Chapter Nine
“You’ve got to strike faster. Like a snake.” Nick stood behind her, barking orders in her ear. “Again.”
Sweat trickled down Kitty’s spine and drenched the back of her neck. They’d been going through the movements of this attack for almost an hour. She couldn’t seem to get the positioning right. “Nick. No one is going to sneak up on me. I can hear thoughts, remember?’
“You don’t know that. You need to be prepared for anything.”
That had become the mantra over the past three days. Be prepared. Like she’d joined the Boy Scouts without anyone telling her about it.
Prepare for any event. Have an attack ready. Strike as fast and as hard as she could. Fast because speed was her best asset, and hard because she could only count on one opportunity.
She’d asked for his help. He’d reminded her of that over and over. After they’d had their conversation the first day, when he’d explained his reservations about teaching her, he’d thrown himself into her training like a man obsessed.
But not obsessed with her. In fact, since that conversation—after telling her that he wanted more than friends, that he wanted her—he’d been true to his word. He’d been a complete gentleman. He’d been respectful of her personal space, and he’d never spoken of it again, as he’d promised. He’d even reined in his thoughts, for the most part.
His touch had stayed completely platonic, as if they were related or really good buddies.
And they’d touched a lot. In fact, they’d spent the last three days wrestling with each other.
The more they touched, the more she craved his arms around her.
It was maddening. She’d been the one to draw the line in the sand. Yet, she was the one who wanted to stay in his arms. She was the one who inhaled too deeply when she was pressed against his chest. She was the one who couldn’t stop staring at him.
In that time, she’d only caught something different in him one time. It had been two days ago, the second full day of training. She closed her mind to him when they weren’t practicing, but she needed to hear his thoughts when they were working out so she could learn how to use her power to her advantage.
They’d fallen. He’d gone down on his butt then rolled onto his back, and she’d landed on top of him. His hands had been on her waist. Their faces had been so close she could feel his breath on her forehead. His brain had buzzed with wanting.
It had been an echo of what was coursing through her…the heat, the need to touch him.
They’d frozen like that until he gently but firmly moved her off of him and scrambled to his feet. As he’d moved away from her, she’d seen it.
Something like longing.
His jaw tightened, and his brows lowered. Then, it was gone from his mind, replaced by his determination. Always his determination. He drove her on and on, teaching with more patience than she’d ever seen in anyone, forcing whatever was happening between them to the recesses of himself.
But in that moment, she’d wanted to reach for him. She’d had to stop herself from crawling to him. She wanted to wrap her arms around him and place her lips on his perfect mouth.
She’d shaken her head, filed that away until the night. As she’d lain in her bed, she’d remembered that look and those thoughts. She only fell asleep because she knew he wanted her well rested to run through their workout the next day. She didn’t want to let him down.
Yesterday, it began again. His impersonal touch and professional advice. All day.
And her fingers itched to touch him.
Behind her, he gave her directions she didn’t need to hear again. She didn’t listen to them.
But when his arms wrapped around her, she channeled her confusion and frustration into doing what he wanted. Her hands met in a prayer position and shot straight up over her head. She arched her back and smacked her hands against his ears.
If she’d hit him hard, it would have done some damage, but she only patted him.
“Yes. Very good.” His words rumbled through his chest, and she felt it against her back. Facing away from him, her arms up and around his neck, she closed her eyes, inhaled deeply and tilted her head back, unable to resist the feel of his arms around her. “Now what?” he whispered in her ear.
In another situation, this embrace could have been sensual. Her thoughts filled in the details, imagined his hands trailing along her arms. Her breasts tightened.
She swallowed hard, opened her eyes, and forced herself to finish the fight sequence. She stepped down gently on his right foot and turned. His arms slacked around her, and she brought up her knee in what would have been a groin shot if she’d intended to harm him.
“Well done.” As always, his praise warmed her. But the gritty timbre of his voice sent a shiver through her stomach. Instead of stepping out of his arms, as she’d done every other time they’d run through this particular sequence today, she allowed herself to look up, into his eyes.
The heat there stole her breath. That look said he still wanted her, that nothing had changed since the first day here. His hands ran along her spine, slowly and with infinite care. She leaned in. Like he was a snake charmer, and she was under his spell.
Even as she watched, he tamped down on everything inside himself. His jaw tightened, and he dropped his hands. Then he turned away. With his back to her, he stretched his neck from side to side and shook out his arms. He paced a bit, marching with high knees. When he finally turned back, he was the same as before.
Her instructor. Her friend.
“Again,” he said.
She launched herself into his arms.
He caught her easily, his whole body tense. He held her tightly against his chest and glanced behind her in concern. As if preparing for an adversary. Ready to protect her.
She clasped him to her, pulling him as close as she could, and placed her mouth on his.
He inhaled sharply, and his fingers pushed into her back reflexively. She pulled away, even though the feel of his full lips under hers was heady, sending shivers along her neck. She gazed up at him, holding her breath, waiting for him to take what she wanted to give him. Waiting for him to give her what she wanted, too.
After the briefest moment, his arms tightened around her and his mouth swooped down, covering hers again. Except this time, he wasn’t still. His lips played across hers in a dance of movement and moisture, firm, straightforward, and assertive. Like him.
Thank goodness he was holding her. Her head swam with the feeling of it. She only had him in her senses—his taste, his smell.
Her first kiss, and it was magical.
He pulled at her lips with his, soft and insistent, the ebb and flow of it making heat flow to her stomach, to her breasts. Her fingers found his hair—that thick, silky dark hair—and she rubbed at it at the nape of his neck, pulling him closer.
Nick held her against him, firm and tender. He was so much bigger than her; he practically surrounded her. She would have expected to feel overwhelmed. Threatened, even. But there was so much care in his touch, so much reverence in his lips, she only felt safe.
At home.
Through the burn, she almost didn’t hear them coming.
She tensed and pulled back. She immediately missed his mouth. “The laundry. Kenny. He’s with them.” Kenny hadn’t been with the laundry guard two days ago.
There was a pause, as if it took him a moment to figure out what she was talking about. Then he cursed under his breath and carefully lowered her to the ground, his arms remaining around her until she was steady. “Right. The laundry.” He ran his hand over his face. “Kenny.” He glanced around as if trying to remember where they were. She found his disorientation, so out of character for him, adorable.
When it seemed to click, his eyes widened. “Right. The laundry.”
“You said that.” She grinned.
“No, no.” He put his hands on his hips. “Remember what we said. Hopefully Kenny has something for us. Distract the others so I can talk with him again.”
“Yes, Nick. I remember.” They’d only been over this a dozen times. She could remember a plan, for heaven’s sake. Even with her brain muddied by kisses.
“Right.” His brow furrowed. “Kitty, listen….”
She held up her hand to stop whatever flood of apology he was about to unleash. She already knew him well enough to know it was coming. Nick acted—or reacted—quickly, and if he felt he’d screwed up, he apologized as fast. Quick to fire and quick to cool, that was Nick.
“Stop,” she said. She couldn’t listen to an apology for that kiss. It would ruin it. “I started it. I wanted to kiss you.”
His eyebrows lifted. “You did?”
“Yes. I did.” She didn’t go on, because she didn’t know what else to say. Under his gaze, her face heated. When would she stop being embarrassed by what she wanted? Old habits…
The lock at the door wiggled and creaked, saving her from this conversation. Two guards stepped inside, one taking each side of the door, holding their guns in front of them. As if she and Nick were armed. But she supposed her gifts were their own kind of weapon.
Kenny stepped in and Kitty’s heart picked up. The soldier didn’t make eye contact, going to the pile of dirty clothes in the corner. They’d placed them as far from the door as possible, for this reason, so Nick and Kenny might have some time together.
She glanced at Nick, and he nodded.
She nodded back, turning to the guards at the door. She stretched her thoughts to cover both of them, her mind spinning. She needed a distraction.
The one on the left was creeped out. He wasn’t changed, and he was afraid of her. The other was changed, with the enhanced strategy and strength that Seth and Jack had. She heard his gift in the way he spun the possibilities in his mind, so fast it might have been inhuman. Like a computer.
She found it interesting that people exposed to the drug didn’t get the same skills. She didn’t understand why some received extra speed or strength and others got the ability to move things with their minds. As far as she could tell, the changes were driven by different personality strengths. A lot of the soldiers seemed to get the strength or strategy, with fewer developing telekinesis. Blue and Luke were telekinetic, and she’d attributed it to their connection with their surroundings and with others’ emotions.
She still hadn’t met anyone else like her.
In front of her, the changed soldier started to piece things together, to question what Kenny was doing.
She needed to act fast. She focused on him. Talk to her, talk to her, talk to her, she thought.
After a long moment of her staring at him, he finally asked, “Do you have what you need?” As soon as the words left his mouth, he looked immediately awkward, as if he’d started a conversation with a circus performer. Why did I say anything?
His partner thought the same thing. He even turned to glare at him. Good, their focus was on her, then. Not on what Nick was doing.
“Oh, yes.” She offered her sweetest smile. “This tiny room with no privacy is completely comfortable.”
Their identical looks of confusion almost made her laugh as she tried to think of a way to keep them talking. “You’re changed then, but he isn’t?” She nudged her head to the one who was afraid of her. Then she lifted her hand and said in a stage whisper aside, “Poor guy. They didn’t think he would make it did they?”
The insulted soldier took her bait. He sniffed hard. “I’m glad. I don’t want to take that stuff. You are a bunch of weirdos.”
She shrugged, but the guy in front of her, the one who was changed, didn’t like being labeled. He cast a glance at his colleague, his jaw tight.
Behind her, she could hear Nick and Kenny murmuring, though she kept focus on the guards in front of her, in case they got suspicious and she needed to twist their thoughts. They were hissing back and forth. She hoped Nick hurried. She had no idea how long she could distract these two.
…
“The drug. It’s the best shot.”
Nick’s pulse thundered in his ears. Even as he mentally flinched from the idea, he knew Kenny was right. Unchanged, he was a liability, one more prisoner to get to safety. If he was like them, he could be of more help. He nodded.
Kenny slipped the vial of Solvimine into Nick’s pocket. “That’s enough for you.”
“Thanks, man.” Maybe thanks weren’t appropriate. After all, this was Solvimine. The drug killed almost as many as it had changed.
“If you live, you’ll be sick tonight and tomorrow morning. Take it now, and I’ll make sure I’m the one to get your laundry in two days. We’ll leave then. There aren’t cameras or microphones here so no one should notice.” He gathered the remaining sheets on the floor.
“Roger.” Nick slipped his hand in his pocket, unstoppered the vial with a flick of his thumb, and he brought it to his mouth. He tossed the contents back without hesitation.
It was tart and bitter. He wrinkled his nose as he slid the vial back into Kenny’s pocket.
It was done.
“Hope you live, man.”
Nick snorted. Leave it to an Army Ranger to joke about something like this.
He hadn’t been able to think of any alternative. Lord knew he’d tried. There was no other escape from this room. At least, no escape that would work. Kenny told him they were in the middle of a courtyard with no easy getaway. He’d been over it and over it, turning over in his mind everything he knew, thinking through the possibilities. He had no chance against the other changed soldiers. There had been two casualties from the first phase of Fields’s Solvimine soldier testing. With Kenny and Brian as allies, that still left eight hostile guards. Even if he could get out and meet up with Kenny and Brian, the chances of failure were too high.
He could see Kenny’s thought process. If Nick was changed, that would be eight against three, or four, if he counted Kitty. Those were better odds. Not good, but better.
The one bright spot was that administration of Solvimine had been halted after the two deaths. He’d learned that while Fields had interrogated him. Not that the mortality rate bothered Dr. Fields, but it had spooked Goldstone’s higher-ups and also the soldiers, especially the ones slated for the next phase of testing. Kenny said there had been some managerial changes, but he hadn’t elaborated.
What he did know was that Fields had grudgingly agreed to do additional screening on the next batch of subjects, to account for factors that might put them at higher risk of death.
That delay would give Nick time to get changed himself. There were already enough damn drug-enhanced guards around. They would never be able to manage to escape ten more.
Beside him, Kenny stood. Their gazes held for a moment, and then Kenny nodded, as if he’d found what he needed on Nick’s face. “Good luck. Be prepared to leave in two days.”
Nick nodded back and followed him to the door.
The two guards at the door looked pissed. Kitty’s mouth had thinned to a straight line. What the hell was going on?
Kenny passed through the door first and the other two filed out behind him. As the door closed, Nick heard the two other guards arguing in low voices as they walked down the hall.
“What’d you say to them?” Nick asked.
“Nothing.” Kitty shrugged. “More importantly, what did Kenny say?”
As he studied her, he remembered the feel of her against him, the taste of her mouth. He wanted more, to take her into his arms again. Most of all, he wanted that away from this godforsaken compound, somewhere he could find out if there might really be something between them besides dire circumstances and too-close proximity. The urgency of the moment pressed on him.
He wondered what to say. What could he say? He probably only had a few minutes before he started to get sick.
The importance of the next minutes hit him.
He might not live through the next day.
“I need to tell you that I’m sorry.” He held her icy blue gaze.
She scowled at him. “I told you not to apologize for that.”
“I’m not sorry I kissed you.” He laughed, the idea was so preposterous. “God, that’s the last thing I’m sorry about.”
Her brow dropped. “What are you talking about, then?”
“I’m sorry for the next day or so. Whatever happens”—he took her hands—“I need you to know that this was all I could think of to get us out. Please don’t be angry.” He shook his head. “No. You can be angry. That’s not right. You can be mad, but I needed to try.”
“What are you…?” Understanding dawned. “Oh no. You took it. He gave you Solvimine.”
He had no idea if she’d heard that in his head or if she’d put it together on her own. He didn’t take the time to find out. “There was nothing else.”
Fear registered on her features first, followed closely by outrage. She threw herself at him, her fists beating against his chest. “You arrogant, stupid idiot.”
She hit him over and over, and he didn’t try to stop her. She wasn’t trying to hurt him. He’d taught her better. If she wanted to hurt him, she would have. He’d given her lots of creative ways to do it.
Instead, she beat against his chest until she fell forward, her face on her fists. He took a chance and gathered her against him, and she let him. That’s when he heard her sob.
The sound tore through his chest like a grenade explosion.
“Oh God.” He couldn’t deal with it if he made her cry. The words poured out. “I told you I’d get you out, Kit. I told you. Kenny couldn’t think of anything else. I couldn’t think of anything else. This was the only option. The best chance we have.” He pulled her closer, squeezed her. “I’m going to make it. I know I will.”
“No, you don’t, you big huge jerk.” He’d never heard Kitty curse. Even when she was mad. She lifted her eyes, rimmed with tears and full of anger. “You decided to do this without asking me. You made your decision, and it didn’t matter to you what I thought.”
“Kitty, that’s not true.” Didn’t she see that he couldn’t stand not being able to do anything? Didn’t she understand that he hated worse than anything feeling useless and helpless? “I was thinking of you. I was thinking of both of us. We were going crazy, being here together.”
“So you decided to kill yourself?”
“Stop it.” His tone was sharp with censure. “You’re being dramatic.”
“Oh, you’ve been through this before, then? You know that for sure?” She pushed away, and he loosened his grip but didn’t let her go. “Because I know what it’s like. I threw up for hours and listened as my parents died.” She glared at him as that image dug at him. “What if I have to sit here and watch you die tonight? Did you even think about that?”
His chest tightened, and his stomach turned. He wasn’t sure if it was her words or the drug but he felt sick. “Oh, Kit. Honey, I didn’t…”
“You didn’t think.” Her scowl was as fierce as any of his drill sergeants in basic. “You didn’t think.”
“I’m so sorry.” He didn’t have anything else to say. He reached up, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I’ll do my best.”
He could feel it. The sickness that had started in his stomach was becoming more intense. “I’ll do my best. I swear. I want to stay with you.”
She nodded and stepped away. Then she folded her arms over her chest, and her gaze softened the slightest bit. “You better, Nick Degrassi. You can’t leave me here again by myself. Do you hear me? You better fight hard. You can’t leave me here.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He offered her a mock salute, but the movement made him dizzy. He tried for a smile but didn’t know if it worked. The room was beginning to spin. “I’m sorry, babe. I’m really….”
The rest of his words got caught in his throat as he stumbled across the room to the toilet and lost his lunch.
God help him through the next day.