Water shone in the human man’s eyes, his will broken. “Don’t let my family find out I died this way,” he said, his vocal muscles having relaxed enough for him to form the sentence.

“Give me what I want and your body will be discovered in a vehicle, broken beyond repair as a result of a single vehicle crash.”

A shudder that didn’t seem controlled, rather the product of the voltage still arcing through his body. “No faces, no names. Consortium.”

Ena was unsurprised at the words, but she wasn’t certain she believed them. “I thought you were against interracial cooperation.”

“Don’t have to like them to use them,” Patel said, his breathing starting to turn jerky. “Consortium is short-term. Psy in charge pretends to be evenhanded, but she’ll betray us all to hold on to power.”

Ena’s senses went on high alert. “She? The head of the Consortium is a woman?”

“No faces, voices distorted, that’s how it works.” His chest spasmed, his hands drumming against the floor before he brought himself under control. “But her software glitched for a couple of seconds once. I record everything. Went back and listened. Woman.”

It was far more information than anyone else had about the individual behind the Consortium. “How did she contact you?”

“Hard-copy letter. Inviting me to join because I’d been public in my distrust of Trinity.”

“Did you keep the letter?”

“I keep everything.” His eyes held hers, his will impressive given the hit he’d taken. “Bottom left drawer of my satellite Amsterdam office.”

Ena put down her cup again. “Do you expect me to take this on faith? Your son’s name is Vahan, isn’t it?”

A shuddering panic. “Please. Don’t hurt my children. I’ve told you all I know.”

“How do you communicate?”

“Internet. Throwaway e-mail addresses. A defunct chat room about entertainment stars.” He gasped a breath. “If we need a comm conference, we leave a message there, with the current channel settings. Different every time.” He gave her the web address without prompting. She didn’t look it up, in case there were safeguards in place tracking where a member was logging in from.

“I requested a power failure in a certain wide area. Someone with the right connections organized it.” His breathing was a touch better now. “I handled Silver’s building myself.”

“How did you find a traitor in the security team?”

A sudden smile with a touch of arrogance. “Not security. Maintenance. Lower pay, but had the right access and skills after I got him a coach. Psy junkie who’s good at pretending to be normal. People never do penetrating security checks on maintenance staff.”

Ena telepathed the information to Ivan. “You’re a clever man, Mr. Patel.” She meant that sincerely. “Tell me about HAPMA.”

“They asked for money, I gave them some.” He flexed his hands as control returned to that part of his body. “I thought they might be useful, but they’ve exceeded my expectations.”

“You expect me to believe you’re not the founder?”

Fear turned his face bloodless. “Please. They’re only children.” He stopped trying to regain control of his body. “HAPMA’s grassroots. Only contact I had was with a man named David Fournier. Survival trained.” He swallowed. “I was open in being anti-Trinity, caught his attention like I caught the Consortium’s. Only difference is that the Consortium bitch is stone-cold sane while I’m not so sure about David.”

“Yet you gave him money.”

“Fanatics aren’t always the sanest people in the room.”

“Unfortunately, that’s all too true.” She picked up the stunner and shot him again.

Chapter 48

I had a five-year plan once. It was a good one, too. Then life happened.

—Unknown street philosopher

SILVER.

Silver sat up straight at her grandmother’s telepathic voice. Grandmother.

Across from her, Valentin tapped the side of his head. He’d asked her if she had time for a date that afternoon and, since EmNet was currently in standby mode while Ena was dealing with Akshay Patel, she’d said yes. He’d told her to change into StoneWater clothes—she’d chosen jeans and a fine vee-necked sweater in palest green with narrow horizontal stripes of silver that Nova had given her and told her to keep.

When Valentin arrived, it had been with a truckful of cubs excited to go to an amusement center where they got to play in a pit of foam balls.

Now she nodded to confirm she was having a telepathic conversation. He grabbed hold of the two cubs who’d been seated beside him and said, “Who wants to be thrown into the pit?”

“Me! Me!” The cubs next to Silver scrambled out, too, running after Valentin as he carried his gleeful cargo toward the large pool made up of colorful balls that were soft enough to do no damage to children, but deep enough that the kids could get “lost” in them if they ducked down. Which was why Valentin had booked this pool privately—so he knew exactly how many kids were in there at any one time.

Anyone caught ducking down to hide would be summarily banished to the benches to watch mournfully while everyone else played. Valentin’s threatened punishment was apparently an effective one. As she watched, the kids thrown in popped immediately back up, laughing and asking to be thrown in again.

Grandmother? she said again when Ena stayed silent after that initial contact.

My apologies, Silver. I’m having to deal with a secondary telepathic matter. I’ll get back in touch once that’s completed.

The contact cut off.

Not surprised by the interruption—Ena was the matriarch of their family and, as such, was the first port of call for all of them—Silver was nonetheless . . . impatient. It had been hours since Kaleb confirmed he’d delivered Akshay Patel to Ena. Since rushing her grandmother was an impossibility, Silver slid out of the bench seat and headed toward the pool.

Watching Valentin’s arms move in his old white tee, his biceps bulging and his face full of laughter as he picked up the cub who’d just scrambled out of the foam pit, she felt a strangeness in her stomach she remembered from when she hadn’t been Silent.

Silver stopped, listened.

Nothing beyond the children’s voices and the sound of their play.

“Throw me, Mishka! Throw me!” The words were delighted, the childhood nickname used in innocence.

Many a man would’ve chastised the cub that he was speaking to an adult—that he was speaking to his alpha, and should be more respectful—but Valentin pretended to growlingly bite Arkasha before doing as demanded. He had no need to worry about respect. She’d seen how he was treated by the teenagers and older children. They loved him as deeply as these cubs, but they never called him Mishka. It was understood that was a privilege reserved for the very young, the very old, and his sisters.

“Siva!” The smallest cub, Dima, saw her on his way out of the pit, ran toward her after he exited. “Will you throw me?”

Reaching down, Silver gathered his warm, solid body into her arms. “I don’t want to do harm,” she said to Valentin.

“He’ll be fine.” He grabbed Fitz, who was jumping up and down next to him. “Throw just hard enough to get him into the balls—and watch for the other five in there. They know not to move when someone’s about to be thrown in.”