Chapter 10: The Twelve

Vaughn folded the shift order in half and then in half again.

His hands were not steady.

"Twelve men," he said.

Astrid pulled the sheet over her chest and waited.

"One of them had a daughter who was learning to ride a bike," Vaughn said.

"Another was my friend from the academy. I carried him out of a riot on my back."

"I trained every one of them, and you put a bullet in every forehead."

"I know."

"Do you? Do you know what it was like to walk down that hall and count them?"

"I remember every one of them too."

"Why?"

"Because I wanted each of them to feel nothing."

He turned his head and looked at her.

"A forehead shot is instant," she said.

"If I'd gone for the legs or the chest, some of them would have lived and screamed for an hour."

"I didn't want that. They were doing their jobs, and you gave an order."

"You killed them anyway."

"Twelve rifles were pointed at my head," she said.

Her voice stayed flat.

"I made it as clean as I could. And I left you alive, Garrow. I had you in my sights twice."

"Why?"

"You were the only one in that hall who looked scared for them, not for himself."

Vaughn stared at the ceiling.

He had been sure that she was a thing with no heart, a name on a wanted list that smiled at guards.

He had spent six months telling himself she was one.

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