Page 23 of Resolve
I stare at him, shocked. “What? Why?”
He looks away, his face giving away nothing.
Tinsley smiles warmly at him. There’s so much love and understanding in her hazel eyes that I almost feel the need to look away to give them privacy. She touches his thigh. “I can answer that.” Tinsley faces me. “Charles started using and training Reid more around the time he watched you.”
If I was a baby then, that would make Reid still a kid. We’re only five years apart in age.
She continues, “When he was forced to witness and participate in some of the horrible things that Charles did, you were the only good thing in his life. You showed him that the world wasn’t all dark and bloody as it was when he was with Charles. That there was good in it. You helped keep him grounded in the real world, not Charles’s world, and—”
Reid grasps her hand on his thigh, and she stops. His cool gaze returns to mine. “I wouldn’t be here today, or with Tinsley, if not for you. You also escaped his influence. The others didn’t. They could be just as cruel and manipulative as him. I don’t owe every spawn of Charles any loyalty.”
I think of how Alice had blindly tried kidnapping Dane for Charles and attacked me. But then I remember how she cried for Harvey and what she’d done. “I think it’s still worth trying to help them. I promised Harvey we would save them from Charles.”
He gives me a sharp nod but doesn’t say anything further as if he’s acknowledging my choice, even if he doesn’t agree with it.
When no one else chimes in on that topic, Cibrina responds to Aiden’s original request. “Thermal scans should be able to detect any other invisible... guests.”
Dane starts typing and clicking on his laptop. “I think we have that option on these cameras. I’d gotten the ones with all the bells and whistles when we had them installed.”
“Good. Let’s find a way to compare the thermal readings with what the camera actually sees for body count. If there’s a discrepancy, flag security and notify each of us for a manual review,” Aiden orders, and Dane nods.
“I’ll stay here to work on that and the tests with Cibrina and Reid.”
“Before you go, we received Harvey and Vera back this morning.” Cibrina looks between Aiden and Dane. “When and where should we have the service? There are a lot of members who wish to say goodbye to Harvey.”
My heart sinks like a weighted balloon.
Aiden slants his gaze to Dane, who’s staring hard at his screen. “Tomorrow. We’ll have Harvey’s in the Hall and Vera’s in the unused office, as it’ll just be the five of us.”
Cibrina nods. “Understood. I’ll have Penn and Quinn get everything prepared.”
“Thank you.”
Chapter nine
Dane
“Yourealizeyouwon’tbe able to teleport around the Tower or in and out of it with this, right?” I ask Reid, who’s now standing with crossed arms and staring at the wall of glowing golden text. We’ve put together a general concept of how we might block inter-dimensional or Void travel into the Tower, and now Cibrina’s out picking up the parts we need with her assistants.
Reid answers, deadpan, with his back still to me. “I could use the exercise.”
I release a small puff of laughter. That might be the first time I’ve ever heard the guy make something close to a joke.
Tinsley swivels her elbow on the couch to casually lift her hand. “I can still get him somewhere fast if I need to.”
There’s nothing else to do now but wait, so I slap my laptop shut and set it aside so I can relax against the upholstered chair. “You never did tell the rest of us what happened with you while you were with GE. You told Rae, but we’ve been distracted today with an invisible guest and Tower security.”
Tinsley leans into her fist, seeming unbothered by my question,while Reid does a one-eighty to stare me down as if daring me to say anything negative or push her. I raise my brows.
“Vera needed me for her plan against Royce—and to protect you—so I made her a deal. She had to fix what was done to me two years ago for her plan to work, but I also demanded she protect the other Guild members who’d been taken. She would pretend she was torturing us for information or using her special brainwashing technique against them, and no one else at GE would question it or bother us. You guys showed up at Royce’s house and Vera said it was time for the plan anyway, so she let us go. Or, let you rescue us, I suppose.”
Imaginary bricks pile onto my chest until it’s a struggle to breathe.
How long had she been planning that? When did something change for her to switch from trying to get me to join her to protecting me from them instead?
Why, Vera? Why did it have to end like this when you were starting to help?
I grip the armrest. “Do you know why”—I clear my throat when it starts to thicken— “why she was doing it?”
