by Sarah Noffke
“Can’t you see that you’re not just some girl? You’re the one that my work is often centered around. Exposing our relationship would give the other Head Officials ammunition to say I’m not taking my job seriously. They’d think I was taking advantage of my position.”
Suddenly he’s haunted by something so real, and without knowing what it is I’m still assaulted by the chill it leaves in his eyes. “Since I was promoted I’ve had to prove myself. I’ve had to watch my behavior more than any of the other Head Officials. They’re all conservative. Close-minded. Old-school. That’s one of the reasons Flynn promoted me, he wanted innovation. He said he’d persuade the others to accept my ideas, but he died before he could fulfill that promise. Since I’ve been in this position I’ve only met resistance from every one of the Head Officials. I feel like they’re all looking for a reason to discredit me now that Flynn isn’t here to vouch for my worth. I already have to regularly churn out new technology in order to keep them off my back.”
“But you do,” I say. “Mind-blowing technology constantly comes out of your lab.”
“You think my technology is mind-blowing?”
“Of course, don’t you?”
A provocative glint lights up his eyes. “The only thing that has ever blown my mind is you.”
“That’s a great line.” I laugh.
“It’s not a line. It’s how I feel.” His penetrating gazes are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.
“Well, excuse my skepticism. It’s hard to believe anything you feel is real when it’s a big fat secret. I get your reasons, but that doesn’t make it easy to accept them.”
“No, and I fear you’re going to continue to doubt how much I care for you. I can see why though. I know secrets make you uncomfortable. I get that.”
“So what are we going to do about it?”
“How about we take it one day at a time?”
“That sounds like an awful idea.”
He exhales, dragging his hand through his hair. “To be honest, I don’t have any solutions. Right now I can’t risk my job. I’m sorry.”
My teeth crush down on my lower lip. Am I really willing to ask him to expose himself for us and risk losing everything he’s worked for? What if I do screw up everything for him? Without his job, this passion he loves so much, he isn’t the same guy. He isn’t the guy I love.
“Why does this have to be so complicated?” I mumble mostly to myself.
“Most things of any worth are,” he sings, a mysterious expression covering his face.
I slump slightly. Why does he have to be so damn cute?
Aiden steps forward, lifts his hand to my face but pauses before moving any closer. When I don’t move away he closes the rest of the distance, brushing his hand against my cheek. A tiny spark radiates under his touch. “Did you miss me?”
I close my eyes, wishing I didn’t have to answer this question. But Aiden doesn’t need a device to steal my heart. “Yes,” I breathe. “Like crazy.”
He slides his hand down until it’s gently resting along my neck. “Crazy doesn’t even begin to cover it for me. I didn’t have food for a week and still you’re what I thought about most.” I rise to my tippy toes, glide my arms around his back, and tilt my head, ready to meet his lips. He leans into me, but pauses an inch from my mouth. “You know I’m not worried about George,” he whispers.
Whipping my arms off him, I step back with an exasperated groan. “Seriously, Aiden? You’re bringing that up again? Right now? Are you insane?”
He pushes his way into my line of vision until I have no choice but to look at him. “Do you want to know why I’m not worried about George?”
“No doubt you’re going to tell me regardless.”
“Well,” he says slowly, “if I knew everything you felt then you wouldn’t be surprised when I fulfilled your desires, right? However, I don’t know how you feel, and so I have the element of surprise when I give you exactly what you want.”
“How long have you been working on that line, Dr. Livingston?” I finger a lock of my hair, feigning nonchalance.
“Honestly, it just came to me. When you’re around I’m frequently graced with spontaneous inspirations.”
“Oh?” I say, gnawing on a smile.
“Imagine how much better my work would be if you could lounge around my lab all day,” he says, staring off like pondering the details of this scenario.
“I’m not sure you’d get any work done at all.”
His eyes return to mine, a wolfish grin on his face. “No, I suspect you’re right.” His pronounced chin tips sideways, like he’s trying to study me from a new angle. “Now would you kindly get over here, there’s something I need to tell you.”
“Aren’t I close enough?” I gesture at the three feet of space separating us.
“Absolutely not.”
I take one step forward. “How about now?”
He shakes his head again, a ghost of a smile on his lips.
I take another step, which I’m quickly chastised for with a glare.
“Well, if you wanted me right up against you, why didn’t you just say that?” I say, taking the last step, feeling his warmth immediately.
“Roya, I want you right up against me.” He strokes my hair away from my face and leans his forehead on mine.
“You had something to tell me?”
His smile disorients me, causing sudden lightheadedness. “I wanted to thank you. You risked your life to save me and if it wasn’t for you then I’d be dead.”
Automatically my hands slide around his waist. “Just doing my job.”
Aiden tilts his head and closes in on my mouth. I lean into him, but when our lips are just about to connect he cocks his head back. I follow his action, seeking his lips. Again he angles away, darting an inch to the left, a playful expression present in his eyes. His toying is about to drive me mad. I drop my head in an act of defeat. “If you don’t want to kiss me then you don’t have to,” I say.
“Oh, is that what you think?”
I look up at him, pinching the sides of my mouth together.
He takes my face in both his hands and pulls me into him with a hungry fervor. His lips smash into mine. His determination to prove his passion for me tightens my heart. Something uncaged escapes from within me. All my pent-up emotions, the ones I’ve harbored, are unleashed in this moment. Tears ache in my throat and each time his lips caress mine I’m closer to the dam within me bursting open. He’s undoing me, tearing out my demons with burning strokes of his lips and the salty taste of his mouth. In his arms I’m changing, becoming anew.
Breathless, I break away, but only a few inches. My fingers interlock behind his back, bolting him in close. His forehead lowers and rests on my shoulder. He pants softly beside my ear.
“I would gladly spend another week with the Voyageurs for another kiss like that,” Aiden says, straightening.
“You don’t have to get abducted for me to kiss you.”
“Thank God.”
He smiles and dips down to kiss me again, this time slowly, treasuring each time our lips touch and we inhale each other. All I want is to feel this. Against my mouth I feel him smile again. It makes me smile too and I slide my head down until it’s resting in the crook of his neck.
“I guess we’re even,” I say, my words muffled against his skin.
“How do you figure?” he says, a smile in his voice.
I raise my head. “Well, I saved your life. We’re even now.”
He doesn’t take those sapphire eyes off me, just shakes his head. “Oh no, Roya, I believe I’m still one up on you. I’ve saved your life twice.” He snickers and kisses me again. “Nice try, though.”
Chapter Forty-Six
While the kitchen staff is still prepping food in the main hall I slip into my normal seat like I’ve done since I was discharged from the infirmary. Joseph has to eat at some point. I’ve beaten on his door for minutes at a time. I’ve even considered
charging in to find out what he’s up to. Instead, I always sulk away. He said he’d be gone a lot, but it feels like he’s disappeared. And what if he has? When would I know for certain? Samara and Trent haven’t seen him since the meeting in the infirmary. My instinct tells me he’s dream traveling, but how can he be gone for so long? When I consented to him going back to this project I forgot about how the last time it turned him into a different person, one I couldn’t reach.
My routine mealtime vigilance has earned me certain knowledge. I know which staff members prep the fastest, who dawdles while socializing, and that at exactly thirty-eight seconds before meals are scheduled to start the last food runner darts back into the kitchen. Usually the main hall remains quiet, save for the sound of the Sterno-heated pans sizzling in their water baths, until the first few people file in for food. A group of white coats always marches in a minute past the hour. Then George, followed by a horde of people I don’t know.
“Here, I brought you your usual,” George says, laying down a bed of wilted greens and a mound of marinated veggies nestled next to them.
“Thanks.” I meet his gaze and instantly regret it. His eyes say a whole host of things that trip wires around my heart.
“Still nothing?” he asks, pushing his roasted potatoes around with his fork.
I shake my head. “At what point do I turn in a missing person’s report?”
“I don’t know. Are you attuned to the connection you have with him?”
“Yes, and I know he’s somewhere close. Not more than a layer away. But still…” I trail off, catching sight of Aiden as he strolls by, two full plates in his hands. As he has on every occasion, he pretends I don’t exist while passing, taking a seat at the table beside ours. Actually I thought it was an act until he almost ran into me the other day in the hallway. He was deep in conversation with the new scientist he hired to replace Amber. Her name is Mia and she’s tall, slender, and her long black hair drapes down to her perfectly toned butt. I thought when Aiden jostled by me, knocking my shoulder so I dropped the books I’d borrowed from the library, I’d get an apology, but I hardly got a second glance.
“How are you feeling?” George asks, taking a sip of water.
“You should be forbidden from asking that question,” I say between bites.
Behind his glass I spy the slightest of grins. “I’ve been trying to give you privacy. I thought it was what you wanted.”
“Thanks,” I say, stabbing my broccoli with a force it doesn’t deserve.
“Specifically, I was wondering how you’re feeling about Chase?”
“I hate him still,” I say, acid in my voice.
“Good,” George says evenly.
What I don’t say is that the hate constantly morphs into unadulterated lust bordering on heart-aching love, one that if I don’t have I’ll die. I don’t tell anyone this. Since these emotions aren’t real I know I can battle them alone.
“How are you recovering?” George ask.
“Still sore, but mostly fine,” I say, staring at a mushroom I’ve over-abused with my fork.
“Amazing, the skill Mae has.”
Scanning the hall, I linger a second too long in Aiden’s direction. He’s in an animate conversation with a white coat. For all the attention he’s given me I could cease to exist and he wouldn’t notice. Instead of using all those cheesy lines Aiden should have been real with me, told me it was all just a fun game. He was probably afraid I’d blacken his other eye. The idea runs through my head constantly lately. Every time I see him in the main hall and he grazes past me like we’ve never met, I fantasize about sending a roundhouse kick to his head.
“I’m sorry, George, I’m totally inconsiderate.” I turn to him, lay a hand on his. “How are you feeling? How’s the knife wound?”
A tamed smile touches his lips. “I’m at around eighty-five percent.”
“Wow, that’s impressive, considering it was just over a week ago that you were stabbed.”
His hand grips my fingers, tugs them closer to him. “When we’re both better I say we celebrate. There’s a place I want to take you.”
How is George always here, never wavering? Always offering comfort I don’t deserve, company I’m unworthy of, and sympathetic looks which break my heart. He’s not stupid though. He watches me, sees the disappointment that flares across my face every time Aiden strolls by high-fiving Trent, asking Samara if she’s feeling better, and ignoring me completely. And he feels the ache that erupts afterwards. George is brilliant actually, because he knows by just being available, he’s giving me the one thing Aiden refuses.
“I’m not sure I’m recovering as quickly as you,” I say, my hand suddenly perspiring in his. “But I agree to a celebration once I’m up for it.”
George swivels, a cautious look in his eyes. “Roya,” he says, facing me, “I feel that someone you’ve been looking for is approaching.”
My eyes go wide. The chair rubs the carpet, catching its fibers as it slides back. Ambling through the crowd, now only a table away, is Joseph. All breath leaves my chest as disbelief invades my head. His ghostly white hands tremble as they seek to hold onto the plate between them. Hollow eyes flick up to mine, a look of complete apathy on his nearly transparent face. His skin reminds me of that of an elderly person’s, smooth, lacking its usual elasticity and color.
“Joseph,” I choke out.
He nods his chin at me before taking a seat.
“Where have you been?!” All eyes in the main hall flick to me.
“Around,” he says, his voice croaky.
“I’ve been looking for you. Worried,” I say quieter, leaning across the table.
“I told you I’d be busy.” Eyelids rimmed with spider web veins close. For an instant I think he’s fallen asleep at the table. He rocks forward, catching himself right before he smashes his face into his ham sandwich.
I want to run around the table to him, but there’s already too much attention on us. Trent takes the seat next to him, steadying Joseph’s shoulder with his hand. I sit.
“Dude,” Trent says, “you don’t look so hot. Maybe you should have Mae check you out.”
“I’m fine,” he says, his drawl more pronounced. “Just hungry and tired, that’s all.”
From the concaved appearance of his cheeks, he doesn’t look like he’s eaten in days. And I know for a fact that he hasn’t had one meal in the main hall since I was released from the infirmary.
Joseph brushes Trent off and then pins his hands on either side of his plate, like he’s trying to stabilize his equilibrium.
“What are you doing?” I ask. “What’s causing you to act like this?”
“What do you mean?” He reaches out for his sandwich but misses it by a couple of inches. A grimace falls over his face until his hand haphazardly bumps into his sandwich. Satisfied, he grips it, brings it up to his mouth like it weighs a ton, and takes a large chomp.
“Joseph, I haven’t seen you for a week. You…” I hesitate, embarrassed to say what I’m about to. My eyes find George’s and he offers a reassuring nod. “Whatever you’re doing looks like it’s robbing you of your senses and your life. Don’t you see that? You can hardly keep your head up.”
“I don’t know what you mean, Stark,” he says, straightening, menace in his eyes.
“You don’t know what I’m talking about? You look like a pitiful street beggar who’s experienced a particularly awful winter under the bridges. Tell me why you look like you’re on the verge of death.”
“I already told you I’m working on something. It’s draining, but I can handle it.”
“Tell me what it is,” I say in a hush, sensing curious eyes from other tables spying.
“No.” He lulls his head forward like it’s suddenly weighted. “Give me a bit longer. It’s wonderful and it will be worth the wait.”
“It doesn’t look like you have much longer,” I say through clenched teeth.
“You’re overreacting.” He pushes h
is food away.
“I’m not. Either tell me what you’re working on or stop it.”
“No.”
“Remember our deal before, Joseph?” I say threading my arms across my chest. “Before when you were working on this project I said if you didn’t tell me what it was then I was going to leave the Institute, prevent you from pulling on my energy. Remember that?”
He nods, a coldness in his eyes. A standoff in his gaze.
“Well, the deal still stands. Tell me what’s killing you slowly or I’m going to stop you by leaving the Institute, cutting off your extra energy supply.” It’s a split-moment decision, but I know as soon as it spills out of my mouth that it’s the right one. I can’t stay here allowing Joseph to pull on my energy for secretive reasons, ones that are turning him into a zombie. I’ll deal with Chase. I’ll keep Bob and Steve protected. And somehow by leaving Joseph, maybe I’ll save him.
Beside me I sense George stiffen. I stay locked on Joseph.
“Seriously, Stark?” Joseph says, an ounce of his casual manner surfacing. “You’re doing that one again?”
“I was planning on leaving before and would have if Trey hadn’t stuck me on a project,” I say.
“We both know you don’t want to leave,” he says shredding his bread into tiny bits like he’s going to use it to feed ducks.
“We both know that I don’t want to watch you kill yourself.”
Bloodshot eyes ram into mine. Red embarrassment flares in his cheeks. I’m willing to stay locked in an intense stare-off with him for as long as it takes, but then Aiden materializes over Joseph’s shoulder, breaking my attention. From the corner of my vision I spy him wave at me. My eyes rise to him and again he points in my direction and waves, looking impatient. “Yes, you, Mr. Anders. Join me over here, would you?”
Heat rushes to my head as I pin my eyes to the table. After a moment of deliberation, George stands and joins Aiden. The Head Scientist leans over, whispering something in George’s ear. Then George nods and turns to leave.