by Angel Payne
As soon as the woman disappeared again, discomfort set right back in. Zoe grimaced and squirmed, despite telling herself this was just her psyche being influenced by Justine’s weirdness. But everything about just sitting here felt wrong.
Make that wrong.
“Damn it.” Now that she could actually rise off the bed, she did. It felt a little better to work off some tension by pacing, but the movement also confirmed that she really did feel better. Damn near perfect, as a matter of fact.
Perfect enough to be helping Shay.
Let it—
“Screw yourself.”
She barked it at her conscience before turning the whole thing off. Later, she’d search it for the insane monkey now cavorting its neurons, but there was no time right now. Listening to her instinct over her conscience wasn’t a natural skill, so she had to focus harder on that innermost voice—even if it was lifted to a bellow now.
Correction. A bunch of bellows. All phrased into questions. Disturbing questions. Angles she wasn’t sure Shay himself had considered in the ardency of his quest.
So what if Stock had influenced his mom’s disappearance? That didn’t mean it had been involuntary. What if his mom was here because she’d chosen to be? What if Shay did find her—and she instantly turned him over to Stock?
And what if the man had his mother thrust on such a high pedestal, he never entertained a single one of those thoughts?
He needs me.
It didn’t just resound in her brain. It throbbed through her entire being, claiming her bones and blood, more deafening than a wall of speakers during the final act at a hard-rock festival.
She kept pacing—and stopped only when Justine came back in. “Oh, lookie,” the nurse chimed. “You’re up. That’s a good sign.” She scrunched her shoulders up to her ears while extending a tray of filled cups. “Orange, apple, or cranberry? I brought all three flavors so you could pick. I also brought a fresh T-shirt for you. Thought you’d want to change, and we seem about the same size, girlfriend.”
Zoe gritted out a smile as her inner creepazoid alert went off. Justine giggled in return, clearly giddy as a bestie about to plop down on the bed, braid her hair, trade boy secrets, and maybe even make out. In her book, her and Zoe’s similar builds and hair color magically turned them into something close to sisters. Next, she’d probably be insisting on a blood oath so they could become—
Sisters.
Mierda.
Who would’ve known? The Demon Pazuzu was actually her ticket out of here.
Zoe smiled again, actually meaning it this time. “Ummm, which one do you like best?”
Justine smiled. “Apple, for sure.”
“Then apple it is.” She waited for Justine to come closer and set the juices on the bedside tray, astounded how the nurse didn’t hear the frantic thrum of her heartbeat. After forcing down a deep breath, she commented, “Vaya. Your smock is super cute.”
The nurse smiled like a girl who’d just been noticed by the captain of the football team. “Really? Errr—I mean, I know, right? Garfield’s the best, huh?”
“Cutest cat ever.” Despite her nerves, summoning her inner fourteen-year-old wasn’t that tough. “Looks like it holds a lot in the pockets too.”
“Oh, yeah. Totally necessary for the job, you know? I mean, if one of Dr. Smythe’s animal boys gets riled and starts rampaging, I have to have the tranq gun nearby.” She patted the pocket with the larger lump in it, answering at least five prayers for Zoe at the same time.
“Animal boys?” Once again, she didn’t have to fake her demeanor. Boys generally were animals at different points in their development, but she was fairly certain Justine’s context was different—and was a huge reason why Shay’s mom had been abducted to here.
Or chosen to come here.
Regrettably, Justine’s face clouded over. “I’ve… I’ve said too much.” Just as hurriedly, she laughed off her disclaimer. “It’s best that we carry on.”
“Couldn’t agree more.”
Before she lost her nerve, she stepped forward…and slammed a kiss on Justine’s mouth. As she’d hoped, the woman froze, suspended in shock. It bought her the three seconds she needed to pull out the tranquilizer gun, hoping like hell the contraption worked similarly to other pistols. Luck was with her. A fast flip of the safety, a jerk on the trigger, and the dart discharged into the woman’s thigh. Justine stiffened again, eyes bulging wide—before she slumped onto the bed right where Zoe had just lain.
“I’m sorry, amiga.” Zoe wasn’t sure her whisper had been heard. Justine was as slack as a tranqed-up antelope.
She took a deep breath, peeled off her top, and then went to work on wrenching Justine out of her smock and hair scrunchie. Thankfully, it didn’t take very long. Panged by guilt, she took an extra minute to redress the woman in the T-shirt she’d brought, which really was a nice shade of pink, despite the smirking Garfield on it and with the words Don’t start with me. You won’t win. Well, hell. With her hair loose and her face peaceful, the woman was actually pretty. If the goon who discovered Justine was horny enough, she might even get her own “soldier sack time” today. In the end, the woman might even thank her for this.
And pigs might fly.
And she’d walk outside into a dewy woodland, with birds wanting to fit her for a princess gown and little crystal slippers.
And Shay wouldn’t be itching to beat her ass to a pulp once he found out she’d pulled this stunt.
That would be just fine by her. She’d willingly, gratefully, accept any punishment the man saw fit to wield—as long as he was alive to do it.
Using the thought as a cheerleader, she straightened her new outfit, scooped up a clipboard and radio from Justine’s station, and turned her path toward the hall spilling out with the most noise.
* * *
Only fifteen minutes later, she felt like she’d lived through fifteen hours. Maybe fifteen years.
This subterfuge shit wasn’t as easy as Emma Peel made it look. Every step she took coincided with another terrified throb of her heart, certain somebody would call her out as an imposter, forcing Shay into a choice between two situations that were hell. He’d have to jump to her rescue and risk exposing his true identity or watch her be “disciplined” by Stock for her stunt, likely by letting his horndog henchmen have some turns with her. She had no illusions that decking Stock on the airplane had sliced her “special favor” with him, a status not helped by tranquilizing her nurse and then roaming freely through the facility’s hallways.
Maybe Shay had been right.
Maybe she really hadn’t known what the hell she was asking for.
Or the strangeness of the party she’d just invited herself to.
As she sucked up her fear and kept moving down the halls, the scene reminded her more and more of a hospital emergency room. Everything was controlled chaos, with Stock’s goons acting as armed directors of medical personnel in full scrubs and sterile gloves. Using the clipboard as a shield for her face, Zoe soon learned that if she stuck to the walls, kept her head down, and pretended to talk on her radio every few minutes, everybody assumed she was just another gear in the machine.
A machine that grew busier and busier as she moved along.
And stranger and stranger.
Despite her clipboard obsession, she managed to snag some long looks at the patients being rushed down the hallways, presumably to be loaded onto the now-empty jetliner. At first, she could only frown in confusion. All the men on the gurneys looked like they belonged in the next Magic Mike movie, not a supersecret medical facility in the middle of the desert. Some of the hulks were so huge, they threatened to spill off the tables. It was a sea of rippling biceps, ripped chests, massive thighs…and many sets of boxer briefs that were stretched to the limit.
But then she looked closer. Peered beyond the “scenery,” to the patients’ faces.
While the men’s bodies looked like strip-club fantasies, their eyes were as ha
unted as D Street crack heads. Their features, while traditionally handsome, were just the skeletons that supported lines of disillusion, despair, loneliness…and pain. The kind of pain she’d often seen while growing up down the street from one of the country’s busiest military bases, on the faces of vets who’d returned fresh from Iraq, Kuwait, Liberia, Sierra Leone. The pain of endurance but not obliteration. Of memories that were monsters.
Caramba. Who were they, and what had happened to them here?
She forced herself to look for more clues.
A few seconds later, she barely quelled a gasp of horror. That was a good thing, since it subdued the bile in her throat too.
A blond hunk, beautiful enough to play Adonis in a movie, scraped the hair from his eyes with hawk talons in place of his fingers. The guy behind him was positioned stomach-down on his gurney, the thin sheet on his back covering a shark’s fin where his spine should be. Farther in the parade, a guy opened his mouth on what looked like a moan, but a soft lion’s roar came out instead. His nose was flat and wide like a wildcat’s too.
Zoe slammed against the wall, holding the clipboard across her face to shield her horror. “Ay Dios Mio.”
The Island of Dr. Moreau had been transplanted into the Nevada desert. Only Moreau was now Cameron Stock, and these poor men were his wretched mutant experiments.
Or were they?
Who the hell was really behind this? This building was situated on the US government’s version of hallowed ground, the most secret installation in the country. Books had been written, TV shows developed, even movies made on the speculation about the activities that occurred here, everything from top-secret spy plane tests to deep-freezing aliens. According to the feds, the very facility in which she stood didn’t even exist.
Still hiding behind the clipboard, she tried to connect puzzle pieces. The “chat” between Stock and General Newport, in which Stock had threatened going public with a computer stick. Then Justine’s earlier reference… Dr. Smythe’s animal boys…
What did it all mean? Who were all these beautiful, tortured men? Where had they come from? More crucially, where the hell was Stock taking them? How and why was the government involved?
The questions continued. And who was Dr. Smythe? Stock’s partner? His enemy? Did Shay’s mother know him? Work for him? Was he the reason she’d left so abruptly, eighteen years ago? Was he still here now?
As she wrestled with all the facets of the mystery, Zoe made sure to continue walking. An object in motion was harder to catch, especially when it was a hostage disguised as a nurse…
Unless that object noticed a distinct change in the hall’s air pressure.
She looked up to observe that she’d passed under a significant juncture in the hallway. The connection looked like the entrance to a Rockefeller bank vault. Both walls and the ceiling were reinforced by layers of steel. The double doors, also made of steel and at least eighteen inches thick, were held open by a dozen cement blocks each.
Another glance around, taking in the marked section numbers overhead, confirmed what she’d already suspected. She’d made her way into quadrant six. This was where “the good shit” was happening, as Shay’s “buddy” had put it. Now to find Shay, without him finding her—but what then?
She could be like his guardian angel. That was it. Helping without his ever knowing it. There was no way he’d find his mom in this labyrinth, plus keep up appearances with the other men, before Stock ordered the plane to take off again. In the meantime, she’d also check out every escape route possible while listening in on these cabróns’ conversations. Somebody was sure to mention where Brynn, El, Harmony, and the others were being held. Once she found out, she’d free them too.
Vaya. This was one of the best nonplans she’d ever planned.
From behind the clipboard, she allowed herself a small smile of victory.
The next second, it was choked from her. Literally.
The beast that belonged to the arm across her throat knew exactly what he was doing. Zoe’s scream, a logical reaction given the spectacle she’d just witnessed, was plugged into a weak gurgle by a hand that constricted her windpipe at precisely the right spot. Zoe fought the guy—the creature?—for about two seconds before realizing the effort was useless. Instead, she concentrated on staying conscious as he hauled her backward, barely stopping to kick back the door through which he dragged her.
Darkness swallowed her.
No. Not complete blackness. It was simply much dimmer than the glaring light of the hallway. And quiet. Too quiet. She glimpsed a leather couch, but when she inhaled, an antiseptic smell hit her. The room seemed to be another medical setting with a small living room attached.
Terror assaulted all over again. Zoe tried to scream but still couldn’t catch her breath. A hidden reserve of strength rose when she thought of that couch again and how this asshole could pin her there. She twisted, managing to get her elbow into his ribs, but it was a tiny win in a big-ass battle. The bear growled before spinning her around, flattening her to the wall, and clamping one of his massive hands over her mouth.
Her dread became euphoria.
Shay wasn’t jumping so fast on that joy-joy ju-ju train. At all.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” His voice was a combination of a hiss and a snarl. He wore his black wool ski mask again, only the thing was rolled back on his head like a cap, somehow making him look more like a criminal. A really pissed off one.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Zoe exchanged stunned blinks with him. Even if she had the breath to speak, the prickly words wouldn’t have been her first choice.
They peered around together. From the shadows of the room, a woman emerged, shocking Zoe by looking more miffed than Shay. She was older, perhaps in her fifties, but clearly possessed an inner strength that enhanced her natural beauty. Her auburn hair was pulled into a ponytail. Little wisps fell free from it, around the classic angles of her face—
With dark-gold eyes that looked exactly like Shay’s.
“Ay Dios mio.” Zoe gasped. “You… You’re…”
“Dr. Smythe,” the woman retorted. “Who the hell are you? And why are you wearing Justine’s smock?”
Her jaw fell. “You’re the animal-boy doctor?”
“I beg your pardon?” The woman pulled up her shoulders, which were encased in a cream button-front shirt that showed off a delicate gold locket around her neck. “Look, I don’t know who you are, and I don’t even care if you’re with Cameron. All I’m going to tell you is that my name is Dr. Melanie Smythe, and—”
“No.” As Shay turned fully to her, he whipped the mask away from his head. His hair tumbled free, instantly making him more recognizable—especially if his mother’s stunned outcry was any barometer. “Your name is Dr. Melody Bommer, and I’m here to rescue you.”
Chapter Thirteen
Shay was damn glad he had such a good hold on Zoe. No mistake about it, he was still steamed as hell with her, but as a thousand emotions slammed him, it occurred that the woman was possibly the only thing keeping him upright.
Especially as his mother’s face crumbled in front of his eyes.
Though he’d dreamed of this moment for at least six months, it was sheer hell to keep holding her gaze—but he did it, digging into fortitude he hadn’t accessed since the end of an eight-day mission last year in Somalia. He smelled better now. He felt worse. Much more uncertain. And a thousand times more scared.
“Oh, my God.”
If it weren’t for the infusion of tears, his mother’s words would’ve been bare whispers. He opened his mouth, intending to be strong for her, but wound up gulping back his own damn sob.
“Oh, my God.”
Zoe stepped back as Mom lifted a hand to his face. As her fingers trembled against his jaw, he attempted the first tugs of a smile. “Hi, Mom.”
Her brilliant gaze scoured every corner of his face. The rest of her features didn’t
reveal anything else. What did she see? He’d been through hell in the last few days and probably looked like the floor of a teenager’s bedroom. Was she happy? Proud? Disappointed? Maybe he fell short of what she expected. Or maybe she really had left that night of her own choice, never wanting to know him and Tait ever again.
The seconds strained on as he waited for an answer.
Finally, without a word of preamble, she locked her other hand at the back of his head and yanked him down against her. She still didn’t say a word. Maybe that was because she was sobbing too hard.
Shay tasted salt on his face too. He didn’t care. His tears came harder when he attempted to suck in a full breath.
She still smelled like Juicy Fruit and sunshine.
“Shay,” she finally rasped. “My sweet, beautiful Shay.”
He closed his eyes and pulled her closer. And, for one moment, didn’t let himself think of anything but the joy in his heart…and the fulfillment in his soul.
It ended by Mom’s choice. On another little cry, this one full of agony, she pushed him back. Then smacked his chest. “You shouldn’t be here! And when the hell did you get so damn big?”
He stepped back, arching brows to match her indignation. “I’m not leaving without you. And Mrs. Verona’s cookies have magic growth potion in them. Or so she always told me.”
She lifted her hands again, bracing both sides of his face. “I want you to stay forever, but as you probably know, that’s not possible.” Her fingers quivered again. “I have no idea why you’re here—”
“Why the fuck do you think I’m here?”
“Language, young man.”
“Ow.” He rubbed his cheek where she’d pinched it. How had he forgotten how accurate her aim was on those things? “I’m here because of you.”
While his explanation didn’t make her freak out, she shot a defined huff that instantly reminded him of Tait. She averted her gaze and jammed her hands into her back pockets, also exactly like Tait. “Me? I don’t understand.”
He advanced back toward her. “I think you do, Mom.”