Page 113 of Two Chambered Heart

“Thanks for stepping in for the twins. Is the coffee okay?”

“It’s fine. Jason makes them best, though.”

“Jase will be just fine, Corey.” They’d all told her that at least a hundred times, but she still worriedly chewed her bottom lip. “He’s been through worse.” His voice had that now familiar gruffness, a low treble she’d never be able to forget.

“I don’t think I want to know.” She took another sip of coffee and sighed, leaning back against the balcony railing, tilting her face up to the overcast sky. “Who would round up children like that? For experiments? It’s so fucked up.”

“Dr. Yrene Filipova would.” The hatred he had for her was apparent in every syllable, coating the sounds as they left his mouth.

“You know who it was?”

“Of course I know. I’m not like the Haevens. I wasn’t able to black everything out and move on. I’ve been digging into it for years, ever since we got out.” There was a mix of emotions there, but she didn’t know him well enough to parse them out.

She turned her attention back to him. “I’d tear her apart for them, if I could find her. They did the same for my abuser.”

He had that assessing look on his face again as he perused her. “I know exactly where she is.”

“Tell me.”

“It won’t be that easy.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s still operating. She still runs facilities just like the ones we were in. Underground, privately funded, security, the works.” Archer’s inked hand flitted up in the air, circling to emphasise his point.

Corey’s jaw fell open. “You know all this, and you’ve done nothing about it?” Her voice pitched loudly.

She pushed herself off the railing, stepping towards him. To do what, she didn’t know.

“Woah, easy there.” He lifted his hands up placatingly. “I’m just one person.”

“You’re not, you have Jason and Kayden a boatload of wealth and the tech to support it. I’ve seen what you can do!”

“Like I said, they’ve walked away from it.” His voice was getting lower as hers was getting higher, and she was finally able to recognize his contained resentment.

“They haven’t. Jason can’t sleep without drowning himself in alcohol because of the nightmares, and Kayden thinks he’s all alone. We can do something about that. Tell me everything you know.”

“I knew I liked you.” His shoulders seemed to drop at that, some tension dissipating with Corey’s commitment. “There are two facilities. I’m sure of it. But I’ve only been able to access one. There’s correspondence going out that I can’t trace. It’s like a dead zone, murky. The destination is somewhere my gift won’t go, like it’s blocked….” He trailed off, his gaze shifting over her shoulder, lost in thought.

Then he pulled his attention back from where it had wandered. His eyebrows pinched together, like he’d figured something out.

“What?” she asked.

Hehmphed. “Nothing. Was just thinking.” But he kept eyeing her, like a puzzle to solve.

Corey lost her patience with whatever he was calculating. “So are we going on another rescue mission, then?”

“If you can convince your men.”

“Easy.” Her grin was quick and sure, a little feral. “Let’s see all that data you’ve collected with that big brain and magical gift.”

Chapter thirty-eight

- Corey -

Five days. That’s how long it took Jason to recover from fatal injuries, for the internal hemorrhaging to stop, for his bones and skin to mend. With the help of a magically gifted healer, there wasn’t a scratch on him. Corey still couldn’t quite wrap her head around what she’d learned, but between Archie manipulating the medical tech and Sophie doing her healing work, Jason recovered fully. What should have killed him had left him in a coma for one day, incoherent for two days, and incapacitated for three.

Five days of Corey feeling like she was going to throw up her heart. Five days of barely being able to get a breath down, terrified that he wouldn’t make it, even though all three of them assured her that he would.

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