Perfect Gravity (Wanted and Wired #2)(14)

“Angela!” The mech-clone. The one that looked just like…somebody mean. Somebody forced.

No, leave me alone. You don’t get to hurt me anymore. I made it stop. I made it.

And then his titanium-boned hands were grabbing her, moving her.

The tree in the wall shattered.

The wall did, too.

A cheese-shaped slab of ceiling—white like baby powder but considerably more solid—hit her shoulder hard enough to shift her arm free of its socket.

The giant roared. The universe collapsed.

? ? ?

Reality blew in like an industrial fan, shoving the memories to dark corners. Angela pulled in a breath and tasted dust. Air from a spice shaker, sweet with an edge of tart. Like a bomb.

Her shoulder hurt like a motherfucker.

“Yes, she is waking,” said mech-Daniel. Mechanical, exuberant, perfectly calibrated voice. His lips taste like death. “But I am uncertain what her mental state will be. She ingested significant quantities of alcohol after the gala. She may need rest. I will contact you later if—”

“Senator Neko—Angela—can you hear me?” Another voice, tinny and forever away, but just as familiar. Training and instinct stiffened her spine in response, made her want to sit up and pay attention. Made her want to be a good girl. Best girl.

With some reluctance, she broke the surface of consciousness. On your own, girl. Get to it. Solve for X.

If it had contained enough air, her body would have sighed. She opened her eyes. A nightmare met her, but at least there were familiar parts: mech-Daniel hovering above her, her mentor, Zeke, on the in-ear com, telling her what to do. So she wasn’t on her own after all. She was neither the decider nor the hero. She could rest.

She opened her mouth, but dust blocked her throat.

A hand moved behind her neck, lifting her head. “Here, you must drink something. My apologies, for I have no water.” Cool plastene rim of a cocktail bulb against her mouth. She parted her lips and drank, and the citrus-spiked whiskey pushed the dust down and into her body. Filth. Contagion. Fire. Sweet.

Her head ached. Tiny, invisible, evil elves were pile-driving spikes into her eye sockets, but her thoughts washed crystal clear. Apparently, almost dying and getting knocked out cold could sober a girl up quick, no matter what she’d had to drink.

Or mech-Daniel had messed with her blood alcohol level. Either way, she was clearheaded. “Fucking hell. Where am I? What happened?”

Ezekiel Medina, president of the United North American Nations—Zeke—replied via com, “The Hotel Riu was attacked. A drone-launched missile or smartbomb, probably. It pancaked the top three floors, including the helipad and your transport. I am sending an evacuation team to retrieve you. Just be still.”

“Somebody hit the Riu? Must’ve done shitty recon. All the important people are staying closer to the Expo Guadalajara.”

“Maybe you’re more important to somebody than you thought.” Zeke’s voice had a grim note to it, something that snagged her concern, but she forced herself to pay attention to his words instead.

Important, her? She was the target? And yet, it made sense. If her transport had been on time, or if she’d been up there waiting for it like usual, she would have been part of the rubble pancake.

Whoever had attacked the hotel might have been—probably had been—trying to kill her.

Which kind of narrowed the suspect list. She didn’t have a lot of enemies. Daniel was gone. And she had just accused Vallejo of mass murder and the destruction of Houston. Maybe instead of retaliating against her government, he’d decided to attack her personally.

“You’re lucky to be alive, kiddo,” Zeke added.

Though her eyes still hurt, Angela was focusing properly now, and she could see that luck had nothing to do with her survival. Mech-Daniel had arched his titanium-core body over her, forming a protective barrier against the giant slab of concrete ceiling. A shield. He was still holding it back. What were his weight tolerances? What would it take to crush him?

She thought about the whiskey sour and his insistence that she drink it. And it had taken, what, three or four gulps to get her so soused she was hallucinating about reverse-blooming flowers? She knew he wasn’t above altering her blood chemistry to keep her down here in her room if he thought going up to the helipad could pose a danger.

Which implied that he’d known about the attack before it happened. White, cold terror shivered up her body. She peered at mech-Daniel. He’d been injured. Something sharp had sliced the vat-grown skin covering his left cheekbone, exposing the metal frame beneath, but his expression was the same as always: pleasant, calming, loyal.

And foolproof. She’d had the mech-clone’s neural net completely wiped and rebuilt from scratch after she’d acquired him. She had even insisted on including that private Dan-Dan channel so if he ever went too far in mimicking Daniel Neko, if the simulation ever got too good, she could pull him back. Mech-Daniel’s job was to serve her, which apparently also included putting himself between her and death. He had done that job tonight. Hell, he’d even managed to save her cocktail.

No, she didn’t have anything to fear from him.

But somebody sure wanted her dead.

“Hey, Zeke,” she said, “can you patch your intel through to my com so I can monitor the feed real-time while we wait for your evacuation team?” It wouldn’t be the first time she’d accessed intelligence channels meant for the president. But it might very well be the most important time she’d asked to.