Page 18

EON

M y head spun with Vector and Flux. I wobbled my way down the corridor to my apartment door, leaning heavily against the wall as I tried to press my palm into the biometric scanner outside.

Nothing happened. I groaned and slammed my palm into it harder until I felt the circuits fire and the dissonant ping of it finally working.

I’d done the job. Both Cy and Maddox had been distracted during the infiltration, and with their devices disabled and in a different district, they wouldn’t be able to get to the site before Taos and her people could slip away.

I didn’t know they had intended to blow up the data center. Maybe they hadn’t? Maybe things had gotten out of control? How many people had gotten hurt because of this? My skin itched all over thinking about it. Well, that—and the Vector withdrawal.

It wasn’t supposed to be like that. I’d always planned on sleeping with him.

That was just business, and I could have convinced myself that I didn’t enjoy it.

Not after that. Not after he’d done something that I never did while working.

Not when he’d looked up at me from between my legs with those electric eyes and made me come so hard I’d seen stars.

Get it together, Eon! It was just sex. That had literally been my job.

Yeah, so I’d had a lot of really terrible sex.

That sex hadn’t been terrible—it had been fucking fantastic.

I’d tried so hard to deny myself, not give into the attraction.

He was beautiful and filthy, but more than that, when he’d shocked me it had resonated deep within me, just like at the data center.

A high I craved almost more than Vector.

As the scar on my ribs ached, heat pooled between my legs again.

The door to my apartment finally slid open, and the florescent lights inside flicked on automatically. It was a shitty place, the whole lot built out of old shipping containers stacked whatever way they would stay put. I never stayed anywhere long enough to care about the ambience too much.

DITA slowly formed in the opening to my kitchen in her usual body-hugging black dress that matched her raven hair, curled around her face in a retro style that, if she had been corporeal, I was sure would be so stiff from hairspray it would be comical.

In her digital format, however, it perfectly accented her strong, pale jaw and offset her cherry-red lips.

On one particularly dark and lonely night I’d bought her this digital avatar, not knowing it was a particularly lascivious model. That was a lie—I had definitely known.

“Welcome home, E. How was work today?”

“I don’t want to talk about it, DITA.” I flopped down onto my threadbare couch and closed my eyes, leaning my head over the back.

Through my closed lids, I saw flashes of light as DITA moved around the couch near me. She flicked on some smooth jazz—her favorite, not mine—and I opened my eyes to her setting the lights to a sensual deep orange.

She moved in front of me and started undulating her body, toying with the straps of her dress. “Anything I can do to help?” she asked coyly.

I waved my hand. “Not tonight, DITA.”

“Oh, would you prefer this?” Light traced up her body as her appearance changed—swaths of soft femme curves replaced with a hard masculine body.

God, I was so fucking blind. The male avatar looked just like Cy, but with dark hair and no tattoos.

The same lean but strong body, the same angular and hard face.

“I said no, DITA.” She flashed back to her usual self with an alarmed look and moved so she looked like she was sitting beside me on the couch.

She was complex code, perfectly calibrated to anticipate my needs. So different from the chaos I’d just experienced. DITA was designed to please; what I’d felt with Cy had no design at all. That’s what made it terrifying.

“What happened? Are you hurt?” she asked softly.

I brought my hands up to my face, scrubbing it roughly. My elbow passed through her, and her countenance flickered as I did.

“No, it’s not that. I just…I just thought I had this under control. I thought I had myself under control.”

Her hands flickered as she set them on my shoulders. “Did you fall off the wagon, E?”

“No!” I practically screamed it as her glowing form looked like fireworks in my eyes from the Vector. I didn’t have a choice. It didn’t count.

“Okay! You just told me to call Mercy if you—”

“I know! I know what I said, DITA.”

I let out a long breath, leaning back on the couch. “Do I have any detox left?”

“Three-fourths of a vial.”

“That’ll have to be good enough.”

I struggled to the bathroom, pawing through the cabinet until the small white cartridge rolled into my palm.

I pumped the remainder of the dose up my nose and immediately huddled over the toilet.

A few moments later I was heaving. This continued until I was sure there wasn’t any fluid left in me.

I finally stood and made it to the kitchenette, where DITA had auto-dispensed some water.

I chugged it, but my mouth was still horribly dry.

All of this was better than the alternative.

I sank back into the couch, and DITA was still there, waiting patiently.

“What happened?” No judgment in her voice—just like I’d programmed.

“I’d been thinking about…this for so long. I wanted to trick him, I wanted to get the upper hand. I thought I had myself under control.”

“All we ever have in this life is the illusion of control.”

I couldn’t help the twitch at the corner of my lips. “Fancy words, DITA. You have your philosophical mod activated right now?”

“My emotional scanners indicated that your body language and tone would be best served by a truthful but not overly cheerful response.”

“Very astute, DITA.”

“They also indicated a rise in body temperature indicative of a sexual hormonal response, which is why I thought—”

“I know, it’s all right. I think I just need…I need some time alone tonight. Please.”

“Of course, E. Whatever you need.”

She folded into herself and was gone. I walked over to my bed and lay down, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling. My skin was crawling, and my pinky shook. It had felt so good. So damn good.

I’d thought about him more times than I could count since that day in the Tech District.

The way his power had felt coursing through me—how right it had felt.

How goddamn amped I’d felt. And how good it would’ve felt to pull that power out of him while I fucked him senseless.

That was fucked on its own. The anger and arousal I felt when I thought about him was something I should probably talk to my therapist about—if I had one.

Instead, all I had was DITA, and I was too embarrassed to talk with her about it.

I’d thought that this would end it. Closure. He’d be just another man. An attractive one, a powerful one, but just a man. Overconfident and fallible. I’d be able to drop this obsession that had haunted me for six months.

Well, that hadn’t fucking worked. In fact, it had only made it worse.

I could feel myself craving him—an addiction setting in.

Leaving him that message had been stupid.

I should have gotten away clean—untraceable—but as the echoes of orgasm and his signal had rolled through me, I’d scrawled it.

A backdoor left open, because even then part of me had known I didn’t want to be done with him.

My Flux was still erratic, and I knew what I had to do.

I pulled on my Vysor and sank into cyberspace.

I flicked open six months of data—six months of leads and false starts—until I’d found out who he was.

My Flux spread out into the void, and now I knew his frequency.

I let it thrum through me, and the only picture I had of him floated in front of my face.

I still ached between my legs. I only resisted a moment more before pulling the vibrator out of the drawer beside my bed. I switched it on and shimmied out of my skirt and underwear.

I pressed the vibe into myself and bit down on my lip as that asshole’s face danced in my vision. Those fierce eyes and wicked smile. The feeling of his long fingers around my waist and his lips against my ear as we’d played our dangerous game.

But it wasn’t just the physical memory that had me aching.

It was how our Flux had synchronized, creating a circuit that felt nothing like the calculated transactions I’d known before.

I could understand that—there was a barrier there.

It was a business. A whore and her client.

Every connection was commodified—bought, sold, or leveraged.

What had happened between us felt dangerously unquantifiable.

Like finding a glitch in Neo Stellaris itself.

I might have ruined his Vysor, but mine had been on. I replayed what my mic had captured—his dirty words and that perfect moan when he came.

Delicious pressure built in my lower stomach as I recalled how his Flux had spiked then, triggering those glowing tattoos that had shone beneath my nails as I pressed into his chest. Then he was between my thighs, and he’d shocked me so hard that every single one of my muscles had seized before releasing into overwhelming bliss.

Electricity snaked over my skin, and I could smell my sheets burning—but I didn’t care.

With others I had to keep it contained, never letting it out so I didn’t hurt anyone.

Not tonight. I let my Flux burn through my body while Cy burned through my mind, his face buried between my legs.

My legs spasmed and I came hard, my electricity spiking.

I heard the pathetic buzz of my vibrator as it got fried and stopped working, but still I rode it through the waves of pleasure.

Cyberspace shattered right along with me—but for just a moment, a shadow lingered.

That same shadow that had hung over me the last few months.

This time it felt different, as if my electromagnetic release had caught its attention.

It paused, observing the unique patterns our synchronized Flux had created in the digital substrate before dissolving back into the noise.

Whatever it was, I ignored it and flung my Vysor off.

I came down off that electric high—but still I was left wanting. And I knew I would be left wanting from now on. I tossed the now-defunct vibrator aside and rolled over, pressing my face into the pillow in a frustrated scream.

Fuck.

“Looks like you’ve burnt out another one, E. Would you like me to order you a new one?”

“Shut up, DITA.”