Chapter 202

• Gean's POV
• The coffee burned my palm, bitter and unnecessary. Leo's absence hit me before I crossed the threshold - no clatter of vials, no muttered curses at malfunctioning equipment. Just cold sheets twisted into knots, still damp with the metallic tang of his sweat. I let the mug steam on the nightstand. Sentimentality wasted caffeine.
• The lab's vault door hissed open beneath my fingerprints. Banks of monitors flickered, their screens vomiting equations Leo had scribbled in manic spirals last night. The centrifuge whirred, empty. A single glove floated in a petri dish, skin cells dissolving like sugar in tea. My reflection warped in the machine's chrome surface: a businessman's haircut, a butcher's eyes.