If anyone figured out a way to fuck without leaving DNA anywhere, he’d have been right on it.
It was exhausting and a lot of work for a one-night fuck, because two nights was pushing it. Jon didn’t seem to have any problems. From what Nick saw, Jon got laid a lot on a regular basis and had no problem whatsoever with telling the women lies.
For Nick, it got very old very fast.
So, now his dick was waking up and smelling the roses. Or at least smelling Elle. Because over the smell of her fear and exhaustion was the smell of her. Something fresh and springlike and absolutely unmistakably her.
No other woman in the world smelled like her. Looked like her. Was her. Which explained the half-woodie in the presence of Jon and Mac and Mac’s pregnant wife, though he knew better.
Nick put his hand on the small of Elle’s back and she stiffened again, which was enough to take the starch out of his dick. She was disoriented enough without coping with his horniness.
Nick laced his hand with hers, ignoring the fact that she didn’t close her hand around his, keeping it loose. He tugged and she walked forward, turning her head slightly at the drop in air pressure as the door shut.
Mac, Catherine, and Jon were standing in front of her, Catherine with a welcoming smile. Mac didn’t do welcoming smiles, but at least he wasn’t scowling, which was something.
Nick whipped the hood off Elle’s head, her pale hair lifting slightly with a crackle, then falling back down in light shiny curls.
“Honey,” he began, but Catherine gasped.
“Dr. Connolly! You’re the one Nick went out to rescue?”
“You know me?” Elle asked.
Three deep male voices echoed. “You know her?”
Chapter 10
Arka Pharmaceuticals Headquarters
San Francisco
Lee suddenly stood up. “I need to check something,” he said and walked out the door. But not before Flynn saw the sweat beading his forehead.
Something was wrong with Lee. Seriously wrong.
Former General Clancy Flynn had watched him carefully all day. Lee was a slick one, always cool and calm and emotionless. Two of the secret programs Flynn and his company had financed had earned him a lot of money in return. And the new one was going to be a bombshell. Creating faster, stronger, smarter soldiers was every general’s dream, but it was the private sector, and Flynn’s company Orion Security in particular, that was going to make it a reality.
They were close. There’d been a trial in Africa, where Orion had a potentially huge contract to guard a convoy conveying diamonds from a rich mine in the rebel-army infested interior to the coast. At first it had worked like a dream. He and Lee had watched as the team moved with increased precision and speed, like a well-oiled machine. Visibly enhanced, a joy to behold. And then the breakdown where they self-immolated.
But those first hours were promising. Lee said he had pinpointed the problem—a question of dosage—and one trial had gone very well and another trial was scheduled for next week.
But this new development . . .
If Flynn hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he would never have believed it. The potential. There was no limit to what he could earn with enhanced soldiers with powers like those.
Lee was onto something that would change the world, if it didn’t kill him first.
If Flynn didn’t know better, he’d say Lee was drunk. But Lee didn’t drink, he was a teetotaler, something Flynn couldn’t understand. The world was full of pleasures Lee seemed immune to. He was a driven, dedicated man and he was falling apart.
The signs were clear.
Lee had spent the entire time drumming his fingers restlessly on the desktop and jiggling his foot. He’d swallowed often and adjusted his shirt collar as if it were too tight, though actually it was loose. Lee had lost at least ten pounds since the last time Flynn had seen him.
But more than anything else there had been a barely contained excitement about the man, which was totally unlike him. Flynn had known Lee for a long time. He’d commissioned research from Lee’s company back when he’d still been in the military. He believed in Lee so much, he dipped into his own company’s pockets to keep this line of research going when he retired. It had been banned by the government, but what the government didn’t know wouldn’t hurt it.
“Human experimentation” was a big no-no in government labs, but that was bullshit in Flynn’s opinion. Portable weaponry had gotten about as lethal as it was ever going to get, and there were limits to the use of the big bombs. The last frontier was human enhancement, which was going to make all the difference in the coming resource wars.
Lee had always been cool and rational. The ultimate scientist, though Flynn had always suspected Lee had another agenda. Not money, which puzzled him. Because money was the best motivator there was. Lee liked money well enough, but mainly he saw it as a tool to help him continue his research. He himself lived simply. So money wasn’t it. Whatever it was, as long as it didn’t impede the ultimate goal, Flynn didn’t give a shit.
But now whatever it was that was driving Lee was messing with him—with the man Flynn had just given fifteen million dollars to.
If what Lee was working on panned out, the history of soldiering would be changed forever and Flynn would almost overnight become one of the richest men in the world. If it didn’t pan out because Lee went off the reservation, then Flynn was out a shitload of money and the promises he was making to potential clients would turn out to be so much hot air. And a couple of those clients were not men you could lie to and walk away from alive.
Whatever happened, he needed to stick around for a few more days to make sure Lee wasn’t going to make fifteen million dollars go up in smoke.
He tapped his ear. He needed to check in with headquarters.
“Yessir.” Oh yeah. Melissa, his new secretary. Efficient and pretty and eminently bangable. She could roll out of bed after two hours of fucking him and coolly plan his next day’s schedule while he was still gasping on the bed.
“Yeah, Melissa. I know I said I was coming back today, but I need to stay. Block out the next two days and cancel my flight back to Virginia. Tell the pilot he can stay at the Marriott until I need him.”
A pause and then Melissa’s throaty voice. “Done.”
“I’ll let you know when I’m arriving. And, Melissa?”
She recognized that tone and her voice dropped even lower. “Yessir?”
“Don’t be wearing panties when I arrive.”
Flynn disconnected with her throaty chuckle ringing in his ears.
Mount Blue
Elle found herself in a warm embrace, short but heartfelt. The woman embracing her was slender, so the slight protuberance of her belly could be easily felt. She was pregnant, and there was no doubt whatsoever who the father was. He stood right behind the woman with a hand on her shoulder.
They made a strange couple. Beauty and the Beast. The woman was very pretty, with shoulder-length dark hair and gray-blue eyes, and the husband . . . well, the husband was huge and ugly and frightening. Those were the only words that really fit. He was the tallest man in the room—though both Nick and Jon were tall men—and would be in just about any room. His face was hard with a nose that had been broken several times, what looked like a knife scar on one side and a burn scar that had melted the skin on the other. His eyes were cold and hard. This was a guy you wanted to avoid if you knew what was good for you. That didn’t stop the woman from gently stroking the huge hand on her shoulder and giving him a quick loving glance over her shoulder.
He smiled down at her and the entire arrangement of his facial features changed. He didn’t turn warm and cuddly, but there was no doubt what he felt for the woman. Elle herself would have been frightened to be in the same room as the guy, but love was love. What could she say? She’d been in love forever with a man who’d abandoned her twice, so she was no one to judge.
This woman knew her, which was eerie bordering o
n creepy. “How do you know my name?” Elle asked as the woman took her hand.
“Chicago, May 2022, the annual meeting of the American Neuroscience Academy. Room B. Your paper on ‘Immune Markers in Trance States’ blew us all away.” The woman shook her hand gently then let it go. While Elle’s hand had been in hers, there had been a weird flash of warmth, something gently blooming then fading. It might have been coincidence, but she felt a little stronger too.
Chicago, May 2022. “You were there?”
“I was.” The woman smiled softly. “Though I read the entire paper later because I had to leave halfway through and go to Room C. To deliver my own paper on ‘The role of Kir4.1 in Oligodendrocyte Myelin Formation’.”
Elle gasped. “Dr. Young! Dr. Catherine Young!” This time Elle was the one to grab a hand. She pumped it up and down. How amazing to find her here! Catherine Young was a legend who was doing cutting-edge research into dementia. Unlock dementia and you unlocked a number of secrets of the brain. “What a privilege! I’ve followed your work these past years with a great deal of interest. Particularly your work on the gamma secretase activating protein in translating ribosome affinity purification. I know you’re applying it to a study of dementia, but really, it could be extrapolated to association cortices in the parahippocampal gyrus.”
Dr. Young leaned forward. “Oh, I know! I was studying the dementing process, but your findings are important in gaining a clearer understanding of immunoreactivity. When we used immunofluorescence assays—”
“Did you use the Coons and Kaplan technique?”
“We did. It’s old but it is reliable and stable. I know some are using the new Hunter and Florheim technique, but—”
“Whoa!” A deep voice interrupted. Elle turned her head to see Nick with his big hands up in a time-out gesture. “Some pity for the non-geeks here. And especially pity for two certain non-geeks who are starving because they just saved a certain geek’s ass.”
Elle felt anger shoot through her whole system. “That would be me, I suppose?”
Nick nodded. “That would definitely be you, Dr. Connolly. No wonder I couldn’t find you. You’d changed your name.” His jaw muscles visibly moved. “I imagine that there’s a mister Connolly somewhere. Or, knowing you, another Dr. Connolly.”
Elle’s own jaw tightened. Nick sounded angry. As if she’d done something without asking permission. How dare he! She narrowed her eyes. “No mister, no doctor. Connolly was my mother’s name. I took it after—after.”
“What? What?” Nick’s eyes widened and he got in her face, jaws working. She could actually hear his teeth grinding. “You changed your name? You fucking changed your fucking name? Do you have any idea how fucking hard I—”
“Nick.” Dr. Young’s husband landed a very heavy hand on Nick’s shoulder and dug his fingers in. Nick’s face showed nothing, but those hands looked extremely strong. It was entirely possible that he was doing some damage to Nick’s shoulder. The man shook his head. “We don’t talk to women like that in Haven, Nick. We don’t talk to anyone like that. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
Nick shrugged his shoulder and the man lifted his hand. Nick was glaring at her and she glared right back. Of all things, she hadn’t expected this. He was mad! At her. The nerve!
Anger, red hot and painful, boiled in her chest. Elle turned to the other woman in the room. Dr. Catherine Young could be trusted to be rational. “Dr. Young, please tell Nick—”
Dr. Young lifted her hand. “Please, Dr. Connolly, call me Catherine.”
One big breath. Two. Manners, she told herself. “And you must call me Elle, of course.”
Catherine nodded and smiled. They could have been in a drawing room over tea instead of some hidden location with three frightening men and one world-class scientist. “Well, Elle. We should make some other introductions. You’ve met Jon.”
Jon gave an ironic smile and a two-fingered salute off his forehead. “Ma’am.”
Elle inclined her head. “We’ve met. As a matter of fact he rescued me.”
“He rescued you!” Nick said heatedly. “He didn’t do anything but fly the helo! So how the hell does he come off as the big rescuer? I’m the one who—”
“And this is my husband, Mac.” Catherine’s voice was soft, but she managed to run right over Nick’s rant.
“Ma’am.” Mac had the deepest voice she’d ever heard. It was a rumble she felt in her diaphragm rather than heard. He reached over, engulfed her hand in his, squeezed gently for a second, then let her hand go. Which was nice because he could have crushed it easily and Elle needed that hand.
Catherine hadn’t mentioned last names at all. Interesting. Well, if she couldn’t know names, could she get some info on other things? “Nice to meet you all. So. Where am I?” she asked.
Silence. Utter silence. That was interesting too.
“I’m sure Nick will bring you up to speed eventually, Elle.” Catherine smiled at her. “But in the meantime, you must be exhausted and you must be hungry. So before we show you to your room . . .”
“My room,” Nick interrupted angrily. “My room. She’s staying with me. In my room.”
Another moment of perfect silence.
“Elle?” Catherine asked softly. “Are you okay with that?”
She had no idea what to say. None. All of a sudden she was aware of her immense exhaustion, like a living thing weighing down on her. A huge boulder that weakened her knees and seemed to dim the lights in the room.
This was Nick, the man she’d loved almost her whole life. And this was Nick, who’d abandoned her the day after she buried her father. And this was also Nick who by some crazy tangled reasoning in his mind had decided he was angry at her.
That was enough to make up her mind.
“No,” she said decisively. “Could I have a separate room?”
How she was going to deal with Nick from here on in was something she was going to have to face in the future, but right now, she was at the end of her physical and mental resources. Having a fight with Nick was utterly beyond her.
Nick’s eyes bugged. “What?” His deep voice rose an octave. “What? What the fuck? Of course—”
“Nick. Stop that right now.” Catherine Young seemed to be about half the weight of Nick and she had a soft voice, but that voice stopped him dead in his tracks.
His mouth closed with a snap, lips pressed together as if he had to work to not talk. But his eyes were still wide and a little wild. He huffed out a big breath like a bull.
He wasn’t liking this. Not one bit.
Good.
“Well, first things first. I’m not letting you go to your room before getting a bite to eat.” Catherine gently steered her toward a cart, pulled a chair from a desk and sat her down. Mac pulled something down from the wall, detached it, pushed a button, and it magically unfolded into a table that connected to some hidden seam in the service cart with a distinct click. It was a cue for everyone to grab a chair and place it around the table.
“Guests first,” Mac said in his deep bass. Which was kind but also served to remind everyone that she was the outsider here. Mac and Catherine started lifting covers off the serving plates and the room filled with the scent of delicious food.
Nick sat his chair right next to hers, so closely his shoulder brushed hers as he piled food on a plate and set it in front of her. “Eat,” he commanded.
Everyone was looking at her expectantly, as if they’d never seen a person eat before. Elle waited a second, fork poised above her plate, watching them watching her.
Nick nudged her plate closer. “Eat,” he repeated.
She ate.
All it took was a bite or two for her eyes to open wide with astonishment. As a scientific experiment she took a bite from everything on her plate and confirmed her first hypothesis.
“This is the best food I’ve ever eaten,” she blurted. They’d been watching to see her reaction to the food. Catherine sat back and looked at her husba
nd and Jon with a smile. Both men nodded. Nick didn’t meet their eyes because his were fixed on her in an unblinking stare.
Everyone but Nick was transferring food to their plates. Nick’s plate remained empty as he continued watching her. It didn’t intimidate her, though. She’d suffered worse things than having someone watch her eat. Not to mention the fact that eating this amazing food was no hardship.
Huge ricotta raviolis with a wild mushroom and cream sauce, the most succulent tagliata in the history of the world, dusted with arugula and parmesan flakes. The lightest possible fried artichoke slices. Sautéed escarole with plump raisins. Frisèe salad with hot bacon. Steamed broccoli with garlic and a balsamic vinegar reduction. A freshly baked ciabatta to soak everything up.
Simple fare, done absolutely perfectly.
Nobody talked. Nobody should. The food was a religious experience and required proper worship. Elle had eaten a couple of times at Chez Panisse before Alice Waters retired, and this food was arguably better.
There was tiramisu—what looked like the platonic ideal of tiramisu, frothy and creamy and chocolatey—in a big glass bowl in the corner. Just for encouragement.
When she was stuffed, Elle sat back. “Is this a secret five-star restaurant? The kind that never advertises and you have to be a foodie and pass a test to find? Though”—this with a slanted glance at Jon—“hooding clients is taking it a bit far.”
“Good old Stella.” Jon had eaten with unswerving fervor and wasn’t finished. He heaped a third helping of everything onto his plate. “I love her experiments, but when she does the basics . . . man. No one does it better.”
“Stella?” This Stella person was obviously the chef.
Jon grinned. “Yeah, you wouldn’t believe who the cook is. She’s—”
“Jon!” Mac’s deep voice was like a whip lash. Jon’s blond eyebrows shot up.
“We might want to discuss this, and other things, tomorrow.” Catherine placed a hand on her husband’s huge one and gave Elle a smile.