Page 120 of You Only Love Twice
Blood all over her skirts.
Her hair—
He had the distant feeling he'd never be able to wash it off.
"Isabella?" A foolish question, for he'd seen the glorious light from her eyes vanish.
"Is she—?" Ingrid paused, a step away from him, visibly swallowing down her words.
Clearly realized how futile they would be.
"He got to her," Malloryn choked out, a hollow ringing sound echoing in his ears. "He put a fucking neural implant in her head and turned her against me."
"Who got to her?" Ingrid asked.
"Balfour."
"Balfour? As in Lord Balfour? The prince consort's spymaster?"
"Isn't he dead?" Byrnes added.
Malloryn rocked Isabella in his arms, clenching his eyes shut against the pain. He'd never loved her, but she'd been a friend, a lover.... If he'd paid her more attention, would he have seen the faint signs of her personality change? Would he have noticed the way the enemy was twisting her to his will?
Could he have saved her?
"London Bridge is falling down," came a soft voice behind him.
A familiar voice, but with each word, there was less and less inflection in her tone, as if what remained ofherwashed out of the words. He didn't know what set him off, but all the hairs on the back of his neck lifted.
Malloryn turned his head slowly.
Gemma stood there, staring blankly at nothing.
Gemma, who hadn't come rushing to Isabella's side despite their friendship.
A second epiphany burst through him like a starburst, sending a chill down his spine.
Just remember, this time the joke shall be on you. I was never the Chameleon. Just the one meant to set her in play....
It felt too easy... The way I escaped.
I thought they'd be tougher....
Taking Gemma had never been a trap meant for him, but a means for Gemma to recover from her surgery. She'd have been suspicious if she'd woken in the streets, dumped in some alley.
So they'd set the scene for her to escape.
"Gemma?" he asked as the full implication of Isabella's words hit him.
A blank doll stared back.
"Chameleon," she whispered again, as if she could hear some other voice and was merely repeating the instructions.
And then those blue eyes locked on him with a sudden, eerie intensity.
"Malloryn," she said.
Not her. No.
