No Broken Beast

by Snow, Nicole

  Fuchsia smiles sadly. “Aren’t we the plucky band of ragtag heroes.”

  I arch a brow, eyeing her. “You’re including yourself in ‘we?’”

  She wrinkles her nose at me. “You were the one who told me I wasn’t allowed in the do-gooders club. I’ve been trying.”

  Yeah, shit, and I really wonder why, but now’s not the time to drag her secrets out.

  Stick to business.

  I sweep the table with a look. “So we’ve got a game plan. Blake, I want you shadowing Fuchsia when you can to prevent any assassination attempts while you get her set up. Work together to get the word out. Set the bait, and Warren and I will set the trap.”

  Clarissa looks worried. “Leo, your leg...”

  “It’s fine,” I promise, squeezing her hand. “You heard Doc say it’s on the mend. He’s a good doctor, trained in people, even if he’s mostly mixed up with animals these days.”

  “You’re still limping.”

  “It’s just a twinge.”

  It really is. The stitches are half-embedded in my healing flesh. I’m going to have fun picking them out later when they’re fabric thread and not the degradable stuff doctors use.

  I’m not a hundred percent, but I’m good enough to protect the people I love.

  I can’t stand just sitting here and doing nothing.

  I’ve spent my life being pushed around, dragged into the riptide of Galentron and pulled under deeper and deeper.

  The first time I tried to come up for air, I caused a catastrophe so great I’ve been on the run ever since.

  Time to stop running.

  Now we stand and fight.

  Right now, though, it’s time to get everybody moving, and I lift my head. Only to realize Blake and Warren are watching me and Rissa with cheesy, indulgent smirks. I scowl.

  “What?”

  “Nothing,” Warren says mildly. “I just remember when we used to play down by the creek. You’d be mooning at each other.”

  Blake’s smirk turns into a grin. “They were awful cute even back then.”

  Clarissa’s face flames, but she laughs. “Oh my God, shut up. I hate you both.”

  “They’re just being assholes.” I glower at them. “And assholes don’t get to stay for breakfast.”

  “Hey! Warren started it!” Blake yells.

  “Don’t you throw me under the bus!” War barks back.

  With a chuckle, Clarissa stands, curling her hand against my shoulder. “We can at least feed them if they’re going to be part of the Scooby Gang.” She pauses as she heads toward the kitchen, though, looking back at Fuchsia. “Do you even eat human food, or do you live on a diet of iron filings and eye of newt?”

  Fuchsia curls her upper lip, mouthing her lips and mocking Rissa, then she sniffs and stands, tossing her hair. “As if I’d eat your food.” She saunters to the door, her heels clicking, and flicks her fingers at Blake. “Eat quickly. I want to get started ASAP.”

  She steps outside, into the dapples of morning light coming down through the trees. Everyone stares after her silently before Blake lets out a whimper like a kicked puppy.

  “Dammit, guys. It’s gotta be me, huh?”

  I shake my head. “You’re the one with the radio station side gig, man.”

  Groaning, Blake drags a hand over his face. “Aw, hell. I should’ve listened to Andrea about that show being a stupid idea.”

  “Smart girl, your little Violet,” Warren says, smiling at the nickname she’s got from the purple streaks in her hair.

  “Smarter than you think, Blake,” I tell him. “Your show might help us save this town.”

  * * *

  Breakfast feels like old times.

  Most of the old crew from childhood eating together, like I’d never vanished into the woods and Rissa never fled town.

  We’re just missing Deanna and Blake’s brother, Holt.

  That absence is in the air, in momentary pauses, in a voice that doesn’t fill in the laughs as we tease each other.

  We’re coming.

  I promise, Deanna, we’re coming.

  After everyone’s gone, though, I join Rissa washing dishes. Me scrubbing, her drying and stacking them on a towel. She leans her shoulder into my arm, resting her head against me, her fingers still working at drying the plates.

  “I don’t like it,” she says. “This waiting around while you do everything. The big damned hero.”

  “It’s for the best.” I turn my head, looking down at her. “We’ve got Zach to think about. Nash can’t figure out he’s mine. He’ll use him to get to us both.”

  “I know.” She bites her lip. “I won’t let them take him and do whatever they did to you. But Leo...”

  “Yeah, Rissa?”

  “...he needs you,” she whispers, her lashes lowering. “He’s so different. The same way you’re different. He’s smart in ways that scare me sometimes. These light-speed leaps of logic, that gift he has with numbers or even just sensing how I’m feeling. He might grow up to be just like you.”

  “He might,” I admit, my heart rising in my throat. “What’re you saying, sweetheart?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t.” She shakes her head briskly. “I’m just worried.”

  I set down the plate I’d been scrubbing, wipe my hands off on a towel, then capture her face in my palms.

  She looks so distressed, so worried, it kills me.

  This whole ordeal has frayed my girl so much. Her emotions are raw on the surface, waiting to be crushed, and all I want is to protect them.

  Not tear them apart more with my fuckery.

  “We’ll figure it out,” I promise. “If you don’t run, I won’t either, Rissa. I want to be part of Zach’s life. I want to be Dad. He’s gonna have a lot of struggles as he grows up. I’ll be there. Every damn day.”

  There’s more I want to say, even if I don’t know how.

  About not just staying for Zach, but for us.

  If it’s what she wants, I can be her friend and Zach’s father, but I’m a greedy man.

  I want more.

  I want us to be a family.

  I want to make up for the last eight years of missing them both.

  I want her back, in my bed every night, wearing my ring.

  But I can’t promise her everything till we bring Deanna home.

  She searches my eyes, looking for something to hold on to. Then she smiles faintly, even if there’s a tremor to it, unsure and hurting.

  “I’d like that,” she whispers. “We have to tell him soon. I never told him much about his dad, and he’s just about the right age where he’ll start asking.”

  “We will.” I lean in and kiss her forehead, promising her silently that I’ll tell her soon, too.

  Every square inch of me hopes we can try for something better.

  “We’ll work it out.” I tuck her hair back gently, grazing over the delicate shell of her ear, before I trace my fingertip down the line of the scar on her cheek. “But I need to go take care of this first.”

  “I know.” She sighs, lightly thumping a curled fist to my chest. “Go on. Go be the big damned superhero.”

  “Don’t get nervous if you see Warren skulking around,” I say. “If I’m not here, he will be to check in on things. I’m not leaving you and Zach alone.”

  “Right. I just wish it was you. But I get why it can’t always be that way.”

  It should be, I think, swallowing a growl.

  But there’s unfinished business waiting.

  I lean down and claim her lips one more time, stealing a taste of her to tide me over. Trying to coax that wavering, sad line of hers into warmth, teasing at her lips till she goes soft for me and sways into my arms with a sigh.

  “Wait for me,” I tell her. “I’ll be home soon, Rissa, and then we’ll fix everything.”

  * * *

  That might’ve been my biggest promise ever.

  Damn if I didn’t mean it, though.

  Now I just need to
make sure my insurance is in place. And that means making sure more folks Nash can’t easily escape can get the data saved from the drives we’ve recovered.

  Nash might be able to track down the rest of the caches now, but his mission isn’t complete till he recovers it all—and me.

  What if Zach’s immune, too?

  What if he has the same antibodies to SP-73 in his blood?

  I don’t even want to know if the reason that stuff didn’t kill me during the lab breach years ago was due to some genetic freak effect or something they did to me in Nighthawks.

  More important, they can’t ever know.

  Ever.

  So I leave copies of the data with Ms. Wilma, with Haley, and with Gray.

  I save my old friend for last because he’s step two in my insurance plan, and I can’t pull this off without him.

  Ember’s fussing and worrying over tea at their place, trying to get me to drink some when I’m too tense to even think about it. Gray checks the files on his laptop, reviewing them with his face set grim, the horrible images on the screen reflected back in his glasses.

  “Brings back memories, doesn’t it?” I say darkly.

  “Unfortunately.”

  He sighs and pushes his glasses up his nose. I always found it a little funny when he does that. Makes him look like a neat ninja-assassin preparing to kill someone and hoping they won’t bleed in too big a mess.

  It’s not that funny now.

  He gives me a discerning look over his glasses. “Are you sure this plan is our best bet?”

  “Yeah. Nash listens to Ross. He’s vulnerable,” I say. “And when we hit him, he won’t be expecting the old man there.”

  “The problem,” Gray says, “is that you’re vulnerable to him as well, Leo.”

  “That’s why I need you there. To keep me grounded.”

  “Fine. I do love being useful.”

  As he says it, though, he turns his head to watch Ember almost absently. Gray’s always been so reserved and withdrawn, so it’s almost strange to see the love there so clearly as he watches his wife.

  His pregnant wife.

  Fuck. That’s what gets me.

  I’m peeling Gray away from his wife and unborn kid, Warren away from Haley and their son, Blake away from Andrea—all to clean up my messes.

  I want to promise I’ll bring them all home safe, but I can’t.

  I’ll just have to make sure if anyone takes the fall, if anyone gets hurt, it’s me.

  Even if that means taking a father away from Zach before he even knows he has one.

  Gray’s watching me just as keenly, though, his green eyes sharp. “Will you be able to hold it together? That night at the facility, years ago...”

  “I froze up. I know. I was out of my wits.” The shame of that shit still burns inside me. “But I wasn’t ready then. I thought I knew the ugliness of Galentron, only to find out it was worse. I’m ready now.” I offer a faint smile. “And I’ll have you with me, won’t I? Just like old times.”

  “You will,” Gray says firmly, and in those two words are a promise.

  He was there for me then.

  He’ll be there for me now.

  I can trust him the way I’ve always trusted him.

  Because for him, this is just as personal as it is for me.

  * * *

  Eight Years Ago

  I don’t want to believe the worst.

  Goddammit, I don’t.

  But after finding out the kind of man the mayor is, it scares me that I haven’t heard from Rissa in hours.

  I told her not to go back to the house.

  Once Edgar Bell realizes she has damning stuff on him and she’s looking for more, trying to capture the abuse her and Deanna have been suffering for years under his thumb, there’s no predicting what’s next.

  I’m afraid of what he might do to her.

  I don’t have much time. Not if I’m gonna put a stop to this, and I need to get to the lab tonight.

  Before they realize I’ve gone AWOL and revoke my security clearance, making it impossible for me to get to the SP-73 cache and obliterate it.

  But I can’t do what I have to do unless I know Clarissa’s safe.

  So I park my Galentron-issued Jeep outside the mansion, looking up at its tall spires.

  It’s always looked like something out of a Gothic novel to me, maybe a horror movie. It never quite fit in this homey little town, but it’s somehow just right for the mayor’s overblown ego and the terrible shit Dr. Ross did in its lower halls.

  It’s the opposite of what it’s supposed to represent.

  Any notion of dignity gets left at the door.

  I mount the steps, start to knock, then realize the door’s open.

  Instantly, I hear the rush of loud, clipped shouts echoing down the halls. Followed by a crash that makes me picture too many things I can’t stand to imagine.

  I’m on the move before I even realize it, shouldering through the half-open door, racing toward the sound of Edgar Bell’s voice.

  It’s not hard to miss when he’s shouting to the rafters.

  “You’d dare betray me?” he demands, and I can just barely hear Rissa protesting, her voice drowned out as his shouts climb higher. “I tried to spare you. I would’ve sent you away! And yet you—you selfish little bitch, you little ingrate—you’re going to ruin everything I’ve worked for the last fifteen years!”

  Oh.

  Fuck.

  He must’ve figured out Rissa was recording him.

  That she caught damning evidence of his scheming, and she has every intention of reporting him to the authorities.

  I pick up speed, crashing through the house, fear and anger building up inside me into an explosive cocktail.

  The study.

  The noise is coming from the study, and I go charging in, hitting the door hard enough to nearly rip it off its hinges.

  Just in time to see Edgar Bell pick up a huge Ming vase off a pedestal and smash it across Clarissa’s face.

  The vase shatters.

  Clarissa screams, crumpling to the floor.

  And the red of the blood on her cheek becomes the red of my vision.

  I charge headlong at that motherfucking mayor with murder on my mind.

  For an older man, he’s fast.

  He sees me coming and darts over Rissa, leaving her a crumpled, shivering barrier between us.

  It’s the only thing that draws me up short. I won’t trample over her—but I’m not letting this asshole get away.

  He retreats behind his desk. It won’t save him.

  I’m between him and the door.

  He’s not getting through me.

  “How could you, you fucking maniac?” I snarl. “How could you sell out all these people? Was it worth it?”

  “Don’t you dare judge me,” he snarls. “I don’t speak grunt. You’re acting out above your pay grade, Agent.”

  Anything I might say gets cut off by Rissa at my feet.

  “Leo...” she whispers brokenly, reaching for my leg with one weak, shaking hand.

  I sink down to one knee next to her, clasping her hand.

  “I’m here, sweetheart,” I whisper. “You’re safe. It’ll be all right.”

  I’m torn between calling her an ambulance and disemboweling her old man first.

  But Mayor Bell seals his fate when he snarls again, realization thick in his voice.

  “You,” he bites off, shaking his head. “Now, I see. I knew she’d gotten reckless, but you’ve been the one putting these...these asinine ideas in her head! You’ve corrupted my daughter.”

  Oh, hell no.

  I don’t even realize it the instant I snap.

  Maybe it’s his tone.

  Maybe it’s his fingerprints I can see bruising her throat, smeared in her blood.

  But everything goes black, and next thing I know, I’m on top of Edgar Bell, smashing his head into the floor again and again and again, timed to the violent mantra i
n my mind.

  Die, die, die, you piece of shit!

  There’s a satisfying crack and his eyes roll back. He goes limp.

  My hands shake, bloody as I pull them back from his crushed-in throat, staring down at him.

  Shit. He’s not breathing.

  He’s definitely not breathing.

  I didn’t—did I?

  I’ve never killed a man who wasn’t pointing a gun at me in a war zone before.

  I don’t even remember moving. I don’t know what I did. Reality just blurs, adrenaline scorching my veins.

  I’m on full berserker mode, this fury rising up inside me, this wild animal thing with only one thought.

  Protect Clarissa.

  And to save the woman I love, I just murdered her asshole of a dad.

  “Oh, God!” A voice shouts from the doorway, strangled, shocked.

  I lift my head sharply, adrenaline pulsing through me in a wild rush. One of the maids stands there, her hand pressed to her mouth, her face pale as she stares at me and the body beneath me.

  I stand quickly, holding out a hand. “It’s not—he was going to—”

  She shakes her head, cutting me off, and takes a shaky breath.

  “Don’t...don’t tell me,” she says numbly, already bustling to Rissa’s side. “If you don’t tell me, I can’t repeat it to anyone. Just go.”

  I stand there stunned while she helps Clarissa sit up and gently touches her cheek.

  And that’s when I realize the maid doesn’t blame me for killing Edgar Bell.

  I wonder what she’s seen under this roof, why she’d look at his dead body with relief and tell me to run, tell me she’s willing to cover.

  But I can’t fucking go. Not till I know they’ll be safe.

  I throw my arms around Rissa, hot panic ripping through me like a current, holding her together. She sways so gently in my arms while I push my forehead to hers, wiping her blood, muttering words back and forth. I wish I could stay here and keep her talking.

  I’m scared that sick fuck gave her a concussion. She’s mumbling, barely able to stand, but the maid gives me a knowing, promising look. My baby girl’s in good hands.