24. Camille #2
“I will investigate tonight,” I say. “None of you will mention this to anyone outside this room.”
“Blaire should know,” Kaia says immediately.
“Not yet.”
Her expression hardens. “Why?”
“Because I do not know which communications are monitored, who has access to her reports, or how quickly the Council will react if they realize we are examining the contracts. Until I know what the system is doing, we do not alert the people operating it.”
Kaia does not like the answer. It shows in the set of her jaw and the way her attention shifts towards the door, as though calculating how quickly she could reach Blaire if she decided to ignore me.
After a moment, she nods.
“For now,” she says. “But we discuss this properly when Jules is awake.”
“Yes.”
Kaia heads towards the door. “She needs rest. We all do.”
Remy follows her towards the door, still visibly processing what she has seen. She gives me a measuring look before leaving, distrustful but no longer dismissive.
Mina remains beside the bed.
Her fingers smooth the edge of Jules’s blanket, though it does not require adjustment.
“There’s something else,” she says quietly.
I wait.
“I didn’t know how much she cared about you,” Mina says. “I mean, really cared.”
I follow her gaze.
Jules is asleep now, her breathing even and her face unguarded in a way I have never seen while she is conscious. There is no performance, deflection, or deliberate provocation.
Only Jules.
“I love her,” Mina continues. “She’s my best friend.
When I first joined, I was in a really dark place, and she…
” Her eyes lower, discomfort passing across her face.
“She was there. Food, bad movies, terrible jokes. She never made me explain it or acted like I was broken. She just kept showing up until I wasn’t alone anymore. ”
Her fingers twist together.
“Jules acts like nothing matters because everything matters to her. She jokes so no one notices how deeply she feels things.” Mina gives a small, unsteady smile. “She has the biggest heart out of any of us. She just hides it better.”
I look at Jules again, at the looseness of her hand against the blanket and the faint crease between her brows even in sleep.
“I am beginning to understand that,” I say.
It is the closest I will come to an admission.
Mina gives me a small, tired smile. “She’ll probably make that as difficult as possible.”
“That has been my experience.”
The smile becomes slightly more genuine.
Then Mina looks at Jules one last time and follows the others into the hallway.
The door closes behind her.
The room falls silent.
I remain where I am for several seconds, watching the space they vacated before turning back to the bed.
To her.
Jules shifts in her sleep, her hand curling against the blanket as though reaching for something that is no longer there.
I step closer before evaluating the decision.
The bond hums between us, steady, low, and constant. She is calmer now. Stable.
For now.
I study the absence of performance in her face and the way the tension has finally left her body. The only time she appears entirely at peace is when she is unconscious.
That is unacceptable.
“This cannot continue,” I say quietly.
There is no one here to hear it. No system to log it and no report to file.
Only the truth.
I return to my laptop and reopen the contract permissions. The override protocol sits beneath multiple security restrictions, inaccessible through ordinary credentials.
That is irrelevant.
I have spent my career learning how Eon conceals information and which rules can be bent without appearing broken.
Tonight, I will learn how to break them.
***
I’m already awake when she starts making noise.
Not subtle noise, either. Not the kind someone makes while trying to pretend they are fine. This is deliberate suffering: a low, miserable groan muffled into a pillow, followed by a sharp inhale as though the air itself has personally offended her.
I don’t look up from my laptop. “You’re not dying.”
There’s a pause.
Then, hoarse and deeply offended, “You don’t know that.”
I glance over.
Jules is half-buried beneath the blanket, her hair a disaster and one arm flung across her face as though shielding herself from the concept of daylight. She looks wrecked. Functional, but barely.
“Your condition is stable,” I reply. “You’re experiencing the consequences of alcohol overconsumption.”
Her arm shifts enough for one eye to peer out at me. “I regret everything.”
“That is an appropriate response.”
She groans louder and rolls onto her back, immediately wincing. “Why is the room spinning? The room shouldn’t spin. That feels like a design flaw.”
“It’s not the room.”
“Rude.”
I close my laptop. She is not going to be quiet, and adjusting expectations is more efficient than attempting to ignore her.
I cross the room and place a glass of electrolyte water on the nightstand beside her. “Drink that.”
She squints at it suspiciously. “What is it?”
“Electrolytes.”
Jules studies me before pushing herself upright enough to take the glass. Her movements are slower than usual. Careful.
Good.