‘I’d hoped you were gone.’ Stephen glared at Keraun as we re-entered the kitchen, then gave me a questioning look.


Keraun smiled, genuine and dazzling. He held up his palms in supplication. ‘There isn’t anywhere else in the universe I would rather be.’ But he paused just inside the doorway, giving Stephen and the others some distance.


Stephen turned back to the table, where someone had spread a map of Perth. He held his phone out to me. ‘Sean wants that disk you took back in exchange for your uncle. We’ve copied it, although we can’t decrypt the data, but he may as well have it. He’s given us two possible locations. Apparently you will know which one to go to.’


I stared at the map, then the phone, numbness spreading through my body. The locations were Cecelia’s and Zenna’s homes. The final words were Gabby’s choice.

‘He’s playing games with us,’ Liam remarked.


With shaking fingers, I dropped Stephen’s phone back on the table as I realised. Sean must have hijacked my phone when he and his goons had taken me in to the Taskforce the first time. I hadn’t even thought of it, but I’d saved Stephen’s number.


‘Which one is it?’ Stephen asked.


I stared at the phone screen until it went dark. Before, my intuition had felt like an island that I’d simply swum too far away from. I had known it was still there. The water was clear blue with a sandy bottom, and I could maybe have swum back if I’d been able to understand myself. Now, I was in a riptide. Now, I was out in the deep ocean, nothing but black water below. ‘I don’t know,’ I mumbled.


Donovan slapped a hand on the table. ‘Well that’s a whole lot of helpful.’


I ignored her. ‘But he knows everything. He knows where Alex works.’ I coughed to cover the crack in my voice. ‘And where my friends live.’


‘These are your friends’ addresses?′ Liam asked, concern filling his voice.


I nodded. Somehow Alex had found out and tried to let me know. And I’d failed. The best I could hope for now was that Zenna was bad enough to be admitted to hospital and Cecelia had stayed with her. Nausea turned in my stomach.


Stephen looked deep in thought. ‘We will have to split up,’ he said eventually.


Donovan scoffed, looking around the table at Stephen, Liam and me. ‘What, four of us, split up? We couldn’t take Sean and his henchmen down while securing hostages all together, let alone with only two. Although I’ll give him a damn good fight.’ She clenched her fists. I felt a slight – very slight – shift in sympathy. For all her faults, she was still on my side. Well, Darkhaven’s side, which I supposed was my side. For now.


‘It won’t be two,’ Keraun said, stepping forward from the doorway. ‘I’m in. I’ll come with you.’


‘So will I,’ said another voice before Stephen could raise an objection. Dr Whittaker appeared behind Keraun. Everyone stared. The doctor rarely left her lab and probably hadn’t left Darkhaven since she’d come here.


‘The Taskforce is threatening my home,’ she said, as if that explained everything. ‘I may not be a fighter, but I can still help.’


Donovan’s eyes blazed. ‘Well, six is better than four. Let’s get this bastard.’ She looked to Stephen. A subtle fire seemed to kindle in his face too.


‘Wait,’ Liam said. ‘What about Gabby’s friends? We need to make sure they are protected.’


I snatched up Stephen’s phone and sent a text to Cecelia. It was so easy to remember numbers now.


She replied almost instantly. Hospital. I think she hit an artery. Doctor with her now.


‘There’s no one at Zenna’s house,’ I said, choking out the words.


‘Will they stay out?’ Stephen asked.


I nodded, swallowing the lump in my throat and banishing the image of Zenna’s bloodied arm. ‘I think so. At least for a few hours.’


‘What about the other one?’


‘Cecelia’s out too. Her mum and sisters will be at ballet now, but they’ll probably finish soon. I don’t know about her dad. He might be home, if he’s not on call.’

‘Where does he work?’ Dr Whittaker asked. ‘I can make sure he’s kept out of the house without raising suspicion.’


‘Dr Robert Wilson. He works in emergency.’ I gave her the hospital details.


‘Okay,’ Stephen began, pulling maps towards him and marking the locations. ‘Donovan, Catherine and Liam will go to the Wilson house. Keraun, Gabby and I will take the other. Report back to Donovan or myself with any news. The aim is to secure the safety of Alex Whitehall. One group will have to take a fake disk.’

He placed a grey disk on the table. It looked a lot like the one I’d taken, except…


‘This is the fake?’ I asked.


‘Yes, a decoy to appear legitimate for long enough to make the exchange –’


‘You are gambling my uncle’s life with this and hoping Sean doesn’t figure it out?’ I was starting to tremble again, but this time it was with fury. I picked up the disk and turned it over. ‘It hasn’t got a holofoil. He’s going to notice instantly if the disk doesn’t have a holofoil.’


‘She has a point.’ Donovan stood. I turned and gaped at her. ‘If his henchmen handle the exchange, we’ll have time, but if Sean sees it first, he’ll probably notice.’

Stephen’s brow creased. ‘What else can we do? We can’t go with nothing, and we don’t have much time. We have to assume that he’s already in place, waiting for us. He’ll know if we delay.’


‘I’ll make one,’ Donovan said. ‘I have a guy who can copy the holofoil. Close enough, at least.’


Stephen looked pained. ‘How long will that take?’


‘I’ll message him now. I can be at the site in under an hour. All going well.’


‘We’ll have to head off without you then, make an appearance and hope you catch us in time. I can buy time at the second location by saying we sent the disk to yours.’


‘You can’t leave Liam and Catherine on their own, they don’t have combat training,’ Donovan said.


I didn’t have combat training. How messy was this going to get? Presumably Sean knew our vulnerabilities. One shot to the head or heart with the right kind of bullet. Against that, combat training seemed almost pointless.


‘I’ll go to the doctor’s house,’ Keraun said.


I turned on him, worry churning in my stomach. Would a Taskforce bullet kill him too? I had no idea. ‘Do you have combat training?’ I asked.


He just quirked up one corner of his mouth like I was being funny. ‘I’ll buy you plenty of time if he’s there. The rest of you go to the other location and take the real disk with you.’


Everyone stared at him. Donovan raised an incredulous eyebrow.


‘Trust me, I know this guy,’ he said. I was pretty sure he didn’t know Sean at all, but then, no one else here knew what Keraun was.


‘If I don’t need to be on the approach team, I can also make sure the mother stays at the ballet studio,’ Dr Whittaker said. I shot her a grateful smile and marked the studio on the map.


‘Liam will go with you,’ Stephen said to Keraun, with more than a hint of forcefulness. ‘And when all this is done, you are going to explain exactly who or what you are, and what you want with my’ – he paused, flushed – ‘with Gabby.’


I hadn’t picked Stephen for the possessive type. But he was working pretty hard to recruit me, so I suppose he counted me as his student. Or something. Something else nagged at me. The holofoil. ‘Wait,’ I said. Everyone looked at me. ‘Why does Sean want the disk back?’


Stephen shrugged. ‘Data control. He wants to make sure we don’t disseminate it. Or lose it.’


I shook my head. Something Zenna had said popped into my mind. ‘You said you couldn’t decrypt the data. What if the holofoil is the key? Like a cipher?’


There was a pause, then Donovan nodded. ‘I think she’s right.’


Donovan was agreeing with me way too much. It was unsettling. ‘What do we do?’ I asked.


She rolled her eyes. So not completely on my page. ‘I’ll make two fakes,’ she said. ‘We leave the original here. Catherine and I will take one to each location when I’m done.’


That was as good as the plan got. Doctor Whittaker and Donovan disappeared to their respective tasks. Liam and Keraun went shortly after to Cecelia’s house. That left Stephen and I standing in the kitchen.


‘I don’t like this,’ he remarked. ‘We’re back down to two people on each approach team, and one of those is a guy I don’t know.’


There was nothing I could say to improve his trust in Keraun. Even if he believed me when I said the boy was an alien god, that would probably only heighten his suspicion. I let it go and followed Stephen out to the Corolla.