Chapter 21 · Drowning Order

The screen lit up the whole vault, and it was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes.

Brown paper. Typed lines. A signature at the bottom, smeared with something that had dried black.

Lucian's shirt was around my shoulders. His sweat was still on my skin, and my thighs still shook from the iron table. Ten minutes ago I'd had my teeth in his shoulder and his name in my mouth.

Now he stood over the terminal, so still I couldn't hear him breathe.

"Lucian."

He didn't turn around.

"Lucian, what is that?"

"Read it." His voice had gone flat and quiet, with nothing left in it. "You've got that freak memory. Read it once and tell me it's not what I think."

I slid off the table. The concrete bit cold into my bare feet. I pulled his shirt closed and walked up beside him, close enough to feel the heat coming off his arm. He didn't touch me.

It was an order, an old one. Five years old by the date. *Subject to be held in the north pier cage until tide turns. No ransom. No body.*

The stain across the bottom was blood.