My mind was broken, and I couldn’t come up with anything that could help me out of there.

I sat there until I couldn’t sit still anymore. Nervous energy forced me to move. I got up and started pacing. Ten steps forward and turn. Ten steps back and turn. Ten steps, turn. I went back and forth, moving just slower than a jog. It didn’t clear my head the way I wanted, but at least I was moving. At least I was doing something.

A clang sounded at the end of the hall, and I stopped moving. There were other cells in the block, but my mind kept picturing Officer Perez coming back with that gray box. Maybe she’d been wrong about the lab being backed up.

I held my breath, counting six, before I let it out, counting to three. Then inhaled quickly for a count of three again and let it out for a count of six. I stayed as quiet as possible, listening to the footsteps echoing and counting my breaths the way Declan had shown me.

When I finally gathered the courage to look down the hall, it wasn’t Officer Perez like I’d thought. A wall of a woman dressed in orange was coming toward me. I assumed there was an officer behind her, but if there was, I couldn’t see them.

The locks disengaged on my cell without anyone entering a code, and the door slid open. The woman stepped into the cell like she was the freaking queen of the prison. She topped six feet easily and was thick with muscle. Her hair was buzzed into a mohawk, and she had body mods in her forehead, giving her horns. The woman probably wanted to terrify people on sight. I’d bet she achieved it for most, but I was too busy being scared of my little vial of blood getting processed to be afraid of anything else.

The doors closed and I heard footsteps walking away, but the woman blocked my view of the officer that dropped her off. It wasn’t until she moved in closer that I noticed the sleeves of her jumpsuit were torn, exposing red geometric tattoos.

She was a Roja. The criminal gang that the Crew fought against all the time.

Why couldn’t I just wait alone for my fate to catch up with me? Why did I have to share my space—maybe even my last moments alive—with a fucking Roja?

“You’re in my spot,” she said.

Fantastic. She wanted a fight, but I wanted to avoid one. I was already in enough trouble for one day.

“Sorry,” I said as I shifted out of her way.

Her feet were heavy on the cement, but she wasn’t moving to the bunk to sit down. She was coming toward me on the other side of the cell, cracking her knuckles.