The Queen's Advantage

by Jessie Mihalik

  The silencer prevented any sounds or wireless signals in a two-meter radius from transmitting outside that radius, including voices, coms, or bugs. If someone wanted to know what we were gossiping about, they’d have to read our lips.

  Once Lynn realized I really wasn’t going to bite, her wit and humor returned. She wasn’t quite brave enough to ask me outright if I’d killed my husband, but the same cleverness that made her spout wild theories made chatting with her entertaining. Saving her had been the right move.

  We chatted for forty-five minutes before Lynn took her leave. The door had barely closed behind her when Catarina pinned me with a stare. “This is how you know everything about everyone,” she said. “You have a legion of spies masquerading as young women.”

  I sipped my lemonade and said nothing. She was wrong, but she drew the exact conclusion I had intended. Shame slid through my system, soft and sour. I didn’t like lying to family, even by omission, but it was the only way to ensure they—and I—stayed safe.

  “How many have you saved?” Cat asked.

  “I don’t keep track. A dozen, maybe. I started when I returned home after Gregory’s death.” The true number was twenty-seven, and that only counted the people I’d truly helped, not those like Lynn who had just needed a momentary rescue. If I included everyone, the number would be closer to sixty. And I’d started well before Gregory’s death.

  Our prenup had protected House von Hasenberg’s interests, not mine. When my husband died, I inherited nothing. His family wasted no time hustling me out of their lives. Money was far less of an issue than stability and familiarity, so I ran home like the wounded animal I was.

  “I can’t believe you’re running your own spy ring,” Catarina said with a laugh. “I bet it drives Ian insane.”

  I smiled. Ian Bishop was the director of House von Hasenberg security—an inconspicuous title for a far-reaching power. He had his fingers in House intelligence gathering, security forces, and even military maneuvers. He was the most arrogant man I’d ever met, and that was saying something considering I grew up in a High House.

  He was also one of the most handsome, but a trained interrogator couldn’t force the admission from my lips.

  One of my few true pleasures these days was beating Ian to a piece of intelligence. It had turned into something of a competition, and I was currently ahead by two. Or, at least, my shadowy, anonymous online persona was. Ian had no idea I was feeding him information from multiple directions.

  “Ian doesn’t think the daughter of a High House is capable of anything other than being a trophy wife,” I said. “I enjoy proving him wrong.”

  “I thought Ada would’ve disabused him of that notion,” Catarina said. “He tried to catch her for two years and failed.”

  My younger sister Ada was exceptional, but even she wasn’t that good—as head of security for a High House, Ian had nearly infinite resources at his disposal. He’d failed because I’d fed him a constant stream of false information, while giving Ada all the info she needed to stay ahead of him.

  I wanted to tell Cat, to let her in on the secret, but one secret led to twenty others, each more dangerous than the last. I held my tongue.

  “Oh, I’m supposed to meet Lady Ying in twenty minutes to go shopping. You want to join?” Catarina asked.

  I repressed a shudder. Shopping with Catarina was a masochistic endeavor if ever there was one. The girl could spend seven hours in a single store. Seven. Hours.

  Luckily for the rest of us, Ying Yamado was always game for a shopping trip. She and Catarina were close friends—as close as the daughters of two High Houses could be, at least.

  “I’ll pass, thanks. I’d like to make it home before tomorrow,” I said.

  Catarina rolled her eyes at me. “I’m not that bad.”

  I just raised my eyebrows until she cracked and broke down into giggles.

  “Okay, maybe I am. But you’re missing out,” she said as she stood. She kissed the air next to my cheek and then she was gone. I disabled the silencer, and the communication signals around me rushed in, overwhelming and nauseating.

  After all of this time, I should be used to it, but Gregory’s gift just kept on giving. He’d been a brilliant scientist and a horrible husband, wrapped together with a morally bankrupt bow. I don’t think it ever occurred to him to not experiment on me.

  Now I could mentally intercept and decrypt wireless signals, whether I wanted to or not, and I had no idea how. Gregory’s lab had been destroyed, taking most of his secrets to the grave.

  He had tampered with both my brain and my nanobots, the infinitesimal robots in my blood that were supposed to aid healing. Father would dearly love the tech, so much so that he would absolutely approve more experiments on me if he found out about my abilities.

  I’d been a test subject for long enough.

  So I kept my secrets to myself and became a grieving widow in public. It kept Father from pushing me to remarry—which I would never do—and covered some of my new eccentricities.

  I attended teas and lunches and balls when I would’ve preferred staying home. But staying home would not let me find other young women who could use my help, so I sucked it up and played the idle aristocrat.

  At home, I earned my keep by using my network to track down information for House von Hasenberg. Father didn’t know exactly where my information came from, but he knew that if he needed something found, I could find it.

  I finished my lemonade and pretended my head didn’t feel like it was being stabbed with stilettos. The headaches were worse when I was in an open public space, as my piddly human brain couldn’t keep up with all of the information flowing to the implant from my modified nanos.

  My com lit up in my mind’s eye a second before it vibrated in my handbag. Because I was attuned to it, I knew I’d received a message and what it said without looking at the device itself. Decoding transmissions, even the secure transmissions my com received, was almost comically easy. Whatever else Gregory had been, he truly had been a gifted scientist.

  I’d taught myself to tune out most transmissions so they became ignorable background noise. It didn’t help with the headaches, but at least I didn’t have to constantly hear strangers’ messages in my head all day. Now they burbled along like a distant stream in the back of my mind. I could hear individual messages if I focused, but mostly they were white noise.

  I was Gregory’s fantasy of an ideal wife, forced to listen to everything without being able to respond. I didn’t know if he’d planned to add transmission abilities later or if he’d designed it this way as a cosmic joke. If it was the latter, the joke was very much on him. I smiled in grim satisfaction.

  I pulled out my com to read and respond the old-fashioned way. The message was from Ian. It was short and to the point. You were scheduled to return home, not split from your sister. The security detail followed her. Remain where you are until the replacement detail arrives. I have eyes on you until then.

  My smile morphed into a grin as I typed my reply. I was just leaving. I’ll be home before they arrive.

  STAY PUT. The reply was so fast, I wondered if he had pretyped it. I’d hate to think I was so predictable.

  I didn’t bother with a reply. If he was actually monitoring the cameras, he’d see me leave. Otherwise, he’d certainly notice when my tracker started moving. Either way, I wasn’t going to sit around for who knew how long waiting for his security team. My head ached at just the thought.

  The coffee shop was close enough that I could walk home, but that was sure to make Ian apoplectic. And while I didn’t really think Serenity was unsafe, we were at war and some basic safety precautions were prudent.

  I ordered a House transport and waited until it arrived before leaving the building. I didn’t see Ian’s second security detail, so he was sure to be livid. I resisted the urge to tap into our House security cameras to see for myself.

  The transport dropped me at the private family entrance without inc
ident. I cleared the new security checkpoint then waved my embedded identity chip over the reader at the door. The reader beeped as it verified that my chip and biometrics matched. The door opened, and I let myself into the ornately carved stone building I’d called home for twenty-one of my twenty-five years.

  The heavy stone blocked some of the wireless signals, and I sighed in relief. I stepped out of the entryway and a shadow detached itself from the draperies.

  I had a blaster in hand before my brain recognized that I wasn’t being attacked by a stranger. No, I was being stalked by Ian Bishop.

  I wasn’t sure that was an improvement.

  Preorder Aurora Blazing today!

  Also by Jessie Mihalik

  The Rogue Queen Series

  The Queen’s Gambit

  The Queen’s Advantage

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  The Consortium Rebellion Series

  Polaris Rising

  Aurora Blazing

  About the Author

  Jessie Mihalik has a degree in Computer Science and a love of all things geeky. A software engineer by trade, Jessie now writes full time from her home in Texas. When she’s not writing, she can be found playing co-op video games with her husband, trying out new board games, or reading books pulled from her overflowing bookshelves.

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  CONNECT WITH JESSIE:

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  www.jessiemihalik.com

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