I had no intentions of telling Kit my feelings like I did, but she irritated me when she wanted an explanation for my truly stupid move of leaving the safety of this house and risking my life along with hers. I groaned into the pillow over my head, it was stupid of me and Kit was hurt because of me.
It was so much easier with Rebecca.
Rebecca was the only long term relationship I had ever managed successfully. I had dated others over the years, but my ambition overwhelmed a wish to build a normal life. I had goals and none of them included a picket fence or pets until I had finished the work I started right when I met Rebecca.
She understood my drive, the public eye always watching every step I took as a Senator and that's why our relationship worked. She accepted the strange silent terms I held over her. I loved Rebecca, but was far from ever being in love with her, and maybe that's why the disconnect was so easy for me when the time came.
Then I met Kit.
The physical attraction was immediate from the moment her hazel eyes met mine and then the way I felt like I could shed the Senator walls when I was around her. Yes, it was because she was hired to be my bodyguard and personal assistant, but then it grew. It grew until it became a feeling that lingered in the pit of my stomach even after she was gone. It also didn't help when I caught Kit more than once looking at me like she did. That's why I eventually threw up the Senator walls because I never wanted Kit to think that I was trying to find a replacement for Rebecca in every aspect. I just couldn't control my feelings or understand them, only knowing that when I was around Kit I felt safe. A feeling I hadn't had in the last few years. I also had the sinking feeling that I would fall in love with Kit so deeply I would not know how to keep holding back.
I took a deep breath under the fluffy cover of my pillows, I didn't know what the morning would bring. Kit was still healing from Callum and the ghost of Montreal, I had to tread lightly with her feelings and not push her emotional walls until they really did shatter. It broke my heart to know Kit was so afraid to let her heart go because she feared the next one to have it would share a similar fate as Callum.
I finally closed my eyes, my mind racing all over the map of things I felt and what I should do about them, I had to again resort to reciting the periodic table to take my thoughts away.
I fell asleep as the storm raged on outside and inside.
_____________
The soft sound of my bedroom door creaking open, woke me up from a dreamless deep sleep. I then heard the floor creak in the spot next to my bed, the only spot in the room where there was a weakness in the hardwood floor, making a squeak noise when some was walking towards the bed.
Instinct and fear kicked in and I reached out from under my blankets, wrapping my hand around the butt of the P99 I had set there days ago.
I had a break in once, five years ago and what happened that night left me with a heightened awareness even as I slept.
The other side of the bed moved in a way telling me there was someone now crawling onto the bed.
I went to roll over and face the intruder when I heard in a soft raspy voice, "Claire, put the gun down, it's just me."
Kit's voice made me relax my grip on the gun and move to the light switch. The light filled the room with a soft ambient light, Kit was sitting on the other side of the bed, wrapped up in a blanket, her hair was messy from rolling around and she was half asleep.
I sat up, noticing the way she was gingerly holding her arm. I tried to hold back from rushing to help her, Kit noticed this, and before I could say anything she shook her head, "My arm hurts like a bitch but I can move it. Nothing a few aspirin won't take care of." She looked down at the end of the bed, "I think I broke the air conditioning in my room when I tried to turn it down. It's freezing in my room and it's making me dream about penguins." Kit grimaced when she sat against the headboard, her shoulder obviously still bothering her. "Why do you sleep with a gun by the bed? I thought that's why you hired me."
I looked at her, confused about the penguin comment before answering, "I have slept with a gun by the bed for the last five years, ever since the last time someone crept into my bed without me knowing." I turned away from Kit before she could ask her own question. The last break in I had was an incident I had almost forgotten, but constantly was reminded about when I would look at the gun in the drawer or on the table top.
I went to throw back the blankets and get out of the bed, "The system on that side of the house has been acting up lately, it's supposed to be predicting the temperature based on the settings I calibrated it to since you have stayed here. It should be picking up your body heat and adjusting the cold air output based on that." I stood up; pulling on the sweater I had tossed to the end of the bed and went to walk to her room. Irritated that HVAC program had malfunctioned on that side of the house when I had spent two hours the other night setting it up perfectly for Kit to be comfortable in her room.
I looked over my shoulder at Kit, staring at me blankly as most who knew how I had the entire house functions programmed from the one computer in my office, I smiled at the look on her face, “Wait here, I will see if I can fix it."
The second stepped into her room I was freezing, no wonder she was dreaming of penguins. I pulled the sleeves of my sweater over my hands and went to the thermostat and pushed the program button, finding that it had been overridden in the last half hour. That the room had been purposely turned into an icebox.
I bit my bottom lip as the smirk grew. I hit the reset button and the system returned to normal, shutting off the cold air that poured from the vents.
I walked back to my bedroom, "Kit, it's all set, I have the heat running to bring it back up to where it was when you went to sleep. It will shut off when everything has normalized." I looked up to find the redhead passed out under the blankets, her head smashed deep into the mountain of soft pillows I kept all over the bed.
I let out a sigh and couldn't help smile at the sight. I walked over to my side of the bed, grabbing the other blanket I had on the end of the bed. I would let her have the bed and I would sleep in the chair facing the windows.
As I bent to pull the blankets closer around Kit, I felt a hand on mine followed by the raspy voice I was getting attached to, "Where are you going?"
"To sleep in the chair. You can stay here as long as you want or until your room gets comfortable again." I looked in sleepy hazel eyes, I could easily read through her broken air conditioning excuse and see that she had a bad dream or something that had disturbed her sleep.
Kit held onto my hand, squeezing lightly, she didn't have to say anything, I knew why she was in my bed. She didn't want to be alone. I nodded and pulled the blankets back, sliding into my usual spot and rolling onto my side. I could feel her body heat as it warmed the bed and me thoroughly.
I sighed at the way her warmth made me warm and adjusted the pillow under my head before shutting off the light. I took a deep breath and tried to calm my racing heart, then the bed shifted again, Kit was pressing her body up against me ever so cautiously.
I heard her mumble against her pillow, "I lied about the air conditioning, I really don't want to be alone right now." The sound of her voice told me she wasn't here for anything more than just to be close to someone.
I whispered back, "I know Kit."
A few minutes later I fell back asleep listening to her breathe.
The penguins were begging me to dive in with them again. It was like the dream never stopped when I woke up from the first one. Panicked as I saw Callums face float by me in the water when I was about to jump into the cold water. Seeing his face is what startled me awake and made me go to her.
The penguins woke me up again after falling asleep in the new bed I crawled into. Now I was half awake, staring at the blonde next to me as she slept peacefully, and for once I was waking up next to someone knowing exactly how I got here.
I had hoped to maybe just talk to Claire after she "fixed" the air in my room. Talk out the
panic I had swirling in my gut, maybe talk until the memories I had brought back to the surface would go back under. But then I sat in her bed, still warm from her body, smelling like the ocean and her shampoo. I couldn't resist laying down under the blankets. I fell asleep instantly comforted by all the things that were Claire.
When she came back and told me she was opting to sleep in the chair so I would be comfortable, I felt guilty for my dumb childish move. I probably could have come in the room and asked her out right to keep me company. I was a highly trained former federal agent and yet Claire made me feel like my first high school crush all over again.
I wanted her to stay with me, just so I could be close to her, but I had no idea how to ask her without feeling like a creep. Then once again she read right through me when I looked at her trying to find the words to say it. She smiled and soon I fell asleep listening to her breathing and how it made me feel like I was home.
I had fallen into a deep sleep and managed to press my body up against Claire with my arm somehow finding its way through the night to fall across her stomach and hold her. I didn't care too much since I was so tired and the arm that was draped over her really did hurt like a bitch, so much so I couldn't move it.
I went to shift position when the vibration of Claire's phone on the bedside table woke her up. She grabbed the phone, rolling away from me to answer it without waking me up.
I took the opportunity to pull my arm back before she realized it was there, but then she rolled onto her back as she answered the phone, her free hand dropping to mine on her stomach, holding it there, surrounding my hand with the warmth of hers. It reminded me of that first day Claire grabbed my hand at the university, how it calmed me then like it was now. She looked at me with sleepy eyes and smiled, answering the call.
"Good Morning Dr. Zehren." Claire's morning voice was soft with a hint of rasp that came from emerging from a deep sleep. I barely heard the other person on the phone issue a curt greeting before they spoke rapidly.
I watched as Claire's smile dropped, her jaw tightening. "When did the breach happen and how long until Metro police call about the break in?"
I heard more murmuring from what sounded like a male on the other line, Claire moved her hand from mine, running it over her hair and closing her eyes she let out a sigh of irritation, "Tell Ivan to go through protocol D. Even though it wasn't a full breach of the firewall I want to double check, triple check that none of our files were compromised. Then we need to start initiating his remote IP program again." Claire swung her legs out of the bed, leaning on her elbows, "The break in at my house happened fifteen minutes ago? The alarm system alerted you first as it was programmed to do, right?" She paused, "Have Ivan run through those as well."
Claire stood up, walking to the giant windows, pushing back one of the shades to reveal that the new day was left sunny and bright by last night's storm.
I sat up in the bed, smoothing out my hair, continuing to listen to Claire on the phone.
"No, No. We don't need to send anyone to D.C. I have contacts in the police department I trust. The Secret Service will be all over the scene in a matter of moments. All I need is Ivan to secure the Criterion files, the rest is unimportant." Claire glanced at me and then back to the window, "No, tell Rebecca to stay there until she is better."
Hearing Rebecca's name threw me back into reality, I tossed the blankets back and rolled out of the bed. Things were far beyond complicated and I had complicated them further by creeping into Claire's bed last night.
I shuffled out of her room, trying to roll out my arm and the stiffness that had settled in overnight.
Back in my room I snatched my phone from the coffee table I left it on and went to the bathroom to look at my arm and check my phone. I clicked the on button and the screen lit up telling me that I had fifty five emails, ten text messages, two voicemails and three missed calls from Davey, the time telling me he had just called in the last five minutes.
I hit the voicemail button cradling the phone between my good shoulder and my ear as I pushed up my sleeve to show the black and deep purple bruise that covered most of my shoulder. I cringed, pushing lightly around the bruise, there would be no sleeveless tops in my near future.
Davey’s voice filled my ear while I dug around in the first aid kit for an instant ice pack, "Hey Kit, I am sure you are aware that Claire's townhouse in D.C. was broken into. My contacts just let me know, I will forward you the info they gave me and give you a heads up that the Secret Service will be all over this one." Davey paused, "Meaning you will be hearing from some familiar faces. Carlton is taking lead, he has no idea where you are working."
I groaned and sat on the edge of the tub, half listening to the rest of Davey's message. I wasn't about to panic that Claire's house was broken into, she was safe and it was bound to happen now that she was on an extremist groups shit list. However, John Carlton was another story.
I set the phone down next to me, crushing the ice pack and shaking it up, John Carlton was the Agent who led the investigation into Montreal until he was pulled by a presidential order and the investigation was shifted to classified. Carlton hated me from the moment we met at my first orientation for Senate detail, he was a traditional no woman should be a field agent, type of agent, and rode my ass any chance he got.
It was worse when he was assigned to the investigation, trying to find everything he could to bury me deeper than I had myself. Part of the reason why I was forced into leaving was because I would not give the piece of shit anything and told him to fuck off more than once in tears.
Last I had heard, Carlton had been pushed back to the home office, humping a desk.
Carlton would shit pure bricks when he found out I was Senator Avondale's new assistant.
I shook my head, leaning against the shower wall to hold the ice pack against my shoulder, picking up the phone to sift through the emails.
After the third email inviting Claire to a charity ball next week that she had already RSVP to, I noticed that some of the emails I received were not from the usual sources of enamored fans or Senate interns. A handful of them were from a different email address out of the Criterion Centre and had titles like regrowth test four, DNA breakdown for project M, and one titled the Avondale formula.
All the emails had attachments and when I clicked on one small paperclip, a huge file opened up on my phone of a set of lungs. The lungs rotated on the screen and began to regenerate sections of each lobe, arrows jotting out and rolling with DNA sequences.
I scanned over the file and picked up key words I remembered from science classes and watching science fiction movies, but the rest was gibberish to my simple mind. Whatever it was, it was complex and grown in the mind of a genius.
I clicked on another file that was marked with Avondale formula and scanned it. There was a small paragraph telling me that this was the newest formula for the latest Criterion project created by Dr. Claire Avondale, MD, PHD.
I looked up from the phone confused; Claire had told me she never really became a doctor, only going through the schooling but never putting it to practical use, but here I was, looking at a formula created by a double doctorate holder. I searched my mind, only remembering that she had gotten her doctorate in research medicine but she had tossed it to the side to pursue politics, not the piece of complex medical breakthrough I was scrolling through. I pushed against the ice on the shower wall, wincing at the cold pain it brought, it had to be Claire doing this work or she had a clone out there I didn't know about. I scanned further, squinting at the words to hopefully make sense of them.
All I could gather was that somehow this formula was a genetic growth program utilizing the existing DNA of a patient. I kept reading the file, struggling to make sense of the advanced scientific dialogue, I wasn't dumb by any means, but this was language well above my pay grade.
All of the files in every email I opened was signed off by Claire, the familiar scrawl of her signature that burned into my memory
that first day I saw it when she had authorized my sedan to be towed, but here, instead of just Claire Avondale, she was signing things Dr. Claire Avondale.
I was slowly getting a suspicious feeling that Claire was leaving more out about the Criterion Centre and being a simple state Senator. I took a deep breath and tried to fight the gut feeling brewing that she was lying to me.
I heard Claire come into the room, calling after me.
"In the bathroom." I yelled back, never tearing my eyes from the phone.
Claire pushed the door open, smiling, "Hey, um I am sure you overheard. There is a small complication with the email system. You might get some weird emails bounced to your inbox." She leaned against the door frame, "Also my townhouse back in the capital was broken into. The Secret Service is looking into it, they think it could be retaliation of some sort for yesterday and the arrest of their pals."
I nodded, "I know, Davey called me. Gave me a heads up that I will be running into some old co-workers." I turned to her and held up the phone, "I also know about the emails, I was just scanning over some of yours, Dr. Avondale."
I watched Claire's eyes widened in confusion and drift to the file I still had up on the screen. I stood up, letting the ice pack fall into the tub. "Now the question is do I call you Senator Avondale or Dr. Avondale?" I held her eyes firmly, I wanted to see if she was lying to me the moment she opened her mouth and started producing answers.
I pushed a little further before she started speaking, "Is this why the extremist freaks are so set on getting their hands on you? That you maybe are doing more than just supporting a political agenda for medical reform? That you are more than just a snobby Senator in their eyes."
I kept staring at Claire and held out the phone to her, "What exactly is it you are doing at the Criterion Centre, Claire? I can see it's more than just fund raising and supporting a research facility." I took a breath and held onto my sore shoulder, looking at the blonde as she slowly took my phone, "Please tell me you are not playing god."
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