by Fall, Carly
Abby blushed. No one had ever talked to her that way, and she had a feeling she could very well get used to it. Despite her injuries that felt like open, raw wounds, the things he said still made her heart sing.
She reached out her bandaged hand, and he took it gently in his.
“Thank you, Noah,” she said. Bruce was shooting something on the TV, and Noah hit mute with his free hand.
“For what?”
“For being there when . . . when that man . . .” She couldn’t finish the sentence, and she felt tears in her eyes.
“Oh, honey.” Noah moved to the bed and gathered her in his arms. As she cried out her fears on his T-shirt, she was comforted by the huge arms around her, the safety they gave her, and the feeling of being right where she was supposed to be.
Except he had made it clear that he could never be hers.
And that only made her cry harder.
Chapter 37
Abby had cried herself to sleep. She woke the next morning feeling better, but still sore. She rolled over and looked around.
Noah was asleep in the chair next to the bed. His head was tilted back, his mouth open. Neptune had perched himself on Noah’s shoulder and had his head tucked in by Noah’s ear. She couldn’t help but laugh. Which, of course, brought both of them awake.
Noah came to consciousness first and lifted his head, which in turn upset Neptune. The cat let Noah know he was angry with a growl, and then jumped to the bed to curl up in the pillows.
“Are you okay?” Noah asked, rolling his head, trying to get the kink out of his neck.
“I’m fine,” Abby said. “Sore, but good. I would really like to try to take a shower, and then I want to look around the silo.”
Okay. Yeah. The trying to take a shower, no problem. Although she couldn’t get the bandages wet, she could do a half shower.
Abby watched Noah heave himself out of the chair and go to the bathroom to run the shower. He then came to the side of the bed and helped her to her feet. She cringed as her mangled feet hit the floor, but waved him off when he tried to pick her up. Her footsteps were hesitant and slow, but she made it to the bathroom.
She turned to Noah and smiled. “I think I’m good.”
“Just holler if you need me.”
Twenty minutes later, Abby emerged from the bathroom feeling much better. She hadn’t quite showered, but she had managed to splash water and soap on most of her body. The water had stung the cuts, but getting clean overrode any discomfort.
As she came out of the bathroom and looked around the room, she realized she was becoming stir crazy. Claustrophobic. Whatever. Before the shower, she had wanted to get out of the room, despite its huge space, but now, she would claw her way out if she needed to.
“Can we please go somewhere?” She heard the pleading in her voice.
Noah stood in front of her and put his hand through his hair. He sighed and looked at the ground as if thinking about her request.
After a moment, he said, “Okay. Just let me get in the shower.”
Twenty minutes later they were on their way up the elevator. Abby noted Neptune had decided to join them, and he wasn’t afraid of the elevator despite never being in one. Or she thought he had never been in one. She had a feeling he had made this trip before and was happy to be doing it again.
The doors opened to a small hallway and door. Noah opened it, and they stepped into a huge living space. Abby moved at a snail’s pace as she gingerly put weight on her cut-up feet.
Because they were in a missile silo, it was circular in shape, but there was a big screen TV, a couple of cozy-looking brown leather couches, a bar, and a pool table. The room was done in dark browns and navy blues, and she fell in love with it.
As she looked around, she felt Noah’s eyes on her, as if he were expecting her to say something.
“It’s a nice place, Noah,” she said, meeting his gaze.
He smiled broadly, and she swore his chest puffed out a little bit.
“Thank you. You hungry?”
She nodded, and they stepped back in the elevator and headed up to the next floor. The elevator opened into the kitchen area, and there stood Hudson. He was dressed in black silk pants and a white silk T-shirt. Abby noticed that a gun was settled in the waistband of his pants at his lower back.
He turned his head at the sound of the elevator and stared at her. Then he smiled.
“Hello, Abby.”
“Hi.”
Hudson came over and asked how she was feeling and if there was anything he could get her. He was just making breakfast, which consisted of chocolate chip pancakes and fruit, and he had a fresh pot of coffee on.
“It all sounds wonderful,” she said, thinking that not only did he dance, but he cooked. He would be a catch for any woman.
He nodded once and turned back to his tasks.
Just then two more men came around the corner.
“Hey, Hudson. Smells fucking good. What is it?”
Abby watched as the big blond with a surfer’s haircut and wearing camouflage pants entered the room.
The other man, built the same as all of them, had a mop of dark hair and wore sweats and a plain white T-shirt. “Wait! Don’t say anything. I’m guessing pancakes. Am I right? Hell yeah, I’m right.”
Hudson turned to face them. He met each of them in the eye, then looked directly at Abby. Both men turned around slowly, and Abby noticed that Noah placed himself in front of her.
There was silence for a moment.
“Hey, Abby,” said the one with dark hair. “I’m Cohen.” He hitched his thumb at the blond. “This is Jovan.” It wasn’t a friendly greeting, just a statement of names, and Abby had the distinct impression that they were not happy to see her.
Abby nodded to both of them.
“I was just showing her around. She also needs to eat,” Noah growled at them. There was obviously some conflict between Noah and the others, Abby thought. Like they don’t want you here.
“Right,” Jovan said with a slight smile.
“We’ll eat in my quarters,” Noah said.
Cohen nodded, and the two left the kitchen.
Noah took Abby’s hand and led her around the corner to complete the tour of the main living quarters. They walked past the War Room, then Abby hesitated a moment. Noah stopped as well. The War Room was glassed-in on two walls, so she could see clearly inside. There was a man with a military haircut sitting at a big, black marble table and hunched over a computer. On one wall, there was a huge screen displaying a close-up picture of another man.
“That’s Talin,” Noah said.
Noah looked at her and followed her gaze to the large screen. Abby looked puzzled as she stared at the picture.
“Noah,” she said quietly, “why do you have a picture of James up on that screen?”
“I’m sorry?” Noah said.
“Why do you have that picture of my coworker James up there? Remember I told you about him? The guy I worked with who had a serious allergy problem?”
Noah cursed violently and stood in the doorway of the War Room. Talin looked up, surprise shown in his face at the intrusion, especially by the female who shouldn’t be in the compound to begin with.
“Noah,” Talin said incredulously, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest, “what the fuck?”
Noah knew that bringing Abby to the silo was a big no-no. It went against an unspoken code of the Warriors. He knew there were some who wanted to beat the shit out of him for it and maybe kill her. But bringing her into the War Room was nothing short of sacrilege, and he probably deserved to be shot for it. But she obviously knew the guy on the screen. The same guy they had spent a full day looking for while going through grainy security feed. The same guy Talin was running a facial recognition program on while syncing to numerous galleries of police mug shots in the area.
Noah ignored Talin. “Abby, take a close look. Are you certain?”
She glanced up at the sc
reen again. “Noah, I spent five years with nothing but a few feet between me and him for eight-to-ten hours a day. Of course I’m sure.”
Noah felt dread and elation. He knew Abby was safe here, but he couldn’t stand the thought that she had been that close for that many years to a Colonist.
“You know him?” Talin asked incredulously, standing up, pointing at the screen. “You know who this guy is?”
Abby nodded.
After a beat of silence, Noah said, “Better call a meeting, Talin. And tell Hudson to bring in some of those pancakes. I think we’re going to be here a while.”
Chapter 38
A few steps shy of pandemonium broke out. It wasn’t pretty.
Rayner and Cohen came in with their guns in their holsters, glaring at Abby as if she had three heads, each containing a bad case of scabies. Talin didn’t meet Abby’s eyes, while Rayner glowered at her as if he were certain they had someone they couldn’t trust among them. Noah doubted that Abby was a Colonist, but for her to be able to put a name to the face of one was bad news. For her.
Hudson came in with a stack of pancakes and a bowl of fruit. Jovan was behind him with some plates, silverware, and a canter of coffee. Noah noted that Hudson now had a knife tucked into the back of his pants instead of the gun. He knew that if Hudson let that thing fly, it would end up buried between Abby’s eyes. There wasn’t anyone better than Hudson with a knife, whether it was in the kitchen chopping stuff for dinner or dealing death. He rubbed his face in frustration.
Once everyone was seated, Noah said, “First, there will be no violence.”
There was a rumble of questioning disapproval among the males as they stabbed pancakes while keeping one eye on Abby. “She’s not here to hurt anyone.”
The coffee cup that was making its way to Abby’s mouth stopped midway. Hurt anyone? Was he serious? She put the cup down on the table and looked around at the big burly men sitting around her. Hurt anyone? If anybody at the table should be frightened, it should be her. She noticed the weapons they carried, but hadn’t thought they were carrying them because of her. Just their sheer size . . . yes, she should be the one feeling threatened. She cringed thinking that they were ready to use their weapons on her. Why that was, she didn’t understand.
She was sitting here with bandages on her hands, her feet, and her face looked like chopped liver. She had on a bathrobe and a nightshirt. She couldn’t imagine anything less threatening. What was she going to do, hobble up to one of them and swear at him? She sure as hell couldn’t hit anyone with the big bandages on her hands. Right now her mouth was the only thing that worked properly, and that was just barely because of the cuts on her face.
Just then Neptune announced his arrival with a loud howl and jumped up on Talin. All the men mumbled their hellos to the cat, as Neptune purred. He quickly settled down in Talin’s lap. Talin stroked the cat’s back, and Abby had the feeling Neptune had been busy making friends while she was unconscious.
Traitor.
Abby let out a little laugh, the smile hurting her face. “Hurt you?” she asked incredulously, looking around the table. She rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. Are you guys serious?”
They were all silent, looking at her. She began to feel a little uncomfortable.
“How much do you know about us, Abby?” Talin asked calmly. He didn’t wait for an answer. “See, we have been here over two hundred years, and no human has ever found out about us. And then Noah meets you. And you and Noah start messing around, and Noah starts glowing, which you can see, but no other human woman has been able to see. Believe me, there are those at this table who have been with hundreds, if not thousands of women, and none of us has ever been busted glowing. And then you can see the ash that is left behind by the Colonists. Our dilemma, and why we feel a little threatened by you, is because humans aren’t supposed to be able see our SR44 forms, nor can they see the ash left by a Colonist. Yet, you can. And then you announce that you actually know a Colonist. So we have to wonder exactly what you are. And then there’s the nice fact that you work for a goddamned newspaper . . .” He brought his fork up to his mouth and popped in a piece of melon.
There were grunts of agreement.
She looked at all of them, stunned. “And what exactly do you think I am?” she asked.
Hudson didn’t meet her eyes. She noticed he didn’t eat either, just watched his fellow Warriors as if he were on high alert, waiting to respond to something.
“Perhaps you’re a Colonist. Perhaps you are some other being that isn’t even on our radar. We don’t know,” Talin said. He stabbed at the stack of pancakes and took two.
Another being? Really? Yeah, that would be cool, but unfortunately, it wasn’t in the cards.
“Look,” she said. And they all looked at her, except for Hudson. He continued to eye everyone at the table. “I was born in Sacramento, California. I never knew my dad. He died before I was born. My mother was murdered when I was ten. The only reason that I know about you is because I saw Noah in one of the crime scene photos from my mother’s murder file, and I called him on it. As for the glow . . .” She felt herself blush while she thought about what caused it. “I don’t know what to tell you. I saw Noah glowing. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why I can see it.” She took a deep breath and continued.
“As for me being a reporter, your secret is safe. I could have already put a piece in the paper about you, but I didn’t. And believe me, a piece about you would’ve been far more interesting than the garbage I did write.”
“Let me make something very clear,” Noah said loudly, he deep voice reverberating around the room. “I trust Abby. I trust that what she says is the truth. There’s an explanation for her ability to see things she isn’t supposed to see, and we’ll find out why that is.”
“And so do I,” Hudson said just as loud. “Abby poses no danger to us.”
She sat back in her chair and watched as they all eyed Noah and Hudson for a moment, then continued eating.
“Very well, Abby,” Talin said as he stabbed another pancake off the platter. “Whatever Noah says usually goes, and if Hudson is backing him up . . . so, welcome, I guess.”
The others grudgingly nodded.
“Now that that’s out of the way, let’s go over what we know about that cocksucker up on the screen,” Noah said. He shoveled fruit into his mouth.
Talin told him there wasn’t a hit on any of the mug shot books, but at this point it didn’t matter because they had an ID thanks to Abby. He was also going to compare the footprint they got from the security feed to the footprint that was left at Abby’s house and hopefully, if the planets were aligned right and luck was on their side, there would be a match.
“Abby, tell us what you know about James.”
Abby took a deep breath. She really didn’t know much. She hadn’t talked to James about anything outside of work, and even their work talk was short and to the point. She didn’t know where he lived, or what he did on his own time. She did know he loved Philly cheesesteak sandwiches and often brought them back to the office. She also knew that James had been fired a few weeks earlier when the paper had issued a round of pink slips.
“I’m also pretty certain that James killed your mom,” Noah said quietly. Shock rippled through Abby’s body. She had sat next to her mother’s killer for five years? “The cut marks are the same on your mom, as well as the other cases we’re working on.”
Abby was silent. On the heels of the shock came rage. That, however, didn’t last too long because she didn’t have the energy to keep it fueled. Her mother was dead and had been for a long time. Anger wasn’t going to bring her back.
There was brief talk and speculation that James was her attacker. He had the motivation to do it.
“Why would he kill me? Because he got fired and I didn’t? Why wouldn’t he kill our boss instead? He was the one who did the firing.”
Talin explained the psyche of a Colonist. They were highly self-absorbed and
love watching the aftermath when they killed. They wanted to see people talking about them on TV and read about themselves in the newspaper.
“It’s really a perfect job for a Colonist,” Talin said. “He had a front-row seat to watch the police work, and he probably even wrote articles about his own kills. He would love that. It also gave him a chance to keep an ear to the ground and make sure no one was closing in on him.”
The others nodded or grunted in agreement. The pancakes were flying off the serving tray at an alarming rate. Abby couldn’t imagine their grocery bill.
“Most likely, in his mind, you took that from him. The good news is that he didn’t get you. The bad news is that he won’t stop until he does.”
“Or he’s dead,” Hudson said mildly.
Talin nodded in agreement.
“Have you ever noticed any ash around him before?” Talin asked.
She shook her head, still trying to get over the “he’s going to be after you until you’re dead” part. She realized that her life as she knew it, at least until James was stopped, was over. She couldn’t go back to her old life, her job, her apartment. She felt a knot in her throat, but swallowed it. She could think about all that, and the implications it brought, later.
“Why do the . . . Colonists? Is that what you called them?” She turned to Noah with the question, and he nodded. “Why do they leave that ash?”
Hudson wiped his mouth with a linen napkin and set it down beside his plate. “We believe the ash is left when a Colonist is in a heightened state, as they would be before, during, or immediately after they kill. We think it is similar to our glow, which only happens when we’re in a . . . heightened state.” A small grin crossed his lips, and the others around the table smirked as well.
They watched as Abby’s cheeks flushed, most likely thinking about the heightened sexual states she had enjoyed with Noah.
Everyone had finished breakfast at the point, and Abby yawned. She was sore.