“That’s what we’re arguing about,” Declan said. His gaze darted to Lorne for a second, but then came back to me.

Why was he staring at me like that?

“Well then maybe I can be a tiebreaker.” I stepped in front of the desk to stand beside Lorne. If there was a choice to be made, I wanted to be part of the decision process. “Who wants what?”

“Lorne doesn’t want you to go back to the planet, but I’m still far away. Ahiga’s worried about what Jason might do once he realizes that Lorne has you, and he can’t find Audrey or Tyler.”

“That’s not good.”

“I know. I have a really bad feeling about it. Ystak said something while you were mining that set me off, too. I’m pretty sure he knew I was listening. I…”

He was quiet, and I knew I wasn’t going to like whatever he said next. The look on his face as he scrunched his eyebrows together said he felt pity for me and guilt and I hated both of those things.

“What? Just say it.”

He gave me one small, slow nod before speaking. “While you were in the healing pod, I searched through the records again for recordings and found more. A lot more. They were in the classified folders, and the ones with you and Audrey in the med—”

“No! No. There were no cameras in—”

“They were there. Hidden. So small I’m sure you’d never find them unless you knew where to look.”

Revulsion made me stumble to the side, away from Lorne, until I hit the wall. It felt like a real, physical kick in the stomach, and I was so angry that I was finding it nearly impossible to breathe.

Lorne took a step toward me, but I held out a hand to stop him. I didn’t want comforting. I didn’t want someone to tell me it was okay. Because it wasn’t okay.

“Please, he didn’t—please tell me he wasn’t watching me.” I hated the hint of whine in my voice, but I couldn’t stop it. It was bad enough knowing that he’d been watching while I was in the suits, but the stuff in the med bay was private. It was private. I’d been weak and vulnerable and in pain and sometimes mostly naked.

“I think he’s played us, and—”

I gasped in air. “Me. He played me. If he was watching the whole time, then he knew about everything. About the test. About my plan to switch to mining. He knew it all.” I never even considered that he could’ve been watching me when I’d been told those areas were off limits, but I should’ve realized.