Chapter 5 - THE PRICE OF KEEPING HIM ALIVE
Agent Reyes drew his weapon.
Mara shut off the interview room lights.
Red emergency illumination bled through the observation window.
The door handle moved again.
Then stopped.
A voice spoke from the corridor.
“Federal transfer team.”
Reyes did not answer.
The voice continued.
“We have authorization to relocate detainee Ashford.”
Nathan laughed without humor.
“They are not federal.”
“How do you know?” I whispered.
“Because Julian never uses people who introduce themselves twice.”
A burst of gunfire erupted farther down the hall.
Someone shouted.
Mara moved to the wall panel and removed the cover.
“You have thirty seconds before they override the lock.”
“Is there another exit?” Reyes asked.
“No.”
Nathan pulled against his restraints.
“Release me.”
“No,” Reyes said.
“If they breach, I cannot defend myself chained to the table.”
“That is the point.”
The lock flashed from green to amber.
Mara crossed two wires.
The light returned to red.
“Temporary,” she said.
Nathan looked at me.
“Victoria.”
I hated the desperation in his voice.
I hated that part of me still recognized it.
Not as love.
As memory.
Twelve years of hearing him call my name from another room.
Twelve years of turning toward him automatically.
“You said you knew the observatory,” I said.
“I know the access codes.”
“Prove it.”
“Eleanor used constellations as passwords.”
“Which constellation?”
He hesitated.
A mistake.
I understood immediately.
“You don’t know.”
“I know Celeste knows.”
Another impact shook the door.
The lock turned amber again.
Reyes aimed at the center.
Mara opened a concealed panel beneath the interview table.
Inside was a maintenance release.
She pulled it.
Nathan’s wrist restraint snapped open.
Reyes pointed the weapon at him.
“Move wrong and you stay here.”
Nathan rubbed his wrists.
“I understand.”
“No,” I said.
“You never have.”
The door burst inward.
Reyes fired twice.
A man in tactical gear fell backward.
Another threw a flash device into the room.
Mara kicked it beneath the steel table.
The explosion blinded the corridor instead of us.
Reyes grabbed Nathan.
I followed Mara through the doorway.
Smoke and red light filled the detention wing.
Two guards lay injured near the security desk.
A third waved us toward the service corridor.
“Stairwell is compromised!”
Mara pointed toward the medical unit.
“This way.”
We moved quickly.
Every step sent pain across my back and ribs.
I refused to slow down.
At the end of the hall, an attacker appeared from behind a doorway.
Nathan shoved me aside.
The gunshot struck the wall.
Reyes fired.
The attacker collapsed.
For one strange second, Nathan and I stared at each other.
He had protected me.
Not because he had changed.
Because he needed me alive.
Understanding that made the gesture easier to accept.
We entered the medical unit.
Mara locked the door behind us.
Reyes activated his emergency transmitter.
“Compromised facility.”
“Multiple armed suspects.”
“Request immediate tactical response.”
Static answered him.
“They are jamming communications,” Mara said.
Nathan moved toward a cabinet.
Reyes aimed at him.
“I need a phone.”
“You are not calling anyone.”
“I am calling Celeste.”
I almost laughed.
“Your mistress is in federal custody.”
“She has a failsafe.”
“What kind?”
“A number Julian gave her.”
Mara searched Nathan’s face.
“You memorized it?”
“I memorized everything connected to power.”
“That explains why you forgot basic humanity,” I said.
The words struck him.
He looked away.
Mara found a landline inside a locked office.
The outside connection was dead.
She removed the wall plate and attached a compact signal device from her bag.
“I can get one encrypted call through.”
Nathan gave her the number.
Celeste answered on the fourth ring.
“What?”
Her voice was sharp and frightened.
Nathan stepped closer.
“It’s me.”
Silence.
Then Celeste laughed.
“You sound terrible.”
“Julian is trying to kill me.”
“Then perhaps he finally developed good judgment.”
“Celeste.”
Nathan’s voice hardened automatically.
She did not respond the way she used to.
“You do not command me anymore,” she said.
“You destroyed everything.”
“You were part of it.”
“I was trying to survive you.”
I watched Nathan absorb the reversal.
He had always believed Celeste admired his strength.
Now she sounded disgusted.
“We need the observatory access code,” he said.
“Why?”
“Victoria found Nightglass.”
Another silence.
When Celeste spoke again, the arrogance was gone.
“Is Eleanor alive?”
“Yes,” I said.
Celeste heard my voice.
Her breathing changed.
“Victoria.”
“You demanded the last two.”
No response.
“You counted them.”
“I know.”
“Why?”
Nathan looked at me.
Mara looked away.
Celeste’s answer came slowly.
“Because Julian told me the pendant only activated after the two-hundredth impact.”
The room went still.
“What?” I whispered.
“The device around your neck.”
“He said it was collecting biometric proof.”
“He needed the full sequence completed.”
Nathan stared at the floor.
Even he had not known.
Celeste continued.
“I thought it would prove Nathan’s instability.”
“You thought?”
“I knew.”
Her voice cracked.
“I knew what was happening.”
There was no excuse in the words.
Only admission.
“I wanted him compromised.”
“And you used my body to do it.”
“Yes.”
The honesty was almost worse than denial.
Mara leaned toward the phone.
“What is the observatory code?”
Celeste breathed in.
“Cassiopeia.”
“That is not enough.”
“Five stars.”
“Order?”
“Two, five, one, four, three.”
Mara wrote it down.
“Where is the Meridian ledger?”
“In the observatory’s lower archive.”
“How do you know?”
“Because Julian sent me there once.”
“What did you see?”
“A room filled with names.”
A crash sounded outside the medical unit.
The attackers had reached us.
Celeste spoke quickly.
“Victoria, listen to me.”
“I am listening.”
“Your mother is not the only person waiting at that observatory.”
“Who else?”
“Elias.”
My father had said nothing about going to Wisconsin.
Celeste lowered her voice.
“And if Julian reaches them first, one of your parents will kill the other.”
May you like
The line went dead.
At that exact moment, the medical unit door exploded inward.
