Chapter 15 · Titanium Feast

"Don't touch her."

My hand stopped an inch from Vesper's throat.

Her back was pressed against the wrecked mech, one knee bent, pistol jammed under my ribs. Her breath hit my mouth in short, hot bursts. Mine came rougher. Hungry. The red shimmer in my right eye painted her face in broken lines.

"Rex," she said, very carefully, "move your hand away from my neck."

"I said don't touch her."

"I'm not touching her. You are."

I looked down.

My fingers had already curled around the collar of her coat. The material creaked under my grip. Beneath it, I could feel the fast beat of her pulse.

Too fast.

The apex core inside my chest noticed.

A thin red prompt crawled across my vision.

CONSUME: HOSTILE BIO-SIGNATURE DETECTED.

Vesper's finger tightened against the trigger.

"Rex. Let go."

"You shot the mech."

"It was about to crush you."

"You shot it after it dropped its weapon."

"It doesn't have rules. It has a reactor and half a district's worth of stolen weapons inside its frame."

The wrecked war mech twitched behind her. A section of its armor peeled back with a shriek of heated metal.