Page 37 of Last Chance to Save the World

He doesn’t even crack a hint of a smile. “I need you to know this: I am going to arrest you.”

You’re going to try.

I can’t look him in the eye right now. Instead, my gaze roves over the party, the chocolate fountain, the security, the chocolate fountain.

“You’re going to have to face the consequences of your actions,” Rian keeps going. “Especially once I...”

I feel rather than see Rian’s attention drawn to me. Like warm honey down my back, his focus melts into my body.

And I can tell—he’s noticed.

Before, my missing earring was on the left side. I left that in the nanobot programming room, stabbing the input receptor with the post and successfully reprogramming the nanobots to protect Earth rather than exploit it.

When I burst out of the server room with the robotic voice telling me that security would be raised in minutes, Rian was too distracted by shutting off the alarms to notice I had no earrings in then.

Which got us to the communications room.

And now I have an earring in the right side.

His eyes shift from my ear to my face. His jaw is tight.

I can see all the pieces falling into place behind his eyes. I can see the accusation just on the tip of his tongue.

And I grin charmingly up at him just as Strom Fetor—and a buzzing cloud of cam drones—walks up to us.

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Except Fetor doesn’t stop. A small woman with long twin braids framing her face rushes up, and Fetor leans down to hear something from her. As soon as she’s done speaking, he turns on his heel, walking the opposite direction, cam drone floating behind him.

The woman turns to us, braids whipping around. She strides forward with purpose, glaring. At me.

“You have to go,” she says.

“Fantastic; I hate it here.” I turn to the door, but Rian grabs my wrist. He really is possessive. I’m going to have to do something about that.

“Why?” he asks.

“You can stay, Mr. White,” the woman says. I’m assuming from her stance that she’s some sort of assistant to Fetor. “But your guest is wearing an article of clothing with flare threads.”

My sun shield. It worked to mess with the internal security of the server room, but it’s also affecting the cam drones.

Fetor only cares about the nanobot program because he wants credit. He also wants to be paid in the back end when they fail, but he doesn’t know yet that I completely fucked over that agenda. There’s a part of me that’s pretty thrilled with the idea that I also could mess up the publicity and distract from his little vanity show, but . . .

But I saw the way Rian’s spine straightened when the drones were coming. Even now, just being here—there’s pride in the way he stands, honor in his pulled-back shoulders.

Mixing a governmental program with private investing rarely works, mostly because of men like Fetor. But doing something this big of scale, something that will truly benefit others...that rarely happens. And it’s only going to work now because of men like Rian.

And women like me. Funny how there’s always someone who does the most but gets no credit, and how that’s usually a woman.

“She can take the sun shield off,” Rian says.

“That would be fine.” The woman nods.

“No, I can just go,” I say, mostly to Rian. “I’d rather see the launch from outside. With everyone.” Because these are not my people.

“I’ll go with you,” Rian offers.

“You can stay; it’s fine.” But I can tell from the way he surveys the room, these are not his people, either.

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