by Angie Fox
The man should have come with a warning label.
He looked down at me, so tender. His lips brushed mine. And then I didn’t want to talk anymore, or think. “I’m a mess,” I murmured as his teeth grazed my earlobe.
“You used to kiss me after I went frog hunting with my dad.”
He’d come back smelling like the bayou. “You never gave me a choice.” He was so darned happy and cute when he came back.
“Not giving you one now.” He caressed the small, sensitive hollow of my back that only he knew about.
“Well, in that case…”
I could barely put a thought together as he drew me to him for a mind-numbingly perfect kiss. It was sweet and heady and sensual all at the same time. I savored it. Him.
This was my moment, my time with Marc. Everything else might have been decided for us—where we lived, whom we fought for, whom we were allowed to love—but we could decide this: to be together in this moment.
And so I drew him back to my little room, to my narrow cot to talk, to laugh, to kiss. And when we finally wore each other out, I fell asleep in his arms.
I slept well, knowing I had someone to watch out for me, someone who cared. Marc had come back to me at last, for as long as I could hold him.
I woke several hours later to find myself alone on the narrow cot. Liquid bubbled in the lab on the other side of the curtain, and I heard the thud of a book opening along with the scratch of a pencil on paper.
Rubbing the grit from my eyes, I fought my way past the flimsy curtain to find Marc crouched next to a bubbling sample, scribbling notes.
I ran a hand through my sleep-tangled hair. “I should have briefed you before tackling you and then taking a siesta.”
He smiled. “It’s okay,” he said, going back to writing. “I understand your notes. I know how you work.”
“You’d better watch that ethanol.” It was at a rolling boil. At that rate, he was going to lose his sample.
“Oh, the ethanol mixture blew up,” he said, glancing back at me. “I’m surprised it didn’t wake you.”
Ha. I’d slept harder that I’d thought. “Seems you could have set a bomb off.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” he teased, tossing his pencil down. “I’m trying the liquid hydrogen mixture now. Let’s hope it doesn’t burn the lab down.”
“I missed this,” I confessed, drawing close. “I missed us.”
He shot me an easy grin. “Me too.” He reached out and laced his fingers with mine, gently tugging me the rest of the way into his arms. “I mean, what are the odds that we’d come together like this in the middle of a war?”
“Well, you were the one who hunted me down,” I said.
After ten years.
I had to try to let that go if we had any shot of making this work. And speaking of that, what were we doing anyway?
A buzzer went off, and he glanced back at the sample. “It’s at temperature,” he said, turning back to the table.
“Great.” I found a pair of lab glasses, double-checked the temperature gauge, and then shut off the heat while he prepared the sphinx venom.
He gave me an uneasy smile, so full of…what? Hope? “Here goes nothing.”
We both braced ourselves as he added the venom. I watched it swirl down into the liquid hydrogen. So far, so good.
“If we can develop an anesthetic that works,” I said, eyeing the sample. “If we can please Argus and your Nerthus,” I added, because with the gods, that was always the trick…“maybe we can use that success to learn more about what other projects the gods have going, specifically that new weapon.”
Marc drew his gloves off. “It could work. I mean, I was already on the weapons project once. And we obviously work well together.”
Maybe it all came down to that. Maybe this anesthetic would do twice the good—it would help the soldiers, and it would show the gods they had a winning team in Marc and me. “If we could stop that weapon, if we could fulfill the prophecies and end this war, think of what that could mean.”
Marc winced. “Petra, I—”
“The imprisoned dragons would be free,” I said, my excitement growing. “Our friends and colleagues could go home. Us, too. Instead of being on opposite sides, we could actually be together.”
“I want that, too. I’d love it.” He tossed his gloves in the trash bin under the table behind him. “But don’t get your hopes up.”
“Have a little faith,” I prodded. “You don’t think we have it in us?”
He planted his hands on his hips, at a loss for words for a brief moment. “I think we have a lot going for us,” he said guardedly. “I think we can make this anesthetic work. I think we have a good shot at worming our way into weapons research.”
“And destruction,” I added, with relish. We’d rob the gods of their awful weapon. “Death comes with a gift. Our gift will be making that deadly weapon fizzle out.”
“But realize this”—Marc went on, as if he wasn’t even listening—“whatever good we do will be because of you and me. Us. Not because of some ancient prophecy.”
Fair enough. “You don’t have to believe for the prophecies to work.” I sure hadn’t in the beginning.
And Marc was…Marc. He always had to be in control. I should have known he’d never accept the idea that something larger—something he couldn’t control—was at work.
“Petra.” He closed the distance between us. “This war isn’t going to end,” he said, as if it were fact. As if we could make no difference at all. “The gods have been fighting for thousands of years, and they’ll be fighting for thousands more. Humanity doesn’t have a chance.” He shook his head sadly. “We don’t have a chance, at least not like we did in New Orleans.”
I didn’t understand. “So why did you start things up again with me, physically, if you have no intention of sticking around?”
“Because it’s you. It’s us,” he said, as if we had no other choice. “We can be together. For now,” he clarified. “Until we find the anesthetic. Or until Nerthus and Argus tire of us. And if we get lucky, maybe we can do more research together and eliminate the weapon. But we’re still on opposite sides. We still have the same problem we did ten years ago.”
When he’d let me go.
I felt myself grow cold. “What exactly are you saying?”
“Petra…” His voice was rough. “I love you, you know that.”
“And?” I demanded.
He flinched. “I never wanted to be with anyone else.”
“And?” I pressed.
I needed to know where we stood, what he truly thought about this. Us.
He winced and said it straight. “This is great for now, but when we’re separated again, and we will be, I can’t do the distance thing again.”
And there it was.
I leaned back against the table. “I don’t believe it.” After all this, he was still more than ready to let it all go.
“What did you expect?” he asked, half demanding, half pleading.
I don’t know. “Peace.”
He drew both hands through his hair. “We’re on opposite sides of an immortal war.”
“Oh, thanks for the news flash,” I said, stalking away. I hadn’t thought of that one.
“I’m only being honest,” he said, following me, as I tossed my lab glasses onto the table. “I’d never lie to you, Petra.”
He could at least sugarcoat it.
I turned to him. “Then are we torturing ourselves if we can’t be together?”
He stood, helpless. “I don’t know. Maybe I shouldn’t have come.”
“Nice of you to think of that now.” After he’d barged into my life again, after he’d kissed me and held me and made me want him all over again.
He pulled off his lab glasses. “This is important work,” he said. “But that’s not all. After seeing you again and spending time with you on my side, I just wasn’t ready to let you go.”
Lovely. “I
’m so glad you got what you need.”
He took a step toward me, reaching out a hand. “Don’t be that way. You were certainly glad to see me earlier.”
I held my ground, my cheeks heating when I thought of exactly how glad I’d been.
“You also needed to know I was alive. I saw your face when you shot me. I knew it destroyed you to do it.”
This might destroy me worse—having him and losing him again.
Well, unless I could fulfill a bunch of ancient prophecies channeled by soothsayers on a lost island. It wasn’t like they had a schedule. Who knew how many prophecies there would be, how many years they could stretch out?
And how this latest one might even come true—death comes with a gift.
Right then, I felt like strangling Marc myself.
He drew a lock of hair back from my face. “Can’t we just be together for now, enjoy now?”
That was what Galen had said before he left me.
Merde. Why was I setting myself up for this again? It was like I had a masochistic need to get my heart stomped on and splattered against the wall.
But it didn’t have to be that way. I could choose. I couldn’t control this, but I didn’t have to be destroyed by it, either.
I looked up at the man who had stolen my heart all those years ago, the one who had stolen it again in the time we’d been together this week. And I drew a line. “We can be together,” I told him, seeing his relief. “We can work together.” I’d even ogle his backside. Because, let’s face it, what red-blooded female wouldn’t? “But I’m not signing up for love and kisses and a future you can’t promise.”
He’d gone stiff. “What does that mean exactly?”
“We can be friends.”
“We are friends,” he said warily.
“Just friends. Nothing more.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said, as if I’d told him I was going to become a nun. “You don’t know what I had to pull in order to get this assignment. It was one in a million, I finally have you back—and you want to be friends?”
That was our mistake—in a nutshell. “You don’t have me back,” I said, ignoring the hurt in his eyes. I didn’t have him back, either.
I didn’t know what he’d had to do to make it here, but I knew it was temporary. And that he was giving only what he could on this particular day, this week, this month.
The Marc I’d fallen for, the one I’d known in New Orleans, had never held his emotions in check. He never held back his love. He was all or nothing—just like me.
This war had changed a lot of things.
A bead of sweat slicked down the side of his face. “So you’re expecting me to be here with you every day and not touch you?”
“Bingo.”
“I can’t live like this.”
“I say that every day.”
But he was right. This was going to be our own particular brand of hell.
To be here, alone. Constantly tempted with what we’d given up at the whim of the gods.
I wanted to hold him more than I’d ever wanted anything in my life. I was raw with it.
But I couldn’t have him, so I might as well save myself the grief and the pain. Last time I’d fallen, it had taken me ten years to get over him. If I tripped again, I might never recover.
He stared down at the rough wood floor. “So what are we really?”
“Lab partners, partners in crime,” I said as he cursed under his breath. “But I’m not letting you break my heart again.” No more than he already had. “Just friends,” I said, holding out a hand for him to shake.
He didn’t take it.
“If you truly care about me, you’ll do this,” I warned.
I could see the emotions warring inside him. Good. He might as well feel it too. I didn’t want this. I didn’t choose this. But I’d do this for us and make the best of it.
“Friends,” he said, reaching out to take my hand. He drew it up and kissed the top of it. “Until you change your mind.”
“Let’s just stick to work,” I said, trying to figure out where I’d tossed my lab glasses. I had to check the sample.
His lips formed a thin line, but he didn’t offer any comment as he joined me at the table.
The sample had evaporated completely.
Great.
“So that one’s a bust,” he said, reaching for my lab notes without even looking at them.
“So we’ll try another solvent.” And another one. We’d try until we found one that would allow us to control the effect of the sphinx venom. “When do you think your side will start sending equipment?”
“Knowing the goddess? It’s already on the way.”
“About that—” I stiffened. “How well do you know the goddess?”
“Jealous?” he challenged.
For a second, I didn’t know what to say. I was too tired, too raw.
Regret flashed across his features. “I’m sorry. That was a jerk thing to say.” He shook his head. “Nerthus means nothing. I know I sound like an idiot when I talk to her, but courtly words make her feel good. And it got me on this project.”
“Why?” I asked.
He softened. “I wanted to see you again.”
Damn the consequences.
“It’s too dangerous.” He had to understand that. “What if she turns you into her slave boy?”
“I don’t care,” he said simply.
I sighed. The man was impossible. “Yes, well, our last group project didn’t turn out so well,” I pointed out, trying for a little levity.
The burn mark marred his chest. I was still amazed by his bravery.
He caught me checking him out and gave me a tight-lipped grin. “Reconsidering?”
He wished.
I planted my hands on my hips. At least this time, he’d sought me out despite the consequences. He didn’t just let me go on with my life, thinking he was gone.
He paged through my notebook. “I heard about this project when I was in the hospital. They needed someone fast. I made a personal appeal to Nerthus.”
“Must have been a good one,” I said dryly.
Still, forces were at work. That much was clear. I just didn’t know what it meant. “The prophecy said death comes with a gift.”
“I’m not dead yet,” he said, quoting a Monty Python movie we used to watch. He went back to the notes.
Yes, well, he might not believe, but I did. Marc was here with me for a reason. And it wasn’t so he could rip my world apart again.
If I just kept my wits about me, we could use the time together for good, for healing. And maybe, just maybe, we’d find what we needed to survive.
Chapter Nineteen
Marc insisted I take care of myself while he prepared a new sample and organized my notes. That was the one good thing about having Marc here; I trusted him—well, with everything but my heart.
It was so easy to fall into old patterns with him. To just live and enjoy being with him, but I had to take it for what it was—a reminder of what I couldn’t have.
So I vowed to keep it light. Enjoy it for what it was.
Take a shower, for heaven’s sake.
He bent over my notes, engrossed, as he scribbled his own ideas in another journal. “You’d better not be a spy or something,” I said, brushing past him as I headed out for the showers.
“I think that was you,” he called as I left him in the sad, stifling little lab.
Good point.
I made my way out of the minefield, careful of the pranks. Although I wasn’t sure a pot of fish over my head would make much of a difference anymore.
I needed a thorough scrubbing and maybe a few more hours rest. I tried not to feel guilty about that. Marc was as good as me, maybe better with his research background. But we had an anesthetic to discover, a weapon to stop, and three oracles who thought death came with a gift.
Still, it felt good to let go for five minutes.
I kicked up a small cloud
of dust as I zigzagged through the cemetery. I’d left my shower kit back in the mess tent, but it was probably long gone by now. Besides, there was no way I was going to show up there looking like a minefield disaster. I headed for my hutch instead.
“Hey, roomie,” I said, charging in the door.
Rodger wasn’t there. His stuff sure was. My bed was lined with three dozen boxes of various Jawas, Ewoks, and bounty hunters. Marius’s bunk was spread with busts of Spock and Kirk, along with plastic-wrapped T-shirts that said things like The Death Star was an inside job and Party like a Vulcan. Then there were a stack of Star Trek logoed plain red shirts on the shelf between their bunks that just said, Expendable.
Rodger’s bed was laden with every action figure known to man. Then he had Doctor Who bobbleheads on my bookcase and comics on the stove (a real wise move there). I touched my fingers to the cast-iron surface. Okay, it was cold. But still…
The floor crunched under my feet. I looked down to see that Rodger had laid out his entire rock collection. What? Did he still think he was in his three-bedroom house in Earlsfield?
Cursing under my breath, I avoided most of the rocks and managed to reach under my cot, where I found a new bar of soap, a fresh bottle of shampoo, another towel, and about seventy-five baby Yoda pencil sharpeners.
It was official; I was going to kill my roommate.
In the meantime, I crawled into my bed for five minutes. It was too close and too soft and I didn’t care that this was my last clean set of sheets.
I’d slept like the dead last night—maybe it was that argument with Marc—but I still felt wiped.
Action figures tumbled to the floor as I curled up and closed my eyes.
Five minutes.
It was pure bliss. And as soon as my eyes fluttered open, I knew I’d rested way too long. Sunlight streamed through the open windows of the hutch. I’d blown the evening, all of the night, and if my guess was correct, a good portion of the morning. I lay on my side, blanket clutched to my chest, and felt—good.
The grit had left my eyes. My head had cleared. My body felt rested and awake. I reached down for my soap and shower goodies, noticing that Rodger had carefully laid out his figurines on his bed for once.
