Afterward, he pulled on a pair of sweatpants while she threw on a loose sweater-dress that came to halfway down her thighs. Hit by a wave of raw possessiveness, he gripped her by the waist, held her. If he ever lost her …

Her fingers on his jaw, her charm bracelet sliding over her wrist, she rose on tiptoe to brush her mouth over his. “Don’t go there. Into the dark.” An order. “Stay in the now. In the here. With me.”

Pressing his forehead to hers, he exhaled before nodding. Sometimes the demons tried to claw him back into the relentless fury in which he’d lived after she’d been taken from him, but that past held nothing but pain. This, where they were now—despite all the problems in the PsyNet—it held only beauty of a kind he hadn’t known could exist.

Hands linked, they walked to the kitchen, where she made him a second drink.

Lips curving, she said, “Kiwi?”

“Is a bird.”

Laughter in the air again as she pushed across the drink. Her bracelet tinkled gently, and he caught sight of the most recent charm he’d given her: a flower in full bloom, its petals pink sapphires and its heart a yellow diamond.

For his birthday, she’d talked his admin into ensuring that his schedule was free of all meetings—and then she’d “kidnapped” him for a visit to a theme park where, disguised to avoid recognition, they’d ridden all the rides and eaten the bad food, and he’d won her a stuffed creature of indeterminate origin that she kept in her home office.

Giving him, giving them, the kind of innocent joy they’d never had as children.

Seated at the counter, he waited for her to join him before he said, “I need to track down that A, find out what she means when she talks about the Substrate.”

“You’re extremely annoyed you don’t know this already.” She rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone.”

He scowled at her, the gentle teasing something else to which he’d become accustomed. She kept on doing things to pull him into the light, keep him from giving in to his tendencies toward cold-eyed power. “I was a Councilor and yet this subject never came up.”

“We both know our race has managed frankly remarkable feats of memory loss—we even forgot an entire designation. In comparison to that, this is a minor oversight.”

The most dangerous thing was that she was right. It made Kaleb wonder what other critical data lay mothballed in the past, gathering dust while the PsyNet floundered. Today, however, his priority was the Delhi hub-A.

“The entire anchor database now has dual protections—I have to get Ivy Jane’s authorization as well as my own.” Everyone knew Kaleb could breach almost any wall put in place to keep him out, but he had no reason to breach this one. He had no ill intent.

Sahara picked up the phone she’d left on the breakfast counter. “She was online just before—it’s early evening for her.” Her fingers flew over the screen. “If you’re right about the A working as hard as you and Aden, you’ll have to wait to talk to her. You’re tired, so she has to be close to flameout.”

A reply popped onto Sahara’s phone screen at the same instant: Tell Kaleb I’ll meet him at the vault that holds the data.

That vault was on the PsyNet. But, courtesy of the Pure Psy attacks in 2081, it didn’t hold information on every A in the world. The information had been split into myriad pieces, much of it held safe by trusted parties, and the rest scattered across seven PsyNet vaults. It was a safeguard so a breach wouldn’t expose all the anchors in the network.

Each member of the Ruling Coalition knew which data guardian or vault held which segment of information, the reason why Ivy Jane hadn’t had to specify it for him. The president of the Empathic Collective also had to be the second person to authorize any request for access. Of them all, she was the one most likely to hold on to her ethical center.

On the PsyNet, Ivy Jane’s presence held an echo of empath-gold. “Who are you looking for?” she asked once they were inside the vault.

“The main anchor for the region that fractured today. Around Delhi.” It was at times hard to tell which physical location correlated to the psychic, but not with such a major city—and not when fatalities had reached over two hundred and fifty. People had collapsed where they stood, their minds crushed in the initial assault.

“Here.” Ivy pointed out the segment of data that related to northern India.

It only took him half a minute to find the name: Payal Rao.

Chapter 22

We are not meant to be alone.

As a species, we’re designed to be social. Yet we’ve told ourselves for over a hundred years that Psy are different from humans and changelings, that we can function at full capacity within the cold loneliness of Silence—denying ourselves all bonds, including those formed in spaces such as the PsyNet and the Internet.

Each of us must accept that that was a mistake. To move forward, we must embrace the truth: that Psy need connections as much as changelings and humans—and that such need isn’t a flaw or a weakness.

—PsyNet Beacon social interaction column by Jaya Laila Storm

PAYAL.

Mmm.

Wake up, baby. Or I could send an electrical shock through the door and fry your brother’s brains. Sounds like a better idea to me.

Payal’s eyes snapped open. Canto?

Even as she reached for him with her mind, she winced at the high-pitched sounds emanating from her organizer—the emergency alarm from her security system. Coming immediately out of her groggy state, she turned off the alarm, then got out of bed and scanned outward with her telepathic senses.

Multiple minds beyond the door.

They can’t get in. Canto’s voice, as clear as an ice-cold lake. But I’m picking up chatter that they’re considering a battering ram. Want me to melt Lalit’s brain?

He sounded serious.

No, that’ll just cause questions.

She should’ve been grilling him about his security access, but ignoring that, she pulled up the external visual feed on her organizer. A maintenance team stood outside, with her brother giving them orders. “Lalit,” she said through the intercom, “what are you doing?”

He stilled, then looked up at the door camera. “You’ve been incommunicado for hours, dearest bahena.” He made the word for “sister” sound slimy. “Father asked me to check on you.”