She simply could not get warm. Baths were nice, but she preferred not to float in her own filth.
Beth stood under the spray, missing her cleanser from home but grateful for this one.
She washed her body twice, opening her mouth to get the horrible taste of the Three out, thinking about Jeb's kiss.
She lathered her hair then rinsed the suds slid down the drain, a vague pink stain chasing them.
She rinsed again.
Beth toweled off then dressed in the foreign clothing. The denims were almost perfect, but a tad too long. The shirt and bra were very tight across her breasts.
She swiped an arm against the fog on the mirror and braced herself for the reflection, fighting the urge to jump.
It was very powerful compulsion for every Reflective when faced with a looking glass.
She opened a new toothbrush and scrubbed her teeth until only her own scent and the feel of smooth teeth remained.
She leaned against the sink, and thick shame enveloped her.
Beth had cried like a weak female in front of Jeb.
Her gratefulness, her relief, had needed release.
He’d happened to witness it.
Where was the hardcore Reflective you used to be?
She gazed in the mirror. A soft triangular face filled the image. Large eyes so dark they were almost black stared back, looking vaguely shocked inside the sea of ivory skin. Raven hair tickled her waist, and she had a sudden longing for the normalcy of tight braids.
She saw no beauty in the reflection. Pale-green or blue eyes were not present. Beautiful gold or platinum locks were absent.
Beth was bland by Papilio standards.
But she was herself.
Sometimes, that was enough.
*
Beth peered out of the bathroom.
A ticking clock borrowed the silence of the house.
The lack of voices filled her with disquiet as she tiptoed out of the bathroom and down a corridor covered with a strange soft floor beneath her feet.
Oh yes, carpet, she remembered absently.
Beth longed for a weapon, her right hand itching for the solid weight inside her palm. But cocky Jeb had figured he would be the big man and protect her.
Deep inside, it didn't make sense. Nothing but death would keep a Reflective separated from his or her soul mate.
That knowledge tightened something in her chest.
Beth should be grateful for his protection and the close call he'd interrupted. Yet she felt resentful, and she wasn't sure why. She was vulnerable without the small arsenal she usually carried.
Reflective men were meant to shelter and protect their mates, and Beth didn't need that. Besides, she wasn't his mate.
Yet.
The inevitable was a pressure inside her skull. She waited for her head to explode.
Beth had needed assistance that night. She could feel herself frown. Low voices filled the main room, and she walked out, recognizing the timbre of Jeb's immediately, her chest loosening again with relief.
What she had not been prepared for was a stabilizer pointed at Jeb's chest.
Beth's pulse went from resting to rioting.
Lance Ryan held Jeb at gunpoint. Jacky was behind Jeb, who was shielding the boy with his body.
“Hi, Mongrel.” Those perfect pale seawater-green eyes locked onto her.
Beth's heart sank. Her eyes went to Jeb's, and he shook his head.
Ryan raked his gaze over her.
She didn't like that he lingered on the curves that were proof of her gender.
Not at all.
Anything that made Beth afraid made her angry. She latched onto that emotion. It was safer.
“What do you want?” Her voice was calm.
Ryan smiled, thrilled to deliver some kind of awful news. “I've been sent to fetch you back.”
That surprised Beth. She felt the shock to her toes.
Why would Rachett send Ryan, of all Reflectives?
“Your face!” Ryan whooped, slapping his thigh, and Jeb made a small movement.
“As you were.” The ceramic barrel of the stabilizer nodded at Jeb, and he stilled.
“Why?” Beth asked.
“It's been five years,” Ryan announced, watching her with keen interest.
Beth steadied her heart rate. “For what—five years for what?”
Ryan sighed, obviously put out by her perceived slow intellect.
“Since you jumped.”
Beth's head swam, her heartbeats going back into overdrive.
“No.”
“Oh yes!” he squealed in delight.
Beth didn't believe him. “Then why weren't you sent sooner?”
Jeb's eyes narrowed.
“Anarchy, my dear mongrel. The Cause has been overthrown and your precious Rachett has been tossed out on his ear.”
Beth felt her mouth drop open.
Many things flashed through her mind. Madeline, her dwelling, The Cause—a mainstay since before recorded history?
My butterflies!
“Oooh, this is too fun! Your face, the horror. The devastation—the loss.”
“Stop it, traitor,” Jeb said through his teeth.
Ryan laid the butt of the stabilizer in Jeb's stomach in a bursting strike.
He doubled over soundlessly.
Beth wanted to cry over her brave partner being brought down by a corrupt warrior of The Cause—if there was still a Cause.
Ryan strode to Beth, and she did an evasive maneuver that was as automatic as breathing.
She slammed her palm into his nose as she moved into his charge. Beth knew she'd struck home when there was a sharp crunch of a broken nose followed by blood.
Ryan jumped, striking her in one motion.
“Beth!” Jeb bellowed.
It was too late. Beth was falling, a new injury against the old.
She landed on the floor, hand to cheek, looking up at the newest nightmare.
Beth struggled to catch her breath, her eyes swinging to Jeb but posing the question to Ryan. “What are you doing? Why come after us?”
“I can't help you if I'm dead,” Jeb explained quietly while the stabilizer was trained on his head.
“Too true, Merrick. Smart, for once. Not that this little mongrel whore is worth saving.”
He doesn't know.
Relief swamped Beth.
If Ryan had known that Jeb had claimed her as his soul mate, she would already be dead.
Jeb's eyes begged for her silence.
Ryan stared down at her with disdain.
“Because I don't want to deal with you in Papilio. It's a new order.”
Beth didn't ask him, just held his eyes in a contemplative glare.
“No? You won't ask? Well, mine—of course.”
He smiled.
“I was always meant to be leader, and I've worked these past five years for the revenge I needed for true joy, Beth.”
The use of her name was not intimate.
It was frightening.
Ryan's eyes flicked to Jeb and Jacky. “Stand down, or I'll stabilize you into forever.”
“You,” His eyes burned holes through her. “I know where you're going.”
Beth didn't ask but gave solemn eyes to Jeb instead. His face was a mask of hate and anger—not for her, but for his inability to protect her.
She clamped down on her emotions.
“Where?” Beth ground out.
“Sector One.”
Beth burst from her position and ran in the opposite direction.
Ryan easily caught her around the waist, tearing her into the bathroom. He locked the door and forced her face to look into the reflection, his fingers biting into her chin to keep it stationary.
His image smiled at her.
Her dark looks contrasted with his light. Whoever said evil was dark had never danced with the devil.
She heard the door crack with the weight of a massive shoulder being thrown against it.
Jeb.
A wave of heat consumed them.
Then they were gone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Beth was not fully healed, hurtling through the pathway with Ryan clamped onto her like a second skin.
Upon landing, the first thing Ryan would do was subdue her.
That was what Beth would have done to control another. That was what they had been trained to do.
Beth knew how to subdue others without killing them.
Her last thought before they burst out of the pathway in a free fall was the struggle she would have in getting away from Ryan.
Ryan had been in charge of the sector jump, but Beth was the strongest jumper they had, and her worry had translated into a more specific location of her choice.
She had the advantage of surprise.
The water slapped her face hard as she landed.
Beth ignored the pain and dove deeper, having sucked the air from the atmosphere as she fell.
Beth came up for air and immediately began swimming away from Ryan.
She moved true—hard, then she turned over and heaved backward.
Ryan was approaching fast behind her.
His reach was longer.
Beth didn't panic; she had never been prone to that.
Instead, her arms sliced the water as she flicked her eyes behind her, finding the shore easily.
It was a quarter kilometer away.
Doable.
Ryan trained his eyes on her while he attacked the water that lay between them.
He ate the distance as she moved backward.
Ryan began to gain, only two body lengths away from her.
She poured on the speed, her arms smooth propellers in the water, churning her backward.
Beth hadn’t been wearing shoes when Ryan had taken her, and that helped. Ryan’s combat boots were like lead weights that slowed him.
Beth felt something solid underneath her back and stabbed soft sand with arms that shook with fatigue and spent adrenaline.
She scuttled backward and turned to her hands and knees then jumped to a standing position.
Her sodden clothes added unacceptable weight.
Beth ran forward, staggering on the sand dune that led to the crest of the hill. Sweeping sea grass, a solid wave of bleached green, whispered in the slight breeze off the shore.
She heard splashing behind her and drove harder toward the top of the hill.
It wasn't a Reflective sector, most materials were banned. But she needed only the smallest thing to jump.
Anywhere but here. If she found a reflection small enough, Ryan wouldn't be able to follow her.
Beth's eyes scanned the environment: grass, sand, sky… no buildings, no glass—certainly no mirrors.
She couldn't go back to use the water—Ryan was behind her.
Beth picked up speed, moving into a sprint, arms jaggedly pumping by her side in a brutal rhythm as she made the top of the hill, only to grind to an abrupt halt against a wide muscular chest.
The air plowed out of her, and she made an oofh sound.
Beth would've bounced off had it not been for the hand that circled her forearm, gripping it to steady her.
Dark eyes, as brown as her own, regarded her with guarded amusement, and Beth balked. Reflectives knew every species and sub who resided in all the explored sectors. She found herself kissing distance from the most dangerous one.
Bloodling.
The fangs gave him away.
She could hear Ryan's breath as he barreled up behind her.
Beth remained quiet. She knew what awaited her at Ryan’s hands.
She tried to take the new threat in stride.
After all, the male bloodling had not killed her.
Yet.
“Take your hands off my prisoner, bloodling.”
Ryan's voice sounded so sure.
The bloodling studied Beth, his dark eyes roving each part of her face, moving down to her soaked clothes.
Beth realized every part of her body was on full display before him. Despite the dire circumstances, Beth found she could still be embarrassed.
His eyes snapped to hers. “Why are you uncomfortable that I look at you.”
Oh, Principle.
Before she could answer, his eyes narrowed, black brows falling over his eyes.
“Who has put these marks on your face?” His suspicious face swung to Ryan behind her.
“She doesn't appear to be a prisoner by choice, Lance Ryan of Sector Ten.”
Silence.
“She is payment to Dimitri.”
Payment?
More silence.
“What is your business here, my tiny frog?”
The bloodling's face was hard but his eyes held a tender edge as he regarded her.
Frog?
Beth looked at the silent faces of other bloodlings, one of several demographics on Sector One.
They were all terrifying. One was known for its brutality. Ryan’s need for payment could only mean one thing: he had been jumping there to entering in illicit sports, barbaric bribes… any multitude of things.
Beth shored up her confidence, but he could scent her anxiety, his nostrils flaring, his eyes fast on her face.
“I… Ryan claims that my home world is in… upheaval.” Beth simply didn't know how much of what Ryan had said was true. The odds of it being all lies wasn't looking good.
“What does Papilio have to do with your presence here?”
Tell the truth. He’ll scent a lie. All bloodlings could.
“I was on a jump, and it went badly.”
The understatement of that was profound. Saying less was definitely more.
His eyes roamed the wounds of her face, the latest of which Ryan had put there.
“I smell his abuse on your face,” the bloodling said decisively.
He leaned forward and Beth tensed.
“I will not harm you.”
His nose skimmed her face, stopping at each wound, leaving none without his attentions.
When he finished, his face was like stone as it turned to Ryan.
“Leave.”
Beth could hear the pause, feel it.
“No, she is my prisoner to do with as I want. I was hunting her down when you bloodlings got in the way. This is Sector Ten business.”
Bullshit.
“Tiny frog,” the bloodling began.
“I am Reflective Beth Jasper,” Beth replied. She didn’t like or understand the amphibian nickname, but it made her uncomfortable.
Hades, but it all does.
“Jasper, like the stone?” His eyes held warmth as they touched her face, and Beth felt well, whole.
She gazed into those dark pools and everything became calm, clearer. “Yes,” she said, her mind growing fuzzy as she gazed into his eyes.
“Jasper!” pain split into her head, and she felt herself being pulled against the bloodling male.
“He had you in thrall that fast, mongrel.”
“Who do you call ‘mongrel,’ hopper?” The bloodling's response was immediate.
Ryan was quiet.
Beth's head tipped back, and the bloodling, who was close to Jeb's size, stroked the damp hair off her forehead.
“Shhh, Beth Jasper.”
Her mind told her to struggle out of his hold, to run from them all.
Then a vague instinctive response unfurled deep within Beth in answer to his touch.
That quickly, she knew what foreign blood she held.
It was not just any species in Sector One—but bloodling.
Still, in her heart, Beth was Reflective.
She would plan her future, not be taken in the ever-changing current between two sectors—and two males.
She was capable of great calculation.
Beth tentatively touched the pale-gray skin of the bloodling's neck; it was all she could reach.
Color bled across his cheekbones. Dark-ebony hair was tied at his nape, and it fe
ll forward as he leaned to hear what she was going to say.
Beth rose on tiptoes, her palms on his chest for balance.
“Save me from him, bloodling. Don't let him have me.”
His nostrils flared as his pupils dilated in response.
“Never, blood of my blood,” he replied.
“Jasper—no!” Ryan yelled.
Beth turned in the arms of her new captor, staring Ryan down as bloodlings strolled casually toward him.
There was no pity left in Beth, only survival.
She would do what she must.
*
Jeb was frantic as fuck.
That prick Ryan had hurt Beth and taken her to Sector One. He could taste the tailwind. As if I had any doubt.
He kicked the broken shards he'd made of the door, and they skittered across the cheap floor covering.
He'd seen Beth’s eyes as Ryan's forearm lay pressed against her throat.
Jeb was haunted by the fresh memory of her wide eyes.
He would not have to be if he could just get to Sector One. His gaze went to Jacky.
“We need to go.”
Jacky was clearly shocked. “I'm not going anywhere with you crazy-ass loons!”
Jeb marched over to Jacky, his pulse a deep abiding pain in his throat.
“Listen and listen carefully.”
His eyes bore down on the Three teen. Jeb experienced a minor flicker of guilt, knowing how he would need to emotionally hack away at the boy.
But his soul mate was in danger.
Jeb's gut clenched at the thought of her in the tender care of that psychotic, Ryan.
Jacky's mouth clamped shut.
“Your parents are dead.”
Jacky's brows rose. “Really? Ya think? ’Cause I was totally there, dude. And it sucked ass.”
Jeb's eyes closed. He counted to ten.
Opening them again, he plowed forward, “You have no other guardianship, so it falls to me. My soul mate has been taken by a man that was tortured on Sector One for his transgression against her.”
Jacky's face fell. He was beginning to understand the magnitude of the situation. “Holy crap.”
“Yes,” Jeb said in a terse clip, hoping he'd reach him with reason.
“It is the most dangerous sector of the thirteen. I can't take you there. We'll have to return to Papilio…”
“That's now fucked up?” Jacky asked, the disbelief plain on his face.
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