by Anna Leonard
She might not be able to move her hands, but she was able to hook one leg around his, bringing his body in closer, feeling the heat coming off his skin and the friction of his body stroking against hers. Never mind that anyone could see them, anyone could find them, utterly defenseless. Right now, all she wanted was the press of his body against hers, the roughness of his mouth bruising hers, and to be able to give back as good as she got, letting him know that she felt the same, the hunger and the urgency and the hot flame of desire—and something more, something she had no words for, no way to understand, but accepted as part of what was between them, a blade-sharp slice into her soul that stung and yet felt good all at once, a sensual pain that made no sense but could only be indulged in.
Her words had triggered it, somehow, but the kiss made it real.
Was this the rut he had talked about? If so, she didn’t know how he could stand it, how he could resist it. All she wanted was to shed their clothes, to have him inside her, to surround him entirely, to take him inside until he could never leave...and know that she would never be washed from his skin, either, that he would never look at another woman without remembering the feel of her, the touch, the need....
“Stop, stop...” he muttered, but she couldn’t tell if he was talking to her, or himself. “Not now. God, ah...” He dove in for another lingering kiss, this one ending more gently, his mouth moving down the line of her throat, his tongue picking up the drops of sweat as though they were precious liquor. Then he found the strength to step back, his hands dropping away from her arms, his entire body shuddering like he had just run a marathon.
Her body felt the same way, and she didn’t know if she could walk, or if her bones would melt from the heat.
“Maggie first,” he said, drawing a deep breath. His eyes looked almost black with emotion, and his face was drawn into determined lines. “Maggie, and then...we are going to deal with this, Elizabeth.”
With that oath, he took her hand, and they stepped back out into the street.
* * *
They hadn’t made it more than halfway across when a man started walking behind them, his pace steady, not quite threatening but obviously following them. Another woman came from the left, pacing them, as well.
“Steady,” Josh murmured into Elizabeth’s ear. “They’re just humans. You’ve already beaten them before, and they know it. They’re going to be cautious of you, because you kicked their asses.”
It wasn’t even close to true, but the warm feel of his breath did more than the actual sound of his words or the knowledge of the gun still in her pocket, and Elizabeth kept her own step strong and calm, her back straight and her head high, as though she was walking down the street on her way to the bakery, her day spread out ahead of her with peace and contentment. Nobody needed to know that she was terrified inside.
She would never give Ray or his crew the satisfaction—or risk being rejected, the others still unable to see the horror underneath that smooth voice and smile.
They entered the Hall, and she heard several people call out her name, but didn’t stop, merely raised one hand in greeting and moved on. Her feet took her, unerringly, not toward Ray’s office, but toward a door in the back of the main hallway, one she had never been in before. Josh walked with her, his body shielding her from any attacks their unwanted companions might make, but the two guards merely walked alongside, falling back when they reached the door, as though they had not been given permission to go any farther.
The door opened under her hand without resistance, leading into a short, well-lit hallway, and a flight of stairs leading down.
“Step into my parlor, said the spider to the fly....” Elizabeth said softly.
“I swat spiders with my tail,” Josh said flatly in response.
Together, they stepped into the hallway, and went down the stairs.
* * *
The space below the Hall might once have been a storm shelter, but someone had spent a lot of money upgrading it recently, probably when Ray brought in all the medical supplies to battle the flu epidemic. The walls were finished and painted, the lights updated to indirect fluorescents like an office building and the floor a smooth white linoleum that echoed their footsteps against the walls. The space had been broken up into several frosted-glass cubicles, and over the tops Elizabeth could see desktops with laptop computers and printers, and ergonomic chairs set as though the occupants had just gone out to grab lunch. It looked so...ordinary.
Then a muffled roar broke the silence, and they both stopped. Elizabeth fought down the urge to flee back up the stairs and slam the door behind her.
“If you bolt, I will, too,” Josh said.
“Are you kidding me?”
“Lead mare leads the way. I’m just here to hit things.”
“Making me laugh is not helpful,” she said sternly, but found that her own shaking had disappeared.
The next roar sounded different, higher-pitched and angrier, and she could pinpoint it this time, as coming from the far wall, where there was a row of seven white doors, each with a large window at the top, and an electronic keypad set where the handle should have been.
“They’re down here. Oh, God...”
Josh made a move as though to go investigate, and she grabbed at his arm to hold him back. If they were behind doors, hopefully those doors were locked. Why tempt fate?
Then the sound of another door opening off to their left made them both stop.
“Libby. It’s been too long. I’m so glad you came home.”
She turned to face the speaker, feeling Josh move with her. “Ray.” Her voice didn’t shake or show any tremor at all; they might have been meeting in the grocery store, for all the emotion she let escape.
He stood there, tall and elegant, and as honest-looking as ever in his khakis and dress shirt. Even knowing everything she knew, having seen the things she had seen, it was difficult not to trust him. “Who is your friend?” he said. “I don’t think we’ve met?”
“Where’s Maggie?” she asked, not answering him or bothering with introductions.
“In my office, waiting for you. Please, come in, both of you.”
The last thing that Elizabeth wanted to do was follow him anywhere. But he was beckoning them inside the door he had come through, and if Maggie was there, they had no choice but to follow.
She was uncomfortably aware of the gun still in her sweatshirt pouch, and how long it would take her to reach in and take it out, much less aim and shoot.
Behind the door was a large office, as sumptuous as the rest of the space was barren, and Maggie, sitting on a small sofa. She looked unharmed, and Elizabeth ran to her, only to discover, when she tried to hug her sister, that the younger girl was chained to the seat.
“Damn you, unlock her!”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, not yet, anyway. It does pain me to offer her such hospitality, but I’m not quite convinced that she means to stay, and I really must insist that she remain. It’s not safe for her, wandering around the outside world like that. Really, Libby, what were you thinking, taking her out there?”
“I’m sorry, Libby,” her sister said mournfully. “I heard what Josh said, about...” Her voice trailed off, not wanting to spill any secrets, and a tear dripped from the corner of her eye. “Why didn’t you run?”
Elizabeth turned her back on Ray, trusting Josh to keep an eye on the other man, and gathered Maggie into her arms again. “Idiot. Did you really think I’d leave you alone? Did you think either of us was just going to abandon you?”
There was a sniffle from somewhere against her shoulder, then Maggie pulled away, trying to wipe at her eyes with her unbound hand. “I was dumb, huh?”
“Very.”
And now they were back in Ray’s hands, surrounded by his people; exactly where they hadn’t
wanted to be. Maggie looked like she was going to burst into full-blown tears now that she no longer had to be tough and defiant, and Elizabeth touched the edge of her nose with one finger, forcing a smile. “Eight legs are better than six,” she said, and hoped that Maggie understood.
* * *
Josh heard Elizabeth, too, but he wasn’t sure if he would be able to follow through. There wasn’t enough room in the office to shift, not with all four of them, and the furniture, and he didn’t want to risk hitting Maggie or Elizabeth with his hooves accidentally.
Ray, he’d have no trouble hitting. In fact, the Mustang very much wanted to plant a hoof right in the middle of his well-bred, superficially pleasant face. He understood now what Elizabeth had meant, when she said that he was too well liked. Whatever this man was really thinking or planning, he never let it reach the surface. He was like a prairie dog; seemingly harmless, but constantly digging holes underfoot, until the entire ground was riddled, and you had no safe footing when you ran.
“We haven’t been introduced. My name is Ray Barist.” He held out one well-manicured hand, and Josh took it, but didn’t offer his name in return.
“Ah. The strong, silent type?” Ray chuckled, as though he had said something amusing, then let go of Josh’s hand and turned back to Elizabeth. “A pity you didn’t bring your little war-pony, too. I was quite curious to see if my people were hallucinating, or if you had actually managed to capture a unicorn.... That must have been Maggie’s doing, of course. We all know that you’re not exactly unicorn bait, are you, Libby, dear?”
He said it in the same pleasant tone of voice as previous that it took Josh a moment to realize what the bastard had just said. Fury surged in his veins, and the shift threatened to take over without his consent, but the small smile on Elizabeth’s face calmed him. She wasn’t upset at the insult. In fact, she looked almost...amused.
“Is that the best you can do, Ray? Really?”
She looked calm and in control, but he could see the way the hand on Maggie’s arm trembled, just slightly, and he could smell the fear on her skin, rising in the air. The instinct to charge to her aid, to snort and paw at the ground and warn this snake off, threatened to overload his brain. No. He was in control, not his instincts. He needed to stay in human form, to stay human....
“You’re supposed to be so brilliant, such a great leader, and all you can do is sew together a few pitiful creatures, and insult the fact that I’m a healthy woman with a sex life? That’s your idea of being a supervillain?”
“A supervillain? Is that what you think I am?” The snake sounded surprised, and almost hurt. “All I am trying to do is continue the work your very own grandfather began. Work, I might add, that your own parents were part of—but sadly has fallen by the wayside.” He took the pose of a professor, patient and wise. “Your grandfather had a vision—that was what the Community was for, to be a laboratory, an incubator for his dreams. To create a society where the very best potential is encouraged, where humans can develop into the utmost of our abilities.”
He smiled at Maggie, and Josh felt his skin crawl at the look in the man’s eyes. It wasn’t sexual—Elizabeth had been right about that. It was worse.
“Little Maggie here.” His gaze intensified, and the girl shuddered under the weight of it. “So very special. Do you even know how special she is? All the work I have done on my creatures over the years—the ones you dismiss as ‘pitiful’—and she comes along quite naturally, the perfect combination of genetics, and shows me the next step to take. She will help me to create a generation that is able to accomplish anything, mind and body. Maggie will do great things here, my dear, I assure you.”
“Over my dead body,” Elizabeth said, still calm, her gaze steady on Ray, watching him the way a cat would watch a fox too near her kittens.
“Libby, Libby. Again, you overreact. Why do you insist on thinking that I want to harm her?” He leaned forward, his hands flat on his desk. “No, no, I will take care of Maggie as though she were my very own. She will lack for nothing.”
“So long as she does what you say.”
“That is how it works, yes.” Ray didn’t seem to see anything wrong with that statement. “I am the alpha male. It is your responsibility to follow me. I am the Community’s chosen leader.”
There was a distinctly feminine snort at that, but Josh couldn’t tell if it was from Maggie or Elizabeth, as he had been distracted by a sound behind him. Human hearing wouldn’t have picked it up, but it was like gunshot to his sensitive hearing: the sound of electronic dead bolts being released, one after another.
The need to shift was screaming at him, but there was no room, and no way to predict how Ray would react. Did he have a gun? A knife? More henchmen like the ones who had shadowed them into the building waiting for his call?
Or was he relying on the creatures Josh could smell creeping toward the office door, even now?
Elizabeth could protect herself, could run, but Maggie was still chained to that damned sofa. They had to get her free, somehow.
“Where did they come from, Barist?” He only wanted to get the man’s attention off his females, to see his face, read his intentions there, but the question, once asked, was vitally important. “Your beasties. What did you use to create them?”
“Oh, a bit here and a bit there,” he said casually, turning to look at Josh, but not moving away from the girls. “The topic always fascinated me, even as a child, and when I came here, reading on the history of the Founding, it all came into focus.”
He looked so calm, so normal, it was impossible to comprehend what he was really saying.
“My own training was limited, but once I became chair of the hospital committee, I was fortunate enough to have access to very talented medical technicians, who found the chance to experiment with human tissue...irresistible.”
“Whose tissue?” Elizabeth asked, her voice low and horrified. “You bastard, whose tissue did you use?”
“Every member of the Community volunteered,” Ray said, refusing to become defensive. “By coming here, by being a part, you also agreed to be part of the ongoing experiment. I merely accelerated the pace.”
Elizabeth took the attack again. “You used our friends, neighbors... Oh, God. Were they still alive when you did that to them? Was the flu your fault? Did you make them sick so they’d go into your hospital, be under your care?” Her voice shook, a mixture of outrage and disgust. “How many people died because of what you did?”
“Elizabeth. Stop your hysterics. I did not cause the flu. It was a tragic outbreak, likely brought home from school by one of the children. Closed communities are prone to those sorts of thing, and you know I warned the committee about it, time and again. I urged everyone to get flu shots—including your parents.
“Every person in my study was a volunteer. Some gave less, some more. But they all believed in what we are doing.”
Josh saw, out of the corner of his eye, Maggie trying to work her slender wrist free of the manacle. Her skin was red and bruised-looking, indicating that she had tried before, and not been successful.
“And do they still? Do they still believe, once you’d twisted them, and then locked them in cages—and set them on their neighbors, to kill?” Elizabeth stepped directly in front of Maggie, blocking her from view.
“If you hadn’t run, there would have been no need to send them after you. You’ve only yourself to blame for any damage done.”
“And what’s Maggie’s role in this? Why do you want her, really? It’s not to talk to those things of yours, is it?”
Josh could hear the footfalls outside, the soft wet sniffing of a predator scenting the air. The need to shift was making him tense and edgy, but he had to maintain control. If this bastard knew what he was, there would be no escape for any of them. There was a small grunt of pain, and then the snick of me
tal against wood. Was Maggie free?
“She is the natural next step in the Community’s genetic experiment. Her skills tie into our animal nature, control it. Her beast is inside, while mine are external. What rests within her genes, when matched with my discoveries, will create the perfect blend of man and animal, beast and intellect, able to call on the best elements of each.”
Josh went cold. This bastard wasn’t trying to create a superhuman. He was trying to create a were. Like him. Like the herd. Not consciously, not the actual shift, maybe, but far too close for comfort.
He looked up and met Elizabeth’s horrified gaze. She had the same thought, he knew it as though she had screamed it out loud. It wasn’t just about getting Maggie out of there, not anymore. If he discovered what Josh was, if he learned about the herd...
If he would do this to his own neighbors, and call it good, what would he do to strangers? To beings who had already achieved his goal?
Josh had heard more than enough. Nobody else would suffer because of this bastard and his sick experiments. This ended, here and now.
“Barist,” Josh said softly. When the man turned to face him, he shifted.
Chapter 14
Elizabeth knew what Josh was going to do even before she saw his form shimmer. Daring to turn her back on Ray, hoping he would be distracted, she knelt by Maggie’s side. Her sister was holding her arm cradled to her chest, tearstains on her face and an expression of weary pain marking her features.
The manacle dangled off the arm of the sofa, its cuff empty, but still locked.
“I think I broke something,” Maggie said softly, and swallowed hard, like she was about to throw up. Her eyes were glazed over, not focusing properly.