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“Whatever you tried, it didn’t work. Doctor Marcus Buzard is dead. It’s over.”
His head tipped to the side, very slightly. “Is it?”
Ramon said, “We’re not going to prison, bro.”
Three didn’t even look at him. Perhaps they didn’t have any say at all in what was about to happen.Dominatuswas cleaning house and using the FBI to do it. This wasn’t even close to being over. “At least tell me all those kids are going to be taken care of.”
The lawyers, if they were on the right side, were getting Jax free. Bruce would hopefully make sure all that went successfully.
Maizie would be protected by Stairns and Elizabeth, no matter what happened.
“They are infected.” Three paused, as if that was a sufficient explanation.
“So they can’t be out in public until they’re cured. Donottell me you want this virus to spread.” Was it contagious enough she and Ramon were infected, or had they been injected? Kenna was about to flip her lid—and maybe flip this table.
Sounded satisfying. But would it really make her feel better?
She knew what would make her feel better.
Three said, “What I want is immaterial. You’ve signed our death warrants by killing Marcus Buzard, but revenge isn’t in my power. There are greater forces at work here.”
“Dominatus.”
“We serve the future.”
Ramon said, “I’m going to kill all of you.”
Three whipped something from behind his back and fired it at Ramon. Kenna reached for her friend, but he toppled back off the chair, jerking as electricity raced through his body from the twin electrodes in his chest.
Three set the stun gun, still connected to Ramon and still zapping him, on the table as if nothing had happened. Kenna grabbed it and thumbed it off, stopping the charge. “That’s enough.”
“Let’s go, Kenna.”
She refused to stand. Four and Five came over, dragging her by the arms. “Where are we going? You can’t just take me somewhere. The FBI will want an explanation.”
“We have a warrant from a federal judge to take you to a holding facility.”
There was no way that was true. “Where are weactuallygoing.”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answer to.”
Kenna kicked out with one foot, then spun and tried to do the same with her other foot. Her arms were jerked back, nearly separating her shoulders. She screamed at the tearing feeling in her joints, and the whole world swam around her.
She hit the ground, and everything was swallowed up in darkness.
The past. The future.
All of it was gone.
Epilogue
One month later
Kenna sat with her back to the wall, which was fine because it had padding. White surrounded her, including the white floor. She smoothed her fingers down the leg of a pair of white scrubs. Her white shoes were discarded across the room.
Her hair hung down over her shoulders, lank and unkempt. The ends needed cutting.
That errant thought drifted away, and she couldn’t catch it again.