, there was no new intel from their informants.

Claire was still scheduled to appear at the festival, but I was scared they’d already done something horrible to her—imprisoned or tortured her. In my darkest moments, I worried they’d quietly killed her, but Ayanna said she didn’t believe that. Something that big wouldn’t stay a secret for long, she claimed, but I wouldn’t put anything past these fuckers.

I’d told Ayanna everything that Claire and I had found out about Immortalis and how it was made by harvesting from people who’d rubbed the regime the wrong way—either because they were criminals or because, like Claire’s father, they’d threatened to expose them. She’d watched the video of his execution on her own; I didn’t want to see it, and I hated that Claire had. She shouldn’t have had those images of the father she loved burned into her brain forever.

Ayanna had been shocked and horrified like we were, but she’d said it was safer for Claire if they revealed the information after we’d rescued her. I agreed. She’d made a copy of the drive for the White Rose and returned the original to me. I didn’t know if Claire would want it, but it had her father’s journal entries on it as well as the damning video, so I kept it safe. At home, our tech guy, Scott, would be able to open it for her. She might want to look at it someday.

The festival wasn’t supposed to start until noon, but I wanted to move. I wanted to be doing something. Waiting around was torture.

“You’re sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Kimmy asked. “I hate not being there to watch your back.”

“You’ll do more good staying here,” I answered, knowing it was true, even if I didn’t like it either. “As always, they’re short on medics, and I have a feeling we’ll all need you.”

“You’re not as optimistic as Ayanna, then,” she said wryly. “She seems to think this is it. When one domino falls, the others follow.”

I shrugged. “It’s not impossible. It’s just that from everything Claire’s told me and all I’ve seen since getting here, nothing’s simple. Today will throw a wrench in the regime in a big way. But will it really end it? I’ve no idea.”

I looked over at her. “But it’s also not our problem anymore.”

Kimmy bit her lip, and I knew it wasn’t me she was most worried about.

I sighed and said, “Go spend some time with your girlfriend before it’s time. I know you want to.”

“She’s not my—” she began automatically.

Kimmy had been spending most of her free time in Ayanna’s office, often with the door shut. They were awfully cozy anytime I saw them together, to the point that I started to avoid them because it made me miss Claire more.

I rolled my eyes. “She’s your girlfriend, Kim. It’s obvious to everyone but you, apparently. Do her a favour and tell her before she heads out today. She needs to hear it.”

She still looked unsure. “I don’t know how things will work—”