Page 218 of Silver Elite

But then he pulls me on top of him again and I forget why I’m annoyed with him.

—

Later, as we’re lying in his bed facing each other, I run my fingers over the warm flesh of his arm.

“These…” I lightly stroke the ink. “Are dangerously close to being religious. They could be mistaken for angel’s wings. I’m surprised your father allowed it.”

One corner of his mouth tips up in a crooked smile. “He didn’t. At least not the first time. I got the first tattoo when I was sixteen. It was just a small wing on the inside of my wrist. Nothing to lose his shit over. But he took me to the hospital in the Point and threw me into the regen chamber. Made it disappear.”

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”

“Pissed me off so bad I went back to the ink parlor the following night and got an entire sleeve tattooed.”

I snicker. “Very impulsive of you. That sounds like a Darlington move.”

“Fuck. You’re right.”

“So are they angel’s wings?” I trace the detailed feathers. The thin lines and delicate curves.

“No.”

“Then it’s birds? Really? You made fun of my bird name, yet you have bird ink?”

He grins.

“Why wings?” I push.

“I don’t know. I guess they remind me of freedom.”

My eyes move to the flames. “And the fire?”

“Destruction. A reminder that this whole world is always on the verge of total destruction.”

I nod slowly, studying his arm. It’s the words woven amid the artwork that intrigue me the most.

“What do all these lines of text mean?”

His voice is deep, reflective. “Just words, phrases, that have stuckwith me over the years. Lessons I’ve learned. Moments that have changed me.”

I want to spend the rest of the night poring over every word, but instead, I decide to ruin the peaceful moment by doing something reckless again.

“The Uprising has something planned for the Silver Jubilee.”

He stiffens. “And you’re only telling me this now because…?”

“I only just found out. And I don’t even know what the planis.I am so low on the food chain that it would take an infinity ladder to see the top.”

“There’ll be civilians in attendance at the Jubilee.”

“I assume whatever they have planned won’t involve the guests. The network would never harm innocents.”

“They harmed innocents at the weapons depot,” Cross says tightly.

“Three. That’s minimal casualties.”

“Wow, Dove. I’m sure your good friend Sutler would love to hear his death was ‘minimal’ in your eyes.”

I stumble into a sitting position. “That isnotwhat I’m saying at all. I’m not excusing it, and it kills me that I lost Kaine. If I’d been involved in the planning of that op, I would’ve tried to talk them into setting off the bomb when the warehouse was empty. All I’m saying is, large-scale casualty events are not the way Mods operate. They don’t bomb large groups of people—that’s the General’s MO. How many were killed in the Silverblood Purge? Tens of thousands? And what about the bombing of Valterra Ridge? An entire Mod community wiped out. The Uprising doesn’t target innocents.”

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