by Naomi Martin
“She killed four people, Jenni,” I remind her. “You watched her do it.”
“She was pushed to a point where she felt like she had no choice,” she retorts. “Everybody has a breaking point, Colonel.”
Her words sound like a veiled threat to me and it sets my blood boiling again. Helpful or not, I won’t tolerate Jenni going soft on me. If her dedication to this fight is faltering, I will have to deal with her. I don’t want to, but I will.
She looks up at me and I hold her gaze firmly. “We are responsible for our own actions,” I tell her. “If you lose control and lash out like that girl did, there are consequences.”
Jenni says nothing, just turns back to her project. I can tell she’s done with this conversation and wants me to leave. But I’m not ready. I need to impress a couple more points upon her, lest her faith in our cause waver.
“We all choose sides in a war, Jenni. We choose who and what we fight for,” I tell her. “That girl chose the wrong side.”
“She didn’t choose a side, Colonel. She was a child,” Jenni says absently. “She was picked up off the streets by your men. She hadn’t raised a hand to anybody.”
I sigh heavily. “What’s done is done. I can’t bring her back,” I tell her. “All we can do is move forward. And we will.”
“What about Senator Cook? He was on our side,” she asks. “Why did he have to die? What did he do?”
I put an appropriately grim expression on my face and nod, looking as if I’m bearing a great weight.
“His death is a tragedy. But this is war, and certain sacrifices have to be made. Somebody needs to make the hard decisions,” I say. “For all of his talk, Senator Cook was not truly committed to our cause. His support was wavering. I heard it in his voice the last time we spoke. He was not the man to lead this outfit.”
“And you are,” Jenni snaps. “Right, Colonel.”
“You’re goddamn right. I’ve been fighting this battle from day one and I’ve lost a lot of good soldiers to these fucking animals,” I spit. “I will not have the sacrifices these brave men and women have made be in vain, nor their legacies tarnished because of some weak-willed, obsequious politician.”
“Especially when that weak-willed, obsequious politician is a direct threat to your own power,” she counters. “Isn’t that right, Colonel?”
“Watch your tone with me, young lady,” I growl. “You don’t want to end up on the wrong side of me.”
“You’re right. I don’t,” she snaps. “Because I’ve seen what that gets you.”
“Keep pushing me.”
Jenni nods, a mask of cold indifference spreading across her face, and puts her project back down on the table. She turns her back to me and walks to the window, crossing her arms over her chest again. She’s silent, but I can tell she’s crying.
This isn’t going well. I think the only thing I’ve managed to accomplish here is to drive her further away from me. I’m going to need to find a way to smooth the waters between us, because I cannot afford to lose her. I don’t have anybody else with her intelligence, or out of the box thinking when it comes to defense and weapons development. Deep down, I know that if I lose Jenni, if I’m forced to jail her—or worse, kill her—this program is going to be in deep shit.
“I needed to ask you something else,” I say, my voice low and cold. “I need to know about this teleportation thing Raven managed. Do you know how that works?”
She shakes her head. “I’ve never done anything like it.”
I run a hand through my hair. “Do you think it’s something you can work on?” I ask. “It’s something that could prove useful.”
Jenni shrugs. “I’ll look into it.”
I stare at her back for a moment, not entirely convinced she will. I fear her commitment to this fight is diminishing. Which means her usefulness to me might be drawing to an end. I hope I’m wrong and that she can get over this. It would be a shame to lose somebody of her extraordinary talent.
“Yes, please do,” I say. “And get back to me with some ideas about how we can make this happen as soon as possible. Please.”
“Yes, sir.”
I sigh. “Jenni, I am sorry about today,” I tell her, trying to soothe her ruffled feathers. “I know it’s been upsetting. Emotional. But let’s not let that cloud the bigger picture here.”
“Right,” she says. “Sure.”
I stare at her for a moment longer, then turn toward the door. Her voice stops me, though, and I turn back to her. Jenni’s blue eyes are piercing and she holds my gaze. Realizing how vulnerable I am in that moment, I feel a wavering bit of concern flicker through me.
“Her name was Agatha,” she says. “Aggie, for short.”
I nod, not needing her to explain who she’s talking about. I don’t know what she wants me to say to that, though. So, I don’t say anything. Instead, I turn and leave her workshop, knowing it’s more likely than not that I’m going to have to either throw her in a cell or put a bullet in her brain. I hope I have to do neither, but it feels like that train has already left the station and now it’s only a matter of time before it derails.
It’s a shame, but in war, there are always sacrifices that must be made.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Raven
I sit in a chair beside the table that Gray’s strapped to with weaves of Spirit, as I have for the last day or so. After we got him out of the suite and down here to a blank, windowless, and featureless room, Kayla gave him a heavy dose of sedatives. I don’t know what they did to him, but I’m hoping the effects of it will have worn off when he wakes up.
If they don’t, we’re going to have to do what I really don’t want to do—go poking around in his brain. But there’s no telling what kind of damage we’ll do if we go rooting around in there and try to fix what they broke inside his mind.
Zane and Elliot have drifted in and out over the time I’ve been in here, stopping by to check on us. They’ve brought me food and drink, most of which is still sitting untouched on the table. I haven’t been able to muster much of an appetite as I stare forlornly at Gray’s hulking form on the table before me.
With a pneumatic hiss, the doors slide open and Kayla walks in. She gives me a small smile and a squeeze on the shoulder as she passes. Holding her tablet, she takes all of Gray’s vital signs, her fingernails tapping on the glass surface of the screen as she notes them down.
“The good news is that his vitals are all unchanged from the last check,” Kayla says. “Blood pressure, heart rate, both down significantly. Breathing and pulse are still steady. I see no drop off or deterioration in him.”
“Isn’t that to be expected, given that you basically put him into a medically-induced coma?”
“Not necessarily,” she says. “If he was deteriorating in any way, we would still be able to see it.”
I try to take heart in her words, try to nurture that small spark of hope within me, breathe life into it. But the truth is, I fear what will happen when Gray wakes up. Will he be the Gray I know and love? Or will he be the monster they tried to create in the Pit—the one whose only mission seems to be to kill me?
Kayla gives me a sympathetic smile and another squeeze on my arm before she walks out. I sit in silence for a few minutes, the only sound coming from the beeping of the machines that are monitoring him. Behind me, the doors slide open again and I don’t need to turn around to know who walked in.
“How is he?” Dora asks.
She comes around and stands on the other side of the table from me. Her face is impassive as she looks at Gray and, for some reason, that irritates me. He’s fought for us. Spilled blood for us. Shed his own blood. And she can’t muster even a little bit of sympathy? What kind of cold, unfeeling person…
Giving myself a sharp internal slap, I push those thoughts away. One, Dora is a vampire. They don’t feel things the way we do. I see it often enough with Zane. Two, she is a master at concealing her emotions, so I’d never be able to tell what she’s ac
tually feeling just by looking at her. Again, another lesson I’ve learned from Zane. And three, she’s not who I’m actually pissed at.
My anger is reserved solely for Villa. Or, it should be, anyway. I shouldn’t be lashing out at everybody around me. That’s not fair to them.
“He’s the same,” I say. “We don’t know what’s going to happen or what he’s going to be like when he wakes up.”
Dora nods, a small frown creasing her lips. “I needed to talk to you about that.”
“What about it?”
She sighs. “Look, there’s no easy way to put this, so I’m just going to be blunt.”
“I’d expect nothing less from you.”
For the briefest of moments, she looks pained by my words, but then her features smooth over again. I honestly didn’t mean it to be snarky, though I imagine in my current state, it probably came out that way. Her directness is something I actually respect about her. I guess I’ve never done a good job of conveying that to her. But I don’t have the strength or energy to fix that right now. I’ll deal with it later.
Dora stands up a bit straighter. “We need to figure out what we’re going to do if he wakes up and… well, if he’s not himself.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, if he’s still trying to kill everybody, we need to decide what we’re going to do with him,” she says. “It’s not like we can have him roaming the halls, Raven.”
I shake my head, not wanting to hear this right now. Not wanting to deal with it. It’s just too much to think about.
“Why don’t we cross that bridge when we come to it?” I offer.
“I understand that you’re in a difficult situation,” she says, her voice gentle. “But I have to worry about the welfare of everybody here. I have to worry about the greater good.”
“So, what, you’re talking about turning him out if he’s still all fucked up in the head?” I ask.
A flicker of something crosses her face and she looks down, not willing to meet my eyes. It’s then I realize what she’s talking about and I get to my feet so suddenly, I knock the chair over behind me.
“No. Don’t you dare. Don’t you even think about it, Dora,” I say, my voice ice cold and harder than steel.
“Raven, listen to me,” she says. “If he’s not right… if he’s still determined to kill you—”
“He won’t be.”
“I spoke with both Zane and Elliot. They told me what happened in DC,” she says. “He was out of control. Both of them said they weren’t able to control him. And they both said he was focused on killing you.”
The shock of her words hits me like a hard slap across the face. I can’t believe they would turn on Gray like this. I can’t believe they would stab him in the back. He’s their brother. He’s one of us. We’re all a part of each other, and to think they would tell Dora what they did… I shake my head, focusing on the problem before me. Which is Dora.
“He isn’t going to kill me,” I say. “I’ll get through to him. I can fix this.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
She sighs and runs a hand through her hair. “Maybe so. But we need to plan for the possibility… we need contingency plans.”
“I won’t let you kill him.”
This time, actual sympathy does cross her face. She can’t meet my eyes for a moment, but when she raises her head again, I see the determination in her eyes.
“I hope it doesn’t come to that. I truly do,” she says. “But if he is as out of control when he wakes as Zane and Elliot say he was, we may not have a choice.”
“I won’t let you,” I tell her. “If he wakes up the same as he was, I’ll take him and we’ll leave. I’ll fix him on my own. I won’t let him hurt anybody, and I won’t let you kill him.”
“Raven, be reasonable,” Dora presses. “We need you—”
“And I need him!” I shout. “If I let you kill him, we’re no better than Villa.”
Dora sighs and shakes her head sadly, and I can see the conflict in her eyes. Surely, she couldn’t have thought I would be fine with her killing Gray. I mean, seriously? How could she even propose the idea to me? And how could the boys have signed off on it?
“I won’t let you kill him, Dora,” I insist. “If he’s the same when he wakes up, I’ll take care of it. I can undo whatever damage they did. I know I can.”
“I hope that’s the case, Raven. And I’ll give you every chance to do so,” she says. “But if he’s not right, and you can’t fix him… well… we all need to have a contingency plan.”
She says it so coldly that I want to slap her. Killing Gray is not a contingency plan. He’s part of me. Losing him would be like losing a part of myself. And I can’t bear the thought of it. I won’t.
“Get out. Get out of here,” I hiss, and when she hesitates, I scream. “Get the fuck out of here, Dora. Get out right fucking now!”
Dora gives me a tight smile and turns, striding out of the room. I lean down and plant a gentle kiss on his forehead.
“Come back to me, Gray,” I whisper. “Come back to me.”
I stand and wipe away the tears that have welled in my eyes, then turn and leave. There are two attitudes I need to adjust before I do anything else.
* * * * *
“We didn’t tell her she should kill him,” Elliot says.
“Oh, really? Because Dora is under the distinct impression that you are both on board with this plan,” I spit.
“Gray is our brother,” Zane says. “We would kill or die for him. You know that.”
“Then why did you stab him in the back with Dora?”
“We didn’t,” he replies. “She asked us about what happened in DC, and we told her. It’s that simple.”
“Raven, you know how much we love the guy,” Elliot adds. “We’d never be on board with a plan like that.”
Letting out a frustrated, angry sigh, I sit back in the chair. I pull my knees up to my chin and wrap my arms around them, feeling confused, disoriented, angry… and scared. I mean, what if Gray really doesn’t wake up like himself? What will I do if they’ve broken him beyond all repair?
Zane kneels by my chair and takes my hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. When I look into his eyes, I see earnestness and concern. I also see a tremor of the same fear that’s rippling through me. Looking at Elliot, I see the same. And I realize we are all feeling this, together. I’ve flown off the handle and lashed out. Again.
I’m a wreck right now. In the time we’ve been together, we’ve never had to face something like this and it’s terrifying me. I don’t know if I can fix Gray, and I’m scared that if I can’t, he really will be lost to me—lost to us—forever.
“I think Dora is just being as pragmatic as she usually is,” Elliot says from his spot on the sofa. “She’s thinking big picture and not looking at the smaller one. She has a lot on her plate, running this place.”
Zane nods. “I know for a fact she doesn’t want to hurt Gray. But as the commander around here, she’s got to plan for everything. She’s got to worry about everybody.”
I bury my face in my hands and grimace. “I know. I’m an asshole. As usual.”
“You’re not always an asshole,” Zane allows. “But when you are, you really do it up big.”
I look up and he’s giving me a lopsided smile. I shake my head and though my lips curl upward, I can’t stop the flood of tears that come rushing out. He takes me into his arms and I let myself melt against him, sobbing wildly. I feel Elliot behind me. He strokes my back, murmuring soft words, and I suddenly feel like the most worthless, stupid piece of crap that’s ever existed.
Both of them are feeling the same way I am about Gray, yet they’re the ones comforting me. We should all be comforting each other, but I’m feeling selfish. Narcissistic. Stupid.
“We’ll figure this out, Raven,” Elliot says. “We’re not going to abandon Gray. We will never do that.”
Zane nods. “We�
�ll get our brother back. Everything will be all right.”
The sincerity in his words swells my heart to the point it feels like it might burst. I look from Elliot to Zane, the purest love filling every cell inside of me. But even still, it feels incomplete. Without Gray here, it feels like there’s a piece of me missing. And when I look between them, it’s clear they’re both feeling that absence every bit as keenly as I am.
“I love you both. With everything in me,” I tell him. “And if Gray isn’t right, we’re going to save him. We aren’t going to lose him.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Raven
Although I’d much rather be sitting in the room with Gray, I understand the necessity of this meeting in the war room. As usual, Elliot is on my left, and Zane is on my right. And when I catch myself looking at the seat to Elliot’s left—Gray’s usual seat—and see that it’s been left empty, I feel the pain in my heart that’s quickly becoming all too familiar.
“So,” Dora says, “seems as if we’ve got a bigger problem here we need to deal with.”
She punches a button on her remote control and the flatscreen mounted to the wall at the far end of the war room flickers to life. On the screen is a picture of Gray, with an older man with mostly silver hair giving the report.
“DC Metro police have released a statement today, naming this man, Gray Montrose, as the prime suspect in the brutal triple slaying of Senator Alton Cook and two of his bodyguards in Cook’s Georgetown residence.
“Authorities are asking for the vigilance of all citizens and for their help in apprehending this fugitive. They also caution against trying to apprehend this man on your own, stating that he’s armed and is extremely dangerous. Instead, they encourage—”
Dora mutes the sound and drops the remote onto the table. Everybody in the room is silent, exchanging looks with one another. A chill has crept over the entire room as the level of tension has risen.
“Do we know if he did it?” Dora asks.
I shake my head. “I don’t know,” I admit. “And we won’t until he wakes up and is able to tell us what happened to him.”
