Page 80 of Even Robots Die (Even Ever After #3)

Brice

I t feels like it’s been hours since I got separated from Florentine and I’m regretting giving myself away so easily.

I could be waiting for her outside, organizing Elhyor’s forces with Pierre, but no, instead I did the dumb thing the beast inside of me wanted me to do.

The beast has been restless ever since, to say the least.

I would say it deserved it, but the beast is in me, it’s part of me, so I can only blame myself, because I, too, am restless.

It's not like me to be restless. I need to calm down. I won't be any good to Florentine if I can’t stay calm and collected.

I look around me. I’m surrounded by cells—the kind of cells that don’t respect any decency—and they’re all full. There is a mix of humans and shifters alike. It’s not like the birds to mix everyone. Or maybe they consider it to be a heavier punishment for the shifters placed here.

I tug at the small knife I hid on the inside of my belt and move to the bars.

Let’s surprise Florentine and already be out when she arrives.

I slip my arm through the bars and take it back faster.

What the hell was that? When I tried to pass my arm through the hole, an electrical current hit me. Ten seconds later, I still feel my skin tingling and not in a good way.

Someone chuckles two cells down. I guess they all know about the electricity shield.

I curse out loud but barely finish my sentence, and we’re in the dark.

She did it.

I try to slip my arm through the bars—much slower—and it doesn’t hit me with an electric charge this time, so I get to work. At least the knife might get into the lock so I can be out before Florentine arrives.

The guy who chuckled just a few seconds ago looks at me with wide eyes. I have a feeling he’s been down here for a while and that the only way he saw people getting out was at the arms of guards and that it rarely boded well for them.

I don’t pay him too much attention for now. We’ll get him out.

I sigh.

She’ll get him out.

I’ve been trying to open the lock with my knife for over five minutes and nothing is doing it. It seems to be stuck, and I have a renewed pride for Cassiopé who can basically open anything.

“You thought you could get yourself out?” I hear Florentine’s voice at the same time the natural light up the stairs illuminates us in the cells. “They changed the locks since your daughter came to visit them. You can’t open them manually.”

She comes down the stairs and stops in front of me.

“Your idea to come with me still sound like the best?” she asks me as she crosses her arms under her breast. She has no idea how that simple move makes me want her even more.

The way she tugs her hands under her armpits pushes her breasts up and every time I see her do that, I want to sink my fangs into the top of one of her breasts, or both.

I have to get my mind out of the gutter, though, because now isn’t the time to fantasize about everything I want to do to my woman.

“You miss me, Furious?” I ask her instead.

“Maybe,” she says. “You know you’re an idiot and that I’ll make sure to tell you as many times as you need?”

“Yes, I know,” I tell her with an amused smile I’m not sure she can see. “Now get me out of here so we can go help everyone outside.”

She puts her hand on the lock, and I hear a click.

“Electric lock,” she says with a shrug.

She gives me her second glove that is already off her hand and we get to work.

Luckily, most of the people in the cells are in good shape—or at least can walk on their own—so once we get out, it’s easier.

We walk up two flights of stairs and numerous corridors before we finally see the sunlight. It’s harsh on my eyes and I can only imagine what it does to the prisoners we just freed. There was light in the dungeon, but it was still very dark.

That’s not what worries me the most, though.

What worries me is the fact that we just exited a building that was relatively safe to be thrust into during an all out war, and the prisoners with us have no way to defend themselves.

“We need to get them to safety,” I tell Florentine.

At least we got out near the écuries du roi, which means we’re slightly off center from the battle taking place out in the open.

“Charles is on his way with a team,” Florentine says after a second. I wonder when she took over my own team.

That must show on my face because she adds, “Milton reached him faster than any holo could.”

She shrugs, and it makes her metallic wings move with her.

I see movement coming from the sky on her side. Not allies from the look of the feathered wings at their back.

“Attack incoming,” I tell her, motioning her to face the threat.

She opens her wings further and powers them up before she jumps into the sky. I follow her and we rush to the birds coming our way.

Only one of them is carrying the type of gun Florentine warned us about, and before we reach them, he’s already firing. The five others just look very pleased with themselves as the net is launched in the air in our direction.