“Andie, what is it? What’s wrong?”
I force myself away just enough to find his eyes. But when they explore mine, it makes everything impossible. Words have no value when my heart fills with fear of a love I won’t survive. I have to use actions instead.
I push my hands into his hair, forcing his lips to mine. But the kiss explodes the pressure of lust into absolute need for his essence inside me. For assurance that I’m choosing him above the chaos, above the games and the threats. I’m choosing Kaleb, no matter the costs.
My tongue seeks his, fights for his air. He’s magnetic to my fingers that slide over his solid frame and find evidence of his desire. He stifles a groan when I feed it, my hand imploring, exacting, cruel in its demands. I melt my hips against his until we’re both gasping and channeling toward the couch. He lowers himself over me, and I claw at his uniform in search of the addicting burn of skin. His deep kisses lodge in my soul. I want, I need, every piece of him. Now. Yesterday. Forever.
“Andie, wait…”
No! Not this time. There’s no conscience in our contact. The only solution is to abandon caution for instinct. To let it drive the rhythm of our hunger because I’m ravenous.
Even through restrictive fabric I almost explode at the sensation of him, the promise of what’s to come. I’ve won. I can see it, sense it. The strongest saint would lose against the force of this seduction. My hips drag against him, pleading for the rest, and I reach for his belt. My hands slide in. He’s mine. There’s no doubt. He. Is. Mine.
We move slow at first, both of us paralyzed by the sensation of each other. Dreams flood back, but the white flames are unbearable in reality. I gasp and pull him deeper, absorbing until it’s everything I can do to breathe.
“Please, Kaleb.”
He closes his eyes but not before I see the pain. The fragments of his soul spilling from his eyes. “This shouldn’t be happening.”
His voice is so broken. God, this pain is on me, and my own eyes burn in response. I bite my lip when he won’t meet my gaze. He wants me. It’s all over his face, his virile young body tense with longing. I’m the forbidden, the impossible temptation. But I don’t know how to let him go, how to need someone I can’t have. Am I selfish enough to ignore reality? I would die for him, but right now I feel like I’ll die without him. There’s no real choice as I secure our union with greedy hands.
He moves against me in timed perfection, instinct I’m sure. That’s my ally in this moment, his enemy. He can’t fight me and the basic need of a deprived twenty-three-year-old fanned with merciless fury. Yes, I’m shamefully selfish.
Soon it’s hopeless for me as well. Those white flames consume anything left of my reason, my will. My brain loses control of my body as the contact with his incinerates every cell. I tighten my arms around him and encourage his ragged breaths sending me to that place where blinding stars mix with raging heat. Slick skin and hard muscle. The gasp is mine, and I feel another climbing through my core. I claim his mouth, his tongue, and strain until I need a fraction of freedom to breathe. It’s almost too much, and when his weight finally relaxes in a wave of relief, my own shudders from exhaustion.
“Shit, Andie. Fuck!” He drives a rough hand over his head.
“Kaleb—”
“Don’t. Just… stop.”
He straightens and adjusts his uniform with violent authority.
“Kaleb, it’s okay.”
“No. It’s not.”
“I’m not sorry,” I say, terrified his anger isn’t directed at me.
“I am. You need to go.”
“No.”
He’s primed for battle when I pull him back to the couch, and I lace my arm through his to soothe the friction. It takes several seconds for his tension to bleed out like the agony had moments before. Still, my touch does nothing for the embarrassment and guilt draped over his features. I’d do anything to relieve him of it. It’s my sin he’s carrying. But here I am again, the woman with no words. The woman who lets the man she loves pay the penalty for her sins over and over and over. Dennel’s advice comes back to me, and I settle on that. What’s left for either of us but the facts?
“I was summoned by Burlington Henry this morning.”
He stiffens. “What did he want?”
“Sergeant Dennel was there too. Henry wants me to spy on you, Kaleb. He didn’t say it like that, but that’s what it comes down to.”
Kaleb pulls away and runs his hand over his head again. I see his mind racing, a soldier’s instinct to hide his fear.
“What exactly did he say?”
He studies me with a stoic expression as I slip back into my clothing and repeat as much of the conversation as I can remember, including my debriefing session with Sergeant Dennel. You’d think I was telling him the weather forecast, not explaining that his superiors suspect he’s a traitor.
“Kaleb?” I’ve been finished for several seconds, and he still hasn’t responded. “What should we do?”
He leans back, staring at the closed door to his office. There’s something different going on in that wall this time. It’s terrifying, and I still can’t see it.
“This civil war has defined our generation, irrevocably altered our world. But do you understand what it’s really about?”
Well, I know this is a trick question. I know everyone has an opinion and some are strong enough to justify actions that lead to a never-ending civil war.
I decide to play it safe. “We’re told that several groups are trying to overthrow the government and institute their own ideologies.”
“And what are those warring ‘ideologies’?”
“The rebels want freedom.”
“Freedom from what?”
“The government.”
“To do what? Once they gain power, what will their freedom look like?”
I have no idea. We don’t talk about the future anymore.
“You grew up with this war. Which side are you on?” he continues.
I glance over, uneasy. “The side that survives.”
My answer means something to him. Maybe even more than it means to me. “Did you believe you weren’t free ten years ago?”
“I can’t remember much about that. I guess not.”
“Are you free now?”
I almost laugh and scan our “prison.” “No. Not now.”
“Will you be when the war ends?”
“I don’t know. I guess it depends who wins.”
His gaze cuts into me, and I know I’m missing his point. I’ve said something wrong, but he doesn’t correct me. Instead his eyes flicker back to the wall as he retreats to that far-off place. “The government doesn’t have ideologies. The government is itself. It’s power. It’s control. It says the rebels are wrong, but it doesn’t even understand them enough to know what they’re wrong about. They’re just a faction of the machine that stopped accepting the status quo, and that doesn’t work for a system that exists only because it does.”
Oh no, what if they’re right? What if the man I’m falling for is a traitor? I’m not sure I even understand what that is anymore.
“I’m not feeding information to the rebels or helping their cause. I don’t believe they’re fighting for anything better. Their version of freedom won’t be any different, any improvement for the average person who is the real victim caught in this hell. And yes, I know my superiors are afraid that I’ve turned, whatever that means.”
“What really happened during that month, Kaleb? Why won’t you talk about it?”
He swipes another hand over his face.
“I lied to you, Andie, just like I’ve been lying to them. I’m still lying and will continue until I’m dead. I’m sorry. There’s so much… I have to.”
I can’t move, let alone speak, so I wait, tremble as he leaves me for that deepe
r prison I can’t touch.
“Kaleb, please,” I say, drawing him back to me. “Let me help you.”
His eyes. So broken. “I know you want to but you can’t, okay? You can’t, and I’d be a horrible person if I pulled you into this. I need you to accept that because I refuse to do it.”
“But you’re in trouble. I care about you too much to let go.”
“You don’t know what you’re asking for. You want the incident report? Is that it? You want the photographs and body scans and laundry list of broken pieces they had to sew back together?”
“Yes?” The word comes out like a squeak, but it’s out.
He nods, intent on punishing my frightened question with the answer. “Okay, fine. The razor-wire on the wrists and ankles? That’s not their move. It’s ours. Electrical burns are common enough, but we perfected the art with a method of atomic manipulation called the Glaxon Ionizer. The mallet to the hand? It wasn’t a mallet. Only two fingers sustained damage because they used a ZB-783 vise. It’s a customized, small-profile hybrid between a traditional table vise and vise grip pliers. It allows for precision and strength in constricted applications.”
“Like destroying fingers?” I whisper.
He studies his right hand. “Exactly. Like destroying fingers.”
There’s an instinctive question on my tongue but I don’t need to ask it. The horrific answer is radiating around us, bleeding from behind that wall every time he gets lost. “You were tortured for thirty-four days by your own techniques.” My blood freezes. “And your superiors know it.”
“Of course they do. Which brings us to this.”
He rests his foot on the coffee table and pulls up his pant leg. We both stare at the metal limb. His breathing accelerates, and he’s gone again, but it’s different this time. There’s no stony mask concealing the terror. I can’t shake the feeling that I’m getting more lies, but I have no doubt the fear is real. I’m not angry. I trust him even if I can’t trust his words.
He has a damn good reason. If Dennel believes that, so can I.
I nestle against his side, holding on, trying to bring him back to me. I reach up and touch his face, hoping that will pull him from his nightmare. He barely reacts.
“Kaleb, what is it? Kaleb.”
Finally, he blinks and clears his throat. “Sorry. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. You went back there didn’t you?”
He nods, and it’s then that I notice the tears in his eyes. “God, it hurt so much,” he whispers. “I screamed until my heart started skipping beats.” He pulls away and clasps his hands on his head, confronting the unseen vision on the floor.
“Afterward they said they were only starting with my leg. They were going to do the rest of me. They wanted to see what it could do.” He looks up with such fear, such horror, I can’t speak. “I would have told them, Andie. If I’d known anything I would have told them. The razor-wire, the burns, the vise, the beatings, all of that I could handle, but…”
He shakes his head. “They know…” He doesn’t finish the sentence, and my heart is screaming.
“They know what? Who knows? That you would have cracked? But you didn’t.”
“That we have a leak.”
“What?”
He doesn’t want to tell me more. It’s all over his face, the way even his body closes off to me.
“And they think that’s you?”
“Have you ever heard of the ‘Kalik Closer?’”
“Huh?”
“Named after Dr. Alan Kalik, the chief researcher on the project. The idea was to create a super-weapon for interrogation that would maximize the pain and damage of torture with minimal time and effort. A way to cut to the end of the book, so-to-speak, during the interrogation process.”
A chill soaks through my veins. “We do that?”
He lets out a bitter laugh. “Yes we do that. And we’re way ahead of everyone else.”
He quiets again. My temper flares when it becomes obvious that’s it. He’s finished with his explanation that’s explained nothing.
“Why are you fighting them so hard? Don’t you want to help your side in any way you can?”
“My side? It’s my side’s technology that did this to me! My side, their side, what’s the difference? We’re all fighting the same pointless war for the same pointless reward of more of the same. There’s no end to this, Andie, because there’s no goal. There will be no winner.”
“Kaleb—”
“So what, I tell them what they want to know, help find their leak. What if one of them is the leak? What if their superiors are the leak? What do you think is going to happen? I’m their biggest weapon, their loaded gun! Their number one suspect.
“The more I give, the more they take, and then what? Once they extract everything they can from me, they’re going to launch a psychotic witch hunt, and soon I’ll be seeing all my friends, contacts, including you, start to disappear. Do you want to know what a ZB-783 vise feels like as it crushes into your bones and disintegrates your joints?”
I shake my head, hot liquid soaking my eyes.
“I can’t do it, Andie. I won’t sentence other people to the same fate I suffered. I can’t escalate this war when I just want it to end. The leak is there, but it’s one of a thousand. As soon as we plug it, if we plug it, ten more will pop up, because that’s the truth everyone knows but no one will admit. We’re fighting ourselves as much as any so-called ‘Rebel.’
“Who do you think the Rebels are? They’re us as much as we are anything. They’re your neighbors, friends, and teachers, just like we are. They happened to pick a different side and most of the time it has nothing to do with ideologies, or choice, or the propaganda both sides throw at each other. It’s chance. It’s who got to you first. It doesn’t matter which side you’re on. This war is about nothing. We are sacrificing our souls for fucking nothing.”
I’m paralyzed now. He’s spent years forming these conclusions that have blasted me in seconds. These are a traitor’s words. Testimony that will get him killed, but no violent protest bubbles in my gut. No raging rebuttal. These are words he’s earned, words that are infinitely complex, and somehow, somewhere deep, I fear I’m more in love with him than ever as they reveal the depth of his hidden existence.
It’s too much, and I cover my face as I break down. I’m not sure why I’m crying. It’s just raw emotion crushing me into a sputtering pulp of love, hate, and fear.
“Oh shit. Andie, I’m sorry.” He closes the gap and pulls me into him. “I shouldn’t have dumped this on you. I’m not going to let any of that happen, okay? That’s my point. I want to be part of the end, not the escalation. I want to be done with all of this.” The emotion in his voice only rips into me further. “I don’t know what to do anymore.”
He buries his face in my hair before forcing me to look at him.
“I want to leave. I want to find a quiet farm and have chickens and grow tomatoes and get a dog. I want you. The two of us figuring out life without all of this. No war, no sides, just each other.”
He’s sincere in his fantasy as it gushes out, and it’s painful how much I want that too. But I know he doesn’t believe it any more than I do. We’re prisoners here. Another lie? Maybe, but dreams come in all forms. Some people deserve them more than others. I’d forgive Kaleb anything.
“So this whole ‘refugee’ roundup?”
His look tells me everything as my world completely shatters.
“You got to us first.” My voices stammers out.
“Better that we make you pick our side than risk you picking theirs.”
I shake my head, numb. “Would the rebels have hurt us? We’re supposedly here for our own protection. Is that even true?”
He sighs. “It depends on whether or not you would have agreed to join them. They’re no better, Andi
e. You have to trust me on that. There is no good side. No matter what happens, we’re all going to hell.
“Everyone at this compound will have to pick a side. And I’ll tell you right now, it’ll have to be this one.”
I gasp. “The schools!”
“It’s a lot easier to brainwash a child than an adult.”
I can’t move. It’s too much too fast and I don’t know what to do with it.
Kaleb curses. “I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m…” He swallows and meets my eyes again, inches away, but further than we’ve been in a long time. “There’s so much more but I can’t.” He draws in a deep breath, and I don’t like how he suddenly avoids me.
“I’m stuck in this game now, but I’m not a mastermind. I didn’t come back here as a lump of flesh and think all this through. I just wanted to survive for a while. Little choices in the moment, you know? And ten months later, here I am with everything spinning out of control, trying to hold it all together.
“I just go on and survive and try to… I don’t even know. But I want to stop fighting. I want it to end.”
He searches my face again, willing me to understand. “And really, for a soldier giving up is just as treasonous as feeding information to the rebels. So that’s the truth. Am I traitor? Sometimes I think maybe I am.”
He waves his hand in dismissal. “Anyway, none of this matters. There’s nothing I can do to fix it. If I rock the boat now, they’ll go after you, Dennel, and everyone else I’m close to. I’d be launching a whole new civil war inside these walls, and I can’t let that happen yet. I have to survive the game until I can figure out how to protect you from myself.” And that’s that. Final testimony filed away and ready for processing. He even has the audacity to glance at the clock as though filing reports still matters.
Fire rages up my spine. Fists clench, eyes press into a glare. At this second I hate him. No, I love him, that’s why I hate him for giving in. For surviving Hell only to lose it stuck behind a desk. I get it now, Dennel’s warning, his frustration that Kaleb’s worst enemy is himself. His damn principles have strapped him to a burning altar, and I’m furious that he’s decided he’s supposed to bear the weight of this entire war on his shoulders.
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