“I do, Bex. I really do. Whoever it is that’s working against you, it’s not Harrison Ross. Trust me.”
Chapter 14
The modest soup and bread that Veronica has prepared is heavenly considering how famished we are. Now that we have successfully completed our mission and my adrenalin levels have dropped, I feel exhausted. Wilting at the table, I push my chair back and get to my feet. Reed, sitting opposite me, eyes me thoughtfully. We have not said a word to each other since we arrived back at camp, and there is an uncomfortable tension building between us. My newly discovered feelings for Reed are waging an inner war with my lifelong love for Aidan, and my mind is in turmoil, filled with both guilt and possibility.
“We’ll leave for home tomorrow. Mid-morning,” I add, smiling at the appalled faces. “I think we’ve all earned a well-deserved lie-in.”
After a chorus of goodnights I go to the bathroom where Veronica has prepared a warm bath. I stand in the centre of the room, holding on to the basin and staring at my reflection in the mirror. My startling grey eyes stare back at me, black shadows below them reflecting the toll the last few days has taken. My dark hair is still tied back and I pull out the elastic so that it cascades down my back. I put a hand up to the back of my neck, rolling it back and forth, trying to ease the tension in my shoulders.
I contemplate the bath water for a moment. It is so inviting that I just want to lie down in it and go to sleep. Sighing, I turn to the door and pull it open, and I give a start of fright. Reed is standing in the doorway, his hand raised, about to knock.
“Hi,” is all he says.
“I was just coming to find you.”
“What for?”
“You’re filthy,” I gesture at his torn, bloodied clothes. “You should go first.” I wave over my shoulder at the filled bath.
“Nah, I’m fine.” He shakes his head and dust and tiny stones fly from his hair in all directions. “I’ll wait,” he insists.
“Okay.” Suddenly shy and not wanting to broach the subject of what is happening between us, I shut the door.
Feeling selfish, I bath quickly, washing my hair and my body, and then I wrap myself in a well-worn, slightly scratchy towel. Not wanting to put on my dirty clothes, I open the door and peek down the corridor in both directions before I scuttle to my room and close the door behind me. The camp is quiet, everyone seems to have retired to their rooms for the night. I can hear the faint clinking of Veronica washing up in the kitchen, but other than that everything is still and silent.
I give another shriek of fright when I turn and see Reed lounging on my bed.
“You have got to stop doing that,” I giggle nervously. “I need to get dressed,” I add pointedly, looking around the room and deliberately avoiding his gaze.
“Don’t let me stop you.” He gets wearily to his feet.
“Did you need something?” I ask before he leaves.
“No. Actually, yes.” He tries to get me to meet his eyes. “What’s up with you?”
“Me?” I smile in confusion.
“You won’t look at me, you seem different.”
“Do I?” He has no idea how different I am now that I have had to confront my feelings. He stares at me as if trying to read my mind. I have to tell him, I know I do. But not like this. Not standing here wrapped in this hideous towel, with my sopping wet hair and bruised body. I feel incredibly vulnerable and I won’t be able to find the words.
“Never mind.” He sighs and turns to leave.
“Wait,” I say, covering my face with my hands and rubbing my eyes in exasperation. “To hell with it.” I step quickly towards him, stopping only when my body touches his. Throwing my arms around his neck, I pull his head down to meet mine, kissing him on and on in the darkened room. Eventually we pull apart and I have to smile at the look on his face.
“I’m glad you’re okay, Cowboy,” I say, turning to fetch my clothes. As I take a step away, he snatches my hand and yanks me back, my body spinning a full one-eighty degrees and colliding once more with his, before his hands find my face and he kisses me back with a lot more heat and passion than before.
“I should go and clean up,” he murmurs against my mouth, but I know I can’t let him leave. This has gone on for far too long, and my body is reacting of its own accord. I take his hand and lead him to the bed.
“You can do that later,” I whisper, my voice hoarse with emotion and longing. Unwrapping the towel, I drop it to the floor in a pool at my feet. Reed’s sharp intake of breath sets my heart racing.
“What are you doing, Rebecca?” he asks hesitantly, and I smile, feeling comfortable and familiar, knowing in my heart that this is right. Reed will not act, he will not initiate this. He is far too aware and respectful of my feelings for Aidan. But Aidan is gone and I’m tired of playing games. I want Reed; I can’t deny it any longer.
“I’m doing what you don’t have the guts to do,” I tease, stepping forward and into his arms.
“Oh really,” he drawls in my ear, his mouth moving down my neck to my shoulder. “We’ll see about that,” and he lifts me in his arms and tosses me onto the bed, his eyes sparkling wickedly.
“That water is going to be icy,” I say, much later.
“It was worth it.” He kisses my nose and eases himself off the bed. I gaze hungrily at his naked body. It’s not the first time I’ve seen it, but it’s the first time I have really appreciated it and what it’s capable of.
“Jeez, Tiny, stop staring, you’re making me self-conscious.” He throws his filthy T-shirt at me and I toss it aside, laughing. I pull on a clean pair of sweat pants and a long-sleeved cream cotton shirt and follow him into the bathroom, closing the door behind me.
“Ouch, that is cold,” he cringes as he climbs into the bath.
“Sorry,” I say sheepishly, sinking down onto the floor, my back against the bathroom door.
“So,” he says, soaping the wash-cloth, “where exactly are we?”
“Hmmm,” I purse my lips thoughtfully. “Toledo, Ohio. Population, zero according to NUSA. Nine, according to us.”
“Cute,” he grins, and then turns serious again. “What’s going on here, Bex? What changed?”
“I thought you were dead. I thought you had died in that explosion.”
“And?”
“And I realised I didn’t want to live without you.”
“Didn’t want to? Couldn’t would have been far more romantic.”
“But not the truth. It’s amazing what you can live through.” I stare unseeingly into space and he sounds defeated.
“You’re speaking from experience.”
“I loved him,” I admit, truthfully. “I thought I couldn’t live without him, but I did. I have.”
“If he were here we wouldn’t be having this conversation?” he asks, but it sounds less like a question and more a statement of fact.
“Honestly, I don’t know.”
He narrows his eyes suspiciously.
“I don’t,” I insist. “It would be a lie to say that my feelings for you are a recent development. They were there, right from the start.”
“But he was your first love.”
“Yes. And Alex’s father. I loved Aidan my whole life. I will always love him.”
He rinses the soap from his hair, letting my statement hang, and then he wipes the water out of his eyes and meets my gaze levelly.
“And how do you feel about me?”
I cannot help the smile that stretches across my face. Reed is crazy and brave and strong, and he is my equal in every respect.
“I didn’t realise until that cave-in in the tunnels, or maybe I did, but I didn’t want to admit it. It’s funny how you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone.” My voice breaks slightly.
“I’m here,” he soothes, his features uncharacteristically soft.
Then he grins, stands up and pulls a towel from the pile.
“You know, it sounds like you’re a little bit in love with me, Tiny,” he teases and I get to my feet, gazing up into his beautiful green eyes.
“No, Cowboy, not a little. A lot,” I say, meaning every word. “I’m a lot in love with you.”
When I wake in the morning Reed’s arm is draped over my naked hips, and his soft snores behind me make me so absurdly happy that I press my face into the pillow to stop myself from laughing. I ease out of the bed, pulling on my sweat pants and a grey hoodie, and make my way to the kitchen area where Veronica is making coffee. I wonder idly if she ever sleeps.
“Thank you,” I take the proffered mug and walk outside. It’s raining, and the sky is dark and gloomy. “Nice day for it,” I murmur to myself, heading to the garage. My dad and David are already there, checking the fuel and supplies and packing the Jeep and the Discovery. I kiss my father good morning.
“We should be ready to go within the hour,” David says.
“That’s perfect, thanks.” David has really come into his own, I think. He is far more confident and assured than the first day I met him, when he was intimidated by his own wife.
“Do you miss your family when you’re away?” I ask, and he looks slightly uncomfortable.
“I miss the kids,” he admits, finally.
“And your wife?”
“Well, we’re um . . . we’re kind of divorced.”
“Divorced?” I almost choke on my coffee. In the Rebeldom we do not have any legal system, certainly none that would issue a decree of divorce.
“Not on paper, obviously,” he hastens to explain, “but it wasn’t working out, so we’re not together any more.”
“I’m sorry.” The words hardly seem adequate, but I have no idea what else to say.
“It’s better this way,” he says and, remembering how the two argued, I don’t disagree.
“It’s funny how things don’t work out,” I say, just as Reed enters the room. He walks straight over to me and kisses the top of my head.
“It’s funny how they do,” David remarks drily, and he and my father exchange a knowing glance.
“Good morning, Chase,” I smile down at him. “You shouldn’t sulk, it doesn’t become you.”
“People are going to come looking for me,” he warns.
“They’ll probably come looking for me long before you,” I point out. “I’m pretty sure I outrank you on their Most Wanted list.”
“You killed Eric,” he says, bristling with indignation and disgust.
“Oh, don’t get all hot under the collar. And drop the concerned friend charade, we both know you couldn’t stand Eric,” I add. Realising I have called his bluff he changes tack.
“Rebecca,” he oozes charm and smarminess, “you and I go back; we have history. I can’t believe this is what you really want; to hold me against my will.” I don’t answer, and he mistakes this for empathy.
“You need to take me home. My life is in danger out here, so is yours. Why don’t you take me back and we can straighten all this out?”
“How do you suppose we do that?” I feign curiosity and he seizes the opportunity.
“I’m a powerful man. I have a lot of contacts. Whatever you may have done, I can protect you, but not out here.”
“What are you so afraid of?”
“Rebecca, you’ve obviously been brainwashed by the Resistance. They want our resources, our land, our water supplies, but they have no idea how to sustain them. They will destroy the States and everything we have worked so hard to build. I can’t believe that is what you really want; for our civilisation to crumble. The monsters that have survived out here in the barren lands will bring disease and genetic deformities and chaos into our society. They need to be stamped out. The boundary fences ensure our survival.”
“Chase, you’re regurgitating the same bullshit I’ve been fed since middle school: Eric’s propaganda, designed to keep us fearful and stop us from asking questions. I don’t blame you, I believed it myself for most of my life, until I actually travelled outside the borders and saw the truth with my own eyes. The survivors out here are not monsters. They’re people, human beings, just like us. Yes, there are some that are dangerous, the Deranged and the Rados do exist, but it’s NUSA’s fault. We abandoned America. Why concentrate on the ten NUSA states when there are forty more beyond the fences in desperate need of our help? These people are starving, with no education or medical care. Every single day is a struggle for survival . . .” I realise that I am becoming too emotional and I do not want to give Chase any specific information that could come back to haunt me. He cannot know about our headquarters, not yet, anyway. His mouth is a tight, grim line and his expression is pure scepticism.
“Who is controlling NUSA now?” I question, getting to the point.
“Joseph Hale,” he answers honestly.
“Hale is an idiot; he’s not the man behind the scenes. What do you know?”
“What are you talking about?” He looks genuinely bewildered and I curse under my breath. Chase doesn’t have the answers I am looking for.
“Bex.” My father walks in with a bowl of porridge for Chase’s breakfast.
“Jeffrey?” Chase’s puzzled expression makes me smile. My father was head of department at Eric’s lab for years, every board member knows him personally. “What are you doing here?”
“The right thing,” my dad answers, staring him straight in the eye.
“You’re with them?”
“I’m with my daughter,” he puts his arm around my shoulders and Chase’s eyebrows shoot so far into his hairline they almost disappear.
“Your daughter?”
I laugh at his astonished tone.
“Things are not what they seem, Chase. Hopefully, one day you’ll realise that for yourself.”
Chapter 15
“Keep him tied up,” I instruct Jethro when we get outside. “Put him in the trunk of the Jeep.”
We leave the Toledo camp mid-morning, the fifteen-hour journey ahead of us means we will only reach Dodge City after midnight, so we will stay on there for an extra day to recover before setting out for Durango. Reed insists on driving with me. To my intense embarrassment, everybody seems to know what’s going on, and nobody questions this change of travel arrangements. Reed drives and I sit beside him in the passenger seat, David and my father in the back. Veronica declines our offer to join our company, climbing into the back of the Jeep beside Jethro instead.
Tim is driving the Jeep, Gabe beside him, with Jethro and the two girls in the back. I am secretly relieved that Gabe and Tim are not travelling with us; their sombre mood makes me feel guilty about the loss of their friends. Relishing my newfound happiness with Reed, I selfishly do not want to deal with the dark, claustrophobic world that we are living in, just for a while. The drive is pleasant, my dad and David make small talk, and I simply rest my head against the window and gaze out at the Ohio landscape. I try to imagine what it must have been like before the war. The Rebeldom is just a faded, hollow reflection of what once was; the passage of time has left a desolate, lonely shell of what was once the most powerful nation in the world.
We pass a few of the Deranged during the gruelling journey. They simply gape at our passing cars; hollow-eyed and pitiful. A part of me is glad that I was born after the war, that I have no comparisons. How much harder it must be for those who knew what life was like before. My father, the VP, General Ross – they experienced the freedom and the democracy that existed before World War Three, before we destroyed ourselves. I had grown up within the NUSA boundaries, so my upbringing was far more comfortable than those who were abandoned in the wilderness, but I had been living in a gilded cage. The Rebeldom is a hard life, one I would not survive without these amazing people, my friends, my family, my Legion. They are the reason
that I am so determined to bring about change. NUSA’s resources need to be shared. Lives need to be saved.
“Penny for your thoughts,” Reed interrupts my reflections and I clear my throat, turning slightly in my seat to face him.
“I can’t believe we did it, we destroyed the lab.”
“Did you ever have any doubt?”
“Only once,” I answer coyly, and then, at his questioning look, “when I thought I’d lost my greatest asset.”
“So that’s all I am to you, huh? A piece of meat; a number in your Legion.” I chuckle and David clears his throat loudly in the back.
“How much longer to Dodge?” he asks and my dad smiles at me as I turn to look at him.
“I don’t think David can take much more of your flirting, love,” he winks.
“A couple of hours,” Reed answers smoothly, ending our conversation but placing a hand on my leg. Trying to ignore the heat travelling up my thigh, I change the subject.
“I can’t wait to see Alex.”
“How is he?” My dad pounces on the topic.
“He’s fine, his healing has manifested,” I answer.
“So we were right.” His tone is thoughtful. “Any side effects?”
“None that we’re aware of.”
“Unbelievable – Alex is truly a product of the Power of Three.”
“Product?” Reed sounds angry and defensive, and I don’t know whether I am irritated at his accusatory tone towards my father or proud of his natural defensiveness towards my son.
“Not like that,” my dad doesn’t take offence. “It’s just that one has to wonder. Are we going to see a generation of Gifted children inheriting abilities from their parents; or is it just Alex, because of Rebecca’s unique genome.”
“Have any other Gifted soldiers had children?” Reed asks.
“A few, but their children are ordinary, showing no signs of any abilities.”
“So it’s just Rebecca; she’s the freak,” Reed says, making a sharp left turn. I slap his arm.
“She could well be,” my dad agrees, missing the sarcasm. “Bex is certainly one of a kind, as are you. You two certainly wouldn’t qualify as random selection.”
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