Corrupted (Alpha's Claim Book 5) by Addison Cain (read more books txt) 📕

If smiles were something natural in Central, Brenya would have smiled to see that Jacques had left his day's clothing on the floor beside the bed. The vanity of the Alpha was so extreme he donned fresh things to confront what made Brenya sick.

Obsessive as he was, there was no other logical alternative for his behavior.

Jacques' abandoned shirt became hers, the only piece of utilitarian clothing that had touched her skin in ages.

Just like the sloppy leavings of his apparel on the ground, the male had forgotten to lock the door to his private balcony. He had not considered that a golden fork was priceless beyond its polished glitter as one twirled their pasta in the bowl of a matching golden spoon.

The unused knife was almost as exciting.

Priceless china and crystal goblets were abandoned for the simplicity of dumping leftovers atop the starched napkin Jacques had told her was to be laid in the lap and used to dab the mouth should a sauce turn rogue.

Foolish.

Fabric of this nature, with its tight weave and stiffness, was much better knotted up at the corners. Brenya made a tool from a frivolous thing. Just as she took the stolen shirt on her back and wound the tails that hung almost to her feet into a sling.

Careless if Central’s fancy cuisine was mushed into one soggy mass, Brenya tucked the pack in her makeshift pouch and snatched up the only tools she would have for what had to be done.

Just as she would have bit down on any tool when her hands needed to be free during maintenance, she pinched the golden necks of her utensils between her teeth.

Hands braced on the wide balustrade, she took a steadying breath, then stepped out onto the ledge.

All of this having been done so quickly, unit 17C would have outshined her class in efficiency and received a red ribbon of excellence. All of it done with her mind on the plane of emotionless function so familiar, so missed, that she dared not enjoy the splendor of freedom from feeling.

Standing, Brenya towered over Central, the updraft sending her hair into disarray. Her city was at her feet, her people going about their lives, oblivious to Central’s machinations and their Commodore’s flaws.

Exactly how it needed to remain.

Yet Jacques already had a head start.

Fortunately, the palace was intricately embellished with cavorting depictions of the Gods, complicated architectural details offering footholds aplenty. She didn’t even need a rope.

Gold utensils in her teeth and a bag of leftover food stowed in her stolen shirt, she braced her weight on her left foot for leverage… and ascended.

Hands and feet moving from one unlikely grip to another, Brenya moved in a horizontal line, tracking the path Jacques would have had to make to leave his apartments.

At the third window, she glimpsed Jacques moving down a corridor. He would soon be out of her sight. All she needed was a single access panel. Having stood on this balcony, uninterrupted while Jacques stared at her, Brenya knew exactly where to go.

Hand burning with the familiar exercise of holding up her entire body weight, she dangled by a single hand and slipped the knife from her teeth. With the perfect pressure and leverage, the panel popped in.

Slipping into the dimly illuminated maintenance shaft, Brenya stalked the scent of her mate through the air vents as he strolled toward the centralized lift. Guards. Flanking doors as gold as the knife in her hand. She watched them call the elevator as she unscrewed access to the vertical shaft. As if Jacques was above such a menial task.

The lift had already begun to descend before she pulled away the panel. Knife and fork back between her teeth, she sucked a deep breath through her nostrils, wiped her palms on her stolen shirt, and counted to three.

Rocking back on her heels, she jumped.

A moment of blissful freefall. Floating and weightless. Burdened only with gravity and one chance to catch the cables before her.

It was if she had been born for this, the ease in which that rope of engineered steel found her palms. How her skin burned when her body’s momentum continued forward only to be jerked back by a sure grip.

She’d done it!

Of course she had. She was Brenya Perin, who had once breathed outside air and climbed the Dome with one working arm.

She was so much more than a kept pet used to satisfy the sexual urges of a bad man.

The most powerful woman in Bernard Dome.

As the elevator continued its rapid descent, her hair flew upward as she cut through the air, alighted to the cable that bore her weight as if she were the butterfly landing on the side of her beloved Bernard Dome.

Sublevel G2.

The lift slowed, stopped, and Brenya closed her eyes.

All buildings under the Dome followed the same standard engineering code, there were no secrets in design. Making it simple to visualize where she was in regards to Jacques’ rooms.

A map bloomed in her thoughts.

And then she moved.

A short climb down the cable led to a soft landing on the top of the elevator car. From there, she took to the steel maintenance ladder and made her way to the nearest access panel. Spidering through the ducts, unsure of which direction Jacques may have taken, she thought she might have lost him.

Until she heard a male voice, almost imperceptible right below where she crept. Ear to the metal, she made out Jacques’ threat.

“I will have you sedated and fitted with a feeding tube.”

“You can try.”

The voice of Ambassador Jules Havel.

Pulling her ear from the ground, Brenya set her tools before her and strategized.

Unless there was a different maintenance corridor that serviced the room. The ducting in that area had not been designed to be easily deconstructed. Such efficiency in design was only used for rooms that required little ventilation. She didn’t even see plumbing in the tight space.

Even the electrical wiring was scarce.

Ambassador Jules Havel had been tucked into a storage bay.

Ignoring the muffled