Chapter 7

SR: Did you hear Atalina’s brain is awake?

JG: Atalina’s brain is always awake, genius.

SR: Ha ha. No, doofus, the human brain she’s being all mad scientist on.

JG: Whoa! Seriously?

SR: Yeah. Wanna go look in his window?

—Messages exchanged between Scott Reineke and Jayson Greer on Ryūjin Station

THE WOMAN WITH the angry eyes and the gentle touch who, instead of reveling in his embarrassment, had turned away and given him a distraction just pulled the door shut behind herself.

Her scent, however, lingered in the room, cinnamon and a lush tropical bloom. His chest expanded on the inhale, eased on his reluctant exhale. For a heartbeat there when she’d put the alarm strap over his head, he’d caught the scent directly from her skin—it had been richer, deeper, more innately sensual.

“Focus, Bo. And not on the warrior princess who wants to fillet you.”

Leaning heavily on the cane with one hand, his other on the bed, he levered himself down to the ground. Just as well that he’d braced himself because his knees nearly crumpled. Breath harsh, he stood there for long minutes until his muscles stopped spasming. Then he stretched out his legs one at a time—and very carefully.

The muscles felt like jelly, but they held.

Regardless, it took him five long minutes to navigate his way to the shower. The air was cool against his skin—likely because he was covered in a layer of fine perspiration. As if he’d pounded the pavement for miles when he hadn’t even made it a few short feet. Bo wasn’t complaining; that he could walk at all right after coming out of a coma was a miracle.

His fingers were bone white on the head of the cane by the time he stepped inside the doorway, and his breathing had gone from uneven to flat-out ragged. Bracing his free hand against the wall, he took in the spacious area with towel railings and a narrow but tall shelf filled with amenities to his left. To the right was a short passageway that held a washbasin attached to the wall and ended in a smoked glass door.

That had to lead to the john.

As for the shower, it was straight ahead. No separate door because the floor had been designed to ensure that water would flow away from this entrance area. Shoulders in knots, fingers stiff, and his teeth tightly clenched, he walked in another step. It gave him just enough maneuvering room to shut the main door behind himself.

Once inside the shower space, he didn’t even pretend not to need the seat fitted within. Collapsing down onto it, he reached forward and managed to hook the cane to an empty towel rail, then sat back and tried to catch his breath. At this rate, the orderly would be checking on him before he’d even turned on the shower.

Bo frowned, realized it might be a good idea to wait.

Staying in place, he gently exercised his muscles group by group; the bugs seemed to work with him, as if programmed to follow a patient’s lead after that patient became active. By the time the orderly knocked on the door, he had his breath back. “I haven’t even got the water going yet, man. Give me twenty more minutes.”

“You sure you don’t need help?” The other man’s voice had a grittiness to it that hovered on the right side of too much. “Name’s KJ and I swear I’ve seen it all before. You can’t compete against a colossal squid clanmate who refused to shift into human form for treatment. Tentacle hooks and meter-long arms everywhere.”

Bo stared at the closed door even as his brain helpfully presented him with an image of an uncooperative giant cephalopod clinging to the towel rail. “I just came out of a coma, KJ. Stop trying to mess with my head.”

“I wish I were joking,” was the world-weary statement. “Asshole wrapped one of his tentacles around a bolted-in piece of furniture and used his free tentacle to push me away. I tell you, I’ve never before wanted to eat calamari, but that day, I was ready to become a goddamn calamari chef. Especially after the fucker started squirting ink at me—those assholes swim so deep their ink isn’t black. I ended up glow-in-the-fucking-dark.”

Laughter built inside Bowen’s chest, a slow-rolling wave. “You have to finish the story now. Was he high?”

“Nah, just scared of needles.”

And the laugh burst from him in a throb of aching muscles. “I don’t have tentacles,” he said after it passed, “but I’m pretty sure I can handle turning on the shower while seated.” The controls had been deliberately placed for such access. “Kaia will also brain me if I slip and knock my head, so trust me, I’ll be careful.”

KJ’s chuckle was as gritty as his voice. “All right. Just press the alarm if you need an assist back to the bed—I’ve got the receiver tucked into my ear.”

Bo heard the sound of the door to the room shutting seconds later.

Confident now that KJ wouldn’t burst in on him without warning, he took a few minutes to examine the metal bugs attached to his body—each about a quarter inch wide and twice as long, they were literally hooked into his skin. He was guessing they’d shot in fine tendrils that reached all the way down into his muscles.

Curious, he touched one of the bugs, pressed a little.

Nothing. No pain. No change in the pulse.

As for the sensor wires laid directly against his skull, Dr. Kahananui had left them in place but they were so fine he could only feel them if he rubbed his fingers directly against his scalp. The doctor had also confirmed they were waterproof, built to be put on a subject and left in place for the long term.

Satisfied he knew about all the tech currently on—and inside—his body, he activated the large square touchpad placed on the right wall. The system came online, asking him for his water temperature preference and suggesting a “comfortable” range.

Bo slid it up to this side of boiling, then pushed Go.

Blissful hot liquid poured over him, the thin needles stabbing deliciously into his scalp and skin. The last time he’d consciously felt the touch of water had been in that Venetian canal, cool dark closing over his head. He couldn’t actually remember hitting the water, but he remembered Lily’s frantic eyes and searching hands, remembered the starburst in his chest, remembered the water sliding into his mouth and into his lungs.

Not about to be held hostage to an act of violence, he raised his face deliberately to the droplets raining from the showerhead. As they sluiced away the past, running over his face and down his shoulders to his chest, his mind flashed to that semisecond when Kaia had been within touching distance, the curves of her a siren song.

His body stirred.

Shoving his hands through his hair, he shook his head to dislodge the sensory impact of her. But no matter what he did, her scent continued to haunt him. Even after he used the shampoo and soap from the dispensers on the wall, a hint of cinnamon and the luscious bite of a tropical flower lingered on his tongue.

As did the black wave of her fiercely contained rage.

Bo shut off the water with a frown. He let himself drip dry for several minutes before he leaned forward and dragged a towel from the rail. Rubbing his hair with the towel, he considered everything Kaia had said and done. She was angry with him, incredibly angry, yet she’d helped Dr. Kahananui secure Bo for the experiment.

“. . . I can’t say no to family.”

That explained her cooperation, but not her fury.

His instincts stretched awake. Bo had spent his adult life unearthing secrets and unraveling enigmas. It seemed fitting that he spend what might be his final two weeks as Bowen Knight attempting to solve the mystery that was Kaia.

His gut twisted.

And he made a decision—he wouldn’t waste the time he had and he wouldn’t focus on the ninety-five percent chance of failure. He’d live. Protect his people. Laugh with his sister and his friends. Cross swords with a cook with long dark hair and a scent that frustrated and haunted.

If Bowen Adrian Knight was to cease to exist, he’d go out on his own terms.