"Strip her badge," Chief Councilor Venn shouted across the gallery. "The Hart Bureau is officially terminated."
"Touch that pin and I’ll break your fingers."
My back hit the council railing. Fifty high-born patrons watched from the mezzanine, their silk sleeves brushing as they whispered behind jeweled hands.
I didn’t care about the whispers.
I cared about the black auction gavel in Venn’s fist.
Venn stepped down the marble risers, his velvet coat swishing around his boots. "You don’t get a vote, Evelyn. Forty people died in the North Quarter collapse because you chased phantom echoes instead of sealing the sector gate. You’re a disgraced liability."
"The gate was sabotaged." My voice cracked across the chamber. "The seals were cut from the inside. You know it, and so does every councilor sitting behind you."
"What I know is that by sunset, the Hart name won’t own one square foot of Obsidian Reach." He lifted the gavel. "All bureau assets, records, and perimeter rights revert to the municipal council for immediate liquidation."
"They don’t revert to you."
The voice came from behind me.
Low. Rough. Iron dragged over stone.
The chamber shut up.
A heavy boot scraped across the floor. The guards at the side doors snapped straight, rifles lowering before anyone ordered them to.
Kane Valerian walked down the center aisle.
No ceremonial velvet. No polished council uniform. Just black combat leather, a long duster, and the sharp stink of ozone, copper, and dry ash clinging to him.
The warden of Obsidian Reach.
The man who kept the breach under the city sealed with locked gates and brutal force.
He ignored every patron in the room.
His pale gray eyes landed on me.
"Sit down, Oscar," Kane said.
Venn’s face went red. "Warden, this is an administrative hearing. You have no jurisdiction over private salvage licenses."
"I have jurisdiction over every pulse inside this perimeter."
Kane stopped six inches away from me. Heat rolled off his chest and brushed my jaw.
His eyes never left mine.
"Isn’t that right, Miss Hart?"
"Back up, Valerian." I kept my voice low. "I’m not in the mood."
"Careful."
His voice dropped until only I could hear it.
"Your pride is about ten seconds away from putting your sick father on the street."
My chest locked. "Don’t you dare bring my father into this."
"He’s already in it."
Kane pulled a folded sheet of black vellum from inside his duster and slapped it onto the mahogany table between us.
"Sign."
The gold lettering at the top punched the air from my lungs.
I stared at it. Then at him.
"That’s a marriage contract."
"Provisional union," he corrected. "Thirty days. The Hart Bureau becomes an auxiliary holding under my personal seal. Venn can’t touch your assets. Your father keeps his clinic. You keep your salvage rights."
The chamber exploded with whispers.
Venn slammed his fist onto the podium. "Valerian, this is absurd! You can’t marry a disgraced investigator to block an official seizure!"
"Watch me."
Kane didn’t even turn around.
He leaned over the table, forcing me back until the wood pressed into my lower spine. His leather coat brushed my sleeve. His open collar showed a pale burn scar running toward his collarbone.
His eyes dropped to my mouth.
Then climbed back to mine.
My skin heated under the attention. I hated that he noticed. Hated that my breath caught when he leaned closer.
"What’s the catch?" I asked. "You don’t do charity, Kane. You haven’t spared a single soul in this city since the breach cracked."
"You want the truth?"
"I want something that isn’t a lie."
He moved closer.
His breath warmed my cheek. His hand flattened on the table beside my hip, trapping me without quite touching me.
"The lower breach is leaking into the bedrock," he said. "I need an echo reader who can anchor the ward lines before the entire east sector caves in."
I swallowed. "And you think that’s me?"
"I know it’s you."
"Why?"
"Your family built the original dampeners. Your blood matches the lock."
His gaze dropped to my hands.
"You want to save your family? Give me thirty days of access to your veins."
My fingers curled. "Access to my what?"
"Pick up the quill, Hart!" Venn roared from the risers. "Reject him and face immediate arrest for gross negligence! Five seconds!"
Kane didn’t blink.
He drew a slim silver blade from the sheath strapped to his forearm and laid it across the contract.
The steel caught the chandelier light.
"He’s going to strip your bureau," Kane said quietly. "He’ll burn your mother’s case logs, throw your father into a debtor ward, and sell your badges as souvenirs."
His fingers tapped once against the vellum.
"Look at him and tell me I’m lying."
I looked at Venn.
He was smiling now. Waiting for me to break in front of everyone.
My hands shook with rage.
Not fear.
Rage.
I snatched up the blade.
Kane’s eyes narrowed. "Evelyn—"
"If you cross me, Valerian, I’ll find a way to end you."
A sharp smile cut across his mouth.
"I’m counting on it."
I dragged the blade across my thumb.
The cut was quick. Clean.
Blood welled bright and thick.
"Don’t do this," someone whispered from the gallery.
Venn laughed. "Too late. Sign it, girl."
I slammed my bloody thumb onto the wax seal at the bottom of the vellum.
The ink hissed.
The parchment drank my blood.
Black spread around my print, crawling through the fibers in branching veins. The seal cracked open with a sound like breaking bone.
A violent shockwave blasted through the council chamber.
Crystal fixtures rattled overhead. Several patrons screamed. Venn stumbled back from the podium.
Kane stayed exactly where he was.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a heavy iron ring set with a jagged piece of raw obsidian.
My stomach dropped. "The signature is enough."
"It isn’t."
I stepped back. "Don’t touch me."
He caught my left wrist before I could turn.
His bare hand locked around me, rough and scorching hot. My skin felt cold beneath his fingers. Heat shot up my arm, followed by a sharp shiver that had nothing to do with the room.
"Let go."
"Don’t squirm."
"Kane."
His grip tightened.
He slid the iron band onto my ring finger.
The metal bit into my skin like ice.
Then it flared white-hot.
Pain ripped through my hand. The ring tightened, welding itself against the bone.
"Kane, stop!"
My knees buckled.
Something yanked hard inside my chest.
Kane caught me with his free arm and dragged me flush against him. My palms hit solid muscle beneath his leather shirt. His body vibrated with a deep, subterranean hum that didn’t belong to any human man.
His mouth hovered near my ear.
"Don’t look at me like that, little liar."
"Like what?"
His breath moved over my skin. His arm locked around my waist, holding me upright while the ring burned through my finger.
"Like you thought this was only legal paper."
I tried to shove him away.
He didn’t move an inch.
"What did you do?" I choked out.
His pupils had blown wide. For the first time, the control in his face cracked.
"I warned you."
"You said marriage. You didn’t say anything about this."
"The binding feeds directly on the disaster under us."
His thumb pressed against my collarbone.
The touch was hot enough to hurt.
"It’s going to eat your heart first."
A line of black ink tore out from beneath the ring.
It slid under my skin like a living thing, racing up my arm toward my throat.
The chamber blurred around me.
Venn shouted something. The guards raised their rifles. Kane’s hold tightened as the foreign pulse beneath my ribs slammed against my heart.
Once.
Twice.
Then the black line reached my collarbone, and Kane bent close enough that his lips nearly brushed my ear.
"Evelyn, when it reaches your throat, you’ll have to choose who the contract—"