Her dark brows dropped, "What? No- “
"Of course you too. How could I have been so stupid. You see every detail. You could see how I was reacting to you. Did you plan it with him?" He nodded to Reaper. "To you use my desire for you against me?" He threw his head back and laughed, if he didn't do something he was going to cry. Or murder someone. He let his scathing gaze fall back to her, the woman had given his heart to. "That's the oldest trick in the book, smart." He nodded, tapping his chin. “The frigid scientist unable to feel anything, and here I thought it was because you couldn't control yourself around me."
"John, I think you're confused – “
"Confused? Oh, baby, right now I'm surer than I've ever been of anything in my life." He let his gaze rack her from head to toe, uncaring of the fury blasting from his expression.
"You set the bait, and I fell for it. They should give you a medal."
Her cheeks blushed bright red, her previously soft eyes snapped. "You think I slept with you to use you?" Her voice rose higher with each word.
"Didn't you?" He shot back quietly.
Her mouth fell open but no words came out and that was all the proof he needed. Dawson spun on his heal and stormed for the room.
Chapter 32
Melissa's body flushed hot, then cold, then hot again in a matter of seconds. She closed her mouth, opened it and then closed it again. Her chest, so full of love just minutes ago, seemed to have a blow torch running down her sternum.
How could he think that about her? Had she done something to lead him to think that? She quickly ran through any possible scenarios in your head. No, she's done absolutely nothing to cause this reaction. He'd come to that conclusion on his own. He thought she was a whore. Her stomach contracted. He thought she was the type of woman who could do something like that?
Slowly, she turned from the now empty doorway to stare at Reaper. Her voice shook with fury when she spoke, "Did you use him?"
Reaper was silent for so long she wanted to scream, to rage at him. Instead, she used all of her energy to at least appear calm, fighting off the flood of self-pity and despair growing like a tidal wave inside her.
If Reaper really had set Dawson up like that, could she blame him for being so angry? Or for thinking that? She had to find him, talk to him and reassure him. She could make him see logic.
But nothing about the situation was logical.
"At first, I had thought of it." Reapers gravelly voice filled the room.
Melissa's heart pounded hard and fast. "You used him?"
Finally Reapers hard exterior cracked and he blew out a long sigh, scrubbing a hand over his skull cut dark hair. "I was ready to do whatever it took to get Rainier. What if Dawson was a plant? What if Rainier was controlling him? We all had to be prepared." Reapers eyes flickered to King and then back to Melissa.
"And by all, you mean you two," she spat out.
Reaper shrugged. “Like I said, it was a contingency only."
"He surrendered. He laid down his weapons. Do you really think that after seeing that precious girl of his he could betray everyone? Knowing it would mean all of our deaths, possibly even his daughters?" Melissa spread her hands wide.
"How quickly you have forgotten the power General Rainier had over all of us at one point in time. We escaped, we were lucky, that man," Reaper pointed to the empty doorway, "didn't. You have no idea what kind of psychological torture Rainier could've done to him to twist his mind."
“That man is your teammate.” She could no longer control her trembling. She pinned King with the furious stare. “And he used to be your best friend.”
Disgust knotted her insides. She didn’t for one second even remotely doubt that Dawson had meant everything he’d said. He’d surrendered to the team… and to her. He’d given them his trust and had given her his heart.
What would he do now?
The longer she stood here arguing, the more time she gave Dawson to run. And deep in her soul, she knew exactly where he was going. And if he went there, he would never come back. The thought made her jerk.
She turned desperately to Quantum, who was staring at Reaper with an unreadable expression. “Quantum, I need to go to him.”
Quantum eased to his feet, waved a dismissive hand in her direction. “Go. I’ve got this.”
Melissa raced from the room, her footsteps pounding as fast as her heart. She sped across the marble floors, the luxurious paintings on the wall a blur as she picked up speed. Halfway to the training facility, she kicked off her heels in frustration and ran barefoot down to the hall.
She burst through the doors, sliding into the huge empty training room. She turned left and ran to the weapon stock pile tucked behind the now open security door. Dawson had his back to her, violently shoving ammunition and weapons into a black duffel bag.
She paused in the doorway, her confidence wavering for a split second. He stopped, planted his hands on the table and kept his back to her. “Please leave me alone.”
She felt more than heard the heartbreak in his voice. Completely ignoring that order Melissa swept the short distance across the small room and wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to his back. “No.”
John’s fingers were like ice. He wrapped them around her wrist and easily peeled her from him, turning to hold her at arm’s length. “Your body means nothing to me anymore.”
Melissa shook free, surprised when he let her go with ease and gave her his back once more. At a loss for what to do with herself she went for him again, wrapping her arms around his waist once more. “I had no idea what Reaper planned. I swear.”
John held his arms up, as if he couldn’t bear to touch her. “I think I’ve listened to you enough. Let go.”
She shook her head, her cheek rubbing against the hard muscles of his back. She knew he was hurting. “Never. I’m never letting go of you.”
“Why are you doing this to me? Haven’t you done enough?”
She squeezed him with all her strength. “Because I love you. I’m in love with you.”
He broke her grip and spun around so fast she would’ve stumbled backwards if he hadn’t grabbed her under the arms and held her steady. “You can give up the charade, doc.”
She knew he was trying to distance himself from her by using the bland term doc instead of her name, but it still hurt.
“John, I love you,” She said forcefully.
He pulled his hands from her body as if she were slime. “Tell my sister I love her and tell her to tell Faith that I will always be in her heart.”
John grabbed another gun from the table and resumed his task as if she weren’t even standing there.
“Will you listen to me? Think about all the time we spent together. About the way we feel when we’re together. That can’t be faked!”
He stopped and pinned her with an icy stare. “All I feel is disgust.”
Desperate, Melissa grabbed his arm and tried to stop him, but he just kept packing. Her strength was nothing compared to his. “Please listen to me. You can tell your daughter you love her every day if you just stay here. Stay with me.”
John shoved a handful of loaded magazines into the bag and zipped it up, then he shook off his arm and walked to the door. “Promise me this one thing, Doc. Tell Faith everything I’m doing, I’m doing for her.”
And with that, he stormed out of the room. She wavered on her feet, the dawning realization that she was actually losing him beginning to penetrate her stubborn determination.
He was leaving and he thought she’d betrayed him.
That his entire team had betrayed him.
Ice crept into her veins. She’d completely failed at convincing him otherwise. She rubbed her arms, trying to generate circulate some warmth through her blood. All the time before now, she’d been alone and she’d been perfectly fine with that status. Now, however, now she felt empty. Like all the air had been sucked out of her.
She needed John in her life. He made her fee
l whole, like a real woman, not just a lab rat who lived for work. She knew she’d never be able to go back to that bleak existence – an existence that before John had filled her with purpose. It had been her reason for being.
Now John was her reason.
And she was letting just walk out of her life.
Seconds ticked by before her brain kicked into gear. Was she going to just stand here and give up on him when he needed her the most? Hell no she wasn’t. Hastily, Melissa rushed from the empty training facility and up the stairs, hoping to catch him in the hallway but finding him nowhere.
She could feel the emptiness in the mansion. She knew right then and there he’d already gone. Melissa knew what she had to do. She rushed back into the meeting room to find the team gathered in deep discussion. “He’s gone!”
Five sets of shocked eyes focused on her, stopping her in her tracks.
“Where?” Reaper demanded.
She shook her head, “He wouldn’t say, but you and I both know where he’s going.”
“Shit,” Reaper ground out.
Juarez got to his feet. “Surely he wouldn’t be dumb enough to go there alone.”
Melissa shook her head. ” He’s doing the only thing you’ve left him the option to do.” She took a deep, steadying breath. “He’s going after Rainier himself.”
Chapter 33
Dawson plastered his body against the wall, sliding silently closer to the entryway. He’d already disabled the infrared detectors along the perimeter of the bunker, an easy task since he placed most of them himself.
He eased the duffel bag down to the pavement and knelt, sliding the zipper open. He extracted his AR, snapped two extra clips onto his belt and then shoved his Glock into the waistband at the back of his pants. Next he extracted the handheld radio jammer and slid it into the cargo pocket on his right leg. He'd taken his time getting here, giving Reaper and the team plenty of time to follow.
They didn’t believe him, they’d made that abundantly clear, so who was he to argue? He was tired of fighting for everyone’s approval and he was tired of hoping. Hoping had gotten him nowhere but desperate and weak. He’d realized that on his way here. He could handle combat and he could handle death, but not weakness.
He lifted the night vision binoculars to his face, found the blacked out vehicle approaching from the south and pressed his lips together in grim satisfaction. He dropped the binocs in the bag, pushed it over to the side and entered the code for the entry through the high-security metal door.
The guard on the other side of the door spun in surprise, lifting his weapon too slow. Dawson already had his knife at the ready, sinking it into the man's throat, the only sound his gurgle of death as Dawson eased him to the floor.
He went back outside, grabbed his duffel and re-entered the premises, leaving the door open behind him. Dawson made his way down the hall, sticking to the shadows like a ghost, the dim overhead lighting providing just enough illumination for a normal person to feel their way, but with his enhanced vision, he didn't need help at all. He sensed the team outside, and reduced his pace, allowing them to trail him. He knew they'd clear the few rooms down the corridor first just as they were trained to do. Dawson didn't waste his time because he knew they were empty and that the sensors in each room were still active. He wanted to get ahead of them before they tripped the silent alarm. He was sick and tired of playing their game and the sooner he ended it the better.
He listened, barely able to check their movements as they cleared each room. Once they were close to the end Dawson hooked right down the long hallway, punched in the code to a large metal door at the end. The lock beeped and slid open. He slid the door to the side, jamming an empty magazine in the jam to keep it open. The steps down to the lab appeared before him and he descended rapidly, stopping at the bottom of the stairs to punch in the next code, the other four-inch-thick steel door beeping as it was disarmed and slid open.
Light spilled through the open door, reflecting off rows and rows of aluminum research tables. Computers, microscopes and glass bottles cover the tops, much like Melissa's lab, only this one was much, much larger. And this one was empty. Or at least it appeared to be to anyone who didn't know better.
"I've brought you a present," John said out loud to the dark two-way bullet proof mirror that stretched across the far wall.
The speakers in the lab crackled to life, and then General Rainier’s voice flooded the room. "Your late."
Dawson shrugged as if he didn't care. "They kept me locked up for the first few weeks."
"And they just let you go?" Rainier said in a smooth polished voice of a practiced politician, a voice that to normal ears would sound perfectly innocent but Dawson could hear the threat as clearly as he could hear the team sneaking down the staircase behind him.
"I convinced them to trust me," Dawson grinned, bearing his teeth, "it was easy enough, just like you’d said. Lay the guilt trip on them for leaving me behind and convince them I wanted to come back into the fold, especially because of the girl."
"Don't you mean your daughter?" Rainier asked.
Dawson clenched his jaw, but kept his grin in place, "If you mean did I screw her mom and get her pregnant, yeah, the kids my blood. But she doesn't know me, and I don't know her and I'm fine."
Dawson could sense the team hovering just out of sight in the darken staircase behind him. He said, "Might as well come out boys, he knows you're here."
He stared hard at the reflection in long mirror across the back of the room, the door way behind him remaining empty. "Reaper, you can't escape this time. The entry was barred the minute you cleared the first hallway. Even if you manage to take out the guards, you didn't bring the explosive power it would take to blow that door off its hinges."
Dawson shifted his left foot back so that he could see the lab entryway. The team eased into the room, weapons raised. "You fucking bastard," Reaper ground out.
This time Dawson did laugh, "I've got to give it to you, top. You were smart enough to see through me. You and him, the asshole I should've killed instead of blinded."
Reaper's mouth tightened, tiny white lines forming at the corners of his eyes, as his face pulled tight. The curl of satisfaction Dawson anticipated failing to form.
Dawson glanced back at the two-way mirror, "General, your men, as promised."
There was a long pause, long enough to make Dawson wonder if Rainier believed him or not. And then the general’s voice filtered through the COM system again, "How do I know they don't have another team ready to call for back up? Someone waiting just outside the perimeter?"
Dawson held up the radio disruptor, slid his thumb just to the left of the activator button and squeezed. "Because they have no COM system anymore." He tossed the jammer on the nearest table. "I was your personal bodyguard for a reason, General, remember? You may have completely brainwashed the others, but I'm smart. Smarter than them."
Dawson glanced back at Reaper, not acknowledging the flicker of surprise in his old team leader’s eyes, before facing the mirror again. "I've got another surprise for you general." He leaned down and pulled open the velcro pocket on his left thigh, extracting the metal and glass tube full of serum. He held it up. "They figured out how to make their changes permanent. No more weekly injections. No more weakness. One shot and you're done."
John spun, whipping his Glock up and around at the whisper of movement behind him. King froze with his rifle aimed straight at Dawson, his shoulders heaving with fury.
Dawson tsked. "I wouldn't do that if I were you. This is the only sample the good doctor made, and if you shoot me, you risk destroying everything.”
“Lower your weapon." Reaper ordered.
King deliberately lowered his gun to his side. “Bastard.”
"Well General, are you going to make me stand here all day or are you going to come out here and finish this."
The secure door along the back wall opened quicker than Dawson had anticipated. Two huge enhanc
ed soldiers entered the room, flanking the General. "Are you sure?"
Dawson studied the vile in his grip. "Our dear Dr. Averton worked night and day on this. But you shouldn't thank her, you should thank Reaper. He knocked up Caroline, and their sweet baby’s blood is all we needed to complete the DNA sequence."
Rainier rubbed his hands together in anticipation, approaching Dawson with a huge grin. "I'll be damned. It makes perfect sense."
He reached for the serum, but Dawson pulled back. "Not yet."
Rainier’s pleasant expression morphed instantly to anger. "Give it over. That's an order."
Dawson took a small step back, situating himself an equal distance between the General and his old team. "I want to change our plan, just a little bit."
"Bargaining now are we? Well go on, what do you want?"
“I want to kill them. And I want Averton for myself."
Rainier's thin gray brows shot up in surprise. "The scientist?"
"I have to admit, watching her through my cage all month kind of gave me a thing for her. I keep her, you use her to make more of this," Dawson held the serum up once more. "We both win."
"Not bad, I can do that," Rainier tapped his chin with his finger. "But I'm afraid I can't let you kill them. I need them. My researcher’s need to study them. They were the first test run, and they're too valuable to compare further testing against in the future."
Dawson lowered his lids threateningly. "I want my revenge.”
The general relaxed and chuckled, moving closer to Dawson. "Of course you do son, and you'll have it knowing they're locked up for the rest of their miserable lives."
Dawson held up the vile, tilting it this way and that, allowing the light in the room to reflect off the glowing blue serum. Rainier eased another step closer, leaving only two feet separation between them.
Mayhem's Betrayal: Operation Mayhem Book 5 Page 16