Page 4 of Tracked and Taken

“What’s in it?”

“…I am not comfortable sharing that information in the current context.”

JINX, through Vosk’s comm, cheerful and entirely unrepentant: “It’s his punctuality statistics. I thought you’d want them. For your records.”

Vosk’s jaw tightens by a degree which would be invisible to anyone who hadn’t spent their career reading faces across interrogation desks. “He sent you my punctuality stats.”

“Why.”

“Because JINX believes data is a love language, and he’s trying to make friends with your filing cabinet.”

“SENTRY is not a filing cabinet.”

“SENTRY logged three compliance reports during a conversation about a dying woman’s missing husband. That’s filing cabinet behavior.”

“Compliance doesn’t pause for tragedy. That’s the point of compliance.”

“Is that the point? I’ve lost track.”

I don’t smile. The wanting-to-smile spreads warm below my sternum, and I push it down next to the forearm problem and the scent problem and the way his voice changes when he drops the performance. There is no dignified way to process the fact that a male I met yesterday has generated more involuntary physical responses in eighteen hours than the entire Junction One personnel roster has managed since I took the post.

“The diagnostic gap.” The case is solid ground. “The next cycle runs at 1400. Draelith tracking requires on-site scent work, which means you’ll need physical access to Bay 7.”

“Was going to mention that.” He was absolutely not going to mention it and was going to walk into a restricted area without asking, because that is what he does, because fifteen movement violations don’t happen by accident.

“I’m coming with you.”

The smirk flickers. Not at the statement; at the speed of it. I’ve volunteered to spend the afternoon in an enclosed docking bay with a male scent still doing something to my insides, and I said it like it was the most natural thing in the world.

“It’s my jurisdiction,” I add, steadier than the speed of the offer warranted. “My bay. My gap. I’m not sending a civilian into a restricted area without escort.”

“Naturally.” The smirk settles into something smaller, warmer, less theatrical. “Protocol.”

“1400. Don’t be late.”

“You have my punctuality statistics.”

“I have your punctuality statistics, your movement violations, and your termination file from SRS. I’m thorough.”

“I know.” He stands. The chair releases him, and his full height reconfigures the room. Six-five of lean muscle and shifting rosette markings and he knows exactly the effect he has and deploys it like ordnance. His silver eyes hold mine for one beat longer than necessary, and the smirk is back, but thinner now, the cracks showing through the performance like light through a closed fist. “That’s the problem.”

He leaves. The door closes. His tail, passing through the door frame, maintains its loosened curl. Unwound. Unhurried.

My fingers are still pressed flat against the desk.

The ventilation cycles. The warm-wood-and-spice thins, replaced by standard recycled atmosphere, and the room that was mine before he walked in is mine again.

Mostly.

“SENTRY.”

“Yes.”

“The data packet from the Draelith AI. The one labeled ‘professional courtesy.’”

“Yes.”

“…Don’t quarantine it.”