Page 42 of The Quoram Effect

Bending down, I offered the standard cauteriser the Orbital soldiers all carried. Chaz took it and applied it to the injury. The woman hissed as the smell of burnt flesh assaulted my nose.

“I’ll see what I can do about hiding you both.” I rose to my feet, pondering who was aboard Titus I could trust.

Chaz shook his head. “I appreciate it, Remi, but this is not a time for hiding. With both Zuli’s threats and Russo’s retaliation, I need to help my people. We can get home the way we came.”

My heart ached at his predicament. What could he do against the power of a government built on tyranny? Hiding behind Russo wasn’t advisable, and Chaz knew it. The gangster was as sardonic and callous as the Orbital Governors.

No, there had to be another way to make a stand. We didn’t need a rebellion. We needed a revolution.

Chapter Twenty-One

“So, Torz left to find Marla.” The silver-haired god strutted across the room. Violet swirls flowed behind him in the same obnoxious fashion Governor Zuli’s robes always did.

“Yes,” I sighed, leaning back against the inwardly curved window, the night lights dousing my lounge in its usual soft purple hue.

“That was honourable of him.”

“If you say so,” I mumbled into my glass of wine, the lilac bubbles popping on the surface in mockery.

Dream. This is a dream.

“I am sensing anger within you.” The Damson God chortled, twisting my stomach with irritation.

After the day I’d had—discovering so many moving pieces in whatever game Zuli was playing—I wasn’t in the mood for his wit. Not that I ever really was.

“Or is it profound jealousy?” he mused.

I snapped my gaze to him, a raging sea of frustration surging its current through every muscle, every nerve. All afternoon I’d wound myself up with thoughts of Marla and Torz together, but regardless, that wasn’t the issue at the forefront of my mind.

“I don’t care about Marla!” I downed the rest of my wine before launching the glass across the room. The muted thud confirmed it hadn’t broken. It merely rolled towards the Damson God, stopping when it met his shiny black shoe.

He picked it up, a hardness coating his suave expression. “Really?”

“Marla is insignificant. Everything else is just…it’s out of control.” I doubted the images of the Puran woman melting into Quoram’s purple grass would ever be erased from my mind. Especially when everyone who’d watched it, bar a handful of shocked faces, appeared excited by the spike in Zuli’s fucking graph.

Zuli’s team murdered a woman, and no one cared—that was bad enough. But to learn about Torz’s mother wasting away in prison with a death penalty tattooed to her forehead ate away at me. My heart throbbed, my soul cried. And I knew Torz struggled with the same agony—I couldfeelit. And to add torment to despair, I hadn’t spoken to him about any of it. He’d run off to Marla and hadn’t returned to the suite by the time I’d fallen asleep.

“But it is about her, Remi. Everything comes back to the thought of your Damson with another woman.”

Through narrowed eyes, I shot daggers at him. “You’re insufferable! You come here suggesting you’re helping me through this spate of…whatever the fuck this is, but you…this all started when you entered my dreams, putting ideas in my head. Maybe you’re the one making me feel this desire, the longing, thefuckingjealousy!”

“This struggle is part of your subconscious.”

“But this new situation has nothing to do with the Damson bond. Torz is in danger! His mother is in danger. Everyone is in danger!” My heart pounded beneath my chest as a cold sweat coated my skin, sending shudders of dread down my spine. The thought of losing Torz was like a stabbing, twisting knife to my stomach. An agony so deep, I could barely breathe.

Gods, if I lost him…

“Then, perhaps, Remi, you need to look at all the options available to you.”

* * *

“Wow, what’s eating you today?” Saul’s jovial comment buffered through my brain as I punched the crap out of the boxing pads he was holding up for me.

After being summoned by Torz that morning, not knowing where he’d slept, I’d followed him and Marla around all day as part of their security detail. Breakfast, budget meeting, luncheon, governors’ drinks, and soon I’d be standing guard while they chose the fate of the Purans at the Debate Gala this evening.

Frustration burned deep within me, chomping at the resolve I was desperately trying to retain. The Damson God’s comments from last night only heightened my doubts and assumptions, especially whilst witnessing their interactions—the way Torz smiled at Marla. How he allowed her to stick herself to his side like velcro. How he accepted her touch without so much as a flinch.

He pulls away when I touch him, as if he’s repulsed by me.