I wanted to make some protest about him being around while I was naked. It was the natural girl-modesty response. I stared at him, considering my options. He knew more than I did about this spy thing. I’d seen movies where there were bugs planted on people as small as a fly. Was that true? Could one be on me right now? I still had the boxers on and the T-shirt. In the struggle, Mack Truck could have put anything on me and I wouldn’t have noticed. It was something I hadn’t thought of. Suddenly my body was itchy, like a live bug with a tracer device had been planted on me and crawled all over my skin.
I needed to hurry. Axel was right, we didn’t have much time and we needed to get to Brandon. If this was what I needed to do, it didn’t help to just stand here.
I still put the fountain between me and the other boys until I couldn’t even see them anymore and I was sure none of them could see me. I was wondering why we were doing this out in the open, not that there appeared to be anyone around. There could be a lot of reasons, I supposed, but if we were quick, no one might notice us here anyway.
Axel followed. When I challenged him with a glare, he was completely unreadable. Either he was trying to keep things professional, or there was something else on his mind. Maybe he simply didn’t care about nudity when lives were on the line.
I put the new clothes aside and then started to strip. I was going to try to be coy, but he was the one who had to check for bugs in places I wouldn’t be able to check alone. I had to let him inspect me so there was no point in trying to be delicate.
Axel’s eyes never wavered. At first his face was blank, and stayed on my face.
I lifted the T-shirt and ripped it off, facing him full on and bare and his eyes stayed with mine. I challenged him, daring. I don’t know why I needed to, but it was like I was waiting for some reaction from him. Not getting one made me uncomfortable, like I wasn’t attractive enough to warrant some sort of approval.
Crazy girl stuff. Resistant to being naked in front of guys, but if you have to be, you want a compliment.
And my heart was wild because he’d once seen me nearly naked before. We’d even kissed, and fooled around a bit. Now it was like I was testing him to see if he’d lost interest. If maybe I wasn’t his type. I realized it must be hard for him to deal with someone like me, hot and cold like I’d been with the guys. Did I think they’d simply wait while I made up my mind?
And here I was, testing him. I wanted to poke his buttons until he caved. I wanted to prove to him, and to myself, that he was still interested.
I slipped out of the boxers, kicking them toward the fountain. At first he stood completely still, like he was waiting for me to do something. Give him permission?
“Do you have to comb my hair?” I asked.
He blinked, his head shaking slightly as if I’d disturbed some deep thinking.
And then there it was: His eyes did the sweep. He dropped his gaze quickly to my feet, as if trying to avoid looking directly, but once he looked at my feet, his eyes slid up slowly. He angled his head, taking in my calves, thighs, over my hips and stomach, to my chest. Very slow, very deliberate. He’d done the same to me with my clothes on, but now it was all in front of him.
Fair was fair: I’d seen him naked.
He met my eyes again. His expression was so hard to read, but I could tell he was struggling. That made me happy. Axel at least felt something when he saw me naked.
He moved forward with a comb he pulled from his pocket and did a finger twirl. “Turn around.”
This was familiar, too. He’d done this once before, with a brush, trying to collect my own secrets from me.
I turned where he wanted me, and he gathered my hair in his big hands. He started at the roots and worked the comb through. He circled me as he worked, trying to make sure he brushed everything down and got rid of every tangle. Locks covered my face. His fingers followed the comb, touching every strand.
I covered parts of me with my arms from the cold, and partially in preparation if anyone did come by. It was super early still, and the only light we were getting was from dim lamps still lit up and down the park and further out there was some ambient light from streetlamps and homes. Someone would have had to get really close to notice I was naked, and the park was deserted except for us. “Is this even necessary?” I asked, considering what was more awkward, being naked in public or Axel combing my hair for bugs.
I also wanted to avoid talking about us.
He was quiet for a moment, and then held out a palm.
Inside his palm were three dark specks. At first, I just assumed it was dirt or something. When I looked closer, they appeared to be little microchips.
“Are those them?” I asked. I couldn’t believe he found three already. “It’s not just dirt or something? I did jump from a moving car.”
“Trackers,” he said. “I’ve seen these before.”
“Are they working now? Are they GPS trackers?” I was wondering how they put these on. It must have happened while we’d struggled in bed or on the way to the car trunk. Tracking us from the start meant they were assured we couldn’t have jumped up and run off at some point.
“They aren’t really designed for GPS. They just send out a frequency,” he said. “There’s a local scanner out there somewhere that can pick it up. It wouldn't have enough energy for a satellite transmission but it can make it easier to follow you if they wanted to tail you. If they’re searching for you now, this is what they’re looking for.”
“How come they didn’t find me before? They were looking for me while I was keeping an eye on Brandon and they were talking to him.”
“You may have been close enough to Brandon that they were picking up the same frequency from him. These wouldn’t have that far of a range and they’re not very precise, but if they picked it up, they’d know they were close. It’s like playing Hot or Cold.”
“What if they’re following us now?”
“We want them to follow if they are, but we want them closer. We don’t want to make this easy for them. If you want to get to know your stalkers, you need to get them as close as possible and draw them out into the open, into the public areas.” He tossed the three units into the fountain and continued to comb my hair. “With these, they could stay at a distance and keep an eye on you. That’s not what we want.”
Sophisticated. This German and his pals were even smarter than I thought. Could I have ever survived this without Axel and the guys? Probably, but at least with them, it’d be easier. I’d not thought about bugs, and probably would have been picked up pretty quickly if they came across that signal.
I sucked in a slow, long breath and exhaled. I was fooling myself. These guys didn’t even need me.
Axel took his time, going through every lock of hair. The teeth bit into my scalp when he got close, but it was necessary, because the little trackers were really small. He checked behind my ears, in my ears, angled my chin around to look underneath my jaw. He wanted to make sure nothing else fell out and attached to my skin. I’d never caught lice going to school, but I thought the process to clean out those real bugs must be similar. Checking for metal bugs was like catching lice, but way more dangerous. That was a crazy thought.
Again a silence fell between us, and I stared at the dead fountain, almost falling asleep where I stood as he inspected me.
“Are you so worried about your brother that you’re avoiding me?” he asked quietly.
There it was. The question I’d been thinking he’d ask sooner or later. “No,” I said. I wasn’t in the mood to elaborate because if I said what I was really thinking out loud, he’d ask more questions. It was something some of the other Academy boys asked quietly, or sometimes in odd, roundabout ways and I distracted them with something else.
They wanted to know how I felt, and the truth was more complicated than they wanted to really know. I thought over time, I’d eventually get over how I was feeling, but that wasn’t the case. My feelings only grew stronger.
Af
ter I responded, and I didn’t know what else to say, I remained quiet, hoping he’d take a hint.
“You can tell me if you’re not interested,” he said. “Not trying to be passive-aggressive about it. I’m interested in you. I just want to know where I stand.”
I grunted.
“What was that?” he asked a little louder.
What an ass. He waited until I was vulnerable, naked and couldn’t run and he was going to corner me with something like that? Did he really need to know that badly? I had to remind myself not to let him brush my hair from now on. That seemed to be his way of saying we need to talk.
It was difficult now, though, to not simply give in. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to lean into him? To feel like I’d been missed and worried about, and just be held for a while? I’d felt so vulnerable since I’d been kidnapped, and while I wanted to hug Marc and the others, I didn’t, because hugging wasn’t what I did. I wanted to appear brave, to look like I was unshakable.
But on the inside, I wasn’t. I needed something from someone else. I needed to feel grounded somehow. It was hard to describe and telling the others what I needed felt impossible.
And yet I had the feeling if I told one of them I simply needed a hug, or a kiss, they’d do it in a heartbeat.
Why was that so? It felt like a selfish thing, what I wanted from them. I wanted them to feel things for me, even though I had no right to. But I wanted all of them in different ways. In some cases, in very close, intense ways. But if they knew what I was feeling—that I couldn’t decide between them—they’d call me out on it.
“I don’t want to talk about this right now,” I said sharply, trying to make it clear that I hated this. “I want to find Brandon and then...”
“How long do you think I’ll wait?” he asked.
My hands clenched into fists and I stared through my hair at the fountain. My first instinct was to tell him to not wait, and yet I was biting my tongue hard to stop myself. Again, selfish. I didn’t want him to hate me, but I didn’t want him too close to me when I was so conflicted with the others. I couldn’t tell him about it, because he wouldn’t understand.
He stepped around until he was in front of me and I got an up close look at his chest in the dark jacket. “It’s the others,” he said. “You’re trying to avoid a sticky situation by keeping us all at a distance.”
I made a face and then shook my head. It was like he could read my mind. “How do you know?” I asked.
“We’ve had this discussion, about the others getting close to you. At first I thought the last couple of weeks was about separating yourself from the other guys. I know a few of the others have a crush on you, or more than that. Corey’s someone you feel safe with for some reason, because he’s too much of a nice guy to make a move. I understood you wanted time to try to sort it out, but I think you’re making it worse. And I don’t like waiting.”
My jaw dropped and I accidentally sucked in air at the same time, catching some hair into my mouth. I spit to get it back out again and clawed it away from my face.
“Stop,” he said. “I’m almost done.”
“Stop talking like you know everything.”
“I didn’t know for sure until now.”
I groaned. He did that to me before, too. He knew just how to push my buttons to get the answers he wanted. He might have picked up some hints from the other guys, and I’d given away that the other guys were getting close, but he wasn’t sure how close before until just now when he bluffed me out. Was it obvious that I avoided the other guys except for Corey?
Did he know Corey was gay? I couldn’t remember if Brandon mentioned if the other guys knew for sure. He did feel safe, because I could talk to him and hang out with him, and sleep in his bed without feeling weird.
Except last night, when Brandon took his place. Had he done that before and I didn’t realize it because it was dark and I couldn’t tell the difference if I couldn’t see their eyes? Brandon was simply there. I’d snuggled into him, assuming it was Corey. I wasn’t sure if Brandon was being deceptive before, or if he just assumed he could and didn’t realize I hadn’t picked out it was him.
Either way, they didn’t need to know about this. “Don’t tell the other guys.”
“You can’t hide forever. We’ve talked about this.”
I didn’t know how to react to this, because I didn’t know the answer to the problem now any more than I did the last time he brought it up. Marc, Brandon, Raven and Axel were single, and they were interested in me, and there was only one of me. There were several reasons not to pick at all. Part of that was because if I picked wrong, and it didn’t work out, I’d lose out on all of them. Not to be selfish about it, but they were all I had left.
On top of that, I couldn’t choose between them. Getting close to them made it difficult. They each were incredible in their own way, and choosing one felt too much like I was hurting the others, so avoiding the issue was my way of dealing with it. In a small way, I was hoping they’d lose interest and leave me with only one option so I didn’t have to choose between them. “Maybe I shouldn’t do...I mean, maybe I need to not do this with anyone. Not from the group.”
Axel stopped combing, dropping his hands and standing still in front of me. “Because you’re afraid we’ll fight and it’ll break up our group or for other reasons? Like you can’t decide?”
Damn. I rolled my eyes, avoiding looking at him, hoping I could get away with some other lie, but another one didn’t wouldn’t come to mind. What other reason could there be? “Maybe it isn’t the right time to talk about this.” Or like we should probably never talk about it.
He parted my hair, caught my chin and lifted my face until I met his dark eyes. The swell of a storm rose behind his gaze. “Not even something like this would be enough to break us,” he said. “And they’re not stupid. They’ll know. If you want to stay with us, we’ve all got to come out with how we feel about each other. There’s no way around it.”
Panic seared me as much as the cold was seeping into my body, making me shake uncontrollably. Was he suggesting we should confront them all? I envisioned Raven lashing out, Brandon accusing me of being selfish, of the pain in Marc’s eyes. Or maybe if Axel turned them all off by telling them I couldn’t choose, and they didn’t want me after that, he could claim me for himself. Maybe that was the answer. If I couldn’t choose, the boys would choose for me.
Did I want that? I never before had been unable to make a decision. I normally just bulldozed my way through relationships and then ended them on my terms.
“I don’t know,” I said. I locked gazes with him. I was afraid to admit that I couldn’t make this decision, and I didn’t want him to think it was because he wasn’t good enough to single out. I just didn’t have an answer.
The corner of his mouth dipped down. His eyes shifted from mine to move over my face, my hair, my cheeks, my lips, my ears. Was he scanning for another bug?
“We need to figure this out,” he said. “Because I’m not going to avoid pursuing you for much longer. I want you.”
My heart raced and tripped and raced again. I just stared back, naked, daring. My knees shook, maybe from the cold, but I was also on fire from head to foot at the gaze he leveled on me. I had resisted this long, but now I realized I was feeding the flames by avoiding him. My resistance was weakening, but I didn’t want him to know. I didn’t dare. I was scared he was wrong and the boys would feel betrayed.
He was quiet for a while, but then his eyes narrowed. “I have to check the rest of your body,” he said. “Every part of you. I found three so far but I need to make sure there aren’t any more. These things can get into weird places. Do you trust me?”
I swallowed and nodded. A rush of heat washed across me. His being able to change my thoughts and feelings so quickly left me so conflicted.
He started from my neck, brushing the back of his hand down my body, along every crevice. Something told me this was more than an inspection. This
was an examination. He would root out any more scars he thought were interesting. He’d check any tan line, any bump. He already admitted he was attracted to me and would learn every inch of my body.
I was aroused that he was studying me.
The back of his hand slid down between my breasts, and then he lifted each one, checking the undersides. He knelt lower, poking at my belly button.
And then he was facing my crotch and I closed my eyes. His hands slid between my thighs and he parted them a little. His hands brushed in the corner where my thighs met my groin and followed back toward my butt.
When his hands slid down to check my knees and feet, I stared again at the fountain. Somehow, I wasn’t annoyed or angry that he’d gotten so close to parts of me. I trusted him. His hands were smooth, the warmth of his touch welcome when I felt so cold now.
I wanted him to continue touching, but this wasn’t the place, and we didn’t have the time.
When he was finished, he stood up. “Seems like we got it all, but to be safe, you should rinse off in the fountain a little in these little crevices. I’m not sure if the devices are waterproof, but it might wash away any we’ve missed. Then get those clothes on.”
It was over. He turned his back on me, allowing me some privacy once again by maintaining a vigilant watch on the surroundings.
Why did I still hope for him to say something? He was the one trying to make this as doctor-patient as possible, and I was the one needing something more. I was simply greedy, needing of his attention and for him to give some to me, even if I resisted and bit my tongue and seemed to be indifferent.
I swallowed my needs and fears and without another word, did as he told me to do.
RANDALL JONES
I did a quick, cold splash in the fountain and tried to dress quickly. Crop pants weren’t my thing. I think it was because they were in fashion lately and I wasn’t about to succumb to fashion trends. The sports bra squeezed my chest until I had a uni-boob, but given Kevin probably didn’t know my bra size, I couldn’t blame him for that. The underwear was a little big, the pants were a little tight around the butt, but the T-shirt I wore covered my hips. The flip-flops were the closest thing to my own size so I had that going.