REMEMBER JAMIE BAKER

by Kelly Oram

  He was fishing for information on his team. May as well give it to him. “Kind of hard to call the boss when they’re dead.”

  Okay, so only one of his soldiers was dead, and it hadn’t been my doing, but he didn’t need to know that.

  Donovan’s reaction was exactly what I’d hoped for. “Dead?”

  I smiled at the shock in his tone. “Unfortunately. Obviously I didn’t mean for things to get so out of hand—I’m not a murderer—but accidents do happen, doc. I’m not always one hundred percent in control of my power, especially when I’m upset, and I don’t take kindly to people trying to kill me.”

  There was a pause, and then Donovan slowly said, “No. I imagine not.” The cheerful politeness in his voice was gone. I took a sick amount of pleasure in the fact that I’d upset him. Lorenz had to be one of his favorite minions. He had to be feeling that loss.

  When he spoke again, he voice was smoothed out, but I heard his teeth grind together for those few seconds it took him to gain composure. “There will be no need for violence this time. I assure you, you will not be harmed. Unfortunately, I can’t promise the same for any of your friends, should you try to bring them with you. And my men will have to scan you for any tracking devices. You understand.”

  “Of course.” I dropped the sickly sweet act and let all of my danger creep back into my voice. “So long as you understand that I’m coming willingly. I don’t need to be dragged in. If any of your men so much as touch me, I can’t promise they won’t end up as fried as your last crew. I come in as a guest, not a prisoner or a lab rat. Or I come in as an enemy. If anyone tries to lock me up or knock me out, we’ll have another Las Vegas on our hands. Get what I’m saying?”

  “I understand.”

  I snickered when I heard a faint hint of his pulse. For me to hear it over the phones like that, it had to be thumping in his ears. Pissing him off felt so good I was almost looking forward to the next twenty-four hours. “Great. Then I’ll see you soon.”

  I hung up the phone without waiting for a reply, cherishing the thought that he was annoyed to be hung up on. He probably wasn’t the kind of man who got that very often.

  Before I headed for California, I pulled my Me Notebook from my purse. I had a new word I needed to add to my personalities list: aggravating. I grinned as I scribbled the trait beneath all of Ryan’s add-ins. He would probably see this last one as another pessimistic quality, but I couldn’t help feeling my ability to be annoying was one of my greatest talents.

  . . . . .

  The pickup at the pier went smoother than I’d expected. As promised, Donovan’s men hadn’t tried to manhandle me at all. They’d even come in regular street clothes—no Jamie-proof electricity suits this time. They used some kind of device they stole from a Star Trek episode to determine that there wasn’t any kind of tracking device anywhere on my person and then simply asked me to come with them. It was kind of boring, actually—not that I was complaining about a lack of them trying to kill me.

  We ran so far north that, despite the superspeed, I was nearly frostbitten by the time we reached the small group of buildings making up the research compound. We were in Canada. That was all I knew. Unless we’d gone past Canada and were officially in Santa Claus’s territory. Seriously, it was a possibility.

  On the bright side, I was expected, and they knew I’d be freaking freezing. I was greeted with a blanket, a cup of hot tea—not Magic Tea, but I wasn’t going to be picky—and a chair by a roaring fire.

  It wasn’t until I’d stopped shivering that I took notice of my surroundings. There had been a group of cement buildings that looked like exactly what you’d expect of an arctic research station in the middle of freaking nowhere. I’d expected the inside to remind me a lot of the boring white walls of NORAD. But, minus an obvious lack of windows, the building we were in felt more like a fancy ski lodge.

  I was sitting in a high wingback chair perched on a plush polar bear skin rug—hopefully faux, but I couldn’t tell—in front of a roaring fire that had a large moose head hanging above it. There was a small end table to my right, where my tea and a small tray of snacks had been set, and then another chair to match the one I sat in. I still felt the chill from my run through the far North, but the teacup in my hand and the heat of the fire were thawing me nicely. The lighting was dim, and the room was fairly quiet save a few people shuffling about and the wind howling outside.

  When Donovan approached, I knew it was him by the soft off-kilter click that preceded each step he took. I didn’t remember the man, but I knew he walked with a cane. He took a seat in the chair opposite me and waited. I felt the weight of his stare, knew he was waiting for me to acknowledge him, but I couldn’t pull my gaze away from the fire to greet him.

  This place, with the fire and the rug and the snow, reminded me of a memory. One that wasn’t mine. One that should have been mine, but was gone. The description Ryan had given me of our first time together. From the moment I sat down, my heart had begun to ache. It made me desperate to remember. Donovan couldn’t have known, but if he wanted me to play along with his games, this was the perfect first strike.

  “Why so sad, Angel?”

  The ACEs called me Angel. In a way, it was my name. But the way Donovan said it just then sounded more like a term of endearment. He’d spoken softly, but had lacked empathy. He hadn’t asked out of concern; he’d asked out of curiosity. He didn’t deserve an answer, but I gave him one anyway.

  “Memories are more than people realize,” I said, looking into the dancing flames of the fire. “They’re knowledge. They’re power. They’re motivation. Identity. They’re the very essence of who we are.”

  Donovan took his time responding. “I believe you’re speaking more of experiences, Miss Baker. Not the mere memories of them.”

  I finally slid my gaze to him. He was every bit the man I expected a narcissistic billionaire to be. He was in his sixties and very nice-looking for someone of his age. He was slender, with silver-gray hair and a charming smile.

  He had an air of confidence and self-importance, yet he gave me every single ounce of his attention. He was sitting in his chair, but turned toward me and leaned forward as if waiting with bated breath for my next response, as if he planned to hang on my every word. His eyes were alight with intelligence and fascination.

  “Maybe,” I said. “But what are experiences without the memory of them?”

  Donovan’s brows raised slightly and his smile fell from the phony polite one he’d been wearing into something softer, more genuine. “That’s very insightful, Miss Baker. I’m impressed.”

  I couldn’t care less about his opinion of me. “It’s not rocket science. If I can’t remember my past, it does me no good to have lived it. The knowledge and power I gained from my experiences are gone. Without my memory, my experiences aren’t even mine anymore. They’re just stories people tell me about someone else. About a girl they knew once. A girl that’s no longer me. I have no memory. Therefore, those experiences are not mine. I’ve lost them.”

  “That must be difficult.”

  “You have no idea,” I muttered, bitterness creeping into my voice. My gaze returned to the fire. “Everyone thinks they understand. They try to be supportive, try to be encouraging, but they don’t really know. They can’t know what it’s like to truly have nothing. To be nothing. No one.” I gulped, swallowing back the overwhelming urge to cry. “I’ve lost everything, Mr. Donovan. I’ve lost myself.”

  Donovan sat back in his chair and was silent for a minute. “I see,” he whispered, winning my attention again.

  “See what?”

  “Why you’ve come.”

  He was just now figuring that out? Was the man an idiot?

  The question must have read on my face, because he smiled and gave his head a small shake. “When my men confirmed that you were truly alone and had no tracking device, I was suspicious. It was out of character—for you and for Wilks. I thought for sure you would try to com
e up with some sort of plan. Use the opportunity Chen gave you to try to find me. To stop me.”

  We did have a plan, but it was better for him to think we didn’t, and easy enough for me to fake it when I could give him plenty of truth mixed in with my act. “Believe me, we tried. I wanted to. I disagree with what you’re doing here, and if I could stop you, I would.” He frowned, but didn’t look surprised. “The simple fact of the matter is you have me in a corner. I’ve tried everything else humanly possible to try and get my memory back, but you’re the only man on Earth who can do it.”

  His frown was replaced with a proud smile. He sat up straighter in his chair and puffed up his chest a little. It took everything in me not to roll my eyes.

  “You’re my only option, and I’m that desperate to get my memories back. As much as I wanted to work with the ACEs to take you down, I knew if I did, you wouldn’t give me what I want. What I need. Sadly, my selfishness won out over the good of humanity this time, and now here I am. Major Wilks couldn’t stop me from leaving, and trust me, he was raging mad.”

  Donovan chuckled. “I believe it.”

  I yawned. It was unavoidable. The fire had warmed me, the tea had relaxed me, and I’d just run from Colorado, to Florida, to California, to the North freaking Pole after being in a fight with a superthug. I was exhausted. Not to mention sore, with a pounding headache.

  “It’s late.” Donovan rose to his feet. “I can show you to a room if you’d like, or am I correct in assuming you’d prefer to begin the process of retrieving your memories right away? We will need to first do some preliminary testing to see how much of an effect the serum Chen gave you had and make sure it didn’t cause any unexpected side effects. After that, if everything looks good, we can give you more serum, and you can get a good night’s rest while it works its magic. You’ll be a new woman by morning.”

  And there were the warning bells I’d been waiting for since I’d arrived. I shot him a sharp glance. “Just like that? You’re just going to start the process of healing me? No making me wait, trying to negotiate for something in return, making me do a bunch of Jamie’s-a-super-freak tests first?”

  Donovan chewed on my suspicion for a moment. The wheels in his mind spun as he tried to decide how to handle me. I was dangerous, volatile, and unpredictable, after all. Was that not the report he fed his superthugs?

  The longer he waited to give me an answer, the more I was certain he was trying to spin a story I would accept. “Don’t do that,” I warned him. “Don’t feed me a bunch of bull. As much as I love a great pastry, I don’t like things sugarcoated. I was straight up with you. I don’t like you, and I don’t trust you. You have something I need, and that’s the only reason I’m not roasting you right now.”

  When his eyes flashed with anger, I huffed and climbed to my feet. “Oh, don’t act all offended. You don’t like or trust me, either. You don’t even see me as a person. I’m a test subject to you. You’re only playing my game right now because I’m too powerful. You can’t control me. I’m well aware this is going to cost me, so at least have the decency to drop the act and be honest.”

  Donovan’s face fell flat. “Very well. If you insist on bleeding the civility out of everything.”

  “There’s civility in stealing people and caging them up like animals for human testing?”

  Donovan flushed an angry red and gripped the top of his cane so hard I half expected him to try and whack me with it. “You are missing the point entirely.”

  He didn’t wait for an answer before storming across the room to a set of double doors. He pressed his thumb to a scanner that unlocked the doors and held one open for me, glaring as he ushered me into a new hallway.

  “Everything I do is for the greater good. My advancements in the medical field are revolutionary, life changing.”

  When we reached the end of the hall, he held another door open for me. The room behind it was much more like a hospital room. My stomach flipped, but I squared my shoulders and marched inside.

  Dr. Chen was there, already prepped for whatever they were about to do. I guess he’d gotten the memo that I’d be coming. When he handed me a hospital gown and pointed out a small bathroom to change in, I sighed. Someone, someday, was going to have to explain the point of those things to me.

  Both men tried to make small talk with me while they checked my vitals, examined my head—I did have a minor concussion—and looked at whatever else they needed to until they were satisfied that I was ready for another dose of their miracle serum. Basically it was a very long-winded super villain spiel about how the sacrifices of their subjects were for the greater good and that together they were going to make the world a better place and blah, blah, blah…

  I wasn’t interested, but they didn’t need my attention to keep themselves talking. They were happy patting each other on the back. I’ll spare you the details, because listening to them was more torturous than the medical testing, but basically it boiled down to a lot of “We’re so brilliant, we know everything, we’re going to change the world, and people will worship us as Gods among men…”

  When I got to a point where either they shut up or I zapped them unconscious, I interrupted their gloating. “Okay, great, you’re both a couple of modern-day Hitlers. Congratulations to you both.” They frowned at my comparison. (Though, it was a completely fair one.) “Where do I fit into all these evil world-changing plans? Why do you need me so badly?”

  Both men blinked at me, as if the answer should be obvious. “My dear,” Donovan said, as Dr. Chen approached me a gigantic syringe, “you weren’t just born the way you are; you were created. If it could happen to you, it could happen to anyone. If we could unlock your secret, we could duplicate it. We could create more like you. Gain your powers for ourselves.”

  That was a frightening thought.

  Chen smiled as he held up the syringe. “Are you ready to begin remembering?”

  I was, until he put the needle against my skin. The fluid in the syringe was clear but had an off-white tint to it. It looked the same as what Dr. Chen had injected me with before, but I felt more hesitant now. Before, I’d said yes, but I’d been struggling with the nanobots. Now, even knowing I’d dreamed, I wasn’t sure I wanted that stuff in me. “It’s just serum, right? The same stuff you gave me before?”

  “Exactly the same,” Chen said with a nod. “Completely safe. We use it here all the time. Our formula that gives our soldiers their strength, and speed isn’t perfect. It wears their bodies out.”

  I knew that, but I kept my mouth shut, not wanting to give away any hints that we might have the jump on these guys.

  “Whenever any of our soldiers gets too physically exhausted, we give them this serum. It repairs anything biological,” Chen explained. “It’s quite miraculous. Once, we even repaired a man’s knee, which you’d completely shattered with your superstrength.”

  My eyebrows flew up at that, but Chen didn’t bother to explain the altercation. He was too focused on the science. “There was nothing but tiny fragments left of his bone, but this serum fused the fragments back together and mended the knee entirely. There wasn’t even any scarring. You can’t tell it was ever broken.”

  “The same will happen for your brain, Miss Baker,” Donovan said. “The serum will reverse all of the damage done and restore your brain to its original state.”

  Dr. Chen grinned a toothy smile. “You’ll be good as new.”

  “Well,” Donovan corrected, “mostly. Obviously we can’t heal you completely tonight, or tomorrow you would turn against us.”

  I snorted. “Obviously.”

  “But we can give you enough of your memory to help you ease some of the frustration, confusion, and depression that has been plaguing you.”

  “Gee. That’s thoughtful of you.”

  Dr. Chen’s smile fell. “We do want to help you, Miss Baker. We are, above all, philanthropists. We do this because we want to end people’s suffering. And one day, if we can trust you,
we will heal you completely.”

  None of us had that long, but for now I’d take what I could get. “Okay. I guess that’s fair. Go for it, then. Juice me.”

  I held my breath and gritted my teeth as Dr. Chen injected me with four times the amount of serum he’d given me the first time. The cold liquid stung a little as it traveled up my arm and through my body. I shivered at the sensation.

  “So that’s it?” I asked, lying back on the bed. The serum was making my body feel heavy. “That’s all there is to it?”

  “That’s all there is to it.”

  “What’s in the serum?” I asked, covering a yawn with my fist. My eyes were getting heavy. “How does it work?”

  “One of our subjects is blessed with a miraculous gift of cell regeneration—self healing. We’ve found a way to use that gift for the good of others.”

  I sucked in a breath. Self-healing was Natalia’s power. She was an eight-year-old girl they’d acquired from the Netherlands last year. Her family had been in a devastating car accident. Only Natalia had survived. When paramedics arrived on the scene, they’d thought her wounds would be fatal, but she’d recovered overnight. I didn’t like the idea that they’d found a way to use her gifts like this. “How?” I asked, though I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. “What have you done to that little girl in order to make this serum?”

  Donovan didn’t answer me except with a condescending smile. “Nothing as awful as you’re thinking, Miss Baker. We are not monsters. Natalia is carefully monitored. She is fine.”

  Yeah, sure she was. His definition of fine and mine couldn’t be the same. “Donovan, if you’re harming that child, I’ll kill you. You have my word on that.”

  Donovan sighed. “I will take you to her so you can see for yourself that she’s fine.”

  “Yes.” That was an excellent idea. I needed to see Natalia. Needed to know for sure that she was fine. I started to stand, but my head spun and Dr. Chen gently pushed me back until I was lying on the bed. “You’ll see her soon. For now, just get some rest. You need it.”