Naked

by Alexandra Christian

  “Isn’t it beautiful? The wheels of progress turn, yet nothing really changes. Except, of course, who has the power to turn the cogs.”

  “You call this progress?”

  “You don’t?”

  “Of course not,” Jess scoffed. “You’re building a clean, picturesque imitation. Like those ridiculous re-creations of the Great Pyramid in Las Vegas. It’s bland and it’s boring. Hollow. No soul.” She glanced at Machine, watching as he feigned disinterest. “How appropriate.”

  “I would think that you of all people would understand what I’m doing.”

  “What? Raping a planet for your own nefarious purposes?”

  “I’d hardly call this rape.”

  He strolled toward her, coming so close that she could feel the sticky heat of his breath against her cheek. It made her stomach turn.

  “I’m saving the human race, Miss Addison. You and I both know that the end is coming down there on Earth. The portal has been opened, and it won’t be closed again. We couldn’t stop it even if we wanted to.” The tips of Machine’s fingers slid across the exposed skin at the back of her neck, and she flinched. “Evacuation is the only option.”

  “Don’t give me that,” she said, stepping out of reach. “You think the amulet will help you control those things, but they can’t be controlled. Surely you must know that.”

  “Control them? Why would I want to control them, love? Once that floodgate is opened, and the Earth becomes overrun by Others, who do you think those scattering, panicky human insects will come to for help? The one who holds the keys to the panic room. I’ll be a messiah for the new age. Anything I want will be mine for the taking. I’ll be the grand master of the game, holding all the cards, controlling all the pieces. If I can’t rule their world, then I’ll make my own.”

  “You’re insane,” she sighed, pushing past him. “For all your planning and scheming, all you’re really interested in is chaos. You’re like a spoiled child with a magnifying glass, burning the ants to watch them scatter.”

  “It shouldn’t make any difference to you. Really, it’s none of your concern. The only thing you should care about is that your dim-witted sister makes it here before I decide you’ve outlived your usefulness.” Hooking his arm around her waist, he pulled her against him seductively. “Which would be a pity. When I rule the world, it would be nice to have such a pleasing pet.”

  Jess tensed, and looked away. His breath was gamey with a sour scent of old whiskey. She coughed, biting back the bile collecting in her throat.

  He gave a dry chuckle and shoved her aside. “It would pay to have a powerful friend like me. You should look on me as a friend.”

  * * *

  Phoebe descended the broken stairs slowly, being careful to avoid the rotten places. Every step was painful, and she winced as her lacerated feet came down on the hard surface. Not to mention that she’d turned her ankle and could already feel the swelling at the joint.

  After everything they’d been through, finally a bit of luck—the old house had running water and a closet with a few clothes. She had managed to find a man’s Oxford shirt and a pair of jeans. She’d needed a bit of rope to keep them from falling off her hips, but she was glad to be warm, dry, and reasonably safe.

  A warm glow and the scent of burning wood drew her into what appeared to be a living room. Hulking outlines of furniture stood out in the shadows, and despite the fact that everything appeared to have an inch of dust on its surface, the swaybacked old couch looked inviting. There was no sign of St. John, and Phoebe relaxed a bit, limping over to the couch and reclining.

  Truth be told, he made her extremely nervous. Especially after that little incident with the hound from Hell. She’d been a blubbery mess for several minutes, and she was sure she’d looked and sounded like an idiot.

  She closed her eyes as fatigue took over. The pounding rain against the windowpanes and the crackling fire conspired to relax her, and in seconds she was nearly asleep.

  “Ah, there you are.” Phoe opened her eyes, and St. John was standing over her with some sort of tray.

  Evidently, he’d showered too. He was topless and wearing different torn jeans, and his hair was a sopping mess. Phoe had never thought of herself as a sexual being, but looking at the delicious geography of his form was starting to make her reconsider her position.

  “I was beginning to think you’d run away.”

  “Please don’t say ‘run’ to me ever again,” she grumbled.

  He grinned and sat down next to her feet. “I have to say, I was damned impressed. I’ve never seen a human outrun a hellhound. If you hadn’t stumbled, I think you would have made it to the house without my intervention.” Taking her ankle delicately in his hand, he lifted and examined her wounded foot. Though he had given all indication that he was an emotionless robot, his touch was gentle. His fingertips grazed a cut just in the arch, and Phoebe gasped and pulled back. “No, don’t touch it.”

  “Shut it,” he ordered. “If any of these cuts were to get infected, you’d be in serious trouble. I can’t carry you all the way to Canaveral.” She started to protest again, but the intensity of his stare silenced her.

  Shadows played against the slope of his nose as he stared down at her injuries, and his bright blue eyes were intense in their examination. She would have expected him to be more clinical, but the way in which he cleaned the dried blood away from the gash was almost intimate. He tore open a small box of cotton balls and unscrewed a bottle of peroxide. As he pressed soaked cotton against the lacerations, she whimpered but didn’t pull away.

  “That burns.”

  “It’s supposed to. That means it’s working.” He leaned forward and blew gently over the cut before fastening a bandage over it. “What cut you?”

  “I think just sticks and rocks that were lying on the ground.”

  “Nothing like metal or glass, yes?”

  “I don’t think so.” He nodded and continued to work, dressing another scratch on her ankle that had begun to bleed again.

  “We were lucky this place had a first aid kit in the bath.” Slowly he rotated her foot. “Does that hurt?”

  “A little. But I can wiggle my toes. I don’t think it’s broken,” she replied.

  “Quite right. Maybe a sprain.” He pulled out some gauze and started to wrap her ankle. His thick, dark hair fell across his brow, and he kept shaking it out of his eyes. Phoebe wanted to reach out and brush it away. She yearned to feel his skin and those careless strands of raw silk. She clenched her fist, trying to keep still.

  “What was that thing?”

  “Which thing?” he replied, pushing the cuff of the oversized jeans farther up her calf.

  “That thing that was chasing me. You called it a hellhound. You weren’t exaggerating, were you? I mean, surely it wasn’t just a dog.”

  He looked up with a piercing stare. “Of course it wasn’t.”

  “And those men on the train. Were they really…?” She couldn’t bring herself to say it and instead used her fingers to indicate ears on top of her head and bared her teeth. Despite what her eyes had seen, she wasn’t sure she was ready to admit that monsters were real.

  “Werewolves? Yes.” His answer was terse and without humor. He was serious. “And if you think that’s weird, you haven’t seen anything yet.”

  “And you? That man on the train called you vampire. And I saw you… I saw you change.” St. John sighed. He pulled a wad of gauze from the box and used his teeth to tear it into strips.

  Her heart pounded in her chest, skipping beats in an irregular rhythm as she noticed the sharp tip of his slightly elongated canine. Her hands were shaking and she folded them in her lap. “Are you some kind of creature or what?”

  “I’m not a werewolf, if that’s what you’re trying to ask. Or a vampire.”

  “So what are you then?” Immediately she was sorry. “That was rude. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

  “It’s fine.” He smirked and went b
ack to wrapping her ankle. “Anyway, I told you. They don’t really have a name for what I am. I had a bit of an accident.” He shook his head. “It’s not important.”

  “I didn’t mean to pry. I’m just having a hard time with all of this.”

  “All of what?”

  “Well…” She pointed to the room and circled her hand in the air. “This. In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not exactly used to running for my life. I’ve been away from the tiny little town in Louisiana where I’ve lived my whole life only once. Then, everything about this trip has been one giant disaster after another. And there’s monsters. You have to admit it’s past strange. Werewolves. Giant dogs.”

  He nodded as he pulled the gauze wrapping tight. Phoebe gasped. “Sorry,” he murmured. “So you said you lived in a small town?”

  “The smallest. You know, one of those places where everybody knows everybody else.”

  “Sounds terrible.”

  Phoe chuckled lightly, a little surprised she still could. “It has its moments. I tried living in New Orleans for a while but my mom got sick.” She watched his deft fingers move. His hands were large and rough. They had seen lots of work, and it was obvious St. John was a capable man. The way in which he approached everything was deliberate. “But enough about me. Where the hell did those things come from?”

  “Well, it’s all very hush-hush, but someone or something opened a portal, letting those things into our world like a slow-acting virus.”

  “A portal?”

  “A portal. You know, a gateway to somewhere else.” He finished the wrapping her ankle and leaned over, tearing the bandage with his teeth then tying it off. “Not too tight, is it?”

  His profile was exquisite as he leaned over her. His lips were close to her skin, and she could feel his breath. “No. Not at all. What do you mean, ‘somewhere else’?”

  “I mean not of this world. Those werewolves, the vampires, all those strange creatures that you hear about sightings of—all of those creatures are slipping in through that gate, or a rift.”

  Phoebe gave a sideways glance and snorted. “Come on. Monsters slipping through a hole in the Earth? If that was true, we’d know about it. It’d be on the news. The government would be doing something.”

  “The same government that just tried to kill you with a big, scary dog?” His expression was so smug, it was infuriating. But she couldn’t deny he had a point. “And they are doing something. Why do you think they started building a space colony? It makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? All those so-called unexplained sightings? There can’t be that many people all seeing the same weird shit. You know what they say about once you rule out the impossible.”

  “Whatever remains must be the truth.” Phoebe fell silent. She couldn’t believe this. She wouldn’t. Things like this just didn’t exist. What she had seen must have been the product of some drug-induced hallucination. Immediately she started to catalogue everything she’d had to eat or drink since leaving home the night before.

  Home. It seemed so distant. Like some faraway land in a fairy tale. Right now she’d give anything in the world to be at home, curled up on the sofa with her cat Watson in her lap, reading a book. Suddenly she was overcome with such a wave of homesickness that she feared she would start crying again. She definitely didn’t want that. She’d already looked like a blubbering ninny in front of St. John enough times already.

  “Miss Addison?” His voice brought her out of her reverie. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, but please call me Phoebe. Or Phoe. Everyone does.”

  He smiled and took her hand, pressing her knuckles to his lips. “It’s nice to meet you, Phoe.”

  “Likewise, Mr. St. John.”

  “Cage.” She nodded, blushing as he kissed her hand again then turning that intense gaze on her once more. “You’re all right,” he whispered as the tips of his fingers stroked the line from her cheekbone to her lips. “Everything is going to be all right.”

  “You sound certain,” she replied.

  “I’m always certain.” He winked and rolled back on the balls of his feet to stand in a single graceful movement.

  He crossed to a cabinet in the corner and pulled out an ancient bottle of Scotch and two glasses then set the glasses on the coffee table in front of them and poured. He pushed one toward her before downing the other in a single gulp. He winced then poured himself another.

  “Since we’ve established that you aren’t going to die, how about you telling me what the hell is going on?”

  “What do you mean?” She sniffed the pungent alcohol.

  “Well, considering that I’ve nearly died twice on your behalf, I think I have the right to know what I’ve gotten myself into, don’t you?”

  “I told you,” she said, taking a tentative sip of her drink. “I’m going to visit my sister.”

  He shook his head, laughing bitterly. “Phoe, three government agents tried to detain you. Three agents who were werewolves. They were so intent on detaining you they derailed a Maglev train. Two more chased you all the way out here with Hellhounds. Those men had every intention of killing you. And me. I’m sure this is not some perk offered by your travel agent. Now, you can either stop lying to me or I’m leaving.”

  “What? You can’t leave me here.”

  “I didn’t agree to help a fugitive. That’s not exactly my area…”

  “I’m not a fugitive,” she exclaimed, trying to stand up. “And I said I’d pay you.”

  He grinned. “Sweet pea, there are some things that money cannot buy, and trouble with American Central Intelligence is one of them.” He moved around the room, gathering various items and shoving them down into his bag.

  Phoebe’s mind raced. She was afraid to trust him, but he had every right to ask for the truth. Would he really leave her to die here in the woods? Without his help, she would have died already. Whatever was happening, whatever this thing was she had in her possession, it was evidently important enough to kill for.

  “All right,” she sighed. “I’ll tell you. Just don’t go.” She tried to move toward him, but her ankle wouldn’t cooperate, and she fell back on the couch with a defeated whimper. “I was telling you the truth when I said I didn’t have anyone else. I have to get to my sister in New London or this man is going to kill her.”

  “What man?”

  “I don’t know. Some man she works for. Derek Machine.” As soon as she said the name, Cage tensed. “He’s like some kind of mogul who funded her archaeological dig. He says she stole something from him and sent it to me. I have to take it to New London and give it back, or he’ll kill her. And probably me too.” And, dammit, once again, she was crying.

  Putting her face in her hands, the stress of the past twenty-four hours broke her and she sobbed. Big, ugly, shoulder-shaking sobs that made her face red and her nose run. This time she didn’t care. It felt good to finally unload her troubles.

  Cage stood watching, his face unreadable, almost cold. It was obvious that he wasn’t used to this kind of thing and was waiting for it to be over.

  “Please, Cage. Please don’t leave me here. I don’t know why they want this thing. I don’t know why my sister took it, and I don’t care.” She pulled the crumpled envelope from her pocket and tossed it at him. “You take it.”

  He picked up the package and shook the contents out into his palm. Holding it close to his face, he examined the medallion, running his fingertips over the markings on the face.

  “It’s just a necklace, right?” she muttered. “I mean, obviously Jess wanted to hide it from this Machine person, but why would she send it to me? I mean, I’m not an archaeologist. I’m a librarian.”

  Cage didn’t reply, and continued examining the amulet, turning it over in his hands and blowing dirt from the crevices. “These markings—it’s called Sin’khari. Little samples of it have been found on Earth, but the most compelling examples weren’t found until the first Colony was established.”

  “S
in’khari? What is that, some kind of language?”

  Cage nodded. “An old dead language that pre-dates cuneiform by at least a thousand years. Some archaeologists and linguists have dismissed it as a hoax, but there are others who swear by it. To admit that such a thing exists would mean that maybe we humans aren’t as earthling as we seem.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “People in my line of work tend to know a great deal about a great many things.”

  “Can you decipher it?”

  “No. Probably no one can. At least no one on Earth can.” He turned the medallion over in his hand, running his thumb over the stone. “You say your sister found it on a dig at the Colony?”

  “Yes. About a year ago, she told me she’d found something really exciting, but she didn’t say what. She just said that it was going to change the way we think about everything. Why do you think Machine is so desperate to have it back?”

  “I don’t know, but it’s obviously important to the government as well. Which means it’s probably dangerous.” Crossing to Phoebe, he sat close. “Look, see this tiny carving here? This medallion is probably a key or something.” He leaned in, holding the strange object close as he pointed out the markings. “Whatever Machine wants with it, the medallion is only part of the prize. Whatever this key has locked away is the real treasure.” He put the charm in her hand. “Why did she send it to you?”

  “I don’t know. I guess to keep it away from Machine?”

  “Obviously. Though, I wonder if Machine knows there’s more to it. Perhaps he just thinks the charm itself is the key. There are markings here that aren’t just Sin’khari. They look like hieroglyphs, cuneiform.”

  “He didn’t say anything about it. He didn’t want me to know what it was. My sister told me not to open the package.”

  “But you did.” For the first time, Cage was smiling at her, though she couldn’t understand why.

  “Yes.” She smiled back. “I did.”