by T. R. Graves
Chapter 16
Fiancé
Carlie
Jayden stiffened like Rorie had just speared him through the back. His grip on me grew tighter. More protective. He didn't make the first effort to move away from me or pretend he didn't care for me.
"Rorie, can you put the food and water on the table inside my tent, please. After that, I want you to go to the galley and get it cleaned. Don't forget to lock it down. Surrogate Manniless told me you left it open over the weekend and bears got in," Thorne gently chided.
Like always, Rorie did exactly what her brother told her. This time, she was a little quicker. His gruffness had not gone unnoticed by Rorie or me. Gone was the loving, carefree brother who allowed her to have supper with us.
After she'd deposited the food and water inside the tent and as she was leaving, she looked down at her wringing hands and apologetically said, "I-I didn't leave it unlocked, Thorne. I promise. I don't know how the bears got in, but it wasn't because of me."
Softening in a way only Rorie could induce, Thorne reached over, put his hand on her shoulder, and kissed her tenderly on the top of her head.
"Okay, sweetie. Don't worry about it. I'll find out what's going on," he said in a very low voice, one he didn't mean for us to hear.
Wiping the tears from the corners of her eyes, she nodded and, without another word, headed toward the donut-shaped tent. Staring after her until she was safe inside the galley, Thorne kept his back toward us.
Jayden looked down at me as if he thought I might actually be able to telepathically transmit their story. I couldn't. I shook my head in a way that said, I'll tell you later. Based on the thinning of his lips, he didn't want to wait, but he would.
Ignoring the way Jayden still had me wrapped up in his arms, Thorne turned, walked around us, and opened the flap of his tent, the one I'd been recovering in, and said, "You need to eat and drink. After that, we'll find you a place to sleep. Based on the time it took you to make it here, I'm going to assume you've had about three hours of sleep in the last seventy-two hours."
I could tell by the scowl on Jayden's face that Thorne was right, and Jayden didn't like it that Thorne knew that much about him, about what he'd done or not done in the last three days.
I pulled away from Jayden and took his hand in mine before leading him into Thorne's tent. Like me, Jayden looked around and was amazed by the clean sterility and the uncluttered vastness of the tent.
Thorne walked back toward the table where he and I'd eaten and sat down before waving his hand toward the chair Rorie had sat in earlier. She'd laid out for Jayden a feast similar to the one she'd prepared for Thorne and me. I was more thankful for it now than I'd been when it had been for me. Jayden hadn't taken care of himself. He needed water and nutrients, and more than anything else, he needed rest. The gauntness of his cheeks and the circles under his eyes were proof of that.
"Eat," I ordered. "We've already eaten so there's no need to wait for us."
He nodded and before he took the first bite of food, he downed the entire glass of water.
I glanced over to Thorne and asked, "Can I get him more from your cooler?"
"You're still recovering yourself. You've only just come out of your coma a few hours ago. I'll get it," he offered, getting up and walking over the cart at the end of the tent and pulling out a bottle of water. Unlike when he was getting the water for me, he took his time.
I wished I'd have gotten the water for Jayden myself. I would have treated the chore with the urgency I thought it required.
Rather than focus on Thorne's slow water run, Jayden went straight for the roasted duck. Getting protein in his body was a matter of importance. He may have been starving, but when he took the first bite of duck, he raised his brows and nodded his head appreciatively toward the food.
I said, "I know. It's wonderful. Rorie made it. Apparently, she's an amazing cook."
I saw pride swell around Thorne. He loved his sister, and he loved seeing her get her due for the hard work she'd put into the meal. Speeding his pace, he set the water bottle in front of Jayden, who eyed it suspiciously, but like me earlier, he needed it so bad he didn't have the luxury of refusing it.
While Jayden downed another bottle, I glanced toward Thorne and saw the way he was staring at Jayden and my hands… hands that were still intertwined and squeezed tight.
With the curiosity of a scientist and the jealousy of a man who really thought he and I were a couple, he said, "You're a Surrogate, right?"
Jayden stiffened like he had earlier when Rorie suggested Thorne and I were going to marry. He swallowed hard and sent a death glare Thorne's way.
Thorne wasn't intimidated. He may not have been bred as a Surrogate and trained since the moment he could walk to fight until the death, but he'd definitely been blessed with some great genes. He was nearly as tall as Jayden; their builds were comparable and their moves similarly graceful. Seriously, both men would be worshipped as gods for their beauty and strength.
The men's biggest differences were easily measured. Where Jayden's hair was short, wavy, and brown, Thorne's was long, straight, and blond. Where Jayden's irises were a vivid shade of jade (marking him as a Surrogate), Thorne's were an equally brilliant gold.
"Yeah," an irritated Jayden finally groaned. "Why?"
Thorne shrugged but never took his golden stare off our joined hands. "I-I just thought there were rules that prevented Surrogates from getting too intimate with Procreates."
I saw the instant Jayden felt defeated, like reality had throat punched him. His shoulders dropped a little, and he looked at the food like it might actually be poisonous. With a shake of his hand, he tried to pull his fingers away from mine, but I wouldn't let him.
Right then and there, I'd decided I'd wrestle him to the ground and make him hold my hand if I had to, but I was going to hold his hand. I was too glad to see him and too thankful for everything he'd done to make sure I was safe. He'd put me and his concern for me above his body's needs.
Yeah… there's no way he's going to get this hand back.
When I wouldn't let go, he glanced toward me, trying to figure out what the hell I was doing. When he saw the glare in my eyes, he knew I was daring him to challenge me, and that dare brought a lopsided grin to his face.
I softened and smiled back. All the while, I held on tighter, and he didn't complain. Then I sent a smug smile Thorne's way.
"In my house, Jayden is now and always has been much more to us than a Surrogate assigned to protect us. He's part of our family, and like you, we treat everyone in our family with respect," I said, throwing down another challenge. This one just for him.
I knew he'd understand I was comparing the love we had for Jayden to the love he had for his twin sister. It took him a few minutes to embrace it, but with the infinitesimal bob of his head, he did just that.
We sat in silence while Jayden finished his meal. Right before he took his last bite, he shook his head, fighting off the sleep he so desperately needed.
Worried for him, I glanced toward Thorne and asked, "Where will we sleep?"
He looked as if I'd slapped him. "There's a tent next door where Surrogates sleep. It's filled with men. You'll not be welcomed there."
"I need to watch over him while he rests," I insisted. "Look at him. He's about to collapse with exhaustion."
More concerned about me than himself, Jayden asked, "Where will Carlie be sleeping?"
Thorne shrugged as if the answer were obvious. "She's been sleeping here in my tent with Rorie and me for the last three nights, and she's been fine. I'm confident tonight won't be any different."
"You've been sleeping in here with her?" Jayden roared only a little quieter than the king of the jungle would have.
I jumped.
"I'm not sure if you realize this, but Carles's parents and my parents formally agreed years ago that we'd be married when Carles turns twenty," Thorne announced after clearing his throat a few times.
I jerked up to
my feet so quick that I nearly knocked the table over.
"What in the hell are you talking about? My parents would never do anything like that, and if they had, they would have told me. I know you love Rorie and you want to give her everything her heart desires, but I'm not for sale. I'll pick my husband or I'll never marry," I assured Thorne with as much vehemence as I felt over my parents' betrayal.
"This union"—Thorne waved his hand wildly between the two of us—"is one Barone insisted upon. It's not one either of us can back out of. I thought you knew… I thought that's how you knew about me and my father."
The bizarreness of the situation, the fact that I was miraculously brought to the camp where my fiancé was stationed, felt just a little too convenient. As if answering my unspoken question, Thorne continued.
"I'm in my third year of medical school. I'm in the middle of my MediTech rotation, which is why Rorie and I are here at all. Actually, it's as if fate had us in its sights all along. I mean… my fiancée is bitten dozens of times by poisonous snakes, and I'm the doctor on call, the one charged with retrieving and nursing her back to health.
"Even if you don't care for me, you have to admit I did a fantastic job of bringing her back from the brink of death. I'm not sure many other physicians would have been able to do what I did. So before you start questioning where she's been sleeping, I'd like to remind you who you are questioning," Thorne said, throwing down a gauntlet that couldn't be challenged.
Hell will freeze over before I marry a man because someone else wants me to.
As if Thorne's actions outweighed the wonderful things Jayden had done for my family and me over the course of years, Jayden stepped away from me. I reached for his hand, and before our fingers met, he pulled it back and shook his head.
"Carlie, I'll catch up with you in the morning. You and I can talk then. I-if you need me tonight, just yell. I'll hear you, and I'll be here in a heartbeat," he mumbled.
I stared at him and willed him to hear what my heart was screaming.
I need you now.
I want you to stay with me.
He ignored me and left me standing alone with Thorne. I'd never resented my parents more than I did now. Arranged marriages were not commonplace within the borders of our nation. I couldn't imagine why Thorne's and my parents had allowed Barone to exert his will over them like that.
This had nothing to do with Thorne. He was nice enough. The problem was I'd not been given any choice.
And he wasn't Jayden.
After giving him a glare that would have sliced through a lesser person, I turned my back on Thorne and climbed back into the cot where I'd been sleeping for the last three days.
He called my name a few times before giving up and heading back to his desk and popping up a three-dimensional image that allowed me the opportunity to see the reverse image of what he was looking at.
For the next hour, he studied advanced pathophysiology and quizzed himself on disease treatments. I pretended to sleep but actually found the game enjoyable since I had every intention of becoming a physician at some point in my life. I was amazed at all the information Mom and Gran had instilled in me throughout my life. I got more of the quizzes right than Thorne. Not only that, but I was able to answer them quicker than him, and he was already a doctor-in-training.
When a tired Rorie made her way into the tent an hour later, I felt guilty for not going to help her. It was obvious she'd been tasked with cooking breakfast, lunch, and supper for this entire camp, and while that might not be a horrible job, she'd also been tasked with cleaning all of the dishes.
Tomorrow, that would change. I refused to let her kill herself cooking and cleaning without help and then being hung out to dry when she accidentally left the kitchen open. I wondered if any of these assholes thought about taking a few minutes to check to make sure the kitchen got locked up after she finished cleaning it.
It seems like the least they could do.
"Good night, Thorne. I love you," Rorie said after kicking off her shoes and crawling into her bed.
Thorne walked over to her bed and tucked her in like she was a little girl before kissing her forehead. "Good night, sissy. I love you, too," he whispered sweetly.
It was with that satisfied grin on her face that she fell fast asleep within minutes of laying down her head. It was further confirmation that she was beyond exhausted, and all the proof I needed to solidify my plan to make sure she had all the help she needed while I was around.
After Rorie was asleep and because Thorne thought I was also, he walked to the door of the tent, staring back before he left. I wasn't sure where he was going, but I hoped he'd be gone for a while because I wanted to use his computer to contact Mom.
We have lots to talk about. Especially this marriage arrangement. I need to know what the hell that's about. It's not something I'd have ever thought Mom would've done to me.