He Didn’t Kidnap Me. Not Exactly novel Chapter 338

338

Maisy’s POV)

Morning arrived with movement.

Volkova men- mine

practiced efficienc

Vests went

got fitted

still a sentence I hadn’t fully made peace with saying in my own head. They moved through the space with the kind of

e whole scene look lifted straight out of one of those war films DeLuca probably watched for fun.

ced motions, straps cinched tight across chests. Magazines slid into weapons with a series of crisp, mechanical clicks. Bes things I couldn’t name and didn’t especially want explained to me in detail.

Ist

of it, entirely useless.

curacy was the one and only skill the universe had decided to hand me, and it had stopped generously right there. I didn’t know how rap anything, or identify a single piece of equipment beyond that looks dangerous” and “that looks more dangerous.”

posed to do with this?”

red beside me, holding a gun at arm’s length like it might detonate from proximity alone, a loose bullet balanced in her other palm.

know either, I admitted.

ch felt honest, and reasonable, and should have been the end of it

Instead, some deeply misguided part of my brain decided this was a challenge worth accepting. I took the gun from her, examined it with the confidence of someone who had absolutely no business projecting confidence, and tried fitting the bullet into what I assumed was the correct opening.

It did not fit.

I tried another spot. Then another.

‘Is it working?” Tessa asked.

I paused, privately conceding – to myself, silently, with my pride fully intact on the outside – that no, it was very much not working.

I think the gun’s

ad “It’s bad.”

Tessa

The piston has issues.”

sighed, narrating privately to myself how deeply unfair it was that one lucky streak with a target

around me that I understood anything else about firearms whatsoever.

9’s bad Tessa was telling one of the men several feet away. The piston’s got issues.”

A step toward her, tome useless telekinetic instinct trying to yank the sentence back out of the air before it landed anywhere permanent. It

OIGO

173

15:04 Fri, Sep 4 )

Chapter 338

didn’t work. The man glanced toward me, and I turned away fast, mortified, ducking around a corner to escape my own catastrophic misinformation

campaign.

Wich was how I ended up nearly walking straight into Archer.

eyes, and my whole body tensed on reflex. I spun to head the other direction immediately.

Turned back slowly, bracing for something I didn’t know how to prepare for.

have nothing to worry about today,” he said. “We’re going to win this.

That was it. No follow–up, no lingering weight

“Yeah,” I said, and left before either of

I slid past cluster after cluster of

comfortable with it, which felt

ything more.

offering a small, quiet bow as I passed. I’d gotten used to it. technically. I still hadn’t gotten

on to hold onto.

I found DeLuca in anoth

rougher than his usu

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