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19

ผู้เขียน: Gab-Boy
last update วันที่เผยแพร่: 2026-03-31 01:22:13

It’s not here."

I shoved a stack of heavy, gold-embossed ledgers off the shelf. They hit the floor with a dull thud. My breath came in short, jagged bursts. The air in Elinor’s private vault was stale, smelling of old paper and the metallic tang of the heavy security door I’d spent two hours bypassing.

"Looking for a way out?"

I spun around. The room was empty. Just the low hum of the climate control. I wiped the sweat from my upper lip with the back of my hand. My heart slammed against my ribs
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  • THE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE SUBSTITUTE   28

    "Take the deal, Kai. Or watch her hollow out."Marcus leaned against the reinforced door of the warehouse, tossing a small, vacuum-sealed vial of blue fluid. He caught it with a snap. The light from the SWAT floodlights made the liquid look like neon poison. Behind him, the "Template" father stood as still as a statue, his eyes fixed on some point in the air six inches in front of my face."What is that?" I gripped my gun. My finger twitched against the trigger guard."The only thing keeping her organs from turning into mush." Marcus held the vial up. "That heart rate we heard? Two hundred and sixty? That's the sound of the baby eating her alive. Accelerated growth requires accelerated fuel. Without this stabilizer, she won't make it to Friday. Neither will the successor.""You're lying." I looked at Evangeline. She was hunched over the cot, clutching her stomach. Her face was gray. Her skin looked paper-thin."Ask the Doc. Oh, wait. You can't. I had him erased five minutes ago." Marc

  • THE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE SUBSTITUTE   27

    "You're six weeks pregnant."The words hit the air like a wet slab of meat. I didn't breathe. Evangeline didn't move. She just lay there on the moldy cot, her face the color of the concrete floor. The disgraced surgeon—Doc, they called him, though his Blackwood medical license was a blackened memory—wiped a blood-stained hand on his apron. He didn't look at us. He looked at the flickering screen of the portable ultrasound."Six weeks," I repeated. My mouth tasted like rust. My brain started the math. The frantic, desperate math of a man trying to figure out if he just inherited a kingdom or signed his own execution."Six weeks is a long time in a war, Kai." Evangeline’s voice was a whisper. She didn't look at the screen. She looked at the ceiling, at the water stains that looked like maps of countries we’d never see."It’s not mine." The words came out before I could stop them.She flinched. Like I’d slapped her."Is that what you want?" She turned her head. Her eyes were red-rimmed,

  • THE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE SUBSTITUTE   26

    "Hold still, or I’ll slip."The sewing needle caught the flickering orange light of the kerosene heater. Evangeline’s breath hitched. She gripped the edge of the rusted metal table, her knuckles white against the grime. A single bead of sweat rolled down her temple, carving a clean path through the soot on her cheek."Just do it," she whispered. Her teeth clicked together.I poured the last of the cheap vodka over her hip. The clear liquid hissed against the raw, jagged entry wound where Marcus’s tracker sat buried. She arched her back, a silent scream caught in her throat. Her fingernails dug into the table’s edge, peeling back flakes of lead paint."It’s deep," I said. My own hands were shaking. I’d spent months playing a prince in silk. Now, the silk was shredded rags. My "Alexander" contacts had dissolved in the sewer acid, leaving my eyes stinging, dark, and human for the first time in a year. "He didn't just plant it. He anchored it to the bone.""I don't care. Get it out."I bi

  • THE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE SUBSTITUTE   25

    "Get the girl to the bird!"The roar of the rotors drowned out the crackle of the burning mansion. Red and blue lights strobed against the smoke, turning the front lawn into a neon hellscape. I ducked as a spray of dirt kicked up inches from my face. My ears rang."Marcus, stop!" Evangeline screamed.He didn't stop. He didn't even slow down. He gripped her upper arm so hard his knuckles showed white through his tactical gloves. He looked like a god of war in that black police uniform, the 'COMMANDER' patch on his chest reflecting the flames."The party's over, Evie." Marcus shoved her toward the open door of the sleek, unmarked helicopter. "Time to go.""You're killing them!" She struggled, her heels digging into the turf. "Those are your own men!""Collateral." Marcus didn't look back at the carnage.Behind him, the Iron Lotus soldiers—his own cartel brothers—were being mowed down by the tactical teams he’d led onto the property. It wasn't a raid. It was a harvest. The police were ex

  • THE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE SUBSTITUTE   24

    "Check the perimeter again."Marcus didn't look up from his tablet. He stood in the center of the Blackwood foyer, surrounded by six men in tactical gear. They weren't wearing the family crest. Each one had a stylized iron lotus tattooed on the side of his neck. They gripped submachine guns like they were ready to use them on the house itself."Perimeter's locked, boss," one of the soldiers grunted. "Nobody gets in or out. Not even the grandmother.""Good." Marcus finally looked at me. He tapped a finger against his chin. "Kai’s gone rogue. The clone is broken. This house needs a real man to hold the walls. My men are the new law here.""You're bringing a cartel into the Archive?" I stepped forward. My heels clicked against the marble. "Elinor will burn you alive for this.""Elinor’s busy playing god in her lab." Marcus walked toward me. He signaled for his guards to back off. They retreated into the shadows of the hallway. "And she’s old. Old people lose their grip. Me? I'm just gett

  • THE SUBSTITUTE FOR THE SUBSTITUTE   23

    "Don't let them turn the machines back on."The man's voice was a wet rattle, like gravel shifting in a shallow stream. I stood over the tank, the glass cold against my palms. Inside, the Template—the man they told me was my father, the original Alexander Blackwood—looked like a piece of drift-wood. His skin was translucent, stretched over bone. Tubes snaked into his throat and groin, pumping green fluid that smelled like a hospital dumpster."I'm not here to save you," I said.His eyes cracked open. Milky. Yellow. He looked at me, and his chest hitched in a jagged rhythm."I know." He coughed. A spray of black bile hit the inside of the glass. "You're here for the codes. You want to kill her.""She killed my sister, Alexander. She turned me into a photocopy." I leaned in, my face inches from his. "I want the override for the District Nine grid. I want to shut her out of the Archive forever."The man in the tank let out a sound that might have been a laugh. It ended in a gurgle."Phot

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