by LeAnn Mason
“Let’s check how you’re healing, shall we? Maybe we can even remove the bandages. Wouldn’t that be lovely?”
The woman was totally in her own world now. I was nothing more than a means to an end, a subject from which to gather data. That meant my usefulness was finite. At least the small woman behind the bat-shit crazy doctor was not as cold and unfeeling as her superior. She needed to be the one to work my abysmal charm on. She might be my only hope, but I’d need to be alone with her.
As Doctor Parmore began to unwrap my forearm, a figure appeared at my feet like some ginger genie, causing me to jump in alarm. “What the Hell?” I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to someone just popping into existence right in front of me. I’d forever be worried a heart attack would be the result. At that moment, though, I’d probably take it and call it an early release.
Tanner gave me an apologetic wave as he peered at me a moment. As he really looked, his eyes became impossibly wide and the color—what little there was in his pasty complexion—completely drained from his skin. “Oh, my God, Nathalee.” He gasped.
“What?” Then, I looked where his gaze had landed, where my forearm was now bandage-free. Bile rose in my throat as I took in the deep-red swath of muscle that stared at me through a length of missing skin. The chasm had to be a couple inches wide and several inches long, spanning basically my entire lower arm. “Oh, my God,” I echoed Tanner’s sentiment before I bent over and vomited copious amounts of whatever was in my stomach onto the floor. As a bonus, the fluid landed close enough to Doctor Evil to splash onto her lower extremities.
If I could have, I would have smiled at that small victory. As it was, I was too devastated by the sight before me, the color that drew my eye like a magnet. Out of habit, I brought my right arm up to wipe at my mouth. Bad move. The wound was now only inches from my face, the glaring crimson a screaming sign of what shouldn’t be seen. My stomach tried to revolt a second time, but there was nothing left, so I sat and gagged profusely.
I’d effectively been skinned—with surgical precision. A wail rose in my throat as I recalled the other places I’d noticed a bandage. What other horrors had befallen me? What had I yet to endure? Could I endure? As a sob wracked my body, my boyfriend’s father smirked, and Doctor Parmore didn’t even notice as she greedily took in my “progress”.
Only the nurse seemed affected, closing her eyes and pursing her lips. Her thoughts showed anguish, but she was somehow stuck in her role. Sympathy only went so far.
“Hang in there, Nat. We're on our way,” Tanner's projection whispered vehemently, a deadly gleam in his eye I'd never have guessed he would possess. A mechanical nod was my response. I couldn't afford to break down if I wanted to stay whole—at least, mentally—let alone escape as Tanner promised. Then, he was gone. I guessed he couldn't stomach the scene any longer. Once again, I was alone in my trials.
“Could I have some water, please? To… rinse my mouth?” Vomit was still heavy on my tongue, the taste threatening to cause another bout. A plastic bottle landed in my palm a moment later, the nurse stepping out of reach immediately to resume her scribe duties.
An errant thought of the doctor's caught my attention as I drank greedily after swishing a mouthful to discharge the funk, and I couldn't stop the question from leaving my dry lips. “What about my father?”
My question was met with silence. She hadn't even heard the inquiry as she moved to inspect my back where I'd felt another bandage. I was more than glad that this one I couldn't see. After my forearm, I was sure that I didn't want to know what else she'd done. To distract myself, as well as insist that Doctor Parmore not ignore me, I poked again. “What. About. My. Father?” I ground out as I snaked out a hand to grip her shoulder. The move finally got her attention but also that of the Primal bouncer who stepped forward menacingly.
I speared him with an icy stare as I squeezed the delicate bones beneath my fingertips, a cold smile curving my mouth as I rallied my strength—both mental and physical. I would not break. I would get out of here. Soon.
Doctor Parmore squeaked, attempting to duck her shoulder away from the pressure but deciding that answering me would be in her best interest. Right you are, lady, I thought without sympathy. The woman would get jack shit from me, especially sympathy for causing her pain.
“This project was born between me… and your father.”
“You lie,” I hissed, gripping tighter when anger rose up at her words.
She nearly buckled, grabbing the bed’s railing to keep her from collapsing to her knees. I could feel the menace rolling off of Holden’s sperm donor, but I couldn't bring myself to look away from my former boss. “It’s true. In school, we were close, both fascinated with genetics and the impact they had on the Enhanced. We experimented and hypothesized about what could be changed—improved.”
With a growl, I released her with a push. I wanted her away from me, but I knew she wouldn’t go far. “That doesn’t mean he shared your non-consent vision.”
“We had plans. We were going to delete the negative genes and then introduce genes that had been established to hold positive attributes in known Enhanced. But then… he backed out. Discontinued any contact with me and our studies.” She narrowed her shrewd eyes at me behind their blocky frames before continuing. “Shortly after, you were born. Because I didn't believe he'd just stopped, I thought maybe he’d continued his experiments… on you. But my appraisal of you showed nothing overly remarkable, even when I had you under my nose. Your clumsiness and utter lack of brilliance were enough to put me off the scent. I mean, surely, your father would have corrected such things. But, here we stand. You are special in some ways, and I believe it was your father who made you so.”
With that, she moved back to examine the patchwork that was my body like nothing had been revealed. Like she hadn’t just completely obliterated my mind, my entire notion of self. I was too stunned to object as I replayed my life, my father’s hesitations, fears, and warnings that he’d issued my entire life. He’d known. Hell, he’d done it to me! My world was crumbling with one truth: I was engineered—by my father.
“He was very sloppy about it. There are so many more things about you that should have been improved. I need to study your DNA more to figure out what he put in there and where…” Her mumbled rattling tapered off as she lost herself in thought of all the possibilities.
“He saw that you were nuttier than peanut brittle,” I mumbled as I looked around the room for anything of use in helping me escape this nightmare situation, I had no doubt that this was just the tip of the iceberg in the pain department. My body stung, throbbed, and ached, as if to remind me of what it had already endured.
“He wasn't Sage enough to do what needed to be done!” she spit at me. She felt that my existence—at least in my truly-hybrid state—was my father's betrayal. “He wasn't man enough.”
My fist shot from my side and out of my sight, to smash violently across the crazy-ass lady's cheek. Her head was thrown forcibly into the wall behind her, where she crumbled like a rag doll and slid limply to the floor in a disheveled heap. I only had a moment, one heartbeat of satisfaction, before the Primal was on me, his strong hands encircling my neck.
I coughed and sputtered, clawing at his hands uselessly as he squeezed my throat. Black specks danced before my eyes as I struggled to pull in a breath. Just one breath.
That was what this man did. A memory flashed in my mind—a virtual twin to this moment—where this same man, with these same burning eyes and gritted teeth, attempted to choke the life out of a child. His child. Another memory surfaced in its wake. One where that beautiful and fierce man told me that I needed to fight dirty to make sure I made it home to him. It was time.
With every ounce of my rapidly-diminishing strength I could muster, I brought my hand to grip the side of the demon's head. With my thumb in his left eye, I pushed as hard as I could, as if attempting to peel an orange. Every finger dug into his flesh.
I d
idn't hesitate. I couldn't. At any other time, I'd be way too squeamish to literally gouge out someone's eye.
Not today. Not this man. The pressure at my neck released incrementally as his screams increased with each push of my thumb, driving the digit further into the pulpy and warm orifice. I couldn't think about how the pressure built against the force I exerted, or how that pressure suddenly gave, like the crushing of a grape. How the warm, wet, and slightly-chunky fluid was now flowing over my thumb—some having spurted on my face with the force of expulsion. Or how the shrieks had become deafening screams as my attacker realized his eyeball had just exploded.
CHAPTER 23
His grip switched to my arms, one hand landing directly on the large chunk of bare, shiny muscle, forcing my own scream to erupt with the wild burst of pain. Taking a deep breath, I squirmed so that my legs draped over the side of the cot and put every ounce of strength I could muster into a left-handed shot to his dick. The punch forced him to buckle forward in excruciating man-pain before I brought my knee up to meet his descending face. The impact and the shock of his injuries finally rendered him unconscious. I smirked cruelly at his limp form before gathering as much spit as I could muster and expelling it at him in disgust.
The room was monitored, the cameras seeming to cover every inch of the cell. Someone had to know what I'd done. Someone would be coming to contain me, if not kill me. I found the nurse, wild-eyed and cowering in the far corner of the room, as far away from the feral Enhanced girl as she could get. I narrowed my eyes at her while pulling myself free of the machinery monitoring my crazy and tethering me in place, and gave her a choice.
“Help me get out of here, now, and I'll forget about your involvement. Hinder me, and you'll suffer like they did.” I jutted my chin at the waste of life whimpering and covering his eyes, nearly blocking the door and cutting off my escape route.
Wisely, she chose to help. “Grab my music player,” I instructed as I bent to pull the stretchy lanyard from the unconscious zealot’s wrist. A moan alerted me that she was coming to. Another noise called my attention, and I whipped my head toward the closed door. “Do you have access to the codes to get us out of here?” We needed to move, but maybe forcing the oncoming security unit through the small doorway as a choke point would give me a fighting chance. I needed a weapon and to make sure that my captors in the room with me stayed down. I was running out of time.
The team moving down the corridor hallway was disciplined and in sync, but the distinct thoughts were fuzzy at best. I’d probably be incapacitated in half a second… unless I could hide and make them think I’d already fled the room and they were too late. Nope. That wouldn’t work, either. I had momentarily forgotten about the cameras stationed in the corners, falsely giving myself a glimmer of hope.
Fine. Fighting it was, even if it was futile. With my newly-acquired key, I began opening the drawers and cabinets that I hadn’t had access to before. Bingo! I thought as I opened a rolling drawer that had individual packages of sterile utensils. A scalpel glinted up at me like a beacon, and I grabbed at it without thinking too much about my forming plan.
“Get up, Doc. You are going to help me out now.” I snagged a hand around her upper arm and yanked, pulling the woman to her feet dazedly. “Nurse? I’m sorry, don’t know your name. Please make sure that Daddy Douchebag down there moaning gets enough pain meds, from my drip maybe, to make him stay down.”
“You’ll never get out of here, and even if you do, you have no way to get back to anywhere,” Batshit Doc spat at me through clenched teeth. I smiled at the fact that I’d hit her hard enough to bust her lip and split her cheek, even in my weakened state.
My time was up. The voices were very close, but I couldn’t tell much more than that with my head still foggy from the meds. Time to get this show on the road…
“Guess what? You get to help me with my scalpel skills.” I flashed my new accessory in front of her face as I slid around behind her, one arm wrapped around her waist and the other pressing the scalpel to her throat. “Now… stay still. I don’t want to lose my hostage just yet. Pretty sure I could find the carotid pretty quickly.”
Like a sign, the beep announcing the door’s opening rang out its four-digit siren song. I tightened my grip on both my former captor and my only weapon. My vision blurred a moment, and I realized that my body was beginning to notify me of the pain it was in now that the medication was no longer being pumped through my system. Once the adrenaline I was running on passed, I would be down for the count. My only hope was that I’d make it out of my Hell before then.
Nat? It’s Holden… I’m coming in…
Holden? He was outside the door? How had I not heard his mind before then? I couldn’t help the hopeful lean my body did toward the door in anticipation as it slowly opened inward, half a dark-clad body stepping through the space.
An alarmed squeak sounded from my hostage, bringing me back to the fact that my trembling hands probably weren’t comforting to her. A peek around her shoulder showed that, sure enough, I had nicked her. Drawn blood dribbled over my fingers where I still clenched the scalpel to the good doctor’s throat.
Nat, sweetheart. It’s me—us—you can let her go. She can’t hurt you now. Come on. Holden stepped toward me slowly, his molten mercury eyes never leaving mine. He stepped over the now-unconscious form of his long-lost daddy without even noticing who it was. Come on, come to me. She can’t hurt you anymore. Let’s go home.
“Holden.” Words were hard to eke out. “How are you here? Where are the others?” I took a moment to really tune in to the mental voices of the “elite team” I’d heard coming what felt like forever ago. Hoping it’d tell me what I wanted, what I needed to hear.
“Hybrid, stand down,” Devlin commanded from out in the corridor, like the hard-ass I knew him to be. Another dark-clad body emerged into the room. My mentor’s large frame stood before me, his blue eyes looking a little too shiny. His face strained. “Thought we’d leave you?” he joked pitifully. But in his mind? His relief nearly broke me. “Let’s get gone. She’ll get hers.”
Finally, I released the tension holding me upright and allowed my arm to drop away from my captive’s throat before pushing her away from me and into Devlin. “That one was supposed to have gotten his already,” I grumbled, kicking Daddy James’ prone body as I moved to exit my captivity. “How did you guys just waltz in here?” I asked in a daze. “I was all geared up for a fight.”
“Looks like you already had a bit of a fight in here.” Dev’s eyes caught on the bright red patch of my forearm before jerking his head away with a muted but vehement curse. “We had some help. Speaking of, where is…” He spun to locate the only person who’d been free of the stand-off, finally noticing the completely broken and bloody man lying on the floor. The vision chased a tiny bit of his anger away to allow for pride. “Nice work, Dae,” he commented before stepping over the body. Devlin extended a hand toward the fragile female nurse who’d been as far from me as she could get for most of the day. “Stephanie, I presume? Agent Forsithe is out in the hall, if you could just…” He motioned for her to follow him out the door.
I… I was so worried about you. I didn’t want to leave, but we had no choice… we had no resources and no idea where you had been taken. Holden pressed his forehead to mine, eyes closed, just breathing me in, pleading for my forgiveness. I took the time to do the same in return. His smell of pine and sunshine could see me through anything. I’d need him more than ever, because who knew what craziness my mind would throw at me after this, or when. The things I’d learned would haunt me just as much as the deeds done.
Holden finally looked at the body we had to walk over to exit the room and stopped dead in his tracks. Anger and shock vibrated through every inch of his taut body, and I was glad Jade wasn’t here to have to soak up all the crazy emotions floating about the space. What is he doing here? Did you do that to him?
“Let’s just get out of here, okay? We can tell
each other… everything… somewhere else, please.” With a nod, Holden picked me up and toted me over the knocked-out man—those drugs sedated him easily—and out into the hallway without another thought. There may have been a solid kick to the man’s torso as he’d “stepped” over, but that was hearsay. No witnesses.
Out in the corridor, there was no shortage of activity. Many men dressed in body armor with FBI emblazoned across the chest scurried about determinedly, like ants at a picnic. I couldn’t help but gape at all the activity, my eyes stalling when they landed on my team lined up along the far wall all along the walk. They had been told to wait in a more suitable, more open place, but they’d refused to leave the area. There were two new-ish faces among the masses: Tanner and Aimee.
Every set of eyes was riveted to me, faces showing various degrees of relief and happiness as they stood, but Jade couldn't wait. “Nathalee!” she exclaimed as she broke from her spot and tripped forward to throw herself around me. I caught her with less grace than I'd like to think I would have normally and tried to hide my wince. There were so many emotions flying around the space, I figured maybe I'd get away with it. No luck.
“You're in pain.” Her mind was so consumed with thoughts of me that any change was immediately picked up. Jade pushed back and held me at arm's length to get a good look at me, taking in my state and the blood covering various positions of my captive uniform and then my forearm. “Oh, my God, girl. Thank God we got to you. We got you,” she repeated on a whisper as she came back in for a gentle but fierce embrace. We stood there, in the middle of the bustling hallway, glued to each other like the lifelines we were, neither of us able to pull away. Neither of us were able to stop the salty tears from escaping the confines of our eyes. I grabbed her up tighter. I’ll never let her go. Never.
“We ready to get the Hell outta here?” Dev asked rhetorically and circled his hand in the air, single finger extended, the symbol for “round ‘em up”. He sidestepped into another room to speak briefly with one of the men labeled as FBI, handing him something from his pocket. A coin emerged and Dev clapped him on the back as they shook hands and said their farewells.
