Chapter 20 · Fractured Trust

"Get your hand off me before I break it," I spat, though my voice sounded like I'd been swallowing glass.

Kael didn't flinch. He kept his grip tight on my wrist, pulling me closer until the heat from his chest seeped through my shredded tactical gear. He didn't look at me with pity—Kael didn't do pity. He looked at me like I was a puzzle he was half-tempted to burn just to see how it worked.

"You're shaking, Vesper," he murmured, his breath ghosting over my ear. "Is it the shock of who made you, or the fact that you actually like being this close to me?"

I wrenched my arm back, stumbling against the cold metal of the server rack. My legs felt like wet cardboard. The data we'd just ripped from the Dead Zone was still screaming in my head—the blueprints, the genetic markers, the signature. His father. The man who built the empire Kael was now trying to dismantle had designed me like a piece of high-end hardware.

"I don't like anything about you," I snapped, leaning my head back against the wall.