Safe (The Shielded Series Book 1)

by Christine DePetrillo

  “You make it sound as if we’re animals.”

  Foster shook his head. “Not animals, just the unknown. I’m not the only one who lives here.” He rubbed a hand down his face. “In fact, out of everyone, I live here the least.” He looked past her and a dreamy expression washed over his face. “I hope to change that one day.”

  Ghared and Zeke joined them, and Foster addressed them all.

  “This property is sanctuary for me… and some others.” He looked at Zeke and gestured between the two of them. “Others like us.”

  “GECs?” Zeke eyes brightened as he looked around. “Where are they? How many?”

  “Fourteen.” Foster glanced at Darina, waiting for her to… waiting for her to what? Tell him he was crazy for harboring fourteen GECs? Who was she to say a damn thing? She harbored one, but if she found more, she’d take them in too.

  Besides, he had them hidden away where no one would look for them. He was playing the game way better than she was.

  “How long have you had them?” Ghared asked.

  “Different lengths of time, but all of them have been here for at least five years.” Foster stepped ahead of them. “And I’ve never had guests like you. I just got off the phone with one of them, letting her know we were on our way, but that doesn’t mean you’re going to get a warm welcome.” He scratched at his slight beard. “I’m not sure I’m going to get a warm welcome.”

  Releasing a breath, he walked toward a stone path and as soon as Darina could tear her gaze away from the way his cargo pants showcased his toned ass, she looked at Ghared and Zeke.

  “What have we gotten involved in?” Ghared asked, waves of protectiveness coming off him.

  “I don’t know.” Darina reached for Zeke’s hand. “But you feel better, right?”

  “I feel fantastic. Whatever he gave me totally lifted the fog.” He pretended to search her pockets until she slapped his hands away. “Tell me there’s more of it.”

  “There is.” She arrowed her thumb to Foster, still walking. “He’s got it. I handed it back to him after administering some to you in the hovercopter.”

  “Then we’re going wherever he is.” Zeke jogged past Darina and Ghared, his long legs allowing him to catch up to Foster easily.

  Darina watched Foster clap Zeke on the back when he noticed the kid next to him.

  “Are we being stupid?” Ghared asked.

  “When have we ever been stupid?”

  “This is true.” Ghared elbowed her. “C’mon.”

  She stopped him and tugged him around to face her. “Thanks for coming to get us.”

  “You know I’ll always come when you call, Darina. We always have each other’s backs.” He leaned back and checked out her ass. “And may I reiterate that your back is really something?”

  Now it was her turn to elbow him. “Sometimes I think all that flying you do has turned your brain to mush.”

  He stuck his finger in his left ear, pulled it out, and inspected it. “Nothing leaking out yet.”

  With a gruff chuckle that crinkled up the scar on his cheek, he jogged ahead as Zeke had, and now Darina watched all three of them as Foster pushed open a wooden gate. Curious as to what waited beyond that gate, she sprinted up the path, arriving just as Zeke and Ghared passed through.

  Foster held open the gate and motioned for her to go first. “Rich bastard or gentleman?” he asked so only she could hear.

  “Haven’t decided yet.”

  “Let me know when you come to a conclusion.” He followed her and closed the gate behind him. After unzipping his pocket, he extracted his tablet. “Wait here, please.” Stepping away from them, he tapped the screen of his tablet and put it to his ear.

  Darina couldn’t hear what he was saying, but imagined he was telling someone to clean up all evidence of illegal activity. She nearly laughed aloud at that. Ridiculous. Foster Ashby was as clean as they came.

  At least she hoped he was.

  Chapter Five

  Foster led Darina, Ghared, and Zeke to the main house. He’d called Estoria, the first GEC he’d offered sanctuary to, and told her to gather the others in the great room. Best to do the introductions all at once. Better to outnumber the outsiders upfront. He wanted to trust them wholeheartedly, but that would be pretty stupid. He and the others had gone undetected as GECs all this time by not being stupid.

  And then I go and tell three outsiders I’m a GEC. Nice going. What had caused the false sense of trustworthiness when it came to Darina? Was it false? Was he picking up on… on something?

  Hell, he hated having doubts. He hated putting his fellow GECs at risk. He hated being out of the lab. He hated how his gaze kept roaming to Darina as she silently followed him, taking in her surroundings. Cop instincts most likely. She was probably looking for the quickest way to leave should the need arise.

  Why did that thought bug him? He didn’t want her to want to leave.

  Shaking his head, he led them up the half-log front steps, pausing when Ghared crouched to inspect the stairs more closely.

  “Did you make these?” he asked, squinting one eye at Foster and looking like a 17th century pirate with his long hair, scruffy beard, and scarred cheek.

  “Some of them,” Foster said, noting how Darina’s eyebrows rose over her beautiful eyes. “Then I showed others how to make them. People, even GECs, like to have a purpose.”

  “Can you show me how to woodwork?” Zeke asked. “There’s no wood in the city to make stuff. I’m sure I can trade one of my skills for a lesson.”

  “Oh yeah?” Foster said. “What skills do you have? Aside from copiloting hovercopters, that is.” He gave the kid a smile and was rewarded with a megawatt one in return.

  Ghared slung his arm around Zeke’s shoulders. “This guy here? There’s nothing this guy can’t do.” He gave Zeke a little playful shove to which the boy responded with an equal shove. They pretended to scuffle with each other until Ghared got Zeke in a light headlock and messed the boy’s dark hair.

  Something unwrapped in Foster’s chest at the familiar way Ghared and Zeke interacted. While Carielle had shown him unconditional love, a strong bond with a male role model had not been part of Foster’s early years. Sure, he’d learned guy stuff along the way on his own—he had an aptitude for learning after all—but to have had a living, breathing, experienced male show him the ropes? Well, that would have been fantastic. He tried to be that for some of the younger male GECs on the Vermont property, but being the role model wasn’t the same as having one.

  “If you really want to learn, I’d be happy to show you,” Foster said.

  “He really wants to learn,” Darina and Ghared said at the same time. A look passed between them—one also born out of familiarity.

  What’s the deal with them?

  Darina was clearly a gorgeous, intelligent woman. Ghared appeared to be a healthy male. A healthy, tall male whom Foster was sure would get some looks once introduced to the others. The guy had a ruffled, ex-military look, and he knew what he was doing in a hovercopter. He was different, and the others hadn’t had a great deal of different in their sheltered lives in Vermont.

  Had Darina sampled that different?

  He shouldn’t care. None of his business. In fact, now that he’d arrived safely in Vermont, Darina, Ghared, and Zeke didn’t have to stay. They hadn’t been followed. He’d be fine here.

  He kept those thoughts to himself.

  “Foster?”

  Turning around, he found Estoria at the front door, a nervous look on her face. Shit. He didn’t want anyone to be anxious.

  “Estoria.” He gave her a wide grin, and her expression relaxed as she smiled back. “I’ve brought some visitors.”

  “I can see that.” She peered past him, her eyes wary again. “What are you doing?”

  “We’re not going to hurt you,” Darina said, causing Estoria to jump at the sound of her voice.

  “Foster said you’re a cop?”

  Darina nodded
from her position on the stairs. She seemed to understand that any sudden moves might spook Estoria. “I am. That’s my son, Zeke, and that’s Ghared.”

  “He a cop too?” Estoria jutted her chin out to Ghared.

  “No,” Ghared answered, his voice gentled. “Retired soldier. Though the serve and protect mission still applies.” He winked at her, and Estoria’s tensed shoulders lowered slightly.

  “Did you get the others together?” Foster asked, stepping to the door and opening it. He motioned for Darina, Ghared, and Zeke to follow him.

  All three of them moved together, slowly, carefully. He liked how much they were respecting the fact that Estoria was not yet comfortable with their presence. He didn’t blame her for feeling that way. He hadn’t given them many opportunities to interact with outsiders, but it was safer that way.

  Some GECs like himself and apparently Zeke could hide among regular people. They looked like everyone else—except when in the throes of a seizure. Fortunately, medicine could hide that too.

  But some GECs had visible and… unique traits. He always hated the word imperfections. In about ten seconds though, his visitors would see what had gotten Estoria cast off after her engineering.

  Though they wouldn’t understand at first.

  Estoria backed up to let them all in. With pursed lips, she flicked another wary glance at their guests then looked back at Foster. “Almost everyone’s in the great room.”

  “Good.” He turned back to Darina. “This way.”

  But Darina was already studying Estoria. “How far along are you?” she asked.

  Estoria patted the mound at her belly, a protective motion. “A week shy of nine months.”

  “So you could give birth at any moment.” Was that longing in Darina’s eyes? She blinked, and whatever Foster thought he’d seen was gone. “Congratulations.”

  “Condolences is more like it.” Estoria shut the door behind them and took a different route to the great room.

  Darina looked at Foster. “What’s that about?”

  “She’s been nine months pregnant once every year since she hit puberty.”

  With a quick glance toward Zeke who had walked farther into the house, Darina lowered her voice. “I thought GECs were infertile.”

  “They are. Estoria got cast off because she’s not and because she doesn’t need a male to become fertilized.”

  “Well, that’s handy.”

  “Not when every single one of the babies is stillborn after nine months of her carrying them.”

  Darina’s mouth dropped open a little. “How awful.”

  Foster nodded. “I tried to help her, but she immediately became pregnant again. Her body insists on going through the cycle once every year no matter what.” He scratched his whiskered jaw. “I want to work on her situation more, find a solution, but—”

  “The world keeps needing you to work on something else,” Darina finished.

  “Yeah.”

  “Must get annoying.”

  “Slightly.”

  Darina looked to where Estoria had disappeared. “Should I apologize to her?”

  “You didn’t do anything wrong. How could you have known what her situation was?”

  She shrugged one shoulder. “I still feel like an ass.”

  “No need. I’ll smooth things over with her. She’s been here the longest and is probably pretty angry with me for bringing you all here.”

  Stepping closer so Foster couldn’t inhale without catching a teasing whiff of her, she said, “Why did you let us in? I could protect you in any number of neutral places. Bringing us here makes it…” She looked up to the ceiling and chewed on her full bottom lip as she thought.

  “Personal?”

  “Very.”

  “This is the only place I could think of that would allow me to continue my work. I have everything I need here. I have to find the cure. Soon.”

  She glanced down the hallway to where Zeke and Ghared had wandered. “How does this place even exist?”

  “Do you remember reading about how the entire nation used to be like this? Simple. Self-sustaining. Natural. Do you?”

  “Yes. It never seemed real to me, but we had a lake house and I got a taste of it, of this way of living.” She pointed out the hall window where a few GECs were finishing up in the closest garden and heading toward the house. “I just didn’t think places like this could still be found.”

  “The government wants you to think that.”

  She let out a short laugh. “I wouldn’t be surprised if that were the truth. I always suspect the government is up to something. If I hadn’t seen the effects of Warres’s plague in person, I’d think that was something the government invented as well.”

  “Unfortunately, there’s nothing fictional about what Mikale has done.”

  “Then we’d better get on with things.” She brushed past him to join Ghared and Zeke.

  Foster took a moment to figure out what he was going to say to his… his people. They trusted him to look out for them. If they didn’t live in Vermont, they’d be out on the streets just as he had been as a young boy. Maybe someone would have taken them in, but that didn’t happen often.

  Most of the time, runaway GECs got caught and that never ended well.

  Foster rubbed his right thigh, remembering when he’d been caught at age twenty. He’d gone so many years without being found, and then one night, he was crossing the college campus to get to his next class, so caught up in the notes he was still studying for an exam, he hadn’t heard their approach in the darkness. About thirty yards from the door to the building, he’d been slammed to the ground; his tablet of notes fell from his hands and skidded along the pavement like a skipped stone.

  The black night had gotten suddenly blacker. The way his head had hit the ground had caused an awful ringing in his ears. Loud and constant, the noise had paralyzed him somehow. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t fight back.

  Then another sound took control—the buzz of a reciprocating saw.

  To this day, loud noises hurt his ears and gave him phantom pain in his thigh where his leg had been severed from his body.

  “Foster?” Darina’s voice pulled him from his past.

  Shaking his head, he pushed the memory aside. Now wasn’t the time to think about old wounds. Instead it was time to allay the fears of his comrades then bury himself in his lab.

  That cure wasn’t going to find itself.

  ****

  The house itself was a marvel. All natural woods, stone accents, and rustic charm, Foster’s home—for this was much more than a city domicile—made her feel as if she’d stepped into the pages of a history book on early America. The artwork hanging on the walls of the hallway belonged in a museum, and she stopped to take a closer look at one. A red barn sat in a field gone yellow after the harvest. The sky was a shade of blue that no longer occurred in the city and puffy white clouds cast shadows in the field. Trees with gold, red, and orange leaves rose tall behind the barn like an autumn embrace. Darina wished she could climb into the painting.

  “Estoria painted that.” Suddenly Foster was standing right behind her, his breath pushing wisps of her hair forward. The urge to lean back into him disturbed her.

  I don’t lean on anyone.

  People leaned on her. That was the way it had to be.

  Or is it?

  She shook her head. It had to be. The world they lived in wasn’t made for happily ever afters where people gave and took in equal measures. Stupid to think for a moment such a life was possible. Not now anyway. Maybe someday.

  “She’s got a real talent.” Darina motioned to the painting.

  “That barn is on the property,” Foster said, not taking a step back, not giving Darina the space she required. “It looks totally different in the summer. I’ll show you later.”

  Would that tour be a private one? Did Darina want it to be?

  Not going to answer that.

  Too risky. She turned to face Fos
ter and exhaled the breath she’d been holding when he took a step back and motioned to the room where Zeke and Ghared already stood at the threshold.

  “Should we wait out here?” She indicated the hallway.

  Foster shook his head. “Best to hit them fast and get it over with.” He offered her a smile that sent a warm buzz through her body.

  She made a note to ignore that warm buzz. Warm buzzes were distracting, and she was technically still working on keeping Foster safe.

  “C’mon.” He put his hand on the small of her back and edged her into the room. The touch was light, but she felt it everywhere.

  Inside the great room, people were on couches and chairs. The room itself was welcoming with its earth tones and leather furniture. The atmosphere, however, was the exact opposite of welcoming. Darina’s cop instincts darted her gaze to all four walls, noting exits, windows, possible weapons. She made eye contact with each person, quickly counting fourteen total, just as Foster had said lived here. All of them were adults, but some of them younger than her and Foster.

  Estoria sat toward the back of the room, her large blue eyes zooming in on Zeke standing next to Ghared. Was the sight of a teenager—a child—painful to her? Darina couldn’t imagine giving birth to stillborn babies once a year. She’d never given birth herself, but she’d considered it now and then. Of course, the world as it stood now was no place for a baby.

  “Okay, everyone,” Foster began, “nice to see you all.” He moved to the middle of the room and turned in a circle to see the assembled group.

  A few hellos came back to him, but the tension hung heavy above them.

  “So I know I’ve broken my own rule by bringing these guests here, but it was necessary.” He cleared his throat, his hands going into his pockets as he continued moving to see everyone. “As you know, I’ve been working on a cure to the disease my former colleague released into the air. While on a run into the city to collect samples, I was pursued by some of my colleague’s associates.”

  Estoria’s hand went to her mouth, and a few gasps slipped from those listening intently to Foster.