by Amelia Jade
“How are you feeling?” she asked.
“You should see the other truck,” he bragged, twisting the normal statement to imply that he felt like he’d been hit by one. “How long?”
Maddy didn’t question him. She seemed to know what he was asking.
“You were out for about twelve hours,” she said quietly.
“Twelve hours?” he exclaimed, his hands moving in protest, breaking the grip between them. “That’s impossible.”
His bed was facing the door out of the room. He recognized the silvery metal walls, white-tiled floor, and medicinal cabinets lining the walls. This was Flint’s medical ward at another of the small nightclubs he owned. The clubs had proven to be wise investments. They allowed for all sorts of people to come and go over the course of a night without drawing attention. Connor put that thought from his mind as he focused on the clock above the door.
It was now fourteen hours since he had sent Maddy on her way. Two hours of escape, and twelve of unconsciousness. Something was wrong.
He relaxed into the bed, relief that she was okay just now flooding into him as his addled brain recognized that fact. Connor had worried about her, but the sudden easing of weight on his shoulders surprised him. Apparently he had been worrying more than he thought.
But twelve hours? Even the few times Connor had been hit with a tranquilizer gun he had never been out that long. Fourteen minutes? Sure. An hour? Perhaps. Something was very, very wrong. Even now he felt lethargic and felt weak.
“How do you feel now?” Maddy asked.
He looked into her eyes, yearning for the touch of her hand. She looked worried, her arms now nervously crossed in front of her. Whatever had happened to him had scared her, badly.
“Better now,” he whispered truthfully, slipping out of his professional role for just a moment, not breaking eye contact with her at all.
The pair continued to look at each other, neither moving nor speaking. Something passed between them then. Connor knew he might never understand what, but something did. A tear formed in her eye as her guard crumbled under his gaze.
“Hey, come here,” he said, reaching out and pulling her close. Pain twinged in his midsection, and he noticed that Maddy was very careful to use her hands to rest herself on either side of him as he pulled her in close.
But in the end, she allowed herself to be embraced by him.
“I thought you were going to die,” she whispered, looking up at him.
The single tear rolled down her cheek.
Connor reached out with a finger and gently brushed it away. Her eyes were filled, but no more fell, only that single, solitary droplet made its way down her face.
“I didn’t,” he told her, murmuring softly into her ear as he nuzzled his face against hers.
There was a pause. A tremble ran through her body.
“Good,” she replied.
He laughed, resting his forehead against hers. Their eyes locked onto each other.
What are you doing? You just met this woman! She is the mission, you are a soldier. You have your orders. Do not complicate things.
His bear roared in anger, fighting for supremacy, to be heard and obeyed. Connor had fought with his bear before, but he had never felt it so insistent, so demanding. He swallowed nervously as he realized that no matter what the voice inside of him was saying, this time around, the bear was going to win.
The animal growled triumphantly as he tilted his chin slightly, using his fingers to lift Maddy’s until they were level. He had kissed her outside of the safe house, but that had been a spur of the moment thing. This was far more deliberate, far more planned. His skin tingled with the knowledge that they were going to kiss. Butterflies danced in his stomach, pulling at what he now remembered was the knife wound from his earlier fight. Something about that tugged at his brain, but was brushed aside by vivid memories of the brief kiss they had shared earlier.
“Connor, I—”
He pressed his lips against hers, silencing whatever she was going to say. Connor had to act, then and there. If she chose to pull away, he would let her. But he knew, instinctively knew, that this was one of those moments where if he didn’t follow through, he would regret it for the rest of his life. So he brought his face close and kissed Maddy. One of his hands slid up her back, holding the back of her head, fingers running through her hair.
She tensed, and he prepared himself for the awkwardness of her pulling back, denying the kiss. But after a few tense heartbeats, Maddy allowed herself to fall into him, returning the passion in spades. Their lips moved frantically as they searched for confirmation that the other was alive. His brain knew it, but he needed more reassurance. He needed to feel it.
“Ahem.” A throat cleared in the doorway.
They split abruptly. Maddy pulled herself off of Connor and slid back into the chair at the bedside, studiously ignoring the man who had walked in. He glanced at her quickly, trying and only partially succeeding at hiding a grin at the sight of her reddening cheeks.
“Andre,” he said gruffly. He liked the other man, but he should have known better than to interrupt. The door did have a small window in it.
“Sorry,” the shifter replied, and to his credit, he sounded rather sincere. “But we need to talk.”
“Where’s Flint?”
Andre shrugged.
Connor frowned. That seemed unlike him. Flint should be the one here, talking to him about whatever bad news there was. And it was bad news; there was no mistaking that. Andre’s voice hadn’t given it away, but the tense stance he had adopted spoke volumes to Connor.
“Okay,” he said at last. “Lay it on me.”
“Look at your stomach,” Andre said instead.
He glanced down, pulling up the remnants of his blood-encrusted shirt. His right side was a mass of bruised flesh and a three-inch-long line that indicated where the blade had entered his body.
“What the hell?” he said, looking in shock at how visible it all was. He looked at Maddy. “I thought I was out for twelve hours?!”
“You were,” Andre said.
“Impossible. This would be long gone by now.”
The other shifter nodded. “And it should have been healed by the time you got here.”
Connor’s eyes narrowed. “Should have?” He didn’t remember much of the last of his flight. The pain from his leg had been too much to handle as he forced himself to walk on the broken joint to get to the club.
“It was still bleeding when you walked in the front door,” Andre said, crossing his arms in front of him.
“Bullshit.”
“I can show you the damn bloodstains if you wish.” Andre didn’t back down from his statement.
“Why didn’t I heal?” Connor asked at last.
“I’m no scientist, but I’m pretty sure it was because of this.” He produced a plastic vial capped with a black lid. Inside was a bit of green sludge.
“I don’t get it.” Connor looked back up at Andre.
The big shifter went over to the table on the far side of Connor. Maddy had recovered now and was watching with interest as well. He dropped his hand off the bed behind him. Her fingers found his in seconds, intertwining where Andre couldn’t see. He’d caught them kissing, but he didn’t need to know that it was more than just a physical need between them.
At least, Connor thought it was more than just that.
“Hand,” Andre said.
Connor stuck out his hand. Andre swabbed a dirty rag into the back of his palm. A bit of green gunk was still on it, and it smeared slightly on the skin. Andre then grabbed a knife from his belt and used the tip to make a small incision an inch to the right of the smear. A cut appeared, welled blood, and disappeared almost as quickly as his shifter healing sealed it up immediately.
Then he moved the blade and mimicked the same cut where the green smear was. The wound welled blood and continued to bleed. Andre cleared the area with an alcohol pad, and the wound began to close. Slo
wly.
His jaw was hanging slack as he realized what Andre had just demonstrated.
“They found a way to stop us from healing.”
Maddy gasped behind him, her fingers tightening.
***
“Not stop,” Andre said. “But drastically slow, possibly to the point of being slower than a normal human.”
Connor looked at his hand, the cuts both gone now. The difference had been so stark no one could have missed it. “No wonder I was in such bad shape. I was so blinded by my leg, I didn’t even realize I was bleeding out.”
Andre nodded. “You almost did. It was touch and go there for a bit, until we cut off any flesh where this stuff might have gone. Once we could get the outer cut to seal, we knew your insides would take care of themselves in time.”
He nodded. No one in the Underground was a doctor, and operating on someone was beyond anyone’s skill. But closing wounds, stitching, etcetera, was something that they were all proficient in.
There was a knock on the door, and then Flint walked in. He gave Andre a look. The shifter nodded, gave Connor and Maddy a last look, and then departed. Although Flint wasn’t a shifter himself, he was the head of the Underground, and the shifters gave him deference out of respect for his actions in creating it to help their own kind. No one knew why Flint did what he did, but the shifter community in King City was very grateful for it.
“Flint, we need to tell everyone about this,” Connor said seriously. “Valen, Marcus, everyone back in Genesis Valley needs to be aware of it, not to mention the shifter community at large.”
The leader of the Underground, and Connor’s nominal boss for the time being, nodded. “I know. I’ll make the call and tell them personally myself. I’ll also get a sample of it sent out, along with the vial you brought back. They have a better lab than us, so maybe they can figure out just what it is.”
Connor nodded. He had almost forgotten about the vial. “I’m surprised it stayed intact, to be honest. I figured in all the fighting and running it would have gotten smashed. Hopefully it’s a clue, because we’re going to need one.”
“Why?” Maddy asked the question before Flint could speak.
Connor quickly told Flint about the Agent at the shipyard, and how he was stronger than other Agents had been, even Extremis ones.
“What does that have to do with anything?” Flint asked sharply.
What the fuck is bugging him today? Flint was a tricky fellow to understand, but he was being unusually cranky. Connor filed it away to ask him at a different time.
“One of the Agents sent after me today was an Extremis Agent. A strong one. Much, much stronger than I am. Stronger than any bear shifter I’ve ever known. I’ve sparred with Valen before. This Agent hit almost as hard as him.”
“I don’t get it,” Maddy said as Flint’s eyes widened in surprise.
Connor hesitated. That information wasn’t exactly his to share.
“I’m in it this far,” Maddy said. “I know Valen is one of the owners of that mining company back at your home, the one that’s funding all of this,” she said, waving her hands around. “I’m assuming he’s a shifter too. What kind?”
“Gryphon,” Connor said after just a short pause. He smiled. Damn, she was smart. Excellent powers of deductive reasoning too. “And a strong one. There are very few species of shifter stronger than that. The Extremis Agent I fought was just a half-blood. He wasn’t even a full shifter, but he hit like a full-blooded gryphon. Whatever they’re doing with that serum, they’re getting better at it.” He looked at the other two in the room.
“We’re running out of time,” he said at last. “If they keep this up, we’ll be obsolete.”
Maddy gasped.
Flint’s eyes took on a faraway stare as he contemplated that bit of information.
“Flint?” Connor asked after a moment. “What do you want to do now?”
The other man shook himself visibly, forcing his attention back to the conversation. “I’m working on arranging transportation out of the city for tomorrow night. Rest up until then. Something tells me you’re going to need all of your strength.”
Connor frowned as he left the room, but then let it go. Flint was under a lot of pressure these days. The Agency was moving more and more men into King City with every passing day, and the Underground’s resources were stretched almost to the breaking point. Something else must have happened. Flint would tell him what it was eventually. He always did.
He yawned.
Maddy rose from her chair. “Get some rest,” she said, giving him a tender hug that lingered on and on. “I’ll come check on you in the morning.”
Connor just nodded as his exhaustion caught up with him.
I must have lost a lot of blood. I’m not normally this sleep—
Chapter Ten
Madison
“What do you want to do today?” Connor asked as she entered the medical room the next morning.
Maddy stopped as she realized he was clad only in his underwear. He was turned to the side, but she still caught a glimpse of his large bulge. Cheeks flushing, she turned around. Several responses to his question darted through her mind, all of them influenced by what she had just seen, and none of them appropriate to voice.
Clearing her throat, she let Connor know that they weren’t going to be doing much, as he needed to rest.
“I feel fine,” he told her. “Honestly, I do. They brought me a huge breakfast to help restore my energy, and now I’m good to go.” He waved at the scattered piles of dishes.
Maddy felt her eyebrows rise. There were enough plates there to feed a family of six! How the hell did someone afford to be a shifter?
“Yeah, nice try, mister,” she told him as he finally pulled on a fresh pair of shorts. Part of her felt sad at that, so she consoled herself with eyeballing the hell out of his muscular body. He reached up to pull on a shirt, the thirty-six pack of abs rippling delightfully as he pulled it on. Okay, maybe it was only twenty-four. She didn’t want to spend her time counting them, only watching. The white material clung tightly to his large biceps, doing nothing but enhancing the muscles they struggled to contain.
She swallowed hard as her body reacted to the show going on in front of her. Nipples hardened, rubbing gently against the material of her bra. She silently said thanks for her choice to wear the one with the extra thick padding that morning. The last thing she wanted was to make her reaction obvious. Now if she could just stop herself from staring…
“Maddy?”
“Huh?” She blinked twice, looking away from the massive mound of muscles and into the sea-blue eyes that were staring at her.
“I asked if you had eaten.”
“Oh, yeah, I had a little,” she said, finally getting herself under control, and purposefully ignoring the sly grin that crossed Connor’s face. It disappeared just as quickly, but she had seen it.
Damn. Now he’s going to want to talk about our little makeout session yesterday.
Was that a bad thing? The thought had come to her unbidden, but now that Maddy thought about it, she didn’t know what she wanted. She barely knew Connor, and yet, she would be lying if she tried to say they didn’t have any sort of chemistry together.
Most men were intimidated by her, or reacted the complete opposite. Some of them got so worked up by her strength and desire to do as she pleased, that they tried extra hard to exert their control. It was extremely annoying. Maddy knew she was strong-willed, and wasn’t willing to give it up. But she didn’t want a man who turned to mush either. She wanted someone who would respect her independence and smarts, but could still “be the man” when necessary.
It might have been an outdated concept in the changing world, but being taller and more muscular than many, she found that when a man did the little things, like holding the door, or pulling out her chair at a restaurant, it made her feel more feminine and beautiful. It was something she had a hard time feeling on her own. So Maddy knew she need
ed a mix of old-fashioned and modern, all mixed into one man.
Was that Connor?
“Well, I’m not staying cooped up in this room all day,” he said, moving past her, his body dragging purposefully along hers as he moved to the door. “So at a minimum I’m going to move around the club.”
He pulled the door open and held it, gesturing for her to precede him.
Maybe.
Fighting back a delighted smile, she cruised through the door and then headed toward the dance floor. Although she had spent much of her time with Connor, waiting for him to wake, Maddy had had enough time to wander the club and its back rooms to familiarize herself with the layout. She did it partly out of curiosity, but also to learn the exits, in case trouble followed them. It irked her to realize how quickly she was becoming paranoid, but it irked her less to know it might keep her alive.
Oddly enough, Maddy had a small affinity for being alive, and would prefer to keep it that way.
“Where am I allowed to go?” Connor asked, moving up alongside her on the right. His left hand dangled at his side.
“I’m not sure you’re allowed anywhere,” she said sternly.
She let her right hand fall to her side.
“I am somewhat thirsty. They must have water somewhere around here, right?” Connor asked.
Maddy nodded, distracted momentarily as their hands brushed lightly against each other. She liked the warmth he seemed to exude from within. Every time they touched, she was thrust into the heat. Although she didn’t suffer from the constant feeling of cold that many women did, Maddy still enjoyed a good dose of heat, and Connor seemed to produce it in spades. She spent a moment daydreaming about lying curled up with him, watching a movie while she basked in his radiating warmth.
“It looks so different during the day,” she muttered as they entered the dance floor.
Normal lighting was on, illuminating the bar in a way its nightly patrons would never see. Even the few lights turned on at the end of the night were nothing compared to the full glow that illuminated every last corner just then. There certainly were no corners to sneak off to, to perform drunken acts that would shock the sober mind when it remembered.
