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More than that, Aura would be dead. Jem would have killed a child.

A child I felt strangely attached to, even in only a few days.

“Tell them to go in.” I could feel Black focused on me, on my light. “Tell them I’ll be right behind them, but they have to go in. They can’t wait. He could be killing the girl right now. Tell them they’re authorized to shoot if necessary… stopping power only.”

I was already running towards the office door.

I only stopped once, to bend down and yank the gun out of my ankle-holster.

Jax entered the apartment ahead of her, walking soundlessly.

He more or less insisted on going in first, which probably should have annoyed Kiko, given who she was, how long she’d been running full-blown military ops, how many pacification and extraction jobs she’d done for Black in war-torn countries, not to mention her years of military service before she entered the private sector… but somehow shewasn’tannoyed, which managed to amuse her and irritate her at the same time.

She knew it was only because it was Jax.

Maybe it was proof enough that they were still in the honeymoon stage.

Jax had been through his own world of shit, including a planet-wide war on Old Earth that ended with the destruction of an entire civilization. She knew little scared Jax more than losing another person he cared about, especially through a careless mistake.

For the same reason, he lived in fear of miscalculating on how serious a threat was, or how vulnerable someone he loved might be, or just how badly things could go sideways and how quickly and how irreversibly.

Kiko got that.

She’d been in wars, too. She’d lost friends.

She knew that fear.

As much as she hated to admit it, there might also be some acknowledgement in the back of her mind that a seer as formidable as Dalejem going off the deep end wasn’t something she could handle on her own.

Frankly, she doubted Jax could handle him, either, which is why she followed closely behind him, gun drawn, if still mostly pointed at the floor.

She’d heard enough in Black’s voice when he gave the order to know they had no time to waste. Whatever was going on with Nick and his “boyfriend,” this wasn’t normal seer craziness. Black certainly didn’t think it was normal. He hadn’t sounded afraid, exactly, but only because Black never really sounded afraid.

On Black, fear came through as a kind of hyper-aggressive caution.

Given the new orders they’d gotten just now, Black clearly thought someone might need to take Jem down with a tranquilizer rifle… or maybe a bullet to the knee, andthena tranquilizer rifle.

At the thought, she wondered why a tranq gun hadn’t occurred to her or Jax.

She continued to follow Jax steadily, only with her back to him now, as they ventured deeper into Black and Miri’s penthouse.

Kiko knew Black would likely burst into the room any second.

She and Jax had been closest, but the boss and the others would be right on their heels. The thought that Dalejem might be in here, killing the girl with his bare hands, or maybe with a knife to her throat, had been enough for Black to order them in ahead.

She checked the corners, her gun held higher now.

She used her earpiece to listen for sounds her human ears couldn’t pick up, but got no hint of a living being in any part of the penthouse apartment at all, much less in the parts she could see. She switched over to infrared and looked again, but still nothing.

Despite everything, Kiko couldn’t help being glad it was Jem they were told to be cautious of––warm-blooded, seer Dalejem––versus Nick, the cold-blooded vampire.

Frankly, vampires still scared the shit out of her.

“We need to check the bedrooms,” she murmured to Jax, without lowering her gun, and without taking her eyes off her half of the room. “Boss’s bedroom is in the back, but the kid’d be in the guest bedroom, wouldn’t she?” Kiko frowned. “That’s over there.” She jerked her head and the gun. “First door down the hall. I’m not getting anything on infrared, but there might be too much in the way. Can you see anything with your seer’s light?”

Jax frowned. His eyes shifted out of focus, and she knew he was looking.

Kiko thought of something else.