Chapter 13 · Two Clocks

Chapter 13: Two Clocks

"Don't move."

Luca's voice lands flat against my ear, closer than the gun in his fist, closer than the oxygen line still hissing between my cracked lips. On the other side of the steel door, the C4 timer shifts into a different rhythm. Slower. Almost lazy. Like it's waiting on something instead of counting down to it.

I don't move. My spine's still pressed to the cold edge of the recording cabinet, his jacket bunched under me where he threw it to keep the steel from cutting me open. My throat's raw from the smoke. It's raw from something else too, low in my hips, and I hate that my body won't let that go even with a bomb twelve feet from us.

"That's not a countdown." His eyes stay locked on the door, gun steady. "That's a trigger waiting on a signal. Dead man's switch. Somebody out there's holding a button with their thumb. Second they let go, this whole vault goes up with us in it."

My stomach drops.

I claw at his sleeve. Not words — I don't have words, haven't had one out loud in a year — but the motion's enough.