The prison's visitation room buzzed with low chatter and the occasional scrape of chairs. Families leaned across metal tables, speaking in hurried tones, trying to compress love, worry, and gossip into a strict thirty-minute window.

Viv was halfway through a conversation with Pen and other inmates—calm, detached, giving nothing away—when a familiar figure stepped through the security doors. Tall, striking, with a controlled elegance that only came from years of moving in dangerous circles, Daphne Blackwood crossed the room.

"Alexine Vause?" the guard announced, using Viv's prison alias. "Your... stepsister is here."

Viv didn't flinch. If she was surprised, she didn't show it. She simply rose, hands cuffed in front, and walked to meet her.

Daphne slid into the chair opposite her, green eyes flicking over Viv like she was checking for damage. "You look terrible," she said softly, for Viv's ears only.

"You flew across an ocean to tell me that?" Viv's tone was flat, but her eyes sharpened.

Daphne leaned in just enough for the conversation to look like sisterly concern. "I have something for you. You're going to need it soon." Her voice was a whisper, threaded with urgency.

Viv's expression didn't change, but she knew exactly what Daphne meant. She caught the faintest glint of a microdata chip between Daphne's fingers before it disappeared into her closed palm.

Unfortunately, the problem wasn't giving it—it was how. This prison had a policy: all inmates were fully body-scanned after visitation. No exceptions.

Which meant they'd have to improvise.

Viv tilted her head slightly, calculating. "Make it look like a family reunion," she murmured.

Daphne raised a brow. "Most sisters don't—"

"Exactly. That's why no one will think I'd risk it."

The moment was perfectly timed—just as a C.O.'s attention shifted elsewhere, Daphne leaned forward suddenly, her hand brushing Viv's cheek in a mock-affectionate gesture. Their lips met, the contact slow, deliberate, as Daphne transferred the chip with the kind of precision only muscle memory could pull off.

It was a French kiss—intimate enough to look wrong, quick enough to be deniable.

From across the room, Lux Donnelly froze mid-conversation with another inmate's visitor, eyes narrowing. She had just witnessed something she knew she shouldn't have—but would never forget.

The C.O. monitoring the room frowned, walking over. "That's... not how sisters usually say hello."

Viv pulled back, meeting his gaze with the most unimpressed expression in her arsenal. "What can I say? Our family's weird."

The guard didn't buy it entirely, but after a tense beat, he stepped away.

Viv, however, could feel Lux's gaze burning into her back.

This... was going to be a problem.