Page 81 of Cruel Master
“She’s saved the lives of people in the Compound twice. And the world she and Quinn were creating, it’s incredible. I’ll have to show you.”
Was.
Were.
Everything is in the past tense, and Quinn was clearly grieving. I hate to disturb Hadrian’s happy flow of information, but I have to ask. “What happened to her?”
Sayingherfeels off, but I don’t think sayingitwill go over well. The light dies in Hadrian’s eyes, and he looks down at his hands. “She started behaving erratically. Dangerously. For one, she was expressly forbidden to talk to you, and yet she did.”
My mouth drops open, and I let out a gasp. “She spoke to me?”
My mystery woman. Shit.
“Yes, that was Candice. I know she told you she looped the feed, but we had secondary surveillance on you.”
Oh. Lovely. Wait. “We? There were other people watching me on the cameras?”
It stings, a sharp lance of betrayal. Him seeing me like that is one thing, but other people?
“No. Just me,” he’s quick to reassure, though his face tightens. There’s a story there, but I don’t have the energy to chase it down. For all I know, we’re on camera right now, being watched by some unseen cult leader. I still know next to nothing about what is actually going on.
But back to the main issue. “So that was her? The voice and the Morse code?”
Hadrian goes very still. “What did she say to you in Morse code?”
There’s tension in Hadrian’s body now, and suddenly, it clicks. He didn’t know about that. Part of me wants to hold back the information. He’s my captor. Why the hell am I telling him anything? But that doesn’t feel right anymore. Candice was his baby, and something happened to her. I don’t want to lie to him about this.
“She said, ‘Stay strong. Help is coming.’”
Hadrian frowns at the words, and as I replay my interactions with the mystery woman—Candice—I can see why. When she spoke to me, she didn’t seem like she wanted to help me. It felt more like she was curious about me. I’ve had so much on my mind that I never thought about the contradiction until now.
“When was this?”
Now that’s a tricky question. Days in the cell were strange, twisty things. I can only think in landmark events. “It was right after…” I pause, face heating, but push on. “After you fucked my ass the first time.”
Hadrian’s frown deepens, and I can see him doing mental calculations. “Before she spoke to you.”
I nod. He stays silent for a while, thinking, until I ask, “You haven’t finished telling me what happened to Candice. Is she okay?”
His shoulders slump. “I had to use the emergency shutdown. It shut down her servers all at once, without giving her a chance to move herself somewhere else. I don’t know if she’ll be the same once I get approval to bring her back online.”
His matter-of-fact words don’t hide the weight of his sadness. Jesus Christ. Candice was his dream. His obsession. His entire life’s work. And he shut her down…possibly killed her? I can’t imagine what could have made him do that. I wouldn’t have said anything could have.
“Just because she spoke to me?” My chest gives a guilty twist at the thought.
“What? God, no. Not just that. It was…” He takes a breath, then starts again. “Do you remember the day I returned hours after your timer ran out?”
I’ll never forget that day. Even thinking of it, the memory of the creeping panic speeds up my heart. I just nod.
“I came straight from Medical. She arranged for me to be poisoned.”
Whatever I’d been expecting to hear, it wasn’t that. I blink at him, and he raises a hand. “I know it sounds crazy. But it was her voice. It’s unmistakable. The man who gave me the poison said she threatened—”
“Wait. Her voice? She’s an AI. She can change her voice to whatever she wants. Why would she use one people would recognize?”
Hadrian closes his mouth, grooves appearing between his brows. Did he seriously not consider that? Didn’t anyone else? It’s so obvious as to be almost ridiculous, and I’m just about to risk punishment by saying so when the lights start to flicker. The dots-and-dashes pattern is unmistakable.
Morse code.
