“I don't think you need stitches, but I should patch you up,” he remarked, taking a step back and glancing down my glaringly naked body. “Raise your arms.”
I really didn't want to—and not just because I was stark naked, right in front of him. His gaze zoomed back up to catch mine, and now it was real laughter that I saw dancing in his eyes.
“How many times do I have to tell you this? I'm not going to throw you down on the floor and have my wicked way with you. Right now I wouldn't even do it if you begged me to. You have scrapes and bruises all over your ribs and hips. You're the biologist. You tell me how well soap cleans bacteria from open wounds.”
I blinked, then looked down at myself. He was right, of course, and the moment I saw my defensive wounds, they started to ache. I knew that it should have bothered me that my body was acting like this, but I couldn't quite bring myself to care. He raised his brows in askance, and I took another step back but brought my arms up to lace my fingers behind my neck. They seemed to weigh a ton each.
He set to work with some cotton balls and a bottle of antiseptic, moving fast and meticulous. The only positive thing about it was that he didn't touch me anywhere not strictly required, although he had ample opportunity to. He also cut the ruined bandages off my hand, and after cleaning it again left it as it was.
Once finished, he picked up his tools and walked back into the locker room, and with nothing better to do I trailed after him. I stopped abruptly inside the door when I saw a stack of scrubs, complete with white, knee-high socks, resting on the bench in the middle of the room. Next to it was a smaller stack, consisting of the washed-out cotton panties and bra I kept in my locker for emergencies. On top of it rested a picture of Sam and me, both of us smiling at the camera.
Of course he knew about her. He probably knew every little detail of my entire life. That sense of betrayal was back in full force now, making me feel not only stupid, but raging mad.
Trying to shove away my ire, I focused on the clothes instead. I always kept several T-shirts and pants in my locker; that whoever had fetched my other stuff from there hadn't brought them sent me a message that I really didn't want to hear right now.
Nate looked from my clothes to me, then raised his brows in silence once more. Apparently we were beyond the stage where he used words to order me around.
Taking the hint, I dressed quickly. Routine had me pull up the socks over the scrubs legs, but when I caught myself, I stopped. In a show of likely juvenile protest I reached for the hem of the pant legs and tore through the part of them that clung to my ankles, then pulled the socks up underneath.
Then there was only the photo left on the bench, and my fingers shook as I picked it up slowly. Was this a warning? A reminder? A weird kind of peace offering to comfort me?
He only glanced at it briefly, then turned to dump the used cotton balls into the trash by the sink. “Cute,” was all he said, but it still made me glare at the back of his head as I hastily pushed the picture into the back pocket of the scrubs.
Only then did I notice that the overhead lights were on, and belatedly I wondered why the water had been warm. My exaggerated look around must have given my thoughts away again, and this time he was only too happy to supply an answer.
“We've restored electricity to this part of the floor for convenience. There's even a coffee machine plugged in, if you want another cup?”
My eyes zipped back to his face, and although I knew that hostility on my part was nothing if not suicidal, I couldn't keep the acid out of the rasp that left my aching throat.
“Thank you, but if I never drink another cup of coffee again, it will be too soon.”
Why was I even surprised that my remark made him offer me one of those genuine smiles?
“Suit yourself. But you should drink something before the swelling in your throat makes it even harder to swallow.”
I had avoided looking into the bank of mirrors over the sinks, but as his words registered, my eyes were inadvertently drawn to them. I couldn't say what I'd expected, but I looked a lot worse. The side of my face that had been smashed repeatedly into the floor was already darkening with subcutaneous hematomas, same as my throat. I was a long shot from vain, but seeing my own face like that made me want to shrink back. Then I remembered how I'd sustained all those bruises and that I hadn't needed anyone else to save myself, and even managed a semblance of a proud smile. That hurt like hell, too, but I didn't really give a damn about it.
“I'll get you some ice packs to reduce the swelling. Come on,” he said, reaching for the door handle.
My smile died.
“I'm not leaving here before I get some answers.”
My tone was laced with confidence that I didn't know I still had within me, but when Nate turned to glare at me, I didn't even feel the need to shrink back. Much.
“And what exactly gives you the insane idea that you're in any position to make demands?” he asked.
If anything, the challenge in his tone hardened my newfound backbone.
“I'm not asking for anything unreasonable, just some information. You want my cooperation, right? I can't help you if I don't know what you might need help with.”
I'd expected him not to give in so easily, but he relaxed and sank back against the door, successfully shutting me in as a by-product. Glancing at his watch briefly, he then looked at me with a blank face.
“I have fifteen minutes to spare. What do you want to know?”
My heart sped up a little with triumph, although I was reasonably sure that this wasn't really anything I should be happy about.
A million questions burned on my tongue, but I forced myself to start with the two things that made acid churn in my stomach.
“How long were you watching that cube before you turned on the lights and marched in?”
A look of genuine surprise crossed his face, but it disappeared after a moment. His gaze turned almost shrewd, and I wondered if I'd somehow earned a few points for asking about that.
“We had the entire bunch of you under surveillance all night, but as everything seemed to have calmed down over the last hour, we got a little lax. If you mean to insinuate whether I was watching Greene make his move on you and waited for whatever unfathomable reason to see what the outcome would be, no. I wasn't in the atrium at the time the shit hit the fan, or, more correctly, the walls, floor, and everyone inside, but followed my men as they stepped in to secure the situation.”
I couldn't suppress a shudder running through me, but did my best to let my crossed arms look like a show of defiance rather than protectiveness.
“It never crossed your mind that I'd be twice as susceptible to your, let's call them suggestions, if you let him rough me up first?”
Now he looked pissed off, and he didn't try to keep that out of his tone.
“Why should it? I gain absolutely nothing from jeopardizing your physical and mental health. You obviously put up a good fight, but if he had succeeded to completely subdue you, I'm sure that you would have been incapable of any kind of controlled movement by the time he let off you again. You're of no use to me if you’re dead or unconscious.”
“Then why did you throw me into the cube again? You warned me before that he would come after me, and you didn't exactly help by beating him up. In fact, I think that was the last straw that made him unhinged enough to come after me once he thought he had a good chance at not getting interrupted. Does that even bother you?”
I had no idea why I added the last, and I hated just how much emotion there was in my voice. Nate pursed his lips as if he had to think about his answer. That infuriated me enough to take a step toward him, but only one. His slight smile returned, but his voice held no mirth now.
“That was a calculated risk I was willing to take. It is good to see that you've finally shed some of that naiveté and start seeing things as they really are.”
Now it was my turn to consider my reply carefully. He seemed as non-threatening as I'd ev
er seen him—which wasn't saying much—but I didn't doubt that if I physically assaulted him, he would stop acting so damn civil in a heartbeat.
“Trust me when I say that I have no delusions about what you're capable of. You proved that point enough times now. You can stop. I'm convinced. You're a deranged bastard who won't shy away from anything to get what he wants.”
“Few things, not anything,” he corrected me, but it came with that dangerous glint in his eyes that made it twice as hard to swallow as it already was.
Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to calm down again.
“Good that that's settled. Speaking of which, what exactly is it you want me to do?” I really didn't want to add the next part, but as we were already on such candid speaking terms, I might as well forge on and spare myself any useless beating around the bush that might just prolong the inevitable. Besides, if I had learned anything, it was that he wouldn't appreciate it if I tried to play dumb. “I'm not stupid, I get hints when they are slammed in my face. The scrubs and socks I'm wearing are from the hot labs, and since you pretty much aided in Thecla's untimely demise, I'm the only one of your hostages who has both clearance and experience working under biosafety level four conditions.” Fixing him with what I hoped was a dauntless stare, I went on. “If you're here because of whatever fucked-up virus they've supposedly been cooking up and testing on humans down there, you can forget it. I'm not going to help you get your grubby hands on it so you can sell it to the highest bidder or use it yourself to endanger millions of lives. You've made your point that there are many terrible things you can do to me and I can't stop you, but nothing you can think of will make me compromise myself on this.”
He took that all in with not a muscle moving in his entire body, and waited an endless five seconds after I'd fallen silent before he replied.
“I'm not here to set that virus free on the world. I'm here to destroy it and tear down the company that is responsible for creating it, one single brick at a time.”
Considering how they'd started their operation, the ending of his statement wasn't just a figure of speech, and he sounded utterly serious. He had no reason to lie to me, either; he'd said so before that he didn't absolutely need me, and if he simply wanted to blow up the entire facility, I was sure he knew better than I did where to place the charges.
“So it is real?” I asked, my voice a lot fainter than before. Righteousness had carried me so far, but with the mind-numbing idea of endangering millions of people out of the way, it was hard not to let the horror of it catch up to me now.
Nate considered me for a moment. When he inclined his head, there was a look in his eyes that came as close to sympathy as I’d seen from him.
“I would love nothing more than to tell you that the clip I showed you was a hoax, for whatever sadistic reason you can insert here yourself, but that's sadly not the case.”
“Is there more?”
Probably the most inane question possible, but it was the only thing that my mind could come up with. Nate held my gaze as he replied.
“We haven't managed to drag up anything on the company servers or hard drives that we got from the labs in the main building. By now it's obvious that they've stored the data off-site. My guess is somewhere down in the BSL-4 lab, likely in the part where they conducted their experiments.”
Licking my lips, I tried to quell the panic quickly rising inside my chest.
“I can’t—”
He interrupted me before I could go any further.
“No more excuses. Either you’re in, or you’re out.”
I did my best to quench the panic that wanted to spread and take over my mind, and even with my loyalty now frayed at the edges because of what had just happened that was cause for all the cuts and bruises on my face and body, it was hard to come to a final decision.
“It’s not that easy,” I offered.
“But it is,” he replied, shaking his head as I opened my mouth to protest. “I know that you’ll probably not believe me, but I don’t actually want to drag you through hell. Can you really back down and fall in line with all the other sheep after learning what you know now? I’m not asking you to point a gun at anyone and pull the trigger. I can go down into the hot lab alone and try to find and retrieve the data myself, but I’m standing a much better chance of doing so and getting out of there alive if you help me. You’ve worked there for months. You still know the drill, even if it’s been a while. You don’t have to actually do anything except walk in there with me and get me back out with whatever I find.”
I hadn’t expected something that sounded so close to a peace offering from him. And it wasn’t like I couldn’t see the silent “or else” written plainly across his features. One time I had managed to get the better of Greene and keep him from ending my life. I was pretty sure that if I ever stepped into that cube again, the outcome would be quite different.
Didn’t look like I had that much of a choice.
“I’m in,” I whispered, feeling my heart speed up with a different kind of apprehension now.
Nate smiled, and that didn’t make it better one bit.
Chapter 16
Back in the atrium, Nate escorted me over to the bank of monitors, right to where the techie and the Ice Queen were quietly chatting but fell silent as we drew close. The Ice Queen looked me over with a critical eye, then thrust a bottle of neon green energy drink into my hand before she left without saying a single word. I looked after her with a measure of bewilderment and opened the bottle. I normally hated that chemical sweetness, but I didn't need to be reprimanded that I couldn't even take care of myself right now. Nate watched me finish the entire bottle in a few gulps, then handed me another one. This one was blue and tasted just as vile, but I didn't care. The flood lights were shut off again, leaving most of the atrium in perpetual gloom, which was fine with me. Just seeing that damn glass cube at the other end made my gorge rise, and that had nothing to do with my energy drink guzzling.
Halfway through that bottle I stopped, partly because I felt like my stomach simply couldn't take any more, but also because something else occurred to me.
“Does helping you maybe come with bathroom privileges?”
He gave me what I interpreted as a suffering look, but I didn't miss the amused twinkle in his eyes.
“Under supervision, yes.”
I made a face and took another, if much smaller, sip.
“Why, do you get your rocks off watching me urinate?”
“Our conversations keep taking such mature turns,” he remarked, a light lilt in his voice. “But after the air duct stunt you pulled, I'm not going to make the same mistake twice. You're going nowhere without constant supervision—that includes the bathroom. If that's beneath you, you can strip and piss in the shower, too, whichever you prefer.”
I glared at him and did my best to make my next swallow a show of defiance. That made me feel so ridiculous that I almost smiled. Almost.
“Thanks, but I think I can stand using the toilet with the stall door open.”
“How mature of you. Do you have to go now, or is this just a discussion on general principle?”
I thought about it, then finished off the second bottle.
“I'm so dehydrated, I think my kidneys are about to go on strike. I doubt that my body will be ready to let precious water go to waste any time soon.” Looking around, I exhaled slowly, feeling a little better now that my blood sugar levels were slowly normalizing, and I didn’t feel like I was living in constant terror. “So, exactly what do you want me to do now?”
“First things first.” He avoided answering me, which must have been a first. “How are you feeling?”
I blinked, irritation quickly swimming to the surface of my already non-existent calm exterior.
“What do you think? I'm feeling like the warmed up cross between awful and morgue gurney.” He gave me a critical look, but I didn't get the sense that he was taking me particularly seriously, so I went wit
h the most abused word people my age used. “What?”
His grin in return was definitely amused now as he leaned back against a console and crossed his arms over his chest, making the tendons stand out in his forearms. He'd ditched the suit jacket between throwing me into the cube and getting me out again, and with the shirt sleeves rolled up, there was lots of tanned skin visible that drew my gaze. Great, because I needed one more thing to obsess about.
“Let's pick up where we left off. Where were we? Ah, right. You were just about to throw a hissy fit about how you'll never enter a BSL-4 lab, and I told you to shut the fuck up and get over it.”
“I remember,” I pointed out. “You already said you're doing all this to take Green Fields Biotech down. If this super virus is real, and I'm still not completely convinced that it is—”
“It is,” he interrupted, his voice deceptively soft.
“With proof supposedly stored in a secret room in the hot labs. That's the first thing I have problems with. I've been working down there for months, and I never noticed a suspicious, unmarked door leading into nowhere.”
Nate pursed his lips, then looked over to where the techie was making no pretense of not eavesdropping on us.
“Can you bring up the floor plans on the screen?”
“Sure.”
A few strokes on her keyboard later, the security camera feeds rearranged themselves, clearing one screen to show the familiar floor plan of the hot lab.
“That's the diagram that's in all the instruction material and prominently displayed next to the sign-in sheet downstairs,” I confirmed, probably needlessly. “Now tell me where that room is supposed to be?”
“That's the floor plan they sent to the CDC when they got the L4 level certified. This is the actual blueprint the construction crew used,” he explained.
The screen split in half, adding a color inverted image on the right side that looked just the same at first glance, but I quickly found the difference.
The Green Fields Series Box Set: Books 1-3 Page 14