Evolution- Awakening

by Hope Anika

  The darkness shrieked, unwilling to set her free. “No.”

  “No?”

  “We are not done.” He leaned down and met her gaze. “I will try.”

  “Will you?” That pulse in her throat beat harder. “A show of good faith would go a long way.”

  His hands tightened on the chair. “What do you want?”

  “The truth.”

  He stared down at her. “What truth?”

  “Any truth.”

  Truth. Like opening a vein and inviting her in. “Charlie released me from a cell.”

  She stilled. “A jail cell?”

  The heat of her, trapped in his hold, was its own intense seduction. “Prison.”

  She watched him, her eyes flickering, seeing too much. So close. He’d never been this close to her. His heart beat like a hollow drum, and he wondered how she would feel pressed against him. Would it be too much...or not enough?

  The temptation to answer that tantalizing question was disarmingly strong. The desire to touch her was growing exponentially in both persistence and intensity.

  “Explain,” she said.

  Her cheeks were ripe with color, and her mouth was soft and wide and perfectly made; a small beauty mark kissed the bow of her lips.

  He wanted to touch that mark. Enough to risk the repercussions.

  Her rejection; his coldness. The sickening possibility that the exquisite hope she made him feel was just foolish stupidity.

  “Ruslan,” she said in a hushed voice.

  Her breasts were round and lush beneath the old t-shirt she wore, and his fingers twitched around the chair when his gaze fell to them. He wanted to see her.

  Perhaps even touch her.

  Would she be sensitive? Some women were very sensitive. Ruslan might not have had any personal experience, but he was an excellent researcher.

  Would she like it if he stroked her with his hands? If he used his mouth?

  A fine tremor moved through her, as if she’d heard his thoughts. “What are you doing, Ruslan?”

  Truth.

  He leaned down, until only a few inches separated them. “Charlie asked me to come.”

  She froze, staring up at him. “What?”

  “We did not speak.” His eyes stroked over her; he was unable to help himself. He felt caught in a spell, that gossamer web weaving them together. She watched him closely, her cheeks blooming, her breath unsteady between them. “He left a message on my phone a week before he died.”

  “Son of a bitch,” she growled and tried to jerk the chair back.

  Ruslan only pulled her closer. “I was too late,” he told her. Her eyes glittered up at him; her fury was arousing and intoxicating, and he wondered if touching her would burn him. His body grew harder and tighter at the thought. “Charlie had been dead for three days by the time I arrived.”

  She reared back. Her eyes cut into his. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I am telling you.”

  “I’m going to punch you in the face,” she growled.

  He dipped his head and inhaled her. The darkness rolled around inside him, bathing itself in her scent. “Good faith, Ashling.”

  “What else?” she demanded. “There has to be more.”

  He turned his head and pressed his mouth to her ear. “Good faith.”

  She trembled against him. “That’s not fair.”

  “You must trust.” The shell of her ear was delicate against his mouth, their only point of contact. Touching her. “As I must trust.”

  She said nothing, unmoving against him. Then, “For now.”

  No. For always.

  “I will not betray you,” he said quietly to her.

  “Don’t—”

  “I will fight for Eva Pierce and Adam. And for you.”

  “Ruslan—”

  “Together, you said.”

  “Goddamn it,” she whispered. “You’re a manipulative bastard.”

  “When necessary,” he said, unrepentant.

  She jerked her head back and stared up at him, so close her breath touched his chin, and the fine hair across Ruslan’s frame bristled wildly in warning.

  “One more strike,” she told him. “And you’re out. No matter what.”

  He looked at her mouth, lingering on the beauty mark that kissed it. The cut that halved her bottom lip was healing, the skin tender and new.

  “Ruslan,” she said.

  His gaze flickered to hers.

  “You can’t look at me like that,” she whispered.

  “Like what?”

  A tremor moved through her. “Stop.”

  The wildness within him growled. His hands tightened on the armrests and they bent beneath his strength. He felt something inside him snap, a fine, clean break, and it was all he could do not to surrender to the dark impulses flooding through him.

  To touch her again.

  Boldly.

  But she was poised like a bird for flight beneath him.

  “Few things in my life have tempted me,” he admitted. “You are one of them.”

  She stared up at him, and a vision of her filled his head: stripped bare, splayed out atop the desk. Or perhaps pinned to the wall by his weight. His hands on her bare skin; his mouth—

  The bell that hung on the Firm’s front door suddenly jingled.

  Ash jumped, but Ruslan didn’t step away. His heart beat hard in his chest; need and lust gripped him. The darkness seethed, pressing against his skin in demand.

  “Next time,” he grated, uncertain if it was a warning or a promise.

  Then he made himself step away. He moved to stand on the other side of the doorway, half behind the open door.

  Hidden but not, because he recognized the footfalls crossing the lobby and heading down the hall toward them.

  Ash glowered at him from her chair, her cheeks flushed, her gaze heated.

  Need and lust.

  He smiled at her.

  “You did not just smile at me,” she muttered and pressed her hands to her cheeks.

  His smile only grew.

  “Damn you,” she said and closed her eyes.

  Steps just outside the door—

  Ruslan slid out of sight.

  “Hey, sweet pea,” Shirley said.

  *****

  For a moment, Ash could only blink stupidly.

  Her blood was a low, steady roar in her skull; the furious thump of her heart was breathtaking. Her body was throbbing. And damp.

  Screwed, she thought.

  But then the woman standing in the doorway of her office came vividly into focus, and the heat simmering in her veins turned to ice.

  Shirley’s dark hair gleamed like sable in the light. She wore a flowered skirt and a thin red nylon parka. Sturdy boots. In her hand, a slender black 9mm gleamed dully in the light.

  Sadness and fury and pain stabbed through Ash.

  “I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this,” Shirley said.

  Any hope Ash might have felt died. “Why?”

  “Where’s Ruslan?” Shirley looked down the hall. “I saw him come in.”

  “He went for coffee.” Ash forced herself to sit down at her desk. “I was looking for Charlie’s keys.”

  “You won’t find them.” Shirley walked into the office. “I took them when I left.”

  Ash folded her hands on her desk. So she wouldn’t do something stupid.

  Like stab her.

  “He trusted you,” she said, painfully baffled. She felt stupid because she simply didn’t understand. Not what was happening—really happening—or Charlie’s connection to it. Not Ruslan’s involvement, or the unseen hand that seemed to be steering the boat. Not any of it.

  Shirley was supposed to be my friend.

  “Charlie was a dangerous man.” Shirley sat down in one of the chairs that faced Ash’s desk. She held the 9mm in a familiar, unwavering grip. “There’s a lot you don’t know about him.”

  Ash stared at her. “Or about you either, apparently
.”

  “I’m sorry.” Color touched Shirley’s cheeks. “But this is personal, sweet pea.”

  “Fuck you,” Ash said.

  Shirley shook her head. “This was never about you. You’re just...collateral damage.”

  “Friendly-fire?”

  “Something like that. It was never my intention to hurt you. I care about you. You are like my kid.”

  “Yeah, I can tell.”

  “This is bigger than us. I’m sorry, but it just is.”

  “Then explain it to me.” Ash glanced up to see Ruslan suddenly standing motionless behind Shirley. His pale eyes glinted, and something fierce and heated and dangerous flashed through her.

  “The less you know,” Shirley said, “the better.”

  “Which means what?” Ash yelled, suddenly furious. “What the fuck, Shirley? Why?”

  Shirley’s hand tightened around the 9mm. “They put me here to watch him, because they knew. Even though he was careful, they knew. It was just a matter of time.”

  Ash tried to separate the words. “Who knew what? What the hell are you talking about?”

  “That he would save them.” Bitterness coated Shirley’s voice. “He couldn’t help himself.”

  “Save who?”

  A sneer touched her mouth. “He never asked me why. What happened to me.”

  Ash sat back in her chair and forced herself to be calm. She was very aware of the 9mm. And Ruslan. “What did happen to you, Shirley?”

  “No one can tell me they’re not all the same, because I know better. I was there.”

  “Where?”

  “He killed her. I saw him.”

  “What did you see?”

  “Blood,” she said flatly. “Someone who kills like a machine. Without fear. Without hate. Just...dead.”

  A chill whispered across Ash’s nape. She was related to someone like that.

  “Who?”

  “She was mine.” Shirley’s eyes blazed in her pale face like dark coals. “They might look different, but inside they’re all the same. Defective. We have to snuff them out.”

  Charlie was a dangerous man.

  Ash froze. It was all she could do not to leap across her desk and wring Shirley’s neck. “Did you kill him?”

  “It wasn’t me. I didn’t do it.”

  “But someone did.” Ash’s heart sank. Tripped. Then leapt to furious life. “Charlie was murdered.”

  She stood. Shirley tried to jump to her feet, but Ruslan was there, and she let out a startled squeal when she saw him. He took the 9mm from her and stared until she subsided back into the chair.

  “Who?” Ash growled.

  “Like I said, this is bigger than you, sweet pea. This is bigger than all of us.” Shirley tore her gaze from Ruslan and looked at her. “They can’t be, Ash.”

  “Tell me who killed Charlie.”

  “I can’t. I don’t know.”

  “You know.” Fury pulsed through her. “You told them about the Vault.”

  “Yes. I knew that’s where you would put her.”

  Do not stab her. Do. Not. “Those sons-of-bitches blew it up, Shirley. And now they’re out there hunting Wylie and Wanda!”

  “That’s what happens when you protect the Unnamed.”

  Ash’s hands curled into fists. If she’d had any questions about who had put Shirley into play, they had just been answered.

  “That Unnamed is twelve years old!” Ash grated. “She’s a child.”

  “She’s a monster.”

  Ash stared at the woman she’d known for the past three years, one with whom she’d thought she’d found common ground and friendship, and felt the earth shift sideways beneath her. Charlie was CIA. Ruslan had been locked in a cell.

  And Shirley was a traitor.

  “Fuck you,” she snarled again. “He was your friend.”

  It didn’t want to compute, that it was Shirley sitting before her. Shirley who had betrayed them.

  Who had killed Charlie.

  “No,” Shirley said seriously. “Charlie was my enemy. He was always my enemy. He just didn’t know it.”

  A growl welled in Ash’s chest. She was crawling across her desk before she even realized it.

  So dead—

  Ruslan was suddenly there, between them. Ash halted on her hands and knees atop the desk and glared at him.

  “Not yet,” he said. He leaned toward her, so close their noses almost touched. His pale eyes glittered brilliantly. “Questions first.”

  Awareness licked across her skin. “You’d better hurry.”

  He smiled again, a sharp, wicked curve that altered his appearance entirely. “Hungry?”

  “Yes,” she said, stunned for a moment by the change in him. With that smile, he was...devastating.

  Goddamn it.

  She looked past him, at Shirley. “Starving.”

  “It’s too late,” Shirley said and Ash tried to shove past Ruslan, because she recognized that look—

  Shirley slammed her right fist into her cheek; her body seized, arched and shook wildly. White foam burst from her mouth, slid down her jaw and dripped to the floor. Her lungs gurgled. Her eyes bulged, then closed. A moment later, a death rattle ended their discussion.

  “Shit,” Ash said.

  “We should have expected this,” Ruslan said. “They are all sacrificial lambs.”

  Terror and fury almost choked her. “She was just a distraction. They know about Red Lake. We have to—”

  “I will drive,” Ruslan said.

  CHAPTER

  -18-

  “Eat,” Wanda ordered.

  Wylie stabbed a piece of chicken with his fork. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Thank you,” Eva said and shoved a potato wedge into her mouth. “It’s very good.”

  Wanda spooned a large helping of baked beans onto her plate, painfully aware of her empty stomach. She was starving. Like eat a horse starving. She didn’t think she’d ever been so hungry.

  Was it because of what Eva had done? Had her body burned so many calories mending itself that this gnawing, insatiable hunger was its attempt to refuel?

  They’d stopped at a small grocery store on the south shore of the lake and picked up fried chicken, beans, slaw, rolls and a dozen chocolate chip cookies before heading up to Charlie’s cabin, and in the hour since—while Wylie and Eva walked the perimeter and Wanda put away what they’d brought with them—it had been everything she could do not to consume every single thing they’d bought.

  Bad enough she’d eaten all but two of the cookies. Half of the rolls. The chicken wings. A helping of beans. Four sticks of string cheese; half of a summer sausage. An apple.

  She’d even eaten a raisin-filled muffin, and she despised raisins.

  “You okay?” Wylie asked, watching her with his sharp blue gaze.

  Vigilant. He’d been very vigilant since she’d awoken in the SUV, and what Eva had done only seemed to intensify him. Gone was the negligent smile, the shrug, the air of disinterest. In their place was a seriousness that took Wanda aback. Because his brevity wasn’t false or inflated; it was a complete and utter transformation. He had changed from wanderer into warrior, and the difference disturbed her deeply. Because this man, this Wylie, this was someone...tempting.

  You’ll start to trust me again because you can’t help yourself, because I’m always there beside you, watching your back and taking such good care of you, you can’t remember when I wasn’t there, and you can’t imagine me being gone.

  She wanted desperately to believe. Which was the dumbest, most moronic thing ever.

  “I’m fine,” she muttered.

  Outside, the storm they had been driving toward all day, brewed around them. The wind had picked up, sudden, wicked gusts that rattled the cabin, and rain poured down steadily on the metal roof, the sound both soothing and unnerving.

  Trapped. It wasn’t helping.

  She speared one of the chicken breasts. “I’m just hungry.”

  Her stom
ach growled loudly, and Eva giggled.

  “Eva’s going to tell us what’s going on,” Wylie said in a conversational tone. “Isn’t that right, Eva?”

  The smile faded from Eva’s face. “Yeah.”

  “Good.” Wanda took a bite of her chicken. “Eat first.”

  Because she wasn’t waiting.

  All of them were hungry; even Eva chowed down. Wylie consumed three pieces of chicken, half the potato wedges, and finished off the slaw and the beans. Wanda watched him shovel it into his mouth and had to resist the urge to steal the last roll from his plate.

  Sweet, fluffy, yummy roll.

  She looked at the last piece of chicken: a thigh. A dark, meaty, juicy thigh—

  Wylie laughed softly, a low, husky sound that made her stiffen.

  “Just eat it,” he said, watching her, his dark midnight blue eyes glinting. “I know you want to.”

  Color fired in her cheeks. “I’m full, thank you.”

  Her stomach growled again, as if in argument, and Wylie’s laughter grew.

  “By tomorrow, it’ll go away,” Eva said, licking her fingers.

  Relief fluttered through Wanda. “Good. I feel like a bottomless pit.”

  “Me, too,” Eva said. She soaked another potato wedge in barbecue sauce and shoved it into her mouth. “Mmmmm.”

  Wanda smiled, watching her. For the first time, Eva looked like the child she was, barbecue sauce smeared on her cheek, her hair a tangled mess, dirt on her shirt.

  Wylie took a bite of his roll, and Wanda looked back at the chicken thigh.

  “Do it,” he whispered, his tone heavy with innuendo, and she glared at him.

  He laughed again.

  The jerk.

  “You should eat it,” Eva said earnestly. “Your body needs protein.”

  “Fine.” Wanda swiped the thigh and bit into it. “If I must, I must.”

  Wylie finished his meal and sat back in his seat to watch them finish theirs. Wanda felt his scrutiny acutely.

  “I don’t know what to say,” Eva said finally and pushed her plate away. Her eyes held a hint of fear when they met Wanda’s.

  Wylie moved to speak, but Wanda touched his arm lightly and said, “Start with Joe.”

  Wylie stilled beneath her touch; his forearm was hard and warm under her hand, and she could feel the subtle flex of muscle ripple beneath his skin.