ZARA’S POV
Waking up wasn’t a gasp of air. It was a slide into ice.
There was no warmth. No electric heat from Kai’s touch. Just the sterile, biting cold of medical grade steel against my spine.
I tried to lurch forward, to fight, but my body refused. Heavy, mag-lock cuffs clamped my wrists and ankles to a chair that felt less like furniture and more like an altar.
I blinked, my vision blurring.
The room was vast. Circular. The walls weren't made of brick or plaster but of a dark, obsidian glass that pulsed with a faint, rhythmic blue vein. It looked like the inside of a heart that had forgotten how to beat.
“Heart rate elevating,” a calm voice noted. “Cortisol spiking. She is awake.”
I knew that voice.
I snapped my head up.
Dr. Voss stood by a console that looked like it had been
