by Kit Rocha
Apparently, he didn’t hide it well.
Rafe had learned early to respect Maya’s personal space—she was skittish as hell about physical affection and rarely offered it to anyone other than Nina and Dani. But now she paused long enough to wrap him in a tight, reassuring hug. She even let him hug her back, and for a soul-healing moment it was like having one of his sisters leaning trustingly against him. God. Maybe two years before he saw them again. They’d be grown. They’d be strangers.
He’d miss all of it.
No wonder he looked miserable enough for Maya to offer him a hug.
After another tight squeeze, Maya pulled back and flicked her fingers at him. “Go. Gray’s probably over there building a new addition on your warehouse or something by now.”
Knowing how true that might be, Rafe hid his seething worry and tossed her a cheerful salute before heading out the back. He let the false smile fade as he crossed the short distance to their new home and was ready to find a heavy bag and beat out some temper of his own by the time he walked inside.
Instead he found Gray hauling around huge targets. Of course he was.
Rafe hovered in the doorway again, silently taking in Gray’s brand of self-destructive behavior. It wasn’t nearly as overt as Dani’s, but Gray could be a sneaky bastard. Unlike Dani, he could feel pain. No doubt he’d been feeling a wide and wonderful array of it over the past few weeks. He just ignored it so smoothly and skillfully that he’d started falling apart right in front of them, and none of them had noticed.
Rafe couldn’t help but feel the sting of that. He always noticed.
Blowing out a frustrated breath, he crossed the threshold to do battle for the second time. “You should let me do that.”
Gray frowned but continued with his task. “Why?”
Rafe stalked to the nearest one and hefted it with one hand. It probably weighed no more than thirty or forty pounds—nothing for someone with Gray’s enhancements. But Gray’s enhancements were on the damn fritz. “You need to be taking care of yourself, man, not pushing yourself into a damn seizure.”
He rolled his eyes. “I’m dying, not an invalid.”
Rafe dropped the target in the corner and went back to retrieve another. “What the hell were you even doing with these? Maya said you were making her train.”
Gray shrugged. “With her memory, I figured she could take Hwang’s blind- shooting trick and crank it up to eleven.”
“And?”
“And I was right, of course.” He paused and arched an eyebrow at Rafe. “Perfect score on her first attempt.”
Rafe froze. “Are you sure you’re not hallucinating now, too?”
“That, so far, has not been one of my symptoms. And I never joke about bullets.”
Rafe considered the careful spots marked on the floor and how close together they were. It had taken Hwang months to be able to precisely pinpoint direction and even longer to be able to distinguish five meters from ten. Then again, Rafe had never seen anyone listen to the sound a security panel made over comms and then punch in the code until he’d watched Maya pull the trick.
Of course, Gray had seen the potential in that.
Rafe carried the target to the corner. “That’s pretty wild. I’ve heard Dani tease her about hustling pool before. She must be like Conall. A superbrain on top of the auditory recall.”
“Must be.” Gray nudged him with one shoulder. “How’s Knox?”
“Tense.” It took an effort not to let his fingers curl into fists. There was nothing here to fight. “Nina’s taking this hard, and he wants to fix it for her.”
Gray shook his head. “Did you ever think you’d see the day?”
“Honestly?” Rafe snorted. “Knox taking care of someone is nothing new. He’s always had it in him. But he lets her take care of him, too. And that? That is something I never thought I’d see.”
“No.” Gray stowed the last target with a sigh. “Mace was the only one who ever got to do that.”
Compartmentalization. Rafe tried to ball up his grief for Mace and put it in its place, but there was more of it than there should be. The months since they’d been forced to watch Mace die hadn’t blunted the pain. The memories were still crystal clear. The see-through walls of their cells, the acrid stink of recycled air, the dispassionate faces of the biochem techs who’d refused to rebalance Mace’s implant once it started to go haywire.
Every seizure, every pained groan—Rafe could even remember the way Knox’s bones had sounded, shattering on the polycarbonate wall as he tried to beat his way into Mace’s cell to hold his dying friend.
Losing Mace had broken something in Knox that might never be fixed. Rafe could only pray Nina was strong enough to hold him together while they all watched Gray fall apart.
Compartmentalization was a fucking joke. But Rafe tried, slapping Gray on the shoulder as he summoned his biggest smile. “Come on. Let’s figure out where you can make Maya practice next.”
But Gray shook his head again. “Not right now, man. I think I’m gonna rest a while.”
“Even better. Go on. I’m gonna hit the shower.”
Rafe held his smile until Gray was gone, then blew out a rough breath and turned. Instead of heading for the showers, he descended to the basement. Only one corner of the vast space was finished, with bare light fixtures affixed to the naked cement columns and a thin mat laid out on the floor.
Prioritizing a workout room seemed silly with so much else to build, not to mention virtually unlimited access to the state-of-the-art training room next door. But sometimes Rafe needed solitude and physical release.
The heavy bag was a special design, meant to withstand the punishment dealt by someone with biochemical enhancements. Rafe took his time taping his hands, trying not to think of how raw Dani’s knuckles would be by now. Maya would stop her. He had to believe that.
All he could do was work off the tension and find his center. Knox was going to need him in the days ahead, and Rafe would be ready.
He always was.
July 7th, 2073
Marjorie is truly remarkable, and I am terrified for her.
No one understands how unprecedented her cognitive processing abilities are. Most data couriers are mimics, retrieving the things they’ve heard by rote. Marjorie breathes in knowledge and makes it part of her. It’s likely she would have been an extraordinary mind without the genetic enhancement. With it …
I’ve done my best to shield her from the curiosity of the scientists by administering her ten- and eleven-year benchmark aptitude tests myself and logging false results. It’s within my purview as the VP of Behavior to oversee testing, but it’s an oddity that will draw attention eventually.
To keep her safe, I must clip her wings. If they realize how swiftly she’s outstripped their expectations, they’ll take her apart to find out why.
I have to teach her fear.
The Recovered Journal of Birgitte Skovgaard
EIGHT
Six hours after her tense moment with Gray in the warehouse, Maya was still jacked up on adrenaline. The world seemed too bright and her skin felt tight, and it was a miracle neither Nina nor Dani had called her on it yet.
Maya was pretty sure her reprieve was almost up.
Dani probably wouldn’t be the one to notice. Maya had talked her out of beating her hands to a pulp against the heavy bag, but Dani hadn’t stopped trying to vent her feelings through movement. Instead of her usual spot sprawled across the foot of Nina’s bed, she was on the floor doing fluid, effortless push-ups.
Maya stopped counting after two hundred.
Nina had fallen into bed for a far-too-brief nap only at Knox’s firm urging, but as soon as he’d gotten up to check on his men, so had she. The tension lingering in her eyes hurt Maya’s heart, all the more because Nina had taken up her usual position: cross-legged on the edge of the bed, her elbows braced on her knees, her whole body leaning forward in active engagement.
When Nina listen
ed to someone, she did it with her whole being.
That was why Maya was screwed. She’d broken open a new bottle of nail polish to give her something to do with her restless hands, but staring at her thumb as she painstakingly applied the shimmery chromatic silver would only let her avoid Nina’s gaze for so long. “So I sent the girl to Dr. Wells. He already left a message. He took care of the abortion and got her a real contraceptive implant.”
“Good.” Nina tilted her head.
Maya kept her gaze firmly on her fingernails. “It feels like for every one of these assholes we chase out of the neighborhood, two more are popping up.”
“When Knox finishes the clinic, it’ll help a lot.” Nina touched her shoulder lightly. “People only visit these places because they have no other options. That’s going to change very soon.”
Nina could sense something was off. Maya charged ahead anyway, even knowing her voice was too bright. Too fast. “I told the girl she could pay me back by chopping vegetables, but I might see how she does with the scanner. That’d free Tai up to get back to helping with people who come in. And maybe if Emeline is good at it, we could hire her. Digitizing that catalog—”
“Maya.”
She swallowed back the frantic babble of words. “I’m fine. I swear I’m fine. It’s just … It’s been a weird day. I’m in a weird headspace.”
Dani paused mid-push-up. “That’s one word for it.”
“Excuse me?”
“You. Gray.” Dani flipped over and landed on her back with a grunt. Then she grinned. “That’s what’s up, right?”
So much for Dani not noticing.
“Dani,” Nina murmured.
“What? Tell me I’m wrong, because I know I’m not.”
Her grin was so open. So easy. To Dani, attraction was easy. If she found someone hot, she went for it. Sex was like a sport for Dani—athletic, occasionally competitive, and probably a little dangerous. Her flings lasted for a night or a week but rarely longer. And nothing about the activity required her vulnerability.
“It’s hard for me,” Maya whispered, carefully twisting the top back onto the nail polish bottle to hide her nerves. “You guys know that. Touch is hard.”
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.” Nina held up both hands to cut off Maya’s automatic protest. “No, I know Gray wouldn’t. But the pressure we exert on ourselves can be difficult, too.”
“It’s not even about what I want. It’s about what I can have.” Maya swallowed hard against the sudden knot in her throat. “I never know what’s going to be too much. And last time—”
Her voice broke on the word. If she closed her eyes, she’d be back there. On the Hill. In Birgitte’s posh, coldly elegant penthouse, the hardwood floors stained with blood. Too much blood. She hadn’t known a person could bleed that much and live for weeks.
That had been her first mistake.
If she closed her eyes, she’d see his face. Simon had looked nothing like Gray. His blond good looks had still held a boyish softness. He’d had freckles and a mischievous smile utterly unsuited to the gravity of his position. Simon had been far too young to be a bodyguard to a TechCorps VP, but he’d had other qualities to recommend him. Loyalty. Morality. A dedication to Birgitte’s revolution.
He’d smiled at Maya through all that blood, his lip split and his face bruised, and whispered the only words he’d say for those final, nightmarish weeks.
It’s okay. I love you. Don’t talk.
“Maya,” Dani whispered softly.
She clung to Dani’s voice, following it back to the present. Her friend’s face came into focus. Her serious eyes. Her blond hair.
Maya was safe. Safe, like Simon would never be. “I watched him die,” she said softly. “It was slow. So damn slow.”
Dani breathed a curse, but Nina just leaned closer, her gaze solemn.
Maya had never talked about it before. She hadn’t needed to—Dani and Nina had lived with her nightmares. They’d coaxed her back every time she woke screaming, trapped in a bloody past that would never fade from memory because it couldn’t, not for her. It only ever took one stray thought to put her back there, in the moment, so real it was like she was living it all over again.
At least the bad dreams had faded, coming less and less frequently. It had been over a year since the last one. Sometimes whole weeks went by where nothing reminded her of those terrible twenty-three days that had started with Birgitte’s death and ended with a shaken and traumatized Maya waking up under Nina’s protection.
But Simon had been more to her than just the terrible way he died. Maya took a steady breath and eased past the darkest memories, like walking a tightrope over a pit of spikes. Her first teenage love was on the other side, all of the nervous flutters and gentle warmth. One of the few sweet things from her life up on the Hill.
“He was part of Birgitte’s security team,” she said, holding on to Nina’s gaze like a lifeline. “Only a few years older than me. I didn’t notice him at first, but he was our bodyguard in the evenings and at night. The one who slept in our penthouse. I’d eat dinner with him, and we’d talk … I knew him for a year before I kissed him the first time.”
“Simon,” Nina murmured. “You’ve called out for him before.”
“Simon,” Maya agreed. “We didn’t have long together. Only a few months, really.” But when you were nineteen, a few months felt like half a lifetime. Simon had been so gentle with her, never pushing when she felt overwhelmed, all too aware that one wrong move would put them both in peril.
No, they’d been in peril from the beginning. But Simon had let her forget that for a few brief, stolen moments.
And then he’d died for her.
Nina’s hand was so close. Maya reached out, grasping it to ground her in the present. “He was sweet. It was nice. But he’s the only person I’ve ever kissed. He was the only person I’d ever wanted to until…”
“Until now?” Dani smiled a little, the expression half encouragement and half understanding. “Until Gray?”
Maya groaned and flung herself back on the bed, covering her face with her hands. “Remember when I had that panic attack at the underground fight?”
“Uh-huh?”
“He came outside with me. Talked me through it.” The words had been ridiculously mundane. About a hurricane he’d gotten trapped in down on the Gulf. But that voice had been like the best liquor, smooth and warm and blurring all the sharpest edges off the memories clawing her up inside. “I think I imprinted on his voice.”
“Uh, no, it’s just hot.” Dani sighed. “Not everything is some kind of mystical, cerebral experience, Maya. Some things are just … visceral, you know?”
“Yeah. Visceral is right.” Maya propped herself up on one elbow and leveled a look at Dani. “Now imagine you couldn’t forget it. That any time you thought about it, or him, you heard it again. Crystal clear, and just as … visceral.”
“Sounds like a one-way trip to hornytown,” Dani observed gravely.
Nina covered her face and groaned.
“She’s not wrong,” Maya said darkly. “What if I kiss him, and it’s good? What if I can’t forget that? Up on the Hill, we were drilled constantly—no nonessential sensory input. I was half-numb the last time I made out with someone. What if I try to kiss him, and my brain just fucking explodes?”
Nina dropped her hands and shook her head. “Your brain’s not going to explode, I promise you that.”
“Something else might, though.”
“Dani.”
“What?”
Maya dragged a pillow from behind her back and flung it directly at Dani, who snatched it effortlessly out of the air.
Nina grabbed it and set it aside. “I think what she’s trying to say is that if you take things slow, and you communicate, then whatever happens will have a much better chance of being—”
“Orgasmic?”
“—pleasant,” Nina finished, as if she hadn’t been inte
rrupted.
Maya sat up again, her heart fluttering with nerves. They made it sound … possible. “But what if I can’t—” She swallowed and tried again. “I’m not easy. Who the hell would want to put up with kissing someone who might kiss them back or might decide she can’t be touched for the rest of the day? Sometimes I’m a fucking mess.”
“So what?” Dani demanded. “You’re also awesome, and if anyone gives you any shit, I’ll stab them.”
That simple. To Dani, it always had been. Nina’s smile of encouragement wasn’t quite as murderous, but it was no less real. Maya let their support wash away her doubts—the support that had been the only constant in Maya’s life from the day she’d crawled out of the darkest depths of the TechCorps, shattered and hopeless.
Nina had been the one to sit with her, night after endless night, when she screamed herself awake from all those vivid memories masquerading as nightmares. Nina had secured Maya’s future by faking her death, then patiently taught a sheltered girl from the Hill how to survive in the world.
Dani had crashed into their lives a year later. Impossible, outrageous Dani, who would stab anyone who looked at Maya funny and murder anyone who hurt her. It was impossible to be afraid when Dani was with her. Dani had introduced Maya to the pressure valve of a dark club with a heavy bass beat, and dancing until her body was tired enough to chase the oblivion of sleep no matter how restless her mind got.
Dani was teaching her how to live.
Maya might as well tell Dani the rest of it, then. “Something else happened while y’all were gone.”
Nina straightened in alarm.
“No, nothing bad.” Maya took a breath. Blew it out. “Gray blindfolded me and had me shoot at targets.”
Dani shook her head with a laugh. “Snipers have weird hobbies.”
“Maybe.” That tiny thrill of success shivered up Maya’s spine again, a blissful momentary distraction. “But I hit every fucking one. On my first try.”
“Sweet,” Dani proclaimed.
Nina studied her. “I didn’t know you were interested in that sort of training.”
Warmth flooded her cheeks, because she hadn’t been. If Knox or Rafe had pulled a blindfold out of their pocket, she would have politely invited them to fuck themselves and gone back to her comfortable corner to scan more books.
