Chapter Six
Three Months Later…
“It’s really quite phenomenal,” Landon said, and there was admiration in his tone. “Your research and work were so ground-breaking, Elizabeth. The things that we’ve accomplished in a short amount of time—it’s just, well, like I said, phenomenal, truly.”
Elizabeth just stared at him. She didn’t let her expression alter even the tiniest bit, but her heart raced frantically in her chest. The rhythm was so fast and hard that Elizabeth was surprised Landon couldn’t hear the desperate beat. Her palms were wet with sweat, yet her back was ramrod-straight. She was afraid, and she was desperate, but she would never show those emotions to Landon.
The guy was on her shit-list, and he’d forever remain there. Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice…and it will be your last mistake.
Landon gave her a warm smile. The overhead light glinted off his glasses. “I’m so glad that you’re back with us. I had faith in Wright, of course. When he wants something…” His smile faltered. “It’s pretty hard to tell Wright no.”
And the great Wyman Wright had wanted her back on his team. Well, he wanted her back at the moment. But that hadn’t been the case originally. Not when Project Lazarus had first…been a damn go.
After that nightmare day, she’d been abandoned. When Elizabeth had gotten out of the hospital, Wright had been nowhere to be found. He’d emptied their labs and offices in D.C. and shut down the facility there. All of the other employees—everyone had vanished. Elizabeth had been left alone, with a healing bullet wound in her chest.
And Sawyer was gone. They took him away. She’d tried desperately to find out where Wright had relocated his group, but she’d gotten stone-walled at every turn.
But then—two weeks ago—things had changed. Wright had come back to D.C. The conniving bastard had literally just appeared at her door. He’d acted as if he were just dropping by for a visit. A friendly little chat. As if she hadn’t spent months tearing D.C. apart as she searched for Sawyer. And as every door got slammed in my face.
“Wright needs me.” Elizabeth was proud of the fact that her voice came out calm and steady. She and Landon were walking down a long, curving corridor. They were in the middle of Arizona, at Wright’s new research facility. What he’d called the Lazarus Facility. No wonder I couldn’t find the place in D.C. He moved everyone across the country!
Just getting inside the place had been one hell of a challenge. The outside entrance had been heavily guarded by armed men and women. Before she could get inside, she’d had to be thoroughly searched and show her ID at four different checkpoints. Then, and only then, had she gained access to the main facility…a facility that happened to be carved into the very side of a mountain. She figured the new Lazarus research location was only creepy by about—oh, one hundred percent. “Don’t bother trying to sugarcoat things for me, Landon. I know exactly why Wright came to me. Something is wrong with the program, and he thinks I can fix the problems.”
Landon was sweating, too. Only his sweat was more obvious than hers. She could see the trickles sliding down his temples. At her words, Landon stilled in the corridor and faced her. He swallowed, once, twice, then said, voice hushed, “I didn’t want things to end…that way.”
Her brows rose. “What way, exactly?”
His Adam’s apple bobbed.
Elizabeth moved closer to him. Her shoes slid over the stone floor. “You mean…with you stealing my project? Or with me getting a bullet to the chest?”
Silence.
“Perhaps you mean that you didn’t want things to end with me being abandoned in a hospital as I fought to live? With me waking up and discovering you and Wright had shut me out completely and left me? That you had stolen all of my research—both from the facility in D.C. and my home?”
Landon licked his lips. “Pretty much all of that.” He cast a frantic look around them, and his gaze lingered on the security camera perched high on the wall to the left of them. “I didn’t have a choice. Wright called the shots.” Landon barely seemed to breathe the words. “He still does. When the guy says jump, I do.”
But I don’t. She had her own agenda. She wasn’t jumping for Wright, no matter what the sonofabitch might think.
“I know he offered you a whole lot of money to come back on board…” Landon began.
Right. Like money was the reason she’d come back. Money might matter to Landon and to Wright, but she had other priorities.
“We need you,” he added grimly. “There are things—”
A door opened down the hallway. A guard appeared. Elizabeth knew he was a guard because this guy was dressed just as the others had been—all in black from his neck to his boots, and he had an earpiece tucked into his right ear. A gun was holstered on his hip.
The guard nodded to her and Landon as he passed by them in the corridor. Landon didn’t speak again, not until they were alone once more in that narrow hallway.
“Our test subjects are perfect weapons.” He nodded briskly. “Their heart-rates are steady, their adrenaline levels stay within our new parameters when stressed, but more importantly, their senses are enhanced. It’s pretty unbelievable what they can do. Their hearing, their sight…hell, they perform ten times better than normal soldiers. They’re super soldiers, I guess you could say.”
No, she wasn’t going to say that.
“They’re stronger than normal humans. They move faster. They have reflexes that will blow a typical human’s off the charts.” He turned and began walking down the corridor. “Because your test rats showed increased strength and enhanced reflexes, we were hoping to replicate those results with the Lazarus subjects. We had no idea just how significant the changes would truly be for them, though. Developments we didn’t expect, but are certainly thrilled to see.”
She followed him, slowly. She was wearing a white lab coat, and it fluttered behind her.
“They sound perfect.” Her voice drifted around them. “But if they are so perfect, why do you need me?”
They slid around the curve in the corridor. Up ahead, another guard waited. When they approached him, both Landon and Elizabeth had to show their ID. Five times now. After he verified their identities, the guard typed in four digits on the key-pad that waited near the heavy, metal door. A loud beep sounded, and then the door opened. She started to step forward—
“Sorry, doctor,” the guard told her, immediately moving into Elizabeth’s path. “I know you’re new here, so you don’t know the drill yet. But no one gets past this check-point without a pat-down.”
Her brows lifted. “I’ve already been searched.”
The guard—a big, red-headed guy with dark green eyes—exhaled on a heavy breath. “Sorry, ma’am, but you’re going to be patted-down again right now. It’s procedure. Everyone must follow procedure, or I can’t let you into the tombs.”
The tombs.
Goosebumps rose onto her arms. Was the place called the tombs because all of Landon’s “super soldiers” had once been dead?
Since she had nothing to hide—not then, anyway—Elizabeth lifted her arms. The pat-down was fast but thorough, and Landon was searched as soon as she was done.
Then they went inside. They crept down three flights of stairs and Elizabeth saw— “The tombs.”
Only they weren’t tombs. Not really. They were more like cells. Small rooms that she estimated to be about fifteen feet long by ten feet wide. A bed was in each room, a small table and a chair. A toilet.
It’s like prison.
Only there were no bars on the cells. The walls were big, clear chunks of glass.
“We can see them, but they can’t see us,” Landon said as his shoulder brushed against hers. “One-way mirrors for walls. Kind of like what cops use in their interrogation rooms. Only from inside, the material doesn’t look like a mirror. It looks like a plain, white wall—a wall that happens to be very, very strong.”
Her legs were shaking as she stepped forward. “You have…there are a lot of rooms here.” She didn’t see anyone in those rooms, not then. Where are all the test subjects?
“Wright wanted us to increase our research pool.” A new tension had entered his voice. “And that’s where the trouble began.”
She’d been gazing down at all of the rooms, desperately looking for one test subject in particular, but at Landon’s words, her gaze swung back to him.
“That increased aggression that you were so worried about…” Landon licked his lips. “It’s showing itself.”
Her heart stopped beating. “You don’t think that when Sawyer woke up and immediately attacked everyone around him that he wasn’t exhibiting increased aggression?”
“Uh, yes, about that…” He hurried past the cells. “Sawyer Cage was pre-programmed, if you will.”
She lunged forward and grabbed Landon’s arm. “What?”
He was sweating even more now. “I guess Wright didn’t tell you that part, huh? Didn’t mention it when he came to see you?”
She gave a hard, negative shake of her head.
“Um, well, our additional research has shown that when you administer too much of the Lazarus formula, the brain’s functioning is altered. Emotional responses to situations can be amplified and primitive instinct takes over. Sawyer woke to find himself surrounded by unfamiliar, armed guards. His primitive response—it was to attack. To eliminate the threat. To kill.”
“You gave him too much,” she gritted out. “I was telling you that then! We could have all died.”
He sucked in a sharp breath. “And that’s why you are here. So that no additional miscalculations will be made.”
He opened a door to the right, and she saw a small office waiting inside.
“Some of the subjects are showing low serotonin levels. I think their pre-frontal cortexes have a harder time creating an appropriate response to anger—and that’s where we’re seeing the surge in aggression.” He walked around the paper-filled desk and crashed in his chair. “We did expect the aggression, but we had no idea about the memory loss.”
She stood in the doorway. “Memory loss?”
He glowered at her. “You didn’t warn me about that part. It wasn’t in your notes.”
“That’s because none of the rats I used exhibited memory loss. They could still perform all of the same functions that they’d completed before being dosed with the Lazarus formula. I tested them all to make certain their brain function was within normal parameters, but I didn’t test on humans.” Because we were not ready for them. Not even close. You don’t go from rats to humans, that was bullshit. Wright had been working his own agenda, from day one. He’d wanted super soldiers, and he’d wanted them immediately.
Landon’s fingers steepled beneath his chin. “Is it possible the rats only recalled procedural memories?”
“I don’t know—my research wasn’t completed,” Elizabeth snapped out. Procedural memory…the memories that most people took for granted. Memories that allowed people to do simple things like tie their shoes or use a knife and fork when eating. The simple tasks that people completed over and over again became procedures for them to follow, and these memories were attached to the cerebellum, the motor cortex, the putamen, and the caudate nucleus. “Areas involved in instinctive action,” she murmured as her mind puzzled out this new development. Dammit, yes, it was possible that the rats had been displaying procedural memories when they ran through the mazes. They’d gone through her mazes over and over again. She’d assumed memories were intact for them, but that had been a huge mistake on her part. The aggression displayed by some of her test subjects had captured her attention, and she hadn’t even stopped to consider—
“The memory loss isn’t necessarily a bad thing.”
What?
“If the subjects had remembered their pasts, then they might have wanted to reconnect with loved ones. Not really a possibility. The memory loss allowed the subjects to start with a clean slate, if you will.”
Elizabeth glowered at Landon. She bit her lip, hard, so she didn’t scream at him. Sawyer doesn’t remember me? At all? None of the subjects remember? “Anything else?” Elizabeth asked carefully. “Things I need to be told about now?”
His gaze darted away from hers. “The subjects perform well in the field. Far better than regular soldiers—”
She flew across the room and slapped her hands down on his desk, sending papers flying to the floor. “They’ve already gone in the field?” Wright was a freaking lunatic. And she would be shutting his ass down. The sonofabitch thought that all he’d needed to do was throw money at her, and she’d been right back on his team.
Wrong. Elizabeth couldn’t be bought. She was in that facility for one reason and one reason alone…to fix the nightmare that she’d helped to create.
“Yes.” Landon spoke haltingly as he explained, “Wright wanted a full test. He wanted to see just what the subjects could do. We began with simulated missions.”
“It’s been three months.”
“Yes, I know, but the test subjects showed such aptitude that Wright insisted on sending them out right away, with proper supervision, of course.”
She forced herself to take several long, deep breaths. Her temples were throbbing. “And there were no issues?”
His eyelashes flickered.
Shit. There were issues. Plenty of them, Elizabeth was betting. Wright had been desperate to get her back on his team, after all. There was always a reason for desperation.
Landon smiled at her, but it was a fake grin, she could tell. “You’re here to smooth over any glitches.”
That’s what you think. “I want to see the test subjects. Immediately.” She straightened away from his desk.
He nodded quickly. “Right. Absolutely. I’ll get Subject Number—”
Her skin had iced. “You only speak of them by numbers, not names?”
Landon swallowed. She heard the faint click of his Adam’s apple. “Y-yes.”
“You’re de-humanizing them. You can’t do that. They are people.”
Sweat trickled down his temple. “The men you knew before—Sawyer and Flynn—they’re gone.” His voice was careful. “You understand that, don’t you? These subjects don’t remember who they were before Lazarus. As far as they know, they don’t have a past.” He grimaced. “Using a name wouldn’t have meaning for them. The people they were before Lazarus—well, those lives are over for them. The men truly died.”
Like she needed that reminder. Elizabeth would never forget the sight of Sawyer’s body spread out on that table. So still.
With a cough, Landon added. “So, um, yes, we give them numbers. Easier that way.”
She turned away from him so he wouldn’t see her rage. “You give them numbers and you keep them in cages and you think that’s okay?”
“We monitor their mental health.” His voice was sharp, as if she’d offended him.
Before she was finished, Elizabeth would do a lot more than offend the guy.
“And they aren’t in cages. They have rooms, comfortable accommodations—”
“Accommodations that have walls you can see through! They have no privacy. No security!”
But Landon shook his head. “We need to be able to monitor them. For our safety. The men are able to come and go through the facility here, but they are always trailed by a guard. Until we can be certain of them—until we know that there won’t be any dangerous surprises, the men will be watched.”
He made zero sense. “But you send them out on missions. And I’m guessing guards aren’t tailing them—”
“We have other ways of monitoring the subjects when they are sent on a mission. Believe me, we are never at risk of losing them.” His lips thinned. “Should the worst-case scenario situation ever occur, safeguards are in place. The subjects would not get away.”
Get away. They’re prisoners. “Worst-case scenario?” Elizabeth asked softly.
He just stared back at her. “The guards here are armed with tranqs, not real guns. We value our test subjects. Despite what you may think, they are treated well here. Yes, we can see into their rooms, but the men don’t mind that security measure. They understand that they have to prove themselves in order to be granted greater freedom.”
Such BS.
“Wright even brought in the best psychiatrist available to counsel the men and help with any transition issues. Dr. Cecelia Gregory. She started seeing the subjects two months ago. Right after they began field missions. They each come in twice a week to talk with her, and she monitors them—”
“I’ll need to speak with her,” Elizabeth cut in, squaring her shoulders. She gave Landon her fiercest look. “But first, I want to see the subjects.”
He nodded. “Okay, but I have to instruct you not to reveal the full details about Project Lazarus to Dr. Gregory.”
“What? If she’s the shrink for the subjects, then she has to know—”
“Dr. Gregory doesn’t know that she’s treating dead men.” His lips tightened. “Formerly dead men. That is classified information. And it’s information that isn’t relevant to her. Dr. Gregory knows the men were given a serum that made them into super soldiers, and that’s all. She understands the serum caused some unforeseen side-effects, like the memory loss, but she doesn’t know that she’s treating the dead.”
Formerly dead men.
“Classified. You understand that, Elizabeth?”
She understood that Landon liked his secrets, but secrets could be very dangerous. “I heard you loud and clear.” Now, to get down to business. Elizabeth could barely contain her emotions as she said, “I want to start with Test Subject Number One.” Because she already knew who would have been given the number one. The guy Wright had wanted to lead his team of super soldiers.
Sawyer.
***
Elizabeth shut the exam room door behind her. Her fingers were trembling, and every breath that she took seemed to chill her lungs. Her gaze darted around the small room, checking out the instrument trays, the assorted machines, and the two security cameras positioned in two of the upper corners of the room.
Someone is watching. From what she’d been able to tell, someone was always watching in this facility. She’d spied plenty of cameras so far during her time at the—
“You’re new.”
She jerked at his voice. A voice that haunted her dreams. Rough and low. Dark. Elizabeth had deliberately kept her gaze away from the man who sat on the edge of the exam table.
But now her gaze slid toward him, helplessly, and the pain that hit Elizabeth seemed to stab into her heart with the force of a knife’s blade.
Sawyer. Her Sawyer.
He wore a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt. His black hair was tousled, as if he’d run his fingers through it—and his hair was longer than it had been before. His dark blue eyes studied her. His handsome face was tense, and his head tilted as his stare swept over her.
Her knees gave way, and Elizabeth staggered.
Before she could fall face-first onto the tile, he was there. Sawyer vaulted off the exam table and grabbed her arms. His hands curled around her and heat surged through Elizabeth at his touch.
Sawyer.
Elizabeth blinked away tears as the pain in her heart just got worse. So much worse.
I found you, Sawyer. I found—
“Are you all right?” He frowned at her. “Maybe you’re the one who should be on the exam table.”
He stared at her with those familiar dark blue eyes. He stared at her…and there was zero recognition in his gaze.
No memory. No memory of his life before Lazarus.
No memory of…her. Elizabeth hadn’t thought she could hurt more. She’d been wrong.
“Don’t worry, I’ll get some help,” Sawyer assured her.
He isn’t Sawyer. He’s Test Subject Number One. I’m not supposed to call him by his name. I’m supposed to call him One. Those had been Landon’s instructions to her. A requirement before he agreed to let her finally see the subjects. But…
Screw Landon.
“You stay here,” Sawyer, said as he released her. “I’ll be—”
“I-I don’t need help.” Her voice came out low and husky. Shaking.
He blinked at her. A faint furrow appeared between his brows.
“I’m fine.” Liar, liar. “P-please…get back on the exam table.”
But he didn’t move. Was it her imagination, or had his shoulders stiffened? His body seemed tense. And he—
He leaned in close to her. He put his face right in the curve of her neck.
Elizabeth froze. Absolutely froze.
“Strawberries,” he whispered.
Her body swayed toward him. Did he remember? Her scent, he’d—
Sawyer—Subject One—gave a little laugh as he pulled back from her. “You smell just like the strawberries we had for dessert last night.”
Elizabeth licked her lips. “It’s my lotion. Um, would you…would you please go back to the exam table?”
He lifted a brow at her. “Not gonna fall on me, are you?” And there it was. The faintest hint of his Texas accent. Hearing it hurt her.
“I won’t fall.” Another lie. She’d fallen hard for him, long ago. “I promise.”
Sawyer went back to the exam table. He hopped up on it. His long legs dangled over the edge. He crossed his arms over his powerful chest and studied her. “You’re new,” he said again.
“I…I’m Elizabeth Parker.”
A wry smile curved his lips. It was a smile that never reached his eyes. A smile Elizabeth recognized—his cold, pissed smile. His dimple didn’t wink. “And I’m Subject Number One.”
She flinched.
“But then, I guess you know that, don’t you?” His eyes drifted over her. “Another doctor to poke and prod at me. Only I don’t need prodding. I came back from the last mission just fine. Another exam is pointless.”
“Don’t be so sure of that.” She forced herself to move closer to him. One halting step at a time. Her gaze darted around the room, and she saw a stethoscope on the exam tray. She grabbed it, sliding it around her neck. “I’d like to listen to your heart.” I’d like to make this nightmare go away. I’d like to make everything better for you. I’d like—
“You’re scared of me.”
Her stare flew back to him.
His gaze was on her fingers, the fingers that were still curled around the stethoscope. “Your hands are trembling.”
Yes, they were. Actually, every part of her body was trembling.
“That’s why you stumbled when you came into the room, isn’t it?” Sawyer—Subject One!—pressed, voice gruff. “Because you were afraid of being alone with me.”
Once more, she forced herself to move forward. She stopped when she was right in front of him. His legs were spread, giving her the room to move even closer to him, if she wanted.
She didn’t move closer to him. “Don’t be silly,” Elizabeth chided. “Why would I be scared of you?”
And then she remembered the sound of her own scream. The sight of Sawyer holding a gun. Firing it at the guards. Then pointing the gun at her…as he stared at her with zero recognition in his eyes. Now she understood why he’d stared at her as if she was a stranger. To him, she was.
Dammit, yes, I am scared of him. I’m terrified. But fear wasn’t going to stop her.
Elizabeth exhaled slowly. “I just need to listen to your heartbeat—”
“Yours is racing far too fast. A sure sign…that you’re scared of me.”
Her eyes widened. “You can hear my heartbeat?” Before coming into the exam room, she’d read the notes in his file. Landon had indicated all of the test subjects had elevated senses, but to be able to actually hear her heartbeat—
His right hand rose. His fingertips—slightly callused, just as she remembered—skated down the curve of her throat.
Elizabeth shivered as his gaze narrowed on her.
“I can see your pulse racing.” His fingers caressed her skin. “Right…here.” And his fingers were over her frantically racing pulse. “I scare you.”
She forced a smile. You terrify me.
He blinked at her smile. “Wrong.”
Her smile slipped. “Excuse me?”
But Sawyer shook his head, as if he were confused, and his hand slipped away from her throat. “I won’t…hurt you.” His words were halting, as if he had to force them out.
Elizabeth locked her knees. “I need to get started on the exam.” Fumbling, she lifted the stethoscope—
Sawyer yanked off his shirt.
He had new scars. At least five of them. New scars that were white lines of raised flesh over his skin. Her lips parted as she stared at them.
“Thought that would make it easier for you.”
Her stare rose to his face.
He shrugged one powerful shoulder. “Usually the male doc gets me to strip down to my underwear for the exam. You want the same thing?”
“Y-you’ve been injured.”
Another shrug. As if injuries didn’t matter. “Took a few slices from a knife on one of the earlier missions. Then had to get a bullet wound stitched up after a fire-fight. No big deal.”
No big deal. “That hasn’t changed.” The words slipped from her, and Elizabeth immediately wished that she could pull them back. But for just an instant, she’d seen the man he’d been. Her confident soldier. The battle-ready warrior who never admitted to feeling pain.
The man who’d died.
His gaze was assessing as it focused on her face.
Get a grip, Elizabeth. If you screw up, the guards will drag you out of here, and all of your grand plans will go straight to hell.
“Want to say that again?” Sawyer muttered.
I can’t think of him as Subject One.
“’Cause I don’t think I heard you quite right.”
Elizabeth sucked in some deep, steadying breaths. Her eyes flew to the nearest video camera. Someone was watching. Always. She had to remember that. “I need you to relax while I check your heart rate.” She positioned the stethoscope right over his chest. She could hear the beat of his heart. But…faster than normal. Elevated. Her fingers pressed to his shoulder, and his skin’s heat almost singed her.
Elevated body temperature. That bit had been in Landon’s notes. The test subjects kept a slightly higher than average body temperature. Their heartbeats tended to stay faster than an average human’s, too. Their reflexes were better. Their muscles stronger. Even their healing abilities had increased.
No wonder Wright was desperate to get you all in the field.
“So tell me the verdict, doc…”
Doc. She blinked fast, refusing to let any tears fall.
“Am I alive…or dead?”
His words were obviously meant to be flippant, but Elizabeth jerked away from him, pulling the stethoscope with her.
His hand flew out and curled around her wrist.
She stilled.
We’ve done this before.
So many times. Stood close in an exam room. Stared into each other’s eyes. Felt the tension thicken the air. Sawyer…
Did he remember? At all? Anything?
His hold tightened on her. He pulled her closer once more, and she found herself standing between his spread legs. His heat surrounded her. His rich, masculine scent—still so familiar—tormented her. She was staring right at the man she’d loved and lost, and there was no recognition on his face. No hint of emotion. Nothing at all.
“Am I alive?” he repeated, and his mouth hitched up into the half-smile that was painful to see. “Or dead?”
My Sawyer is dead. Subject One is staring at me. Had Landon been right? Were the test subjects truly so different? Not the men they’d been at all…but new people now.
“Alive, of course.” She tugged her hand free of his hold. She had to get out of that little exam room, if only for a few moments because Elizabeth couldn’t breathe right then. Being so close to him was wrecking her. “Excuse me, I-I need to check something outside.” She practically ran for the door. Her hand curled around the knob and—
“Wrong answer.” His voice was so soft that she almost didn’t hear the words. “I’m dead.”
Her head whipped back. She stared at him in horror. “Y-you…you…”
Sawyer smiled at her, flashing the dimple in his left cheek. “Obviously, I’m kidding, doc. You seem stressed. Thought a joke might lighten your mood.”
No, just the opposite. Because he hadn’t been kidding. Sawyer didn’t even realize it, but he’d just spoken the truth. He was dead.
And her heart hurt even more.