Chapter 102 102

Chapter 102 102
Raines opened the door, the metal handle clicking softly as she pulled it wide. The sound snapped me out of my thoughts before I even realized how far into them I’d drifted.

She glanced back at me over her shoulder. “You ready?”

My brain answered instantly. Hell no. The words never made it out of my mouth though. My legs felt heavy, like gravity had quietly doubled itself just to see what I’d do about it. My chest ached in that strange way that isn’t exactly pain but definitely isn’t comfortable either.

Something had happened in that room a few minutes ago. Something big. And whatever it was, my body hadn’t quite figured out how to process it yet.

I felt stretched thin, like a wire pulled too tight between too many poles, humming with tension.

“Yes,” I said finally, answering Raine’s question. The lie slid out easier than it should have.

Raines held my gaze a second longer than I liked. Her cop instincts were probably lighting up like a Christmas tree right about now, but she didn’t call me on it. Instead she stepped into the hallway and jerked her head toward the exit. “Let’s move.”

Sara fell in behind us without saying a word. She had that quiet look on her face again, the one she got when her brain was busy trying to untangle about ten impossible things at once.

The three of us moved down the corridor, and about halfway down it, something shifted. At first I thought it was the building settling. Then I realized it wasn’t the hallway. It was me.

A faint prickling sensation crept across my skin, raising the fine hairs along my arms. I rubbed my forearm absently, trying to brush the feeling away. It didn’t go anywhere. Instead it spread slowly up the back of my neck.

For a second, just a second, I had the strange, ridiculous feeling that the walls around us were…aware.

That’s insane, I told myself immediately. Buildings don’t watch people. Still…

Raines pushed open the exit door and cold night air rushed inside, cutting straight through the stale hallway air.

I sucked in a breath. Seattle greeted us like it always did. Traffic rolled past in steady lines of headlights. A bus wheezed to a stop at the corner, its doors hissing open like an irritated cat. Somewhere across the street someone laughed, the sound drifting lazily through the damp air.

Everything looked normal, but my stomach tightened anyway.

Sara stepped up beside me and studied my face for a moment. “You okay?”

I hesitated. For a split second I almost lied again, but what was the point?

“No,” I admitted quietly. “Not really.”

Sara nodded once, like that was exactly the answer she’d expected.

“Yeah,” she said. “Same.”

Raines turned back toward us, already scanning the street the way she always did before moving anywhere. Her eyes moved over parked cars, windows, the shadowed corners of the block. “Let’s get to the car,” she said. “Before anything else decides to explode tonight.”

I tried to laugh. It came out more like a breath.

As we started down the sidewalk, the pressure in my chest deepened with every step.

It wasn’t pain, not exactly, it felt more like something inside my ribs was shifting its weight…adjusting…trying to settle into a new balance, almost as if the world itself had tilted slightly and my body hadn’t gotten the memo yet.

Halfway down the block my foot caught the edge of the curb and I stumbled. My hand shot out automatically and I grabbed the cold metal of a streetlamp before gravity could finish the job.

“Whoa!” I breathed.

Raines spun around instantly, grabbing my arm. “What happened?”

“I don’t—” The sensation hit again before I could finish. Not dizziness. Direction.

Something inside my chest tilted sharply toward the east side of the city.

“Sponsor?” Sara asked carefully.

I closed my eyes, not because I was dizzy, but because suddenly I needed to listen.

The pull wasn’t a voice…there were no words. Just awareness.

Raines studied my face like she was reading a crime scene. “Talk to me.”

“I think something broke,” I said slowly.

Sara frowned. “Broke where?”

I opened my eyes and turned slightly, my gaze drifting across the river toward the darker stretch of skyline beyond. “Across the river,” I murmured. “Some kind of containment.”

Raines blinked. “You’re guessing.”

I shook my head. “Not exactly.” And that was the strange part, I wasn’t. I could feel it.

The pressure rolled through my chest again, then eased slightly, like whatever had snapped had redistributed its weight across the world.

Sara shifted beside me. “That…doesn’t sound good.”

“It isn’t,” I agreed.

A colder thought crept into the back of my mind. What if that was Cyne?

Raines watched me another moment, clearly trying to decide whether I’d lost my mind completely. Then she jerked her head toward the car. “Okay. Whatever’s happening, we’re not figuring it out standing in the street.”

She opened the passenger door and I slid inside, the seat cold beneath me. I leaned my head back against the headrest. The pressure in my chest pulsed again. Sharper this time.

I let out a slow breath.

Sara climbed into the back seat, and Raines started the engine.

The car rolled away from the curb, the streetlights sliding past the windows in long streaks of gold. After a moment, Raines glanced sideways at me. “You’re doing that thing again.”

“What thing?” I asked.

“The staring into space like you’re listening to something the rest of us can’t hear,” she replied.

I rubbed a hand across my face. “I think someone just escaped,” I said quietly.

Sara leaned forward between the seats. “Escaped from what?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know.” But deep in my bones something stirred.

The pressure beneath my sternum shifted again, and suddenly I knew. Not logically. Not even in a way I could explain. I just knew. I wasn’t the only one who had broken free tonight. Cyne had too.

My fingers curled slowly against the seat as his name moved silently through my thoughts. Somewhere in the city…he was free and moving.