The Cost of Being Special (Survival of the Fittest Book 1)

by Shawn Keys

  Jack pointed over Amanda’s shoulder, “That’s him?” There was photo on the wall that matched the agent records they had already studied.

  Again, Amanda didn’t call them on why they wouldn’t know what he looked like. “Yes.”

  “And the others in the photo?”

  Amanda missed a beat, probably wondering why they were asking, but she pointed around the few photos and described, “That’s my mother. That’s my sister and brother. Those are Kyle’s two cousins. My brother wasn’t immune to Persterim, as you probably know, so they haven’t had any more children since those two. That’s my former husband’s brother along with his wife and his daughter. We still talk to them. They… aren’t any more pleased than I am that he ran out. I really don’t know where he is.”

  Jill nodded, glancing at Jack to see if he wanted to know any more. They knew exactly where Kyle’s father was, and the fact that he was diagnosed with severe depression and alcoholism. Not a glowing mark in favor of Kyle’s genetic line.

  Jack gave a subtle shake of his head.

  Jill found her smile again. “I appreciate your cooperation, Ms. Hutchings. It was very helpful. If you happen to talk to him over the next few hours, tell him we’ll be looking to get in touch with him as soon as possible. He’s not in any danger, but it’s a part of our job to make sure he knows the boundaries.”

  Amanda nodded. “Will do, Agent Niles. Thanks.” She retreated back inside the house. Steve gave the agents a last wave, then closed the door.

  Retreating toward the SUV, Jack offered, “Not a single member of that family would meet baseline. We need to be ready for what we’re facing.”

  Jill nodded, not about to argue. “We can go in soft. Seems like a normal enough family, and I doubt this one will give us any trouble. We’ll talk him into taking the CRAGG dose, then line him up for a re-test in a few days. If it takes, then he can go on his merry way. He can have all the sex he wants, but he won’t taint the bloodlines any further.”

  Grunting, Jack finished, “Let’s hope things don’t have to get messy after that.”

  Chapter 5

  The carnival worker in his loud red shirt and black fedora hawked relentlessly at the small crowd wandering past his booth, “Anyone else? Step right up, we got a new game starting in a few seconds? Only these three? How about you, Sir? No? Alright. These three. Get ready. Three… two… one… Chicken Hunt!”

  Kyle bided his time as the guy did his sales pitch. It was annoying, but he didn’t mind. His focus was on the rotary targets inside the booth, picking out all the cardboard chickens he was going to be knocking off their perches. He had already been through four rounds. He’d racked up enough of the birds to earn a small prize, but that wasn’t his real purpose here. In his mind’s eye, each of those birds was a target the same shape of Fred and Trevor. He brought the pellet-gun rifle up on aim, tucked it into his shoulder and channeled his frustration into shooting.

  He knew the best way to shoot was with calm and proper breathing, but raw anger worked for the moment. Every time he pulled the trigger, it released a little more of his tension. Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! The little chickens zipped around, sliding behind barriers frequently and obscured by the sheep that didn’t count for any points at all. That was fine. He painted Chrissy’s face on those in his mind and got a little satisfaction from putting a rubber bullet into those as well.

  The other two shooters next to him were a ten-year-old kid and his grandmother. Neither were very good, though both were having a grand time zipping shots at the birds and watching the pellets rattle around the backdrop. The timer blared, calling a game to the end. They had managed to take out twelve of the twenty possible chicken targets, and ten of them belonged to Kyle.

  A semi-familiar soprano voice came over his shoulder. “Not half bad.”

  Kyle kept the rifle pointing into the range as he checked over his shoulder. He knew enough not to wave a gun around, even if it was only an air-rifle. The wave of bright red hair drew his eye to Laura Greene’s girl-next-door, heart-shaped face. Her cheerleader’s outfit was gone, replaced with black-denim jeans and a flirty blue blouse that offset the color of her hair brilliantly while hugging her gorgeous curves.

  At first, tension raced back through him. Then he remembered her defensive words, making some effort to talk down the other cheerleaders. Just because the others hadn’t listened wasn’t Laura’s fault. That doesn’t quite explain what she’d doing here, though. His lingering irritation killed any of his normal nerves he had around women. The confidence boosts he’d received from Lily and ‘Ms. Clarke’ didn’t hurt, either. Kyle said with a shrug, “I guess I have the right motivation. Ever heard of visualization therapy?”

  From his other side came the soft, apologetic voice of Danielle Nyqvist, “My father used to tape photos of his boss on a punching bag. Hopefully it wasn’t my face on those chickens?”

  Kyle placed the rifle on edge of the game shed, allowing him to turn around completely. Sitting on the edge, he was able to face both women together. Danielle had also ditched her uniform. She was in tight jeans as well, though hers were a more typical denim. Her top was a form-fitting cashmere sweater that was thick enough so she didn’t need a coat against the evening chill.

  He did his best to show her a forgiving smile. “You tried to help.”

  Danielle wasn’t finished beating herself up. “Four years too late.”

  Kyle couldn’t deny the path she’d picked. Rather than dwelling on it, Kyle shrugged and said, “Easy to look back and see where it all went wrong.” He remembered his younger self. “If I’d rolled better dice when the universe made me and looked like Fred does, and Chrissy had offered me more than the time of day, maybe I’d be the one apologizing to someone right now.”

  Laura sounded impressed, “That’s really sweet of you. I’m sorry you got caught in the middle of all that. Even though you were the cause.”

  Kyle knew this had to have something to do with his test results, but the rest was a mystery. “What happened back there? I mean, I know I set it off, but there was a lot more lingering angst flying around back there.”

  “You only saw the end. In the locker room, there was this huge fight. Chrissy has a lot of status as the girlfriend of the only fertile guy in the school. She likes to ‘queen bee’ him out to anyone who is ‘worthy’. The idea that one of us might hook up with someone else like him was a threat in her mind.” Danielle shook her head. “I’m so sorry. She figured taking you down a peg was the only way. When you walked across the gym, it gave her the opening. You didn’t see it, but she’s the one that hit you with that first ball and started the whole thing rolling.”

  Kyle nodded. He wasn’t about to say it all made sense. This was every bit as idiotic as the rest of it. But it helped somehow to know it wasn’t random. He had no idea why, but it did. “Then you stepped in.”

  Laura huffed. “We didn’t want to see Chrissy fall from grace or anything. Oh, she can be a bitch at times, but whatever. But…” She struggled a little. “I sort of made it worse. She was talking you down hard, and I might have mentioned that it could be fun to see what’s under your hood, if you get my meaning. No-one else knew! I mean, there weren’t even any rumors going around about you! No-one claimed to have slept with you, or even teased you out of your clothes for a peek. Figured if we messed around a little, it would be fun to be the first to spread a few of those rumors.” She fidgeted, doing her best to put on a cutely apologetic face, begging for a little forgiveness.

  Maybe that kind of manipulation should have pissed Kyle off even more, but it was damned hard to turn her down looking like that. Especially since Laura had stood up when it counted. She’d cost herself a lot of friends. “You stuck by Danielle in public. That counts for a lot.” He sighed, then laughed. “Guess I can’t be too mad because you wanted a ‘look under the hood’.” A small thrill went through him at the idea of giving the lean, sexy young red-head that chance. “Don’t suppose you walking
by here was purely random?”

  Danielle looked guilty again. “You won’t freak out too much if we stalked you here?”

  Kyle examined how he felt about the whole thing. Part of my life now, isn’t it? I’m always going to wonder how much is chance and how much is a woman following that damned blip on her screen. He said, “Not really. After what you did, I was going to find a way to talk to you anyway. If that meant dragging you into a dark corner at school tomorrow, then so be it. Might as well be now. I’m glad it didn’t wait too long.”

  Laura quipped lightly, “Though that dark corner idea sounds pretty interesting, don’t you think Danielle?” She grinned as she made her pale-skinned friend blush a little.

  Trying to divert them all from more wicked thoughts, Kyle said, “Not many girls in your posse throw automobile references around. And I swore I heard Chrissy talk about a trailer park. How’d you slip in among them, Laura? I know Danielle’s family came over the pond with a little extra cash.”

  Laura snorted in a most unladylike way. “Oh, Dad’s loaded. Oil and gas drills all across the south. He didn’t have a nose for it, so he just bought as many as he could find. Half failed, but those that struck… they struck big. Even among his competitors, they look at him as a brute. But he got it done. Chrissy tried to freeze me out a dozen times, but I had enough friends and enough talent on the squad that she could never quite make it stick.” She shrugged. “Like I said, this has been boiling under the surface for a long time. You were just the excuse for it to blow up.”

  Kyle grinned. “Did you really come from a trailer, then? Or was that just her attitude?”

  Laura smirked, and strode up to the game table. Smacking down a dollar, she gestured at the carnival worker.

  Her bold sexuality was not something the guy behind the bench was ready for. Rather than hawk another game-start to others in the crowd, he just hit the buzzer and let the chickens fly.

  Laura zoned in. She shifted the gun barrel back and forth with unerring precision, pausing only to snatch hold of the available extra pellets and to pump the air-cylinder back into compression like she had done so a thousand times before.

  Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap!

  Reload. Pumppumppump…

  Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap!

  Reload. Pumppumppump…

  Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap!

  Reload. Pumppumppump…

  Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap!

  Twenty shots. Most came fast. A few she waited a couple seconds between. Twenty chickens were cut down in their prime.

  Kyle whistled. “Holy crap.”

  Laura turned to face him, striking a pose with the rifle on her hip, like she was a bimbo right out of a gun magazine. “Product of a misspent youth. Yeah, my Dad took me hunting all the time. Started in a trailer. Ended up in a mansion. Who knew?”

  The carnival worker came over, his hands actually shaking. “Never seen shooting like that before, Miss. But you dropped ‘em all. Wouldn’t ‘a believed it if I hadna seen it! You get your pick of the prizes.”

  Laura smiled her most girlish smile back him, as if she was once again the clueless cheerleader persona. She seemed to know it would irritate the judgmental guy even more to hear an ‘airhead’ who could shoot like that. “Oh, really? What fun! I mean, I don’t know. Super lucky, I guess! Umm, well, I guess I’ll just need to grab that big ole fuzzy panda there!” She pointed up at the stuffed, black-and-white bear that was half Laura’s own size.

  Grouchy that he had to give away anything that big, but also impressed in spite of it all, the worker handed over the animal and walked away.

  Danielle laughed. “Show off.”

  Laura stuck her tongue out at her friend. “You could get your own.”

  Danielle flashed a smile. “That might make that poor guy cry.”

  Holding up a hand, Kyle demanded, “Wait a minute, you can shoot that well, too? From where?”

  With a self-deprecating shrug, Danielle said, “I’m nowhere near that good. My father taught me what I should do to shot straight, but I never had the knack. But I love watching Laura shoot. She made sense of all the stories my Dad told me. I coached her, and she kept getting better and better.”

  Laura scoffed, “Don’t let her talk herself down too much. But she’s right. She was my escape valve. I loved doing things like this, but if you are a cheerleader around here, putting inch-wide groupings into a target at 300 yards isn’t a ladylike pursuit they encourage. Danielle let slip her interest. She taught me, and I introduced her to my friends. I’m sorry. I know that was probably when she changed in your eyes. Became one of us.”

  Kyle nodded. “Probably.” He shook his head. “I never knew that side of you, Danielle. I’m sorry for that.”

  Danielle chewed nervously at her lip as she gave away a small bit of personal information, not something she ever did easily. “I had to hide that other side of myself. They were so demanding. Chrissy and all the others. They were like sharks. I always swore I would never care, but… suddenly, I did.” She sighed. “My father was Särskilda Skyddsgruppen: Swedish special forces. We moved here after he retired. Safer that way. It’s not like here. When you leave that group, there are a lot of foreign enemies that might have taken it out on him. He moved us here to be away from all that. Took his retirement savings and started a security company. It took off, and we got richer than we knew what to do with.” She shrugged. “Suddenly I was rich enough to be part of the ‘in’ girls. I had never had that before.”

  Rather than put off by it, Kyle smiled. “That’s pretty bad-ass. You father had to give up a lot for his family. I respect that.” A shadow passed over his face. “Mine couldn’t even stick around when everything was going well. He’d fold like a card-table if anyone stuck a gun in his face.”

  Danielle asked softly, “When did he leave?”

  “Oh, a long time ago now. Barely even hurts to think about it. Tore a hole out of Mom, though. That’s what I can’t forgive.” Kyle could hardly believe he was confessing that sort of thing to them. Maybe it was their own openness, or knowing they had been defending him long before the fight in the gym.

  Making an effort to drag them away from heavier topics, Laura nudged him on the shoulder. “So, is it super intimidating to be around two bad-ass women like us?” She narrowed her eyes, and said, “Though from the way you handled Fred, you have to have a little bit of hidden bad-ass under there somewhere, don’t you?”

  Long habit of not talking about his fighting training didn’t evaporate overnight. Kyle tried to be humble. “I know a few things. As for knowing you two can do something like that?” He thrust a thumb at the chicken range. He grinned. “Actually, I’d say it’s kind of hot.”

  Laura’s smile took on an added layer of heat. “And you haven’t even seen how bendy we both are.”

  Danielle smacked her on the shoulder. “Laura!”

  Hugging her newly-won panda close, Laura hooked her arm through Kyle’s. “Come on. I want to show you something.”

  Enjoying her energy too much to resist, Kyle went along for the ride. Danielle drifted behind, though she looked suspicious as to what trouble her partner was about to get up to next.

  Laura stepped off the beaten track, glancing both ways to make sure no-one was watching, then shouldered open a creaky old door leading into a run-down barn. The inside was filled with every manner of rusted-out equipment, old farm gear and tools. All of it was liberally coated with hay as a reminder of the farm this used to be. So much was stuffed in here that Kyle figured the carnival owners had at first thought to use this as a repair shed, then quickly let it devolve into a storage area, then finally into the stowage for all the things too valuable to junk yet far too broken to be fixed quickly.

  Striking out into the mess, Laura didn’t pause. Danielle closed the door behind them, throwing the latch so they would have at least a little warning if someone came around.

  Laura winded her way between the stacks of equipme
nt until she found an exposed wooden wall that looked stable enough to lean against. Wrapping the arms of the panda around her shoulders, she turned her back to the wall, squishing the stuffed animal between her and the wood.

  Kyle raised an eyebrow. “What did you want to show me in here?”

  Snickering at his naivety, Laura snuggled back into the plush bear, then tugged Kyle up against her. “This, silly.” Her mouth captured his in a fierce kiss. The taste of strawberries filled his senses, and Kyle embraced the moment. Not wanting to show off how new he was at this, he took it slow, giving Laura the lead. That seemed to work. She swept her tongue out and brushed against his own, demanding a little more attention. Soon, their lips were crushed together while their tongues wrestled between.

  Danielle wandered a little nearer, whispering, “Laura, anyone could come in!” Despite her protests, one of her hands was rubbing in a swirling pattern outside of her cashmere sweater, teasing her skin beneath, even going so far as to gently cup one of her own breasts.

  Laura broke the kiss and fired her a hot glare. “Don’t go killing the mood, Danni. Or I’m not going down on you this time.” She grinned, grabbed hold of Danielle’s sweater, and dragged her in for a hard kiss. Whatever her fears, Danielle didn’t resist. She pressed into the side of them, making them into a trio squishing the huge panda-pillow against the wall. The two women locked into a sensual embrace that lingered.

  Kyle was absolutely certain this was not the first time these two had kissed. It was too tender; too easy between them. He knew he was staring, but right then he didn’t care.

  Laura mumbled around their kiss. “I’m just saying, Kyle… there are other places you can go with your mouth if we’re occupied. This might take a while, so why don’t you explore?” She giggled as Danielle gasped at her brazenness, then they both renewed their passionate kiss.