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“Wasn’t that expensive?”

“Extremely.”

She winced slightly. “That sounded painful.”

I tucked the module into my coat. “It wasn’t mine.”

For a long moment, she just stared at me.

Then one corner of her mouth twitched. “Of course it wasn’t.”

I moved through the room one final time.

Nothing that identified our destination.

Nothing that mattered enough to retrieve later.

The bed remained unmade.

Her cup sat beside the dead terminal.

One of my shirts lay half beneath the chair where she had pushed it aside earlier.

The room still carried the heat of what had happened here.

I looked away.

There was no time for that.

Talia slung her bag over one shoulder. “Ready.”

I checked her. Boots. Jacket. Bag. No exposed communicator.

“Stay close.”

Her expression shifted.

Not resistance.

Not tonight.

“Okay.”

I opened the door, paused, and listened.

Empty corridor.

We moved.

Twelve minutes later, the room where Talia had chosen me was three districts behind us.

She sat beside me in the transport with her bag pressed between her knees and her hair still disordered from sleep.

Neither of us spoke.

I watched the routes behind us. She watched me.

The isolated storage module rested inside my coat.