Page 77 of Cops and Robbers

Danielle stood in the doorway. “What’s going on?”

Shit. Shit. Shit.

“Why aren’t you wearing earplugs?” Danielle stumbled back through the entrance and grabbed the door to lock it behind her.

“No!” Kate launched forward and grasped the door’s edge. Metal crushed her fingers to metal. Searing pain shot up her arm. She screamed. Danielle released the door and ran down the hall.

Kate used her good hand to pry the door back open and bolted after Danielle. Pounding footsteps against metal followed Kate.

“Stop, Danielle,” Kate yelled, cradling her hurt hand as she ran.

Danielle glanced back, face beading with sweat. “Fuck you, demon.”

Danielle’s fear didn’t surprise Kate. According to Sajani, the last accident with the Bell summoned demons that took possession of the humans onboard, and they killed each other. But Kate wasn’t a demon—she was a Fallen.

As Danielle rounded a corner of exhaust pipes, Kate vaulted over them and tackled her. Danielle screamed and kicked Kate’s shoulder to free herself. Kate hissed through the pain and grabbed Danielle’s leg while focusing on her miracle abilities. Pulling energy from her feathers, she transported Danielle’s mind back through time, just as she had Sajani’s.

Danielle collapsed, her body chilled under Kate’s grasp. Hardly able to catch her breath, Kate scooted onto her knees and touched Danielle’s forehead. Her Influence power acted like molasses, barely moving under her coaxing. But she needed to fix Danielle’s memories so she believed she tripped on her way to the room after the alarm, knocking herself unconscious. Kate pushed herself, and a lightning pain raged in her head. Liquid tickled her nose and over her lips as her vision blurred.

“Kate. Stop,” Raz shouted, shaking her away from her concentration. “What are you doing?”

She twisted free of his grip, and dots swam before her vision. “I’m rebuilding her memories.”

“You don’t have the strength for that.”

Wiping at the tickling on her face, she smeared blood across her hand. “I have to.”

“We’ll find another way.”

“I can do this. Just please get Midnight out of here. I can’t fail her again.”

Raz’s jaw clenched, but he nodded.

He was a man of honor, and even if he didn’t know everything about Midnight and thought her a murderer, he wouldn’t leave her behind. Releasing a breath, Kate continued her work. Pain flourished across her head and blood trickled down her face. Kate created the memory piece by piece until darkness took her.

Raz’s heart fell to the floor when Kate’s eyes rolled back into her head with blood streaming from her nose. As she tilted over, her hands slipping from Danielle’s head, Raz caught her.

“Kate?” He squeezed her shoulders and leaned close to her mouth. Even if his dragon sensed a heartbeat, he still checked to make sure her cool breath wisped reassuringly against his cheek. The link was empty between them, but consciousness flickered from her side. She had used her remaining strength. Ripping the sleeve off his T-shirt, he held it against Kate’s nose, but the bleeding had seemed to stop as soon as she passed out.

A presence approached from behind. Caige rested his hand on Raz’s shoulder. “She’ll be okay. She just needs rest, but we need to pack up before Danielle wakes up.”

Danielle lay next to them, her forehead beginning to bruise from her fall. Raz didn’t know if Kate had finished planting memories, but Caige was right. They needed to hide the evidence of what they were doing.

“Stay with Danielle,” Raz said, picking Kate up in his arms. “I’ll secure Kate.”

Raz walked back to the torpedo room to find that Caige had moved the coffin outside the room and closed the door. He’d carefully placed Naomi at the bottom so that she was in something like a fetal position around Lucifer’s Bell.

The metallic surface and evil energy that felt like death and decay were just as he remembered. A fist of hatred curled around his gut at the monstrosity, and he wanted to destroy it rather than transport it with either of the women so close to it. He would destroy it, but first they’d have to get off the submarine safely.

He rested Kate in the case so that her bloody cheek pressed against Naomi’s shins as the Bell lay between them. Naomi’s breathing mirrored Kate’s.

How could you abandon your friend to save your own skin?

He felt as if he didn’t know the woman in front of him, and that stung. Even if Midnight murdered Lukas and worked for Matsuda, Kate had nearly killed herself to make sure Naomi got out without Matsuda knowing, and Raz wouldn’t waste her sacrifice. There were pieces he still couldn’t piece together, but they still needed to finish this mission. He put the partition in place to hide them. There were enough holes along the side of the container that Raz didn’t fear their suffocation, but it still panicked his dragon when he closed the lid and locked it.

“Hey, we need to get moving,” Caige said in the guard’s voice.

Raz stood and turned to see Danielle heading into the room.