Page 167 of Victorious

June took up the phone, and stared at the text, the message sinking through her like a stone. And by the time it hit her feet, she was already moving, burying herself and her pain and her pink toes inside another body as she started for the door, pausing only to swipe a set of ornate keys from the wall above the dead man’s head as she stormed out.

XXINOW. THEN.

3 HOURS BEFORE THE END

ON THE ROAD

MITCH had known Victor for nearly thirteen years, and in that time, he’d almost never seen the other man sleep.

In prison, he was still awake when Mitch dropped off, awake again when he woke up. After, when they were three instead of two, him and Mitch and Syd, Victor would wait until they both went to bed before retreating into his own room, the door locked fast between them.

On the rare occasions Mitch did catch Victor sleeping, it was never deep. He seemed to hover, shallowly, beneath the surface, senses still half tuned, the slightest motion enough to pull him back.

But now, as the red pickup soared down the highway, juddering every time it hit a crack, Victor didn’t move.

He was slumped, unconscious, in the passenger seat, his face turned not toward the window, but toward Mitch. He kept glancing over—couldn’t help it—studying the other man. Victor had never been big, but the years of dying, of struggling and failing to find a way to fix his glitching heart, had made him even thinner. The Victor who’d left three years ago was sickly, gaunt.

This Victor wasn’t.

He’d gained weight, and strength, the ghoulish pallor gone. He’d gone off to find a cure, and he’d obviously found—

“You know,” said Victor quietly. “Scientists once tried to measure the weight of the human gaze. To test the theory that a person can literally feel when someone’s watching them.” His eyes slid open as he said it, and Mitch forced his own back to the road.

Victor sighed and straightened in his seat. “How long?”

“Two hours.”

He tugged the cell from his coat pocket, read something on the screen. “June’s on her way.”

Mitch stiffened. “Since when are you two friends?” he asked as Victor tapped out a message.

“Jealous?” he said dryly as he put the phone away. “We’re not. But we have a mutual interest.”

“Sydney.”

Interest was putting it mildly. June was obsessed with Syd. She’d wormed her way into the kid’s life like a surrogate big sister. Protected her from EON, sure, but also abducted her. Drugged and locked her in a bathroom like a pet.

Mitch’s fingers tightened on the wheel. “What if June takes off with her?”

“Then I’ll handle it.” Victor glanced toward him and when Mitch met his gaze, he frowned. Like Sydney, Victor’s eyes had always been light blue. A strange quirk that, paired with their pale hair, gave the two a sharp familial look. But now a line of violet light curled around the pupils.

“So,” said Mitch, “you got your powers back.”

“I did,” said Victor as his hand slipped into his pocket.

“You going to tell me how?”

“Trial and error. The right doctor. The right formula.” He withdrew something and held it up. A dark metal disc. A visible cartridge sat in the center, the liquid contents the same shade as the filament of purple in his eyes. An inhaler, Mitch realized, the kind you cocked back like a gun before putting to your lips.

“Any downsides?” he pressed. “Glitches?”

One side of Victor’s mouth twitched up. “No.”

Mitch gripped the wheel until the leather groaned. “Then why?”

“You’ll have to be more specific.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”