Chapter Eight

Thunder hadn’t planned on breaking open the building doors so the humans could enter. He had intended to send a blast from his plasma gun over their heads and scare them. He became distracted and fired too late, allowing the Liberators to get in his way.

The shot that killed the Purity Force officer, however, was not an accident.

He intentionally avoided looking at the human woman. Thunder could sense her presence even when he couldn’t see her, and her aura kept him from concentrating on his work. There had been nothing in the plan about taking hostages. The cyborgs usually killed anyone who got in their way and asked questions later.

But there was something about this girl that was different. Thunder had grabbed her in the doorway because he knew he could use her to help get rid of a nuisance. In the fast-paced processors of his mind, the only thing that mattered was getting the humans out of his way.

The cyborg hadn’t anticipated the feeling of her curves under her sweatshirt, the softness of her body, or the sweet, musky scent as he lifted her off the ground. Something different was replacing the bloodlust ruling his mind. It was new but raw and powerful. It was an urgent desire that he couldn’t identify.

For now, he had a job to do. The captive cyborgs needed to be freed from their cells so they would have a larger force helping them fight their way back out of the building.

It would have been easier if he didn’t have to explain the woman’s presence to Savage. However, his leader had asked and Thunder had to respond. “We should keep her, for now. If Purity Force comes in here, we might be able to use her again. They won’t want to kill a human.”

Savage shot him a hard look. “She’s a cyborg sympathizer. They might not care if she’s a human or not.”

Thunder opened the next lock. “Isn’t it worth a try if she makes our job easier?”

“Not if we end up killing her. We’ve already eliminated some humans getting here. The public will think she’s innocent. Do we need another variable tonight? Are we supposed to protect a girl now?”

The blonde cyborg knew better than to interpret the warning from his commander as sympathy for the girl. Savage wouldn’t hesitate to kill the human if he thought it would help them. Thunder was determined to keep her alive and with them, for a little while, at least. He wanted to explore the new hunger she inspired.

The dark sound of boots stomping caused Savage to stop his work and look up at the guards in the doorway. They let in the rest of the cyborgs, who immediately gave a situation report to their leader. “There are too many of them,” Dagger said. “They’ve surrounded the entire compound. I don’t see how we’re going to make our way out of here.”

“We can do it.” Compass was eager to fight. “Their weapons are no match for ours. We can split up our forces and flank them. We’re holding them off for the moment. We have time to figure everything out.”

“They’re like rabbits! There are so many members of Purity Force that they might have cloned themselves. We’d be crazy to try and get out of here.” Dagger adjusted his glasses with shaking fingers.

Compass shook his head in frustration. “Stop acting like a human. If we wanted that kind of attitude, we would have kept them alive.” His dark gaze slid across the room and ended on the cowering woman in the corner. “Aw, shit.”

Savage had a sharp glint in his eye as he pointed a finger at the girl. He looked at Thunder. “Get her out of here. We can keep her alive, but she doesn’t need to hear our plans.”

Thunder nodded his assent. “There’s another floor below this one. I can secure her downstairs before I return to help you strategize.”

“No. Stay with the girl.” Savage’s reply came quickly and froze Thunder in place. “We can’t trust her. What if she’s part of Purity Force? I’ll let you know if we need you.”

The blonde cyborg knew guard duty was an assignment for a lower-ranking soldier. They hadn’t created an official system among the cyborgs, but until this point, Savage had always chosen Thunder to be his second-in-command. He didn’t need to waste his skills watching a human.

Something had shifted, and he didn’t like it.

This wasn’t the time to debate the issue. Thunder grabbed the woman’s arm and yanked her to her feet, taking out his frustrations on her body. She yelped, setting off a twinge inside him that was as inexplicable as his other reactions around her. As a cyborg, he hadn’t ever worried about emotions. He did his duty as a soldier. Once he escaped Cyborg Sector, he had only concerned himself with survival. Having any other ideas in his mind was unsettling.

“You’re coming with me.” The woman staggered along behind him. He had noted a doorway and staircase that led further down below the building, and it seemed as good a place as any to keep an unexpected prisoner. The seclusion meant the other cyborgs wouldn’t see his embarrassment at being reduced to guard duty.

“You don’t have to do this. Just let me go and say I escaped.” She kept begging for her freedom as they descended the dark stairwell. Enough moisture seeped into the concrete walls to make them damp. The floor was dry except for the edges.

“That’s not going to happen.” Thunder reached the landing, pushed his way through a door, and found a light switch. It illuminated a single bulb on a chain in the center of the room. At first glance, it appeared to be a storage area lined with metal shelves along the sides. He noticed a narrow bed that folded down from the wall. They were in a bunker.

“I promise I won’t tell anybody about you. All I want is to get out of here and go home.” The woman looked up at him with huge blue eyes that had tears at the edges.

Thunder knew his brothers upstairs were relying on him to do the right thing, even if they didn’t want him to attend their meeting. “Tell me your name and what you’re doing here.” His first instinct was to ask for her rank. Savage’s suggestion that she was part of Purity Force sounded reasonable, but Thunder was skeptical. She was too young and soft for Purity Force.

“My name is Melissa Quinn. We came here to save the cyborgs.” She stood in the middle of the room, shaking visibly.

“I find that hard to believe. How could a bunch of humans expect to get past Purity Force?” There had to be a reasonable explanation for why they came here. She wasn’t making any sense.

She nodded, and her light brown tresses enticingly flowed around her shoulders. It made Thunder want to reach out, grab the strands by the handful, and pull her head back to expose her white throat.

He kept his fists clenched behind his back.

“I know it sounds dumb,” Melissa admitted. “We didn’t think anything through. We only knew that we wanted to help.” The girl slumped down onto the edge of the bed, wrapping her arms underneath her breasts.

Thunder was unable to keep his eyes off her. He could still feel the outline of her body when he had held her, and he wanted to touch her again.

“I need to check you for weapons.” It was a reasonable excuse to touch her, even if it wasn’t entirely accurate. Any weapons she carried wouldn’t be a threat to a cyborg.

“I don’t have any.” She sounded bitter but resolved. “Jake wasn’t smart enough to think we might need them.”

There was hope for this human after all. The cyborg was glad to see she didn’t believe it was a good idea to start a rescue mission without bringing weapons. Thunder had a plasma gun built into his body. He wouldn’t ever want to be without it.

“I can’t take your word for it.”

Thunder stepped forward and pulled Melissa to her feet. She stood before him, trembling and fearful as he slipped his hands around her body. The cyborg felt the gentle slope of her waistline, the smooth plane of her back and stomach, and the roundness of her ass. The girl had no weapons in the traditional sense, but her body was enough to bring him to his knees.