The Ultimate Mystery Thriller Horror Box Set (7 Mystery Thriller Horror Bestsellers)

by Perkins, Cathy

  He wanted to protest what she said about him as well, but Brett remembered his own speculations about Ambassador Nocker. They seemed absurd now – but were they? Had his perceptions already been subtly altered? A beautiful woman was the oldest bait in the world for certain sorts of traps.

  Angry with himself, he shoved the thought aside. She was real and human, or he didn’t know anything about people at all. She needed him now – or never.

  When he spoke his hoarse voice startled him. “Since I’m not running away screaming, how can I help?”

  Muriel shook her head. “Only Ariel can help herself.”

  Brett turned to Ariel. Her face was tense, but not frightened. Did she resent being pushed more than she feared what was being discussed?

  He asked her, “Please. Your life is worth more than anything the overmind thinks it needs you for.”

  Ariel’s eyes widened. “This is temporary. I knew Muriel would be overdramatic, but didn’t think she’d involve you.”

  Muriel answered before Brett could. “You don’t want Brett to blame all this on Oceania, do you? Tell him what else you’ve been doing.”

  Ariel raised her voice. “That’s none of his business!”

  Yet she’d asked him to come – but Brett said nothing.

  Muriel sighed. “Or mine either. I’m just your doctor.”

  Ariel stood up and screamed down at the older woman. “I’m sick of you! I hate that phony calm voice when you’re so sure you’re right and everyone else is wrong. I’m sick of your backstabbing Michael. Leave me alone!”

  To Brett’s surprise, Muriel stood up and walked out silently. Shortly he heard the front door close behind her. Did Muriel hope Brett could say or do something?

  He sat beside Ariel wordlessly, wondering if the invitation to leave had included him as well. Apparently not, because she spoke to him, very softly. “I wish I hadn’t done that. It drives me crazy the way she’s so calm and so aggressive at the same time, but she means well, and she’s always been there for me.”

  Brett replied, “She’ll understand.”

  Brett wanted her to leave the overmind, get rid of Michael if he had any involvement at all, and start over. Clearly Ariel felt advised enough for the moment, so he just sat beside her, offering what mute comfort he could.

  Abruptly he felt as if Muriel wanted to tell him something. No, that made no sense, she had left. After a moment he unblocked a thoughtmail for the first time since Ariel’s original demonstration.

  Muriel communicated, ‘Patient confidentiality prevents me from telling you anything most of Ariel’s friends don’t know already.’

  Not an auditory hallucination. More like he remembered just hearing the words, complete with emotion and intonation. It seemed Dr. Buchanan was stretching a point. She meant to tell him something.

  Brett restrained a smile, not wanting Ariel to think she was being discussed behind her back. He wouldn’t either, though he felt some empathy for Muriel’s concern and frustration at not being heard out.

  They sat in companionable silence for a few more minutes. Then Ariel said, “Everyone’s exaggerating what’s happening, and blaming Michael for decisions I’ve made.”

  As much as he wanted to understand, today was hard for Ariel, and Brett didn’t want her to feel like she was being interrogated. He said only, “I saw you fall when we went skating last week. Not unusual, in itself, I guess.”

  Ariel shrugged. “Any effects are only temporary.”

  “I’m surprised Muriel doesn’t realize that.”

  Brett didn’t want to argue with her, since she didn’t want to hear it she would be upset to no purpose. The hint that if her doctor was concerned there might be something to worry about was as far as he would go.

  Ariel picked it up. “She won’t believe we’re almost done.”

  Brett squeezed her hand again. “If you don’t want to tell me what we’re talking about you don’t have to.”

  Ariel smiled. “That’s sweet.”

  For a minute Brett thought the conversation had ended. Then Ariel explained, “I’m helping Michael become part of the supermind.”

  For some warped reason Michael wanted to become part of the supermind, but couldn’t without help. Somehow Ariel had to lose more of her soul in the process.

  Brett exhaled. He’d try not to let presumptions get in the way of comprehension. Oceanians didn’t see the overmind that way. The people who were most concerned about Ariel didn’t see it that way. He’d already decided that Ariel was still human.

  “Do people often get hurt helping others join up?”

  Ariel shook her head. “Normally many people are involved, and do it during working hours, so nobody goes near the safety margin for totaling.”

  Brett wanted to provide emotional support, not interrogate Ariel, but he also wanted to understand what was going on so he could help. He asked, “Why not now?”

  She didn’t meet his eyes as she replied, and Brett wondered what she was holding back. “There’s prejudice against him for political reasons.”

  Brett held on to his poker face, but the idea struck Brett as funny, like a vegetarian being thrown into the lion’s den and finding they refused to eat him because he smelled bad. Ariel leaned back and closed her eyes. He couldn’t badger her now. He abandoned his earlier intentions and replied to Muriel’s thoughtmail. “Was Michael rejected by the overmind because of politics?”

  He half expected Dr. Buchanan would now be occupied with something else, and the reply would come much later – if ever. He was wrong. “No. If Ariel still pretends to believe that, ask her how many Galactics have joined.”

  Sounded like a group of expatriates. No, wait, Williams had referred to them as a political party. Probably worth knowing more about, but Brett didn’t want to get sidetracked right now.

  Avoiding assumptions, Brett asked Muriel, “Is their any chance Michael doesn’t know what this is doing to Ariel?”

  “No, and we were nice the first couple of times we explained it.”

  Ariel sat, oblivious to the silent dialog beside her. She stared at the images of her brain floating in the air before her. The occipital lobe cycled between red, pink, yellow and green. Ariel’s visual cortex was responding to the shifting image of itself, with a brief feedback delay as the nannies interpreted what was going on.

  Brett restrained a surge of anger at Michael. “Ariel says it’s only temporary.”

  The reply came back, “It would be if she quit her job and stopped trying to help Michael during a few weeks of therapy. Michael isn’t capable of learning what he wants Ariel to help him learn to do, and won’t admit it. Soon she’ll need to take a vacation from both her job and Michael to avoid permanent damage, and her job means a lot to her.”

  Brett felt the last pieces of the puzzle had fallen into place, why Ariel’s friends were immediately open to someone Michael had taken a dislike to, why she hadn’t told him about her career, the unique way of moving which had so captivated Brett the first time he saw her. Suddenly he visualized his hands around Michael’s too handsome neck, but he couldn’t really do that.

  Then another idea came to him, if anything less workable. He indulged the fantasy for a moment. How ironic to use the nannies themselves to get her first away from Michael, then Oceania herself. Even in imagination he couldn’t quite think what she would do after she left the hive mind and the planet. Fortunately it was an unrealistic problem, the most plausible result of the harebrained scheme was a slap in the face and the end of a friendship.

  Or was it? Brett remembered the time Ariel had spent with him – and never with him and Michael together. Though there had been many reasons not to speak of it, Brett was convinced she had the same emotions for Brett that he had for her.

  All the arguments against involvement that had been true yesterday still applied today. Rationally, he should take time to consider the cost before acting rashly. There was no time to think. The moment had to be seized – or else l
et pass forever in an excess of common sense. Perhaps she would slap him, save him from his own folly.

  He studied the floating brain image before him. His idea had captivated him, and he kept planning despite its flaws.

  When he knew he would never be readier, he touched Ariel’s brain again. The initial site of contact was the sensory cortex, the part that would represent her upper arm near the shoulder and back. Different neurons connected with different regions, and her brain responded. Would she experience a meaningless sensation, or a warning from her own equipment?

  The floating image before him indicated otherwise. The stimulated neurons signaled other dendrites, communicating with both the pleasure and pain centers. Brett imagined what Ariel felt: a light stinging pain, as if fingernails were being gently dragged across her skin. Somehow the mild pain was mixed with pleasure, although not completely localized in her arm.

  Ariel turned to face him, saw he hadn’t moved even if his fingers could have passed through her blouse. Before she could speak, Brett mimed embracing an invisible woman with his left arm and pulling her close. His right arm moved through empty air, but it might have followed the curve of a woman’s neck, passing over her shoulder while moving inward towards the middle of her back, sliding downward but curving outward again so they passed near but did not quite touch the cleft between an imaginary pair of buttocks.

  Did she feel invisible fingernails pass effortlessly through her clothing? She inhaled sharply as they might have brushed over her neck, arched her back as they would pass across her shoulders. A few moments later her face flushed. She gasped and leaned most of her weight against the cushions behind her. For a few moments she seemed to have trouble speaking, and when she managed her voice came out in an effortful whisper.

  “How dare you! I never gave you permission to do that to me!”

  Brett felt like a god.

  “Tell me to stop and I’ll apologize and go away. Better yet, slap me in the face.”

  He came close enough to make it easy. She whispered, “I can’t”

  “I guess you could use the overrides on your equipment.”

  She shook her head silently, closed the remaining distance between them.

  He tried to lift her onto his lap, but instead she shifted him and pressed his back down towards the seats of the couch. He complied and she locked her legs around his hips. He savored the curve of her shoulders and back with his hands instead of virtually. She slid her tongue in his mouth and he became aware of the heat inside her.

  When she pulled her tongue out of his mouth and started to undo his clothing, he managed to speak. “Ummm … birth control.”

  “The nannies will take care of it.”

  Chapter 15

  The couch was too narrow. A couple of hours ago, when Ariel had straddled him and enthusiastically begun bouncing up and down, her knee had slid off. Luckily she hadn’t pulled a groin muscle, which would have been an exceedingly painful way of killing the moment.

  Now he lay on the leather stomach down, with his head turned to the side. It was getting a little sticky. Ariel lay on top of his back, with her breasts pressing into the spot that was hard to reach. His body felt good all over.

  That part was nice, but when he relaxed his legs tended to sprawl. Either he made a conscious effort to keep them together, or his right leg fell over the side, pulling him off balance. He couldn’t even use his other leg for balance, because the couch had a back.

  Then his stomach rumbled, and that decided it for him. He asked Ariel, “You mind if I grab a snack? Can I bring you anything?”

  He felt her voice vibrating through his chest as well as hearing it with his ears. “Kitchen is right through there, or you can circle round through the hallway and go in the other side.”

  She didn’t move though. When he nudged her she asked, “Am I too heavy for you? Maybe the Space Force should have their officers do some exercise.”

  Her arms wrapped tightly around his chest as he levered himself to a standing position. Then she said innocently, “My legs are sort of dangling. Help me wrap them around your waist?”

  Brett did so, gripping her warm thighs near the hips. She unwrapped her arms from around his chest and gripped his shoulders. Then she said, “OK, I’ll tell you how this is going to work. When I kick your sides like this …”

  Her heels were dangling much too low to actually kick him in the sides. Instead they caught the outsides of his thighs. She continued, “… you walk forward. If I just kick on one side you turn away from the pain while continuing to walk forward. If I sit up straight and clench my thighs like this you stop.”

  She scissored her thighs together but didn’t make much progress against Brett’s torso muscles.

  Brett suddenly recalled video he had seen long ago on military history. A word drifted into his mind: ‘Cavalry’.

  He reached behind him and slapped Ariel’s bottom hard enough to sting.

  “Ow!”

  “I am not a horse,” Brett told her firmly.

  “The kitchen is still thataway, but I don’t know if I’m going to get you anything if you’re not good. There’s grass outside though.”

  Did horses eat grass or hay or something? Was hay a species of grass or vice versa?

  And did he really care? His stomach rumbled again. He walked towards the kitchen to get something for himself. He let Ariel stay as she was. The warmth of her body was pleasant, and she wasn’t that heavy to carry.

  He’d walked out into the hallway and was about to turn left into the kitchen when she started kicking him in the left thigh. The joke was becoming a bit annoying.

  “Even if I were a horse, you’d still be steering me the wrong way, away from the kitchen.”

  Ariel replied, “I thought I’d take you for a little walk first. You can graze later. I didn’t signal a stop. Gee-yap!”

  Presumably that was supposed to be horse language, though the little he recalled of horses made him uncertain they had their own language. Ariel kicked harder, and her round heels were becoming annoying. Enough was enough. He moved back to the plush carpeting of the interface room and got down on his hands and knees. People usually didn’t know how to fall right without training.

  Then he twisted his torso sharply. Her thighs had no real purchase and he had no trouble pulling her hands off his shoulders.

  “You bastard!”

  She didn’t really sound frightened or hurt. He turned over, using his weight to pin her body to the carpet. His hands pinned her upper arms down, raised above her shoulders, which immobilized her unless she knew how to wrestle.

  “You’re hurting me!”

  The dulcet tones belied the words, so he brought his head forward and bit her on the neck, first wetting it with his tongue, then scraping it lightly with his teeth a couple of times first to prepare her.

  Noises of protest soon changed to pleasure, but eventually he had to stop for breath.

  Ariel asked him, “What took you so long?”

  Brett studied her face, at a loss for words. So long to bite her? So long to seduce her? Something else entirely? She was an adult, capable of communicating, and had given him to understand she was in a relationship.

  In some ways he had come to know her well in the past few months. Her gentleness could sometimes be eclipsed by mischievousness. She was knowing and capable, but had a vulnerable side beneath that, and deep passion layered beneath both.

  Yet he had missed all the cues that she was part of the hive mind, because his brain was focused in one direction. Surely all the people at the party where he had met her had been wealthy, powerful, famous, or important in some other way. Nothing but the best for visiting diplomats from another world. He had never asked himself why she was there. Ariel had known as much as his instructors about nanotechnology. And she had argued with the imperious old gnome at the Herbirthday celebration as an equal. Brett could have seen if his eyes were open.

  According to Muriel, his lover had been awar
e of and encouraged the misunderstanding. Perversely, Brett felt flattered, because he knew Ariel hadn’t wanted to drive him away. Now though, he would really get to know her.

  Brett asked, “Did you grow up in Landfall?”

  The city where foreign diplomats were hosted, the beautiful city by the Ocean and the spaceport, the only Oceanian city Brett had seen more than once. As good a guess as any.

  She nodded. “My dad was a Meddy.”

  When Brett’s eyes widened in puzzlement she added, “A medtech had some of the skills of doctors, nurses, and pharmacists, and works closely with all three. They make housecalls and they’re especially trained to observe and do examinations.”

  And the information could go directly to the doctor’s brain if needed. Convenient but creepy.

  “Get off of me,” Ariel told him. “You’re heavy.”

  He released her arms and propped himself up on his hands so they bore most of his weight, almost as if he were doing pushups. His knees were on the ground though, and his midriff and thighs still touched hers. He couldn’t quite give up the feeling of her underneath him yet, and she didn’t complain again. She continued, “He had a way with people and everybody loved him. So did my mom. I’m not sure she was an artistic genius or anything, but she made people feel good about the way their house was going to look.”

  She swallowed and continued, “Not so little, Ariel. Maybe I was overwhelmed by the number of friends they had, and my brother and sister had. I kind of avoided crowds, even though I also wanted people to like me the way they did the rest of my family.”

  The words came pouring out. Perhaps it had been hard for her to keep so much hidden.

  “Even as a little girl I knew they had ways of learning stuff I couldn’t use. I somehow thought they could teach me the secret of having everyone at a party love me without my being overwhelmed or feeling shy. When I was old enough I begged to get the nannies early, but it’s not usually medically recommended, and my dad was especially against it. By the time I was safely a year past puberty I had turned fourteen, and it seemed to me I had waited forever.