Jerrick mentally cursed himself for not crushing the man's trachea when he had the chance.
Keeping his face entirely deadpan, he looked at Serena. "Do I have your permission to kill him?"
Serena suppressed a heavy sigh.
She had less than zero interest in watching two grown men measure egos during a tactical operation.
She fixed a terrifyingly blank stare on Jasper. "Did you come here to be useful, or did you come here to dig your own grave?"
Her icy tone instantly shut down whatever witty retort Jasper had lined up.
He stared at her for two seconds.
Then dramatically pressed a hand over his heart with a heavy, theatrical sigh. "I see how it is. First come, first served."
He looked utterly heartbroken. "I guess I just can't compete with the hired help."
"He attacked me first, yet you're viciously defending him and chewing me out. The blatant favoritism..."
"It wounds me deeply."
He dramatically covered his face. "I haven't even signed on as your partner yet, and I've already lost."
Serena remained deadpan.
Jerrick stared in stunned disbelief.
Jerrick honestly wondered if he had inhaled some sort of hallucinogenic gas down here.
Because not only did The Panacea remind him shockingly of his younger sister.
But this masked lunatic was painfully giving him flashbacks to his younger brother, Jasper...
The sheer, punchable arrogance radiating off this guy was a mirror image of Jasper's insufferable personality.
"Wraith," Serena cut in, her dark eyes flashing with lethal impatience. "Spit it out."
If he whined for one more second, she was going to permanently staple his mouth shut.
Reading the shift in the atmosphere, Jasper instantly dropped the theatrics.
He had absolutely no doubt that if
he
bet
needed her again, the next silver jugular his
needle was going straight into his
FindNovel.net
She wouldn't hesitate.
Snapping to attention, he fished a small Void-Trace Beacon out from his jacket and tossed it to her.
Serena caught the small device flawlessly.
It bore no corporate logos, only a smear of dried blood on the casing.
A tiny red light blinked rapidly on its side.
"Pulled that off Vance Miller and his goons Jasper explained, crossing his arms, "Right before they tried to jumpyou, they received heavily
jud coordinates."
"I took the liberty of cracking the firewall."
He jutted his chin down the shadowy corridor. "The final drop point led fight here, fo the perimeter of The Sanctum Vault."
Serena's fingers stilled over the tracker, her eyes narrowing.
If Vance Miller and his crew had just been a bunch of greedy thugs out for a quick payday.
They never would have had the exact coordinates of this highly classified sector.
Nor would they have perfectly intercepted her path to the vault.
Which meant only one thing...
The people running this ship knew she was going to ditch the auction.
They knew she was making a play for the cargo.
Vance's crew hadn't stumbled onto her by accident.
Someone had laid a trap.
They were just waiting for her to step away from Nicholas's side, waiting for her to
be utterly alone.
Before swooping in to bag her alive.