“Ride me, woman. I promise you I won’t break,” he gasped as Meara rose and fell on him, hard. The next surge of her hips brought his grateful body up to meet her plunging one. They both moaned at the pleasure of each rocking stroke.
He sought and found Meara’s lips and soon had the woman begging for more. He rolled her back over and made them both happy by giving her exactly what she wanted. Her screaming climax sent him into the kind that blows a man’s mind apart.
When their heartbeats finally slowed, Will rolled them back to their sides. He pushed her damp hair out of his way and put a hand on her cheek to stroke it. She had her eyes closed and was looking serene.
“Meara?”
Meara giggled over Will’s Captain Serious tone but thought better of pointing it out. She pried her eyes open to look at him. “Yes, Will?”
“Can I stay tonight? You never really answered.”
His repeated question made her giggle. Will was a tyrant in bed, but evidently an ever-so-polite one. “Yer leaving would be illogical, Captain Talon. If ya left, I’d just be over at yer place in a few hours and breaking in to get some more of ya. I’m sure Nero would call that a waste of our neural skills. We might as well stay within arm’s reach, since this is already so convenient. Ya haven’t been out of me long enough to leave anyway.”
Silence reigned after she finished. Meara could feel his confusion tensing his body.
“What is it, Will?”
“Was any of that speech a yes?” Will asked, putting his face in her clean-smelling hair.
“Yes. That was a yes. Ya can stay, for pity’s sake,” Meara said, openly laughing at him. The man was exhausted and nearly asleep, but she was more content being with him than she’d been with any other. They probably were going to drive each other crazy, but it was going to be fun to have someone in her life worth the trouble.
“I’m going to rest for a few minutes,” he whispered and promptly dropped into a relaxed darkness.
Hours later, Meara still stared at the wall. She had one weak leg draped over Will’s while he slept deeply. He’d napped and woken up several times. She should be nearly comatose by now as well, but her thoughts were too jumbled.
Did she believe Will’s words? Perhaps not as much as she did the four straight hours of sex they’d had tonight. The man was far too enthusiastic to be faking it with her. Most men could go a couple times, but only the committed ever asked to stay because they couldn’t get enough. Watching Lucy and Eric had taught her that.
But did Will love her as he said? Well, only time would tell, right?
Why did it matter, anyway?
The man made her feel desired, and his talent in pleasuring her made her happy. Sure, much of his lovemaking techniques were unpolished. It was obvious the man was out of practice, but what would a confident version of Will be like in bed? Now that was something intriguing worth keeping him around for.
Maybe in time he’d see his kids again and come to some genuine acceptance of his past. Perhaps he and Sanchez would meet on some common ground of both wanting the best for Cassandra and the kids.
Didn’t she want to be there watching all that happen?
Meara ran a hand through Will’s hair and smiled at his face, now relaxed in sleep. If this level of contentment was what real love felt like, she could definitely see herself getting used to it.
17
Meara’s front door opening woke both of them. She put a hand over Will’s mouth to keep him from swearing in alarm.
“Human,” she whispered.
“Meara?”
Her hand dropped away. “Fecking Nero,” Meara said, climbing from the bed.
“Meara?”
She turned to glare at the second male calling her name. Will pulled the blanket off the bed and threw it at her.
Snickering over his attempt to hide her nudity from their uninvited guest, Meara let it slide to the floor. “Don’t ya think seeing me like this would make his morning?”
“You know you slept with a trained killer last night, right?”
Meara laughed as she turned to the bedroom doorway. “Make yerself at home, Nero. I need to find some fecking clothes.”
“Alright,” they heard Nero call back.
Meara went her closet and pulled out some exercise clothes. She pulled them on and turned to Will. “Happy now?”
“Not really. Happy would require you still being here in bed with me.”
Grinning at Will’s comment, Meara went to see the man who’d waltzed into her place like he lived there. “Does every bloody person have a key card to get…” She stopped and stared. “Ya look like warmed-over shit and that wasn’t a brown-skinned joke at yer expense.”
“I’m too tired to be offended… and I’m here because I can’t rest,” Nero said. “Aren’t you going after her?”
“Of course I am,” Meara said sternly. She went to Nero, took his arm, and pushed him into a chair before he fell. “I’ll make ya a coffee with a stimulant in it. That will help ya think better.”
“No. Don’t bother. I just wanted… I want to go with you. I want to help. I can’t…” Nero ran a hand through his hair. “She drives me crazy and I’m worried sick. Do you think Creator Omega got her?”
Meara waited for a heartbeat and then nodded. “Unfortunately, I do. And I don’t know how to find her either. Luckily, not knowing has never stopped me before.” She walked to the sofa Aja had bought for them and sat where she could look into Nero’s worried gaze. “Ya can’t let this eat ya up. It will do no good to grieve her when she’s still alive. I can say that because I would know if she was dead. Now go get some rest and we’ll discuss going after her when yar recovered.”
Nero shook his head. “I can’t. The college kids are waking up. One named Phoebe is demanding to see you. She’s the other reason I’m here.”
Meara nodded. Looked like her tracking trip was going be slightly delayed. “Okay. I need to see the girl before I leave. I’ll get properly dressed and do that first thing.”
“I want to go with you. I can’t… I know I should care about the kids, but she’s all I can think about. The idea of him hurting her…” Nero shivered and closed his eyes.
“Nero… I know how bad this is, but they need ya here. The horrors that man was doing to decent people—they’re beyond my ability to explain. Our hope is that it takes time for what he does and a place to do it. Will and I took both those from him. I’ll not stop searching until Aja’s back with us. Ya have my word.”
Nero scrubbed his face with both hands and groaned. “I can’t just do nothing.”
“Of course not. But those people yar going to be helping fix? They’ve seen the bastard recently. They may tell us something we don’t know about him. Ya need to help them and learn what ya can.”
“Are you going after her alone? What if he gets you too?”
Meara opened her mouth to give him reassurances, but a voice behind her answered before she could.
“Meara’s not going alone. I’m going to have her back,” Will said, coming into the room. He walked straight to Meara’s side and sat down to face Nero. He wanted them to look like the team they were. “Meara’s right. Those kids. Rio Sanchez. Those German engineers. They all have information about the sick bastard. And they’re going to talk most to the person fixing them or helping better their situation. You and Kyra will be the ones getting what we need to find the SOB.”
Meara watched as Nero’s startled gaze moved between the two of them. Her mouth twitched. “Yes, feck yes, we’re doing the deed now. No, it doesn’t change what has to be done.” She yelped and rocked sideways when Will shoved her arm.
“Be nice to Nero. He’s stressed enough,” he ordered. Will turned a bland smile to the man’s tired, shocked gaze. “I’m in love with Meara. God help me. She’s still adjusting to the shock, which is why she’s being crude. I guess we’re both adjusting. We’re leaving to look for Aja as soon as we can.”
Nero fished his
airjet keys from his pocket. “Use my transport. It’s efficient and faster than anything you can rent or buy. I had it custom made. Drop me off at the bunker and give me a way to stay in touch with you so I can deliver what you need to know.”
While Meara merely stared at the offer, Will reached out and took the keys from Nero’s hand. “Thanks. Meara hasn’t learned to fly yet. I’ll be the pilot.”
Nero nodded. He looked at Meara. “May I still accept your offer of a stimulant?”
“Sure,” Meara said, rising from her sofa. “Just like that, yar handing over yer ride to us?”
Nero swallowed. “If it is all I can do for her… yes.”
“Ah, Nero. For yer sake, I wish Aja wasn’t such an emotional coward. Life has given us more pain than pleasure and it makes a woman afraid to love. She is falling for ya too, ya know,” Meara said softly. “Shiva’s handmaiden wasn’t too happy about it, but she was coming around.”
Nero nodded. “I know. I was doing the same… in my own inept way.”
“Being competent is all about attitude, Nero. Will Talon there is a walking success story about overcoming yer fears. Talk to him while I fix yer drink. Keep it to man stuff, but I better not hear any bragging. There’s nothing worse than a man telling his buddy the next day how often a woman went down on him the night before,” Meara said, then marched into her kitchen.
“I’ve lost my mind.” Will’s headshake over Meara’s crude warning prompted a sympathetic man grunt from Nero.
It was all that really needed to be said between two men who both loved difficult women.
Dressed in her freshly sanitized stealth gear, Meara walked down to the bunker floor where nine sets of youthful and innocent eyes met hers. She was barely double their chronological age, but she felt a much wider gap.
“Is she the one?” she heard a guy ask. Meara saw Phoebe look at her and nod.
“Yes. Her name is Meara. She’s the one who saved us. I woke up and talked to her. She and her partner killed the men who were taking us for more experiments.”
They all stood and waited patiently for Meara to sign in with their human guard. Peyton was always careful to put a human security officer with new cyborgs. Meara was sure he’d hand-selected the one to put with these kids. Appreciating Peyton’s reasoning and vowing not to harass him as much in the future, Meara lifted her chin as she walked toward them.
“Hi, Phoebe. Yar looking much better.”
“Meara, right?” Phoebe asked.
“Yes. Meara MacDonald—at yer service.”
“Where’s your partner? You know… the brooding guy in black who was mad at you.”
“Nothing wrong with yer memory,” Meara said with a laugh. “The brooding guy’s name is Will and he’s parking our ride. We’re leaving shortly to go look for my friend… and yers. We never found either of them in that place.”
Phoebe tucked her hair behind one ear and then crossed her arms. “They said…” she paused and looked at the others. “A woman in a white coat—I think she was a scientist—told us we’d been converted into cyborgs. Is that really true?”
Meara nodded to a nearby table with her head and the whole crowd followed her as she slipped into one of the seats. “Technically, I suppose yer a cyborg of sorts, but none of yer organic parts have been replaced. Ya’ve just become enhanced humans. Ya weren’t turned into someone like me.”
“What does that mean?” Phoebe asked.
“I don’t know exactly, but ‘enhanced’ is the term they use for what he did to ya. Let me show ya the difference in us so ya understand better what I’m saying.”
They crowded around as Meara held out an arm and shoved up her sleeve. Goddess only knew what the fecking guard was thinking, but their earnest expressions were more important at that moment. She popped open a storage compartment in her arm with an assortment of ports inside.
“This is what a real cyborg is like. My whole arm is cybernetic and I’m wired like a portable com. I was created to be a storage for information we collected on missions. And no, it doesn’t hurt. It might have ached when it was first done to me, but now it just feels normal. It’s no different than someone getting a prosthetic limb of any sort. I have a panel in my head like all of ya do, but mine’s a lot bigger and far more complicated.”
Meara tilted her head and touched a button to open her panel. The hair grafted to it lifted. A couple of the kids even laughed. God bless the ignorance of youth, she thought.
“What are we going to be like?” a girl asked.
Meara smiled at her as she pushed her panel closed. “I’m not a cyber scientist so I can’t say. Ya should ask Dr. Kyra Winters or Dr. Nero Bastion. Those two can explain everything to ya. I’m just glad to see ya all awake and talking. We had to fight our way out of that fecking place ya were in. Our friends showed up to help just in time. Ya’ll see one walking around here sooner or later. His name is Peyton Elliot. He’s a cyborg as well. He’s also very nice and will help ya all he can.”
Phoebe nodded gravely. “It was the crazy guy who called himself our creator who did this shit to us, right?”
Meara nodded as she rolled her sleeve back down and secured her wrist com back on her arm. “Yes. I think he got away before the place blew up and burned all evidence of his work. I also think he has both our friends. Will and I are going to go get them back.”
“I want to help you,” Phoebe said firmly. “Can you get me out of here? What can I do?”
Meara saw Nero come through the door. She lifted a finger and pointed. “That’s Dr. Bastion. If ya really want to help, tell Nero everything ya can remember about the one who did this to ya. He’ll get that information to us. Something ya remember could help us locate him.”
Phoebe crossed her arms. “If I was like you, could I go with you?”
“No… and ya don’t want this life, Phoebe,” Meara said firmly. “What was done to me, I volunteered for as a soldier who’d signed up to fight a war—a war most yer parents have forgotten was so awful for this planet. Now people look at cyber soldiers like we’re carrying a plague and all because of lies and half-truths told by our government. The cyber scientists looking after ya here have one goal and one goal only. They will do what they can to restore ya so yer life can go on as it was meant to do. Helping them is the best use of yer time.”
“Well, I think I was meant to help you,” Phoebe said firmly. “Everything happens for a reason.”
“Maybe ya were meant to overcome what was done to ya,” Meara argued back. “How about ya redefine the rest of humanity? Maybe get yerselves elected and make some changes that will make a real difference to this planet.”
“There were twenty interns who went to the facility,” Phoebe said. “Now there are nine of us left. I don’t even know if Angela survived what happened to us. She could be dead too.”
“That place was a pit of horrors. We found plenty of dead,” Meara said flatly. “Yer friend Angela wasn’t among them. I scanned the ID chips of all we found. She’s not on the list.”
Phoebe closed her eyes. “Then, where is she? This is my fault—all my fault.”
“No, girl. Yer not important enough to take that on yerself,” Meara said coldly. “I don’t mean to be cruel to yer feelings and yer caring, but the fact is, ya were nothing more than a handy human for a madman’s experiment. It could just as easily have been her talking to me right now and yer arse that we’re going after. Whatever happened to her wasn’t yer fate. Thank whatever gods ya believe in and do what ya can to make this world a better place.”
Will’s voice came from behind her. “When you’re done lecturing, I’m ready to leave. Transport is packed with essentials.”
Meara lifted her head and narrowed her gaze on Will. He was in military mode, but she refused to respond to it. She could tell he was avoiding direct contact with the converted kids. She couldn’t allow that or let his ignoring them go unpunished, whichever way a person wanted to look at the situation.
“Did
ya hear what she said, Will? Phoebe here has decided to become even more of a cyborg. What do you think about that?”
Will slid one of the metal chairs from the table and started bending it into various shapes while the kids backed up and stared at him. “Well, being super strong is nice. Except for the drugs you take for the rest of your life to keep your body from rejecting your cybernetics. Also, there’s all the ongoing calibration that must be done. Getting redefined isn’t half as painful as a visit to Seetha’s chair to make sure your artificial limbs continue to work properly. I think that woman enjoys inflicting pain on us.”
“Agreed,” Meara said, rising to her feet. She looked at the girl who was angry enough and hurt enough to give up her humanity. Well, that wasn’t happening if she could stop it. “Phoebe—the moment we find her, we’ll be in touch with ya.”
“Okay,” Phoebe said in a small voice.
Meara knew she’d been a bit hard on the girl, but it was for the best.
They’d already lost valuable daylight coming to see Phoebe. They were taking two minutes to say goodbye to Lucy and then they were leaving.
18
“Are these ours to keep? Really?” Tad asked, more excited than he’d been about anything else to date. His New World Companion was beautiful. Jake couldn’t quit staring at his. They were both just as amazing as promised.
Tad glanced over at table holding the brown-skinned beauty with the perfect breasts and willed away his disappointment about not being able to sample her. Jake had been right to stop him. The boss wasn’t letting them touch the woman at all, but still… she was sure something special, that one was. He could always tell.
“These New World Companions are all yours and made to your specifications. Once you initialize them, they’ll do whatever you ask. We can’t safely do it here in this small place. You’re going to have to wait to enjoy them until I find us a new location. My two are safely stashed for now. I advise you to do the same with yours until the restored cyborgs stop hunting for us. Hide your New World Companions somewhere where you can easily get to them later. They’ll do just fine in their current auto-existence mode. The timing on that code is very precise. They’ll take care of themselves and stay out of trouble until we reach safety.”
William 874X_Book 5 of Cyborgs_Mankind Redefined Page 20
