Page 191 of Villainous Rise

There was a sickening pop and fire shot through my shoulder joint. I screamed.

“Get your fucking hands off of her. Now.” Cipher took a step forward.

Valor laughed but the sound carried no humor. He pulled me tighter against him, positioning my body as a human shield. “No. Annie is going to answer for being a two-faced, cock-sucking whore and trying to destroying my reputation.”

I felt the shift in Cipher’s energy a split second before it happened. His stance changed imperceptibly. The air around us filled with a high-pitched whine.

Dozens of tiny drones swarmed from his suit. They moved fast, targeting Valor’s exposed skin and eyes.

Valor cursed and released me to swat at the mechanical swarm and the moment his grip loosened, Cipher’s voice cut through the chaos.

“Run.”

I broke away, sprinting toward the twisting corridors of the Maze. Behind me, I heard Valor’s enraged shout as Cipher engaged him directly. The sound of energy blasts and impacts echoed through the narrow alley as I ran.

I made it perhaps fifty yards before a golden streak flashed overhead again and Valor snatched me around the waist. The ground fell away as he shot upward, carrying me into the night sky.

“Stop.” I struggled against his grip. We were already thirty feet up and climbing rapidly into the fog rolling across Chroma Bay.

“Shut up,” he snarled.

Below us, I saw Cipher launch into the air in pursuit.

“You fucking coward.” Cipher’s voice carried through the night air, raw with fury. “Face me instead of using her as a goddamn shield.”

Valor’s arm tightened around my waist as we climbed higher. Fifty feet. Seventy. A hundred. The glowing city spread out beneath us, beautiful and terrifying.

“Come any closer,” Valor called back, “and I’ll drop your whore. Let’s see if she bounces.”

I stopped struggling immediately. I was acutely aware of the fatal distance between me and the ground.

Cipher slowed his pursuit and hovered perhaps twenty feet away from us.

We were at an impasse. Valor couldn’t escape with me without Cipher following. Cipher couldn’t attack without risking my life.

I dangled above the city, my life resting in the hands of a man I had never truly respected, a man I never imagined could be this unhinged.

“I’m taking her back to the Tower,” Valor yelled over the wind. “Havoc needs to see the trash he’s been harboring.”

“You aren’t taking her anywhere.”

I looked between them. Valor was unstable and unpredictable. If Cipher pushed him too far, I was going to die.

“It’s okay,” I called to Cipher. I forced my voice to stay steady. “I can go back to the Tower.”

Valor’s laugh sent chills down my spine with how dark and ugly it sounded.

“If you think you’ll be okay when we get back to the Tower, you’d better think again,” he hissed near my ear. “Havoc is going to see exactly what kind of bitch you are.” He glared across the gap at Cipher. “Follow us, and she falls. Understood?”

The silence stretched between them. I could see the calculations running behind Cipher’s mask, the desperate search for options.

Finally, he nodded once. “I understand.”

My heart sank as Valor turned, accelerating toward the Tower in the distance. I watched helplessly as the darkness and fog swallowed Cipher up while Valor sped away.

CHAPTER 34

CIPHER