their day lifting up heavy objects and putting them down again.
Dariel gawps like one of his damn fish.
“You’re not supposed to be here yet!” he shouts.
My stomach sinks as two figures walk in behind the thugs. Featureless gray suits, with featureless gray helmets, every possible hint of their identity hidden.
Crap, crappity, craaaap.
It’s the GIA.
I hit the Mute button on my uniglass, slide it under an empty packet of Just Like Real Noodelz!™ And then one of the figures speaks, its voice an electronic monotone.
“Hello, Legionnaire de Seel.”
22
Cat
“Finian, we’re in position.”
Tyler’s report crackles over squad comms, almost lost under the music. I’m watching through the swirling crowd, the flashing lights, the strobing blue. The beat is thudding in my ears and my pulse is thudding in my temples as I watch Tyler and O’Malley dance. They’re close now, close enough to Bianchi for Finian to work his magic. Tyler leans in as if he’s whispering something in O’Malley’s ear. She smiles as if it was funny. My jaw clenches.
“Finian?” Tyler asks. “Do you read me?”
No answer.
I feel the butterflies in my stomach flutter then. They’ve been growing louder since the bar last night, since those G-men said their farewells and bumped my uniglass to transmit the paperwork—official documents, emblazoned with the GIA seal, signed off with my thumbprint. Words like immunity and cooperation and capture written in bold. Words I don’t want to think about right now.
“Has anyone got Finian on comms?” Tyler asks.
“Fin, do you read me?” Scarlett asks beside me.
Nothing.
It wasn’t supposed to happen this way.
Tyler leans in close to O’Malley’s ear again to mask the motion of his lips.
“Zila, Kal, report status?”
“Charges are set,” Pixieboy replies. “We have just left Gravity Control.”
“We may have a problem. Finian is off comms. If he can’t snatch the signal, we can’t open the door to Bianchi’s office.”
“Why is he off comms?”
“That’s what I want you to find out. Head back to Dariel’s squat. Expect trouble. Scar, I want you to go with them as backup.”
“And what are you going to do?” Scarlett asks.
I look through the crowd, find Tyler’s masked face in the pulsing light. The mass of bodies is rolling and swaying around him, Bianchi and his concubines, people of all shapes and sizes moving in unity with the beat. But he stands perfectly still. Brow furrowed. Eyes narrowed. Mind racing.
“Cat, meet us near the restrooms.”
Scarlett meets my eyes, and I see the uncertainty. But once Ty has given an order, she’s not going to buck on him in public. She’s as loyal to him as I am.
As loyal as I am.
“Be careful, roomie,” I warn her.
“You too,” she nods.
We part ways, Scar moving off toward the exit, me diving through the crowd. Tyler and O’Malley are working their way out of Bianchi’s swarm of bodies, slowly, not attracting attention. I run my hand along the aquarium as I walk, watch a dozen luminous worm-things follow the path of my fingers across the glass. My heart is thumping. The music is so loud.
“You all right?” Tyler asks when he sees me.
“Five by five, sir,” I reply on instinct.
I try not to notice the way O’Malley is hanging on to his arm. Tell myself she’s more overwhelmed by all this than I am. That she doesn’t know. Can’t know.
“Orders, sir?”
“Zila and Kal’s explosive charges are in place.” He taps his uniglass. “Even without Fin, I can detonate them remotely. When they pop, Bianchi’s security will be in chaos. We’ll still have ourselves a window, just like we planned.”
“But without Fin, we can’t get the key code,” O’Malley protests. “Even if we make it to Bianchi’s office, we won’t get through the security door.”
Tyler calls up the schematic from Finian’s presentation and points.
“The security door isn’t the only way in.”
“You’re not serious?” I ask.
Tyler winks, and my heart drops into my boots.
“I’m improvising.” He grins.
A few minutes later, we’re lurking near a heavy plasteel door in a shady corner near the back of the ballroom. It’s a little quieter here, and a few couples and one triple are getting to know each other better in the gloom. Large red letters are stenciled on the door in a language I can’t read. If I was a betting girl, I’d wager the passkeys to the Longbow that it says Menagerie: Keep Out.
The door is guarded by four huge Chellerian goons, leathery blue skin gleaming in the dim light, thin black masks covering their four blood-red eyes. They’re each standing with four arms folded across