Prototype

by M. D. Waters

  “We were married on this exact beach,” Noah says. “Do you remember?”

  I cannot look at him as I shake my head, and a knot has formed in my throat. The details of this moment overwhelm me. Finding out the exact location of my beach. Standing here with Noah and our daughter. Those things alone are enough to upset my fragile balance, but then he has used the word “we,” and it is all I can do not to shatter.

  Noah sits near the edge of the simulated water, arms wrapped around upturned knees, and looks over the expanse of ocean that seems to go for miles. “We rented a house for a month after. The beach sat empty for miles thanks to the South American War ravaging the entire coastline back in the day. Just us and the little house.” He pauses and a small smile lights his entire face. “We were different people there. Relaxed and free of responsibility for the first time in our lives.”

  Adrienne skips into the simulated waves and starts spinning. When she grows dizzy, she tumbles to the ground and giggles. I cannot help but laugh in response. I wish I could experience every moment of my day with the same carefree attitude.

  “We never did get back there,” Noah says after a long moment.

  I ease to the floor near him but not close enough to touch. I must keep my distance, especially faced with this memory. “Why not?”

  “What we do here is important. We both knew that, so we put our future on hold, believing that was the right choice.” He meets my eyes and says, “I still believe that.”

  My muscles tense, because just like that, we are no longer speaking of our past. I can only hope he does not ask me to help Sonya in return for the freedom I have requested. I am not the same Emma who believes in giving up Her life for the sake of what is important to their cause. Fighting Her fight lost me my husband and daughter. My memories. My entire life.

  Tearing my gaze away, I focus on Adrienne, who chases another gull.

  “I spoke to Reid about your request,” he says.

  “And?”

  “And he agreed. He’ll be keeping a close eye on you, though. Nothing I can do about that. He’s always been a suspicious person.”

  Adrienne kneels beside me to watch a gull strut past my knee. She points to the sand where little footprints mar the surface, then smiles up at me.

  “Footprints,” I tell her, and am reminded of my early conversations with Declan and, later, with Ruby Godfrey. How I taught her simple things her husband, Charles, should have, the way Declan did for me. Things like footprints.

  “Where is your foot?” I ask her.

  She stabs the top of her left shoe and looks up for approval.

  “Very good.” I reach out and run a hand over her soft curls, and she lets me, though to be fair, her full attention has returned to the gull’s footprints.

  To Noah, I say, “Major Reid can keep as close an eye as he likes. I have nothing to hide from him. Or you.”

  He sighs, drawing my focus away from Adrienne. He watches his hand wring the opposite wrist. “I know you don’t.”

  Adrienne runs off, leaving my palm cold. “What do we do now? I need to look for my parents now more than ever. I cannot let Declan find them first.” I hope Noah is right and that they are resourceful enough to stay hidden. “But I also made you a promise, and I intend to keep it.”

  Noah leans back into his palms and spreads his legs out in front, crossing them at the ankles. He stares almost absently into the waves crashing in front of us. “I’ll ask Foster to help you search some of our old files. There has to be a record of your parents somewhere. As for Burke . . .” He trails off and shakes his head.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. Just a feeling I can’t shake, I guess.”

  “About Declan?”

  He glances at me. “What do you think happened to him after he fell through the ice?”

  Noah’s words put me back in the freezing water of the lake, staring down at my unblinking ex as we sink to the bottom. “I really believed he had died.”

  But I was wrong, because he has returned with some fanciful story for the entire world. It was not as if I was around to see him for long, though. That was the time I kept returning to my host body as She died. I almost drowned in that lake with Declan because of it.

  I flick a fingernail over an imperfection of thread in the knee of my jeans. “Maybe he was hurt so badly that he has been recovering this entire time. No one saw who pulled him from the lake?”

  “The cameras don’t reach that far. We based all our evidence on what we heard and saw from the people working for him. Nobody knew a thing. Because of the resistance involvement that night, they assumed he was kidnapped. We had Foster’s account and believed he was dead.”

  “Did you ever go there? Look for ways he may have gotten out undetected?”

  Adrienne walks around Noah and climbs into his lap, facing me while leaning against his chest. He rubs her back and kisses the crown of her head.

  “I didn’t see a need,” he says. “Feel like taking a trip tomorrow? I have the morning free.”

  My heart thunks against my ribs. “You want to go to the lake?”

  “Why not? Could answer a lot of questions.”

  “Just you and me?” I ask before I can stop myself. My inflection rises with my abruptly elevating anxiety level. “Why not send someone else?”

  He looks at me with laughter in his eyes. “Yes, you and me. And yes, I could send someone else, but aren’t you curious?”

  Yes. Always curious. About everything. But this is the lake where I nearly died with Declan. If not for Foster, I most certainly would have. Then there is the fact that I will spend an unknown amount of time with Noah. Alone.

  What are you afraid of?

  I shake off the irrational fear. “Okay. A trip to—” I do not even know where Declan’s home actually is. Mountains. That is all I know. “Where is this lake exactly?”

  He chuckles. “Tennessee.”

  “All right, then. A trip to Tennessee sounds fun.”

  Noah glances down at Adrienne. “It’s somebody’s bedtime.”

  Adrienne yawns as if on cue. Her eyes look glassy, telling me she is already halfway there. We stand and Noah holds Adrienne close. She rests her head on his shoulder and lets her eyelids close.

  I reach out and tuck stray curls behind her little ear. “She really is beautiful.”

  “I already feel sorry for the trail of broken hearts she’ll leave behind,” he says with a soft chuckle. “It’ll look like a war zone.”

  Adrienne takes a shuddering breath and her mouth droops. Already asleep. I envy her this ease. “You should take her to bed.”

  We head for the exit and pause only so Noah can shut down the hologram. “You can use my log-in to access the system if you want to start searching the records for your parents,” he says, docking the tablet. “My password is ‘Europa.’”

  The hologram of the beach is gone, but the memory is clear in my mind. Noah sitting behind me, holding me after we made love on the beach. Telling me the story of Zeus turning into a white bull to attract a woman he loved.

  “The princess,” I say.

  He is careful not to react, and his voice is almost too controlled as he says, “You remember the story?”

  “Yes. Along with the others you told me that night. It is one of my favorite memories,” I admit. I do not remember making love, but I know it was the night he painted the luckenbooth into my sunset painting. I have always believed it was the luckenbooth that led me back to him.

  Noah stares at me in silence; then his cheeks begin to turn pink and he looks away. “I need to put her to bed.”

  I open the door and he lets me exit first. In the hallway, I turn to face him. “Thank you.”

  He looks distracted as he closes the room. “For what?”

  “The beach. It means more than you kn
ow.”

  Just like that, his attention is solely with me. He takes and squeezes my hand. “I know exactly what it means.”

  Taking my hand back feels like sinking my fingers into an existing rip in my heart and tearing it open further. I tuck both hands in my rear pockets and back away. “See you in the morning.”

  CHAPTER 12

  Miss Emma.”

  I glance over my shoulder. Dr. Malcolm runs up behind me, hands clutched to his chest to keep his white lab coat from flying about. By the time he reaches me, he is out of breath and can barely talk. He holds a finger up, asking me to give him a minute to collect himself.

  I do not want to give him a single second. Not after what I found out last night. He has been trying to get close to me in an effort to trick me into tests. I knew I could not trust him, and it has since been confirmed.

  “Dr. Malcolm, I really do not have time. I am meeting Noah in two minutes.”

  He swallows hard and shakes his head in an attempt to pull himself together. “Sorry. I often intend to start working out. I understand you like to run. Maybe”—he points to me and back to himself several times—“you would let me tag along sometime? Show me the proper way to”—he swings bent arms front to back in a jerky, stiff motion—“move my arms for the least resistance. My knee joints aren’t what they used to—”

  “One minute,” I cut in, glancing toward the command center, where I am to meet Noah. I do not want to be late.

  He looks up as if I came out of nowhere, rather than the other way around. His bushy brows pinch together. “Are you sleeping well, Miss Emma? You look tired.”

  The nightmares grow worse, and my only defense is to stay up as long as possible. Not that it matters. The moment I fall into a deep sleep, I end up drifting into the clutches of the abyss. “Just adjusting to sleeping in a new place.”

  He nods and gives me his trademark smile for the first time since approaching. “The trick is to get on a regimented schedule as soon as possible. Up at the same time. Down at the same time. Exercise. Don’t eat a heavy dinner. Oh, and no napping.” He winks. “I’d personally have a hard time with the last one.” He leans in as if telling me a secret. “I love naps.”

  I take a slow, deep breath. “Dr. Malcolm, I appreciate the advice, but I am going to be late.”

  His mouth forms a perfect oval. “Oh, right. I stopped you.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  He rocks on the balls of his feet and buries his hands deep in his coat pockets. “I owe you an apology. You see, I had no idea Dr. Toro meant to run your gene sequence, and by the time I found out, it was too late to stop it.”

  “But you could have?”

  “Well—”

  “You could have stopped it, yes? Destroyed samples or whatever it is you need to do? Erase files. Throw my blood down a drain?”

  “Well . . .” He trails off, sighs, then nods. “You’re absolutely right. You have been wronged. It will never happen again.”

  I give him a tight-lipped smile. “You are a scientist, Dr. Malcolm. You will not be able to help yourself.”

  A straight finger flies up between us, making me flinch back in surprise. He lifts both eyebrows. “Challenge accepted.”

  “I really have to go,” I tell him, fighting the urge to laugh. He makes it so hard to be mad at him.

  “We’ll talk later?” he calls when my back is turned.

  I lift a hand to wave rather than answer. It seems I will not have a choice in the matter.

  • • •

  Noah and I appear in Declan’s living room. The sun is still rising in the mountainous background through the wall of solid windows on the other side of the room.

  I step into the familiar setting, my heart drumming. Despite the fact that the fire has not been lit since the winter before last—I assume—the room smells of the burned wood. The lighting feels foreign, too, as I never lived here any other season than winter. There is no snow to reflect sunlight.

  The security cameras are set to show a prerecorded feed so that no one is alerted to our arrival. Even so, I am nervous. If Declan ever found out I was this close, not to mention standing here with a man he respects . . .

  I am looking into the open bedroom, the bed unmade, when Noah sets soft fingers on the small of my back. I startle.

  “You okay?” he asks, his gaze dipping to my lips and back up.

  My heart trips; then I realize we stand in the same spot where we first kissed. Post-cloning, that is. Right after that, he told me I was not his wife and dragged me away to prove it. That kiss was the last good moment I had that day. Truthfully, I have not had many since.

  “I would like to leave,” I say.

  He glances around, his jaw clenched, and nods. “Yeah. Let’s get out of here.”

  I follow him across the hardwood, each slat varying in shades from light to dark. One of my favorite throw blankets lies in a heap on the couch in the sunken living room. The kitchen counter holds a couple of days’ worth of dirty dishes. Declan was never this untidy before. Blankets should be folded and tucked inside the chest near the fireplace. Dishes rinsed and placed in the dishwasher. Bed made. Even when I forgot to do this, Declan came in behind me to do it himself.

  Pausing in the nook by the dining room table, I take another look around. This table was always set with a floral centerpiece and a crisp linen tablecloth. Always. The only thing on it now is a dirty plate with a half-eaten breakfast and a stale cup of coffee.

  “Who has been living here?” I ask, because I am positive it cannot be Declan.

  Noah stills with his hand on the sliding glass door handle. His eyebrows pinch together. “Burke. Who else?”

  “You are certain?”

  “Of course I am. I’ve seen him here myself. Why?”

  I cannot tell him how unlike Declan it is to live this way. Doing so would be like throwing my unwitting indiscretion in his face. “Never mind.”

  Outside, the ground is patched with grass. Our boots crunch on the needles strewn everywhere. The thick mass of trees shields us from the brunt of the sun, but it does not take us long to break a sweat.

  As we near the ledge where Declan and I went over, Noah lets me lead the way. I avoid the exact area and seek the path down the mountainside instead. When we near the edge—a good distance away from the spot where I threw Declan and myself over—Noah stops and looks over the side. He glances at me, then back down.

  “You’re lucky to be alive,” he says. “That’s quite a drop.”

  “Declan’s body shielded me from the ice’s impact.” I turn and step onto the dirt path. “We can go down here.”

  The way down is narrow and steep. The soles of my boots slide on loose rock and dirt.

  Halfway down, Noah says, “I heard Foster’s version of that night. Saw the video.”

  The following silence takes hold of my curiosity and swivels me around to face him. He slows to a stop two steps away.

  Shielding my eyes from the sun, I squint up at him. “And?”

  “Just curious about your take on what happened.”

  The truth is, I do not want to talk about that night. Reliving the day I found out I was a clone, how Declan stole me from my family, that I would never be accepted back into my old life . . . That day is not something I want to think about ever again.

  “You already know what you need to know.” I start down the slope again and slide, losing my balance. Noah catches me under the arms as I am about to fall.

  “Careful,” he whispers. Whiskers tickle my ear. His breath is hot on my cheek. His fingers dig a little too deep.

  Goose bumps rise on my arms and I step out of his hands. “Thanks.”

  Near the bottom, he says, “Where did you fall from?”

  I glance between the lake and the ledge above us, searching for the spot. I point a
t an area extending out farther than most. Large gray rocks jut out from the side. “We went over from there.”

  He looks up, then lifts an arm to wipe his sweaty forehead across the green sleeve of his T-shirt. “Jesus, Emma.”

  My sentiments exactly. The drop looks worse from here somehow. But I shrug a single shoulder and look up. “It was not so bad.”

  He laughs and I cannot help but join. It eases the tension at least.

  “Okay,” he says, and looks around. “Foster said he didn’t pass anyone, and no one ever saw anyone from the house feed. They had to come and go from another direction.”

  I point left. “You walk down that way. I will go right. Yell if you find something.”

  We part and I am both grateful and sad for the separation. I never should have agreed to come here alone with him. When it is easy between us, it is too easy. And it cannot be easy. Not while he is in love with Sonya.

  Is he in love, though?

  I shake my head. I cannot ask things like that. That will only lead to talking myself out of believing it to be true, which will only lead to hope. I gave up on a future with him the second I walked out of his office more than a year ago.

  Despite the arguments I tell myself, I glance across the lake and watch Noah looking for another way out of this area. The lake is surrounded by cliff walls and trees on all sides and, according to what Noah told me earlier, man-made. The lake’s dark shadow reaches almost to the edges, revealing how deep the bottom is. Not that I need a shadow to tell me. I am well aware of the lake’s depths.

  I turn and look at my own wall of mountainside. Tree roots curve out of the side of the dirt like the tentacles of some sea creature. Some gnarled and pointed ends have sprung free of the dirt. It is then I notice how the trees stagger upward at an angle. Upon closer inspection, I find a shaded trail behind them.

  “Found it!”

  Instead of waiting, I enter the trail, which is nowhere near as steep as the other. Leaves and needles coat the loose dirt floor. I walk at a brisk pace, anxious to see what I will find. But the path only ends in more forest.

  Noah finally reaches me, breathing hard. “Thanks for waiting.”