Chapter 20 · Twelve and a half. And you get out of my stall and never come back

Rook stared at the stick. Licked his gold tooth. "Twelve and a half. And you get out of my stall and never come back."

"Done," I said before Jax could argue.

Jax glared at me. "Kaelen—"

"We don't have time to haggle," I said. My vision flickered again. The timer stuttered: 00:44:03. "Pay him."

Jax swiped the stick. The table reader chirped green. Rook's eyes lit up as the transfer hit his implant.

"My pleasure doing business with desperate people," Rook said. He shoved the case toward me with two fingers like it was contaminated. "You install it yourself. Not my problem if you stroke out."

Jax picked up the chip with tweezers, careful like it was glass. He pulled a battered installer from his bag — a needle gun, patched with tape, the kind street docs use when they don't want a record.

"Sit," he told me.

"I hate when you do that," I said, but I sat on the rusted crate he kicked over. My knees hit his.