I’d normally have heard the ice clipping his words, but I’d gone tone deaf, batting my head against a dead end of resentment I couldn’t have named the cause of. I told myself diamonds should bring me glory, not guilt and humiliation. I stuffed the pack and the pile of clothing into my grab bag, making a rat’s nest of it, and turned to sulk off.

His fist shot out and pinned my wrist. He half-rose in his chair. “We’re not done here!”

I flinched hard.

Whatever he saw in my face made him ease back into his seat and quiet his voice. But he held me firm. “Listen to me. We’ve no room for self-indulgence around here! Really, I expected better. There’s enough bad shit coming down without you sensible ones going off on me. And that includes your buddy Rubio.”

“He’s only trying to help!” I leaned toward the door, but no way Rousseau would let me decide how this argument ended.

“Saying every other den is better than the one that saved his life, that’s his idea of help? He feels that way, he can leave anytime. See if anyone else will take him, sick as he is!” He shoved my arm away like it was my fault he’d got so worked up. Which it totally was. “Now get out of here. Be ready for a morning work call. No night shift till we get this shooting looked into.”

I heaved myself through the door and nearly slammed into Song-yi, carrying mugs of fresh tea, a cloud of mint steam traveling with her. The hot flash of rebuke in her glance told me she’d been listening. She guarded Rousseau’s peace of mind like a mother hen.

I mumbled an instinctive ‘sorry!’ and escaped up the corridor, wondering which of so many things I was apologizing for. My tantrum lasted me just past the turn of the hall, where I halted, panting, and leaned against the wall. Only some really deep breaths kept me from throwing up.

What was going on?

In all my months at Unca Joe, I’d never talked back to Rousseau like that, not even at my craziest. It was like some restraint had broken, the lid flying off a jar of rotted food. I’d pushed him to the edge of rage—and meant to. Knowing he’d had the worst of days, I’d kept pushing. It just wasn’t like me.

The stash in my gut wallet weighed a ton right then. But the looting of my bunk struck deep. Standard procedure, he’d said, so why should I be the exception? Did I think I was somehow special?