Wildcard (Warcross #2)(13)

“You betrayed me. You made me think I was working with you to do something good.”

“That’s what you’re most angry about. Not the algorithm. This.” Hideo lowers his head, closes his eyes for a heartbeat, and opens them again. “You’re right. I wish I’d told you sooner, and I’m sorry for that. But you know why I’m doing this, Emika. I opened my heart to you.”

“Your choice to, not mine,” I fire back. “It’s as if you believe I owe you something for it.”

“That’s what you think?” An edge comes into his voice. A warning. “That I’d use my past to bait you? Because I wanted something from you?”

“Didn’t you?” I say. My words are hoarse. “Why did you open up to me, anyway? I was just another bounty hunter on your payroll. Just another girl passing through your life.”

“I’ve never told anyone about my past,” he snaps back. “You know that.”

“How can I believe anything you say now? Maybe what happened to your brother is something you tell every girl you want to get into your hot spring.”

I can tell I’ve gone too far the instant the words escape my lips. Hideo flinches away. I swallow, telling myself not to feel bad for spitting my retort out at him. “We’re done here,” he says in a low voice. “I suggest you not waste our time by contacting me again.”

He disconnects our Link before I can respond.

The suite, the glittering city lights, and Hideo’s blue-black silhouette vanish abruptly, and the white couch I’d been lying on shifts back into the silk sheets of my bed. I realize that I’m trembling all over, my forehead hot and damp with a light sheen of sweat.

My burst of fury is over as quickly as it came. My shoulders droop.

I shouldn’t have said it. But all I want to do when I’m angry is stab the deepest wound I can find. And it shouldn’t matter anymore, should it? If the distance in his tone hurts, it’s just because I’m not used to it. Because I’m exhausted. Too much has happened over the course of the day, and with Hideo’s brief presence, I’m suddenly so worn-out that all I want to do is sink into my bed until I disappear.

I shake my head, then head to the bathroom. In the mirror, I see a dark bruise on one side of my throat. It must be from where Jax shot me with that drug. I rub carefully at the sore spot before I turn away and step into the shower.

The steam from the hot water clears my head a bit. Maybe I was fool to think I could ever pull Hideo off his current path. If anything, my conversation with him has only confirmed how unwilling he is to compromise. He’s unfazed by what’s happening around the world, and that means he’s moving full steam ahead to make sure the last two percent of the population is hooked into the algorithm, too.

Soon, that’ll include me.

I have to stop Hideo. Before it’s too late to pull him back. I repeat this to myself, trying to feel convinced, until the water has wrinkled my fingertips.

By the time I step out, the aftereffects of the drug seem to have worn off, and I feel a sense of alert wariness instead of the fog of panic. I walk out into the bedroom with a towel wrapped around me and bring up my menu. I know I’m in a hotel in Omotesando, but that’s about all I can find. Nothing about my suite or this building tells me anything about the Blackcoats. Not that I’d expect it to.

An hour has passed when I finally get an invite to connect from someone I don’t have in my contacts.

I’m about to accept it, but it goes through before I can. I freeze, clutching my towel closer. Has someone hacked into my NeuroLink?

“You’re awake.”

I recognize Jax’s voice. I feel a curious mix of relief and unease at her words. “Are you watching me?”

“I just saw your status blink green.” She sounds as clipped as I remember.

“And where am I, exactly?”

“A hotel, of course. You should probably stay here for a while, at least until you’re no longer at the top of the lottery.”

“Why’d you drug me yesterday?”

“Two days ago. You’ve been asleep for an entire day.”

I’d lost a day? I blink. So this isn’t the sunset after the night Jax had come for me. No wonder all the Riders sounded so worried.

“Why’d you do it, Jax?” I ask again. After my argument with Hideo, I’m in no mood to play around.

“Relax. I needed to get you here without you causing a scene. You said you didn’t trust me entirely, so I couldn’t trust you not to attack me in the car. I could’ve thrown a sack over your head, but I didn’t want to freak you out.”

I make an incredulous face. “Because I totally didn’t freak out when you shot me instead.”

She responds with a bored sigh. “You’re fine. Now go get dressed.”

“Why?”

“Because Zero is heading upstairs to see you.”

That brings my sarcastic comments to a halt. The thought of Zero coming into my suite sends a trill of fear through me, and I find myself stepping toward the bathroom before Jax can say another word.

“I’ll be ready,” I mutter.

I pull on a fresh change of clothes that I find folded neatly in my room’s closet. They’re crisp in their newness and fit a little loosely. The sight of myself in the mirror, dressed fully in black, only reminds me of how foreign everything feels right now, how deeply I’ve gone into a hive and how likely it is that I might never come out of it, and I look quickly away, wishing my old clothes hadn’t been ruined by blood and smoke.