Chapter 6 · The Only Battery

"Stay. Still."

Eve’s voice was a jagged blade, barely holding together. She didn't just have the gun to my head; she was leaning into me, her chest heaving against my shoulder. I could smell her—expensive ozone and something metallic, like a dying circuit.

I didn't move. I couldn't. My blood was still screaming, that Forbidden Protocol humming under my skin like a thousand starving wasps. I looked up at her, and for the first time, the ice-cold heiress looked cracked. Her pupils were blown wide, her skin a ghostly, translucent white.

"You're shaking," I rasped. My throat felt like I'd swallowed broken glass.

"Shut up," she snapped, but the muzzle of the gun wavered. "You're a glitch. A mistake. You shouldn't even be breathing, let alone... this."

She didn't say what 'this' was, but she didn't have to. The air between us was thick with it. A pull. A hunger. It wasn't romantic—it was predatory. Her system was crashing, and I was the only thing in this neon-soaked hellhole that looked like a charger.

I let out a sharp, wet laugh and shifted my weight. The gun pressed harder into my temple.

"Go ahead," I challenged. "Pull the trigger.