2026-11-04 00:38:18
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Chapter 14: Black Gloves at the University Gate
Lily's POVMy phone buzzed for the fifth time in the bottom of my backpack, and I ignored it again, because it was Dad, and Dad only ever called at dawn to ask whether I'd seen his reading glasses.The Number 9 bus was packed with sleepy students and dockworkers coming off the night shift. I stood squashed between a man who smelled of squid and a girl doing her lipstick in her phone camera, and I practiced suture knots on my own thumb with a piece of thread, because Professor Halden's anatomy lab started at seven sharp, and Professor Halden locked the door at one minute past.My plaster had come loose again. I'd sewn through my own finger twice last week practicing on pig skin, and Tess from my lab group said I had the hands of a surgeon and the luck of a pigeon.The bus braked so hard that the squid man fell into me."What's going on?" somebody shouted.Through the front window, I saw blue lights. Six black SUVs had pulled across t
Chapter 13: Tell Him Thursday
Gerald's POVI smoke one cigarette a week, and in twenty-nine years of marriage, Margaret has never found the pack.I keep it in a coffee tin behind a loose brick at the bottom of the garden wall, under the magnolia. Tonight I'd gone out at a quarter to four, after lying awake for three hours beside my wife and replaying the banquet in my head: Dr. Henry Moore walking in on his granddaughter's arm, the banker with the steel briefcases and Lucas Grant spinning across the stage like a slapped top. My mother had sat in her room with the lamp on since we got home, staring at the wall, and none of us had dared to knock.I was halfway through my cigarette when I noticed the car.It sat on the hill road just below our gate, a grey sedan with its lights off and its engine ticking as it cooled. Through the iron bars I could see the glow of a phone inside and the shape of a man in a cap.I'm not a brave man; I'll say it before anybody else does. I stood under the tree with smoke going up my nos
Chapter 12: A Parade That Needs Live Rounds
Damon's POVI unfolded the paper under the orange glow of the dock lamps.It was a page torn from a printed program, heavy cream card with the Ministry of War's gold eagle stamped at the top. In neat black type it listed the evening schedule for Victory Day: the Grand Marshal's address at seven, a flyover by the Capital Air Wing at half past, and at eight o'clock, live on National Channel One from the yard of the Iron Coffin, a program called Justice at Frostgate.Four names were printed under the title: Tobias Rook, Bruno Mace, Ryker Stone and Samuel Adeyemi.Under the names, in smaller letters, someone had added a note for the guests: Refreshments will be served in the east pavilion following the program.I read the page twice. Halfway through the second reading, I noticed that my thumb had gone straight through the card beside Bruno's name."Refreshments," I said."Shrimp on little crackers, I heard, and the good champagne." Kira's voice was flat. "A printer from the government pre
Chapter 11: Two Inches From the Left Boot
Kira's POVThe man in my scope didn't run, and in five years of hunting and being hunted, nobody had ever done that to me.I lay flat on the steel catwalk of Crane Six, forty meters above the container yard, with my cheek against the rifle stock and the harbor wind tugging at my hood. My red dot sat in the center of his chest. A soldier would have dropped behind the nearest bollard, and a civilian would have screamed for the police.He stood on the dock road in his cheap grey clothes and looked up at the crane, straight into my lens, as though he could see the color of my eyes."Who the hell are you?" I whispered.Two nights ago, Old Gus had sent the Legion's emergency code from a payphone on Lantern Street. That code hadn't gone out once in five years. I'd locked up the Red Fox Bar, packed my rifle in pieces inside a guitar case and ridden the night bus nine hundred kilometers south, telling myself the old cook had finally cracked. Then tonight, standing at the back of the Grand Impe
Chapter 10: The Papers Torn in Half
Dr. Henry Moore walked down the center of the ballroom, and the guests stepped back to let him pass. Elena walked at his side with a thick white folder under her arm, and the Channel Six camera swung around to follow them.Agatha rose so fast her walking stick clattered to the floor. "Dr. Moore! What an honor! We had no idea you were well enough to...""I came on business, Mrs. Whitmore." He stopped in front of the head table. "Two days ago, my hospital moved its supply contract to Kane Pharmaceuticals. Yesterday, my granddaughter tested their herbs.""They're fake," Elena said, loud and clear. "Rice powder, dyed tree bark and cheap fillers. Kane Pharmaceuticals has been selling useless medicine to sick people."The whole room went silent."So tonight," Dr. Moore continued, "I'd like to sign an exclusive five-year supply contract with Whitmore Pharmaceuticals, worth two billion dollars."Somebody dropped a glass, and it shattered on the marble.Agatha's mouth opened and closed without
Chapter 9: Ten Thousand Dollars to Lick a Shoe
The Grand Imperial Hotel glowed at the top of Harbor Avenue like a palace made of light. Black cars lined the driveway, cameras flashed along the red carpet, and the richest families in Eastbay stepped out in silk and diamonds.Inside, the main ballroom held three hundred guests. A band played under gold flowers, and a news crew from Eastbay Channel Six stood by the wall with their camera already rolling. Lucas Grant had paid for every bit of it.At the head table sat Grandmother Agatha with a leather folder in front of her. It held the divorce papers, open to the last page.Damon walked up the red carpet in his old grey work clothes, and the photographers lowered their cameras, because nobody wanted a picture of him.The two guards at the door stepped together and blocked his way. "Kitchen staff use the back entrance.""I'm a guest.""Sure you are, and I'm the President." One of them shoved his shoulder. "Get lost before we drag you."The second guard laughed. "Look at his shoes, man
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