Chapter 7 · Gilded Cage

"Don't move. One twitch and I'll shut your nervous system down before you can even blink."

Eve's voice was a razor, thin and dangerous. She had me pinned against the cold, sterile wall of the med-bay, her hand gripping my wrist so hard the bone felt like it was going to snap. The medical pod hissed behind us, a sleek, white coffin waiting to swallow us both.

I looked at her. Really looked at her. The ice-cold heiress of the Syndicate was shaking. Not from fear—from the glitch. A flicker of static jumped across her iris, a jagged line of neon blue that betrayed the crash happening inside her brain. She needed me. She hated that she needed me, but she was starving for my blood like a ghost wanting a body.

"You're shaking, Eve," I whispered. I leaned in, my chest brushing against her expensive silk suit. I could smell her perfume—something that smelled like rain and old money—and the metallic tang of ozone from her failing implants. "Does it hurt? Watching your perfect world glitch out?"

She slammed me harder against the wall.