Chapter 14 #2
“Sorry,” I say, but Arc shakes his head as he wraps his arms around me and squeezes me tight.
“Don’t you dare.”
I always knew Mom felt that way about me, but I didn’t think my sisters…
“Look at me,” he tips my head up and makes me meet his eyes. “Do you want to leave?”
I take two deep breaths instead of saying yes. “No. I told Kimba we’d do this, so I’ll stay.”
I drop my head to his chest and breathe in again. I don’t want to turn around. I don’t want to deal with the fluttering anxiety and embarrassment that are bouncing around in my stomach and chest like kids at a trampoline park.
“You’ll excuse us,” Arc says, abruptly picking me up and walking away.
“That’s one way to deal with it, I guess,” I say quietly as he takes me to a small bathroom and sets me on the counter.
When he steps back, he shakes his head. “Do not try to apologize again.”
“I hate when something like that punches me in the gut.”
“Because you can’t punch it back?” he guesses.
“Something like that.”
He takes a deep breath and presses his forehead to mine. “If you want to leave, just think it and I will pick you up and carry you out of here before anyone has the chance to ask what’s going on.”
I laugh at the idea of it. “No. I’m a big girl. I’ll get through this and then we’ll go home.”
I take a deep breath and then another before I square my shoulders. “I’m ready. Let’s go back out and face the dragon again.”
She’s not waiting to pounce.
I think we have Trench to thank for that.
Arc slips his fingers in mine and holds my hand as we make our way back into the slightly more crowded room.
Shock and Risk have already moved on, they’re talking to Laurel’s mate and another man who is watching the woman with a baby talking to Laurel very closely.
“Cindy is Core’s mate,” Arc says softly. “They’ve very recently had a weeun. He is, understandably, protective.”
“Right.” Obviously… babies.
He squeezes my hand. “Please think of something else.”
Like going home and—
“Not that.”
“You know I might use that against you some day.”
“I’m sure you will.”
“Make sure one of them drives us home because I will be torturing you with my thoughts on the trip.” I almost laugh, but then my gaze passes over my sister’s glare. “Jessica really hates you.”
“I’m an asshole, she has plenty of reasons to.”
Having spent the last week with my cold boys and my two trips to town… I’m still a little unprepared when the others filter in.
There are ten of them total when Shock leans close to tell me that everyone is here. He runs through their names and I forget most of them immediately.
The ones I haven’t met cast me a quick and curious glance. When those glances move on to the three of them, I can see the question. They’re curious who I belong to. I glance at Arc and he just nods to confirm my suspicion.
The last one in has to be Hazard. Something about his grin—the textbook definition of shit-eating—makes it impossible for him to be anyone else.
“Oh good,” he says as he stops at the top of the small stairs leading down to the sofa. “I don’t have to keep the secret anymore.”
“He knew?” Jessica asks, staring at me wide-eyed.
“I can’t help what Hannah told him.”
“Hannah knew before us?”
Laurel covers her mouth, but it doesn’t hide the fact that she’s laughing.
“If you’d like to calm down…” Kimba says, sitting next to her mate. “Thank you all for coming in for this irregular meeting. You’ve noticed that we have one more than usual. This is Chrys.”
I wave a little, and when they all look at me I force myself to stay still instead of shrinking back into Arc and letting him hide me.
RISK
Curiosity, irritation, amusement… the expressions around the room are as varied as the men and women wearing them.
“Chrys is the sole survivor of that,” Kimba points toward the still smoking wreckage.
“Finally, some answers,” Strike comments. I wince.
Kimba does too. She glances at us so I say what she’s not particularly happy to divulge. “Actually, Chrys’ presence on the ship only gives us more questions.”
“I was abducted from Earth,” she chirps from beside us with a little flourish of a hand movement. “Drugged, stuffed in an escape pod, and thankfully ejected before the ship actually hit the ground.”
Trench’s hand grips Jess shoulder tight as he whispers something to her. It is, I assume, the only reason she isn’t already half way across the room. She would like to strangle us.
“No memory of anything?” Hazard asks.
She shakes her head, earrings clattering against the side of her face.
“Nope. One minute I was leaving the dance studio, then there were a bunch of whacko dreams, and I woke up here. If I didn’t know better, it would be just as easy to think they kidnapped me over anyone else.
” She points at the three of us with a casual wave of her thumb.
“Okay then, why would they kidnap you?” Drift taps at his leg. “There’s the family connection, but that doesn’t seem like enough to go to the trouble. Could it be something with your work, or—”
“She doesn’t have a real job.” Jess’s comment pulls everyone’s attention to her.
“Yes she does.” Arc’s retort brings everyone right back, but Chrys stares at her oldest sister.
“I’ve worked for the Agency for years… how did you think I was paying you rent? How did you think I was going to be able to take over your mortgage when you decided to stay here?”
“I—” Jess stares at her blankly. “How many years?”
“We’ve talked about it a dozen times. Do you really not remember?”
“I must have forgotten.” Jess’ brows furrow and she looks up. “Do you think your job might have had something to do with it?”
“No, I’m just incredibly offended.”
“Chrys,” she says, a warning.
“Jess,” she says right back.
Laurel is the only one in the room laughing.
Arc leans over to whisper, “Chrys is used to this… half the time, she was the one who’d started it.”
She watches Jess for a long moment before turning back to Drift.
“I don’t think my job has anything to do with it.
Being their sister is a more likely reason.
You said the Company wanted both of them for whatever reason.
If they just wanted an Ardem… going to Earth might have been the easiest way to get one. ”
Kimba stands, Drift steadying her as she says, “I’ll go let the CSS and the Agency know that they might need to figure out how to protect anyone else here or still on Earth. They have gene panels, so they’ll know if anyone’s related to you in the system.”
“Thank you.” Laurel adds, before anyone else does, “And I don’t think they’re going to kidnap our mother, but… just in case.” She flutters her hand vaguely in a way so similar to something Chrys does…
I look down at Chrys. She’s smaller here. She’s trying not to be seen. It’s so odd, I get lost watching her.
“Have you had any strange contact since you got here? Anyone trying to talk to you or get you away from them?”
“No.”
“They might think you died in the explosion.” Kimba’s gaze trails over Chrys and I hate that I know she’s cataloguing things the rest of us can’t see.
Drift hasn’t looked at her since we arrived… she’s too bright for his eyes, but Kimba’s physiology is better adapted to what she’s gotten of his mutation since they bonded.
The chaos of color is amusing to her, not abhorrent.
“Your medication,” Shock says quietly.
This time, Laurel and Jess both turn to look sharply at us.
“That was just a weird mix up at the pharmacy,” she says, but she isn’t sure.
“What kind of a mix up?” Andrea asks, handing her weeun to Strike and scooting forward. “I take three different medications and they’ve never screwed anything up. It’s one of the things that they boast about. They don’t make errors”
“They gave her kirocilicantephen.”
Everyone in the room looks at me like I’ve switched to a language no one else knows… except for Trench and Drift.
“They discontinued that decades ago,” Trench says.
“Yeah.” I nod. “But somehow, she got a bottle of it instead of what she was prescribed.”
They look at each other, and Jess says, “Do you guys want to clue the rest of the class in?”
“One of the scientists trying to figure out how to keep our species from going completely extinct created kirocilicantephen… It’s like Vitamin S, but it was removed from the market because it put the test subjects into…
” Trench pauses to ask Kimba for the right word before he finishes. “It put them into a heat.”
No one looks at Chrys after that.
“It killed a few of them,” Trench adds, glaring at the floor. “Most of the scientists wanted an answer… they didn’t always care what they needed to do to find it.”
“I’ll ask Tylen,” Drift says, looking uncomfortable.
No one asks, but I know… Tylen was the one who discovered humans were compatible. His methods were questionable too… but he didn’t kill anyone. And he was the one who got the drug removed from all testing. The least unethical man of the lot… which isn’t saying much.
“Did you get the filloum sample?” I ask Trench, and he shakes his head. “I thought it might be hard.”
“Why?”
“I met with Riann today. The CSS is unable to help with information on them… and we may want to be careful about who in the CSS we talk to. One of the founders may be involved in all of this.”
Core curses. Cindy scolds him for his language. And the others look concerned.
“I thought I might have been able to talk to the man in question today, to get some answers, but Margot stopped me. Her policies kept me from catching up to him. All I know for sure is that he’s the same person who got a zurgle to scratch Jessica.”
That knowledge is met with a silence that makes my skin crawl.
With a sharp nod, Kimba says, “We’ll look into that too. If we think of any other avenue to explore, we’ll keep you updated. You do the same.” She waits for one of us to nod, and then she moves on.