"Where are you?"
Sinn's voice came out of the comms tight and moving, the sound of a man circling a desk he couldn't sit at. I'd put him on speaker because there was nobody in this building to hide him from. The words filled the reception and settled against the stone.
Venna leaned back against the wall, knees drawn up, one leg stretched straight along the polished counter. Afternoon light cut a hard gold rectangle across her bare thigh and the curve of her hip. Sweat still marked the hollow of her throat in a thin, shining line. She watched me with a smile she wasn't bothering to hide—small, private, the kind that lived mostly in the eyes.
"Safe. Long way from headquarters."
"Can you get through?"
"No."
"You can. I've seen what you do. I watched you in the Fallen City."
"I can't." I didn't dress it up. "I'm not alone, General."
A pause on the line. I could hear him deciding how to ask—the small shift in breathing that came before the careful version of a question.
