Chapter Twenty-Six
Addie
“The Zodius have retreated for now…”
That’s all I hear Caleb say before I turn the corner, seeking a much-needed escape.
Fortunately, the bathroom is actually easy to find, and once inside the tiny one-stall room, I press my palms against the cool ceramic sink, looking skyward without seeing what is above. I don’t need to hear more of Caleb’s report. “Retreated for now” translates too easily to “more bloodshed to come.”
I’m not pissed at Creed, though I’m fairly certain that was his intent. He’s pushing me away. Maybe he can’t bear the idea of being in love with my father’s daughter. Being bound to me for the rest of his life.
But I can’t think about my personal pain over him right now.
More bloodshed to come…
The bloodshed has to end, and if I could turn back time and do a hundred things differently, I would have connected the dots about my father’s motives and taken action. But I can only go forward, however daunting it may become. Inhaling, I lower my chin, cringing at the raccoon eyes staring back at me in the mirror, the mud slashes streaking a line down my cheeks. I’m still sick—feeling pretty crappy, to be honest—but worrying about my stomach churning seems selfish when soldiers are fighting for their lives.
What rattles me in this moment is not my disheveled image or my personal discomfort, but what was underneath it all. For years, perhaps all my life, my identity has been tied to my fathers in ways that reached beyond biology.
“You can make this right,” I whisper. “You will make this right.”
Pulling myself together, I clean up a little and force myself to get back out there on the front lines. I exit the bathroom and intend to rejoin Creed and Caleb, locating them side-by-side outside the surgery-viewing window. The sight of Creed standing there—legs braced in a V, arms crossed in front of his chest, an unapproachable air about him intended for me—is disconcerting in every possible way.
Because I have nowhere else to go but to him.
In a matter of days, we’ve gone from enemies to lovers, and right now, I’m not sure what we are besides the soldier that didn’t kill my father but wishes he had. Truth be told, I’m not certain Creed could ever completely separate me from my father, no matter how hard he might try or how much he might say otherwise.
I take a hint and don’t step to Creed, leaning against a wall behind him, but still between him and Caleb. My attention cuts beyond the glass as Katie drops one green-spiked bullet after another into a glass container. The tension in the waiting area is palpable; the worry that Jensen won’t make it through this is no doubt on everyone’s mind.
Creed stands like steel, watching every move the doctor makes. Caleb, in turn, resorts to pacing, and pacing some more, until he all but wears a hole in the concrete floor. Until, finally, Katie is here with us, offering an update.
“He’s stable,” she announces, eyeing me with a silent, understanding welcome, and this news is as welcome as a soft breeze on a hot day. Oh, so needed. “But he’s not out of trouble yet,” she warns. “He’s lost a lot of blood. And he’s endured tremendous damage to his body. Whatever those bullets are made of, they do more than penetrate the armor. They shred muscle and tissue. He’s in for a long night of healing, and I’m worried about the healing sickness, considering the extent of his injuries. Though untested, I’m of the opinion that C deficiency is creating the healing illness, so I’ve started a supplement intravenously. That and the fact that he’s shown no healing illness in the past allow me to be optimistically hopeful.”
“When will we know he’s out of trouble?” I ask, beating the others to the question.
“A few more hours,” she says, looking us all over. “You should all go clean up and get some rest.” She points at me. “Not you. I heard what happened to you. I need to examine you before you get away from me. I just need a few minutes to check on Maddox.” She begins to depart and hesitates, reaching into her pocket and producing a clear, sealed baggy full of bullets. “Thought you might want these.” She drops them into Caleb’s hand, then turns and leaves.
Caleb stares at the bullets. We all do. As if they are the devil in disguise. After seeing the other men bleeding to death because of them, I think perhaps they were.
Abruptly, Caleb does something I have never seen him do. He loses it. Totally, completely loses it. He curses and then flattens one fist against the cavern wall beside the viewing glass, his big body tense, thundering frustration rushing off him.
I cringe as blood oozes from his knuckles and quickly back away, hugging myself, unsure of what to do. Not sure there’s anything I can do. Caleb holds the lives of his soldiers as his responsibility; perhaps he even represents the future of the world as we know it.
The pressure had to be immense.
“Julian’s soldiers on our perimeters,” he growls. “Waiting to unload those damn bullets in every one of my men. And what do we have to beat them back? Nothing. Not a damn thing.”
“We can fix that,” Creed offers. “We can even the playing field. Let’s go get Lawrence’s stock of Green Hornets now, tonight, and claim them for our own.”
Caleb runs his uninjured hand over the back of his neck, slowly calming himself. “Too much of the data on the hard drive is still encrypted. We don’t know enough to move forward. Can you get stock direct from Taylor?”
A muscle flexes in Creed’s jaw; his discomfort at Caleb knowing those bullets were his family’s creation, is palpable. “Obviously, Jensen updated you on my mother’s involvement.”
“He did. This is not your fault, Creed, but it might be a blessing. You have insider knowledge of their operation.”
“If I’m right about her involvement, and I show up and do what I have to do to get those bullets, then we’ve alerted her and Lawrence that we know what they are up to.”
“I’m pretty sure we’ve done that already,” Caleb says, his hands settling on his waist, blood dripping down his wrist. “We need those bullets.”
Long, tense moments pass, Creed’s expression indecipherable, but I can feel him through our bond—feel the emotion rolling off him, the tension eating away at him from the inside out. His mother is a problem for him in all kinds of ways none of us understand, I decide.
But he’s a soldier, as he’s reminded me oh, so brutally today, and he will do what is necessary. Proving I’m right, he says, “I’ll need a team at the Taylor facility ready to go the minute I deliver the coordinates. If they leave with me now, I’ll get them out of the canyon under the cover of wind.” Caleb offers a short nod of approval, and Creed’s gaze shifts to me, coldness in the depths of his stare. “I’ll be back in a few hours.”
A futile desperation rises inside me. I want to beg him to stay, to wait one more day, to allow his closest allies to heal. But I know why this is necessary, and I know what my role is in this, too. And it’s not to be a problem, not to deter him from his duty. I nod and whisper, “Be careful.”
His eyes darken, a flicker of emotion in their depths so fleeting I almost think I imagine it. He rotates on his heels and starts walking. And I can’t help it. I fear he won’t return. I think I will always fear he won’t come back. But not because he’s a soldier. Not because we’re in a silent war. Because he is Creed.