Page 10 of Dark Reign

“Well, I can’t accept that.” The statement was the verbal equivalent of her putting her foot down.

“What we do has never been pretty or perfect,” I reminded her, and I had the scars to prove it.

There was the time I nearly burned to death inside an abandoned apartment building—a hive of roamers blocking one entrance, a tactical unit from the Ianite army flooding in from the other. There was also the time I had to run several miles on a foot that’d been impaled with a three-inch nail, thanks to a trap set by some amateur, wannabe hero. My choice had been to either keep running while I cried, or stop to nurse the wound and be captured by Dynasty sentinels.

I chose to run and cry.

Liv was quiet, that furious gaze of hers softening only a little when she handed me the tin cup that my pride wouldn’t let me beg for, even if I needed it. I was thirstier than I’d ever been in my entire life.

“Thank you.” I barely got the words out before snatching it and guzzling half.

She stared while I panted like Riot after a good run.

“Alex says it happened again.”

My gaze lifted from the cup, confused about what she referred to for a moment. It was that sympathetic gaze beneath the harsh one that gave her away. As if she wanted to still be pissed at me, but couldn’t—considering.

At this point, I only feltrelativelyembarrassed. The crew was somewhat used to me mumbling about my mother as I came out of an episode. Usually, I just asked for her, disoriented by the haze, forgetting she’d been gone for years.

I lowered the cup and instead of following Liv down the rabbit hole of deep-rooted feelings and untapped emotions I knew she hoped for, I ignored the statement altogether.

“Got any aspirin?

The sympathy she held for me evaporated as it dawned on her what I was doing—avoiding.

“We’re out,” she sighed. “Supplies, in general, are getting low.”

My hand stopped midair with the cup nearly touching my lips. When my eyes flitted to Liv’s, I could tell right away she regretted saying so much.

“Howlow?” I asked.

She started toward the door as a passive response tumbled out. “We’re fine, Cori.”

I managed to catch her arm from where I sat, interrupting what she thought would be a clean getaway. It was no secret we were beyond max capacity. We had taken in more bodies than we could feed and care for, but we had no choice.

“Still no word on when the next boat’s coming in?” My breaths came quicker, mirroring my heartrate.

Liv hesitated but finally shook her head. “Not yet.”

No boat meant no transportation for the refugees to Pitcarin Island. No transportation meant supplies would only continue to deplete faster than we could replenish them.

“Times like this, I really wish we hadn’t lost contact with the Benefactor,” Liv mumbled to herself.

I hated hearing her say that, hated hearing how heavily her hope depended on some stranger’s charity—a stranger we hadn’t been in contact with for over a year. I never approved of our arrangement with the anonymous donor. One who gifted us supplies and funds without any explanation of who they were or what they might one day want in return.

Everything came with a price.

The part of me that regarded our team of eight as family wanted to panic with our provisions being scarce, but the side of me that was more like my father immediately began to strategize.

“Felix has the bike back up and running, I can easily find out when the next race is and—”

“Absolutely not.” She did that thing where her words sounded eerily like a foot pounding down on the pavement. “I hate that you even think it’s an option, Cori.”

“It’s our best bet.”

“You’ve got a death wish,” she countered.

“It’s easy money,” I shot back. “And alotof it.”

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