The change had been subtle, at first. Erik had gradually reduced the time he spent with our friends and even me, outside of the apartment. Without fail, I made excuses for him, claiming he was too tired to eat dinner at one of Eden’s restaurants or grab drinks at Heaven’s Gate, the island’s lone bar. Our friends weren’t the only ones I was lying to, however. Even though I knew better, I tried to feed my aching heart the same nonsense.
Denial became harder and harder as more people began to notice.
When Erik spoke to me, his words were just as sweet and playful as always. His touch was just as gentle and loving as ever. But half the time, while he was physically there with me, his mind was somewhere else. His thoughts were hidden behind mental walls made of reinforced steel, topped with barbed wire, and surrounded by an electric fence. On the rare occasion Erik allowed me a glance at what was going on up there, dark shadows blocked the vitality that usually shone within him.
The one time I’d dared to mention the attitude shift, Erik’s temper had gone through the roof. He hadn’t yelled or anything, which I’d have preferred since at least then all the tension between us would have been out in the open. But his walls had slipped, exposing a torrent of rage and fury that scared me. Then, he walked calmly to the door of our suite and left without a word or backward glance.
Later, I’d found Erik in one of the private workout rooms, pummeling a holographic opponent. Unable to help myself, I’d stood there watching him for a long time, just out of his line of sight. And, thinking he was alone, Erik didn’t bother hiding his emotions. Terror and confusion rivaled his earlier fury, each fighting for dominance and collectively pushing him closer to the edge of sanity. Instead of seeing the hologram he was fighting, Erik saw his internal demons. Every hit gave him hope that he would win the battle, if not the war.
“He probably went to get in an early morning workout,” I told Penny, smiling like all was right with the world.
Penny returned my fake smile with a sad one of her own.
“Probably.”
“I’ll shower and change real quick,” I said, as we stepped off the elevator at our floor. “Formal attire, I assume?”
“She didn’t specify.” Penny rolled her lime-green eyes. “But it’s Victoria, so, yeah, formal attire.”
“Meet you back here in thirty?”
“See you soon.” Penny waved as we split off, her going right and me left, to our respective suites.
The lights in the living area were off when I entered the apartment Erik and I shared. The wallscreen was on but muted, and an overly made up blonde newswoman was front and center. Text, detailing the latest world news, scrolled beneath her image. In the upper right hand corner was a live action scene from Dublin, Ireland, according to the caption. A small girl was morphing into a hideous half-man, half-beast creature in the middle of a crowded street. The bystanders gaped in horror as, teeth bared, she advanced on those nearest to her. Thankfully, the clip ended before the carnage began. I didn’t need to see what came next to know.
No wonder Victoria is coming to kick our butts in gear, I thought.
If my nose didn’t deceive me, an enticing dark roast was brewing in the kitchen. The aroma drew me towards the back of the apartment. I could hear the faint drip of the liquid as it drained through the filter into the pot.
“Erik?” I called.
No answer.
“Erik?” I tried a second time, louder.
No answer.
I concentrated as I walked through the living room into the kitchen to pour myself a cup of coffee and could make out the sound of the shower running inside the master bedroom’s ensuite bathroom. I briefly debated joining him. Before, it would have been a no-brainer—Erik loved naked surprises. But between our impending meeting and his unpredictable moods, I didn’t want to take the chance. Instead, I fixed two mugs of coffee, complete with too much milk and sugar, and carried them into the bedroom.
When the water shut off, I was rummaging through my closet for something both clean and appropriate. As if on a switch, my stomach clenched and I braced myself for whatever version of my boyfriend came out of the bathroom.
Lavender-scented steam warmed my back when Erik opened the door. I took a deep breath and plastered on a smile before turning to face him.
Erik stood, framed in the doorway, his dark hair wet and messy. A fluffy white towel was knotted low on his hips, leaving his lean, muscular torso bare. The scars that blemished the skin there were always hard to see, but I’d come to think of them as simply another part of him. The steam misted around his perfect form, giving him the appearance of a god emerging from the smoke of battle. He was so beautiful.
Turquoise eyes lit up like fireworks when they landed on me and I relaxed. It was going to be a great day. Today he was my Erik.
“You’re beautiful,” he said, grinning in that lazy way that was so natural for him.
And just like that, I was living in the past again. I was transported back to when Erik had graced me with that same smile countless time a day, each one making me feel like the luckiest girl in the world.
Erik crossed the bedroom in four long strides, leaving wet footprints on the sleek white floorboards, and wrapped me in his muscular arms. I breathed in his scent, a mixture of my soap and shampoo, and his natural piney aroma. It was like a balm to my nerves.
“Careful,” I said, tipping my head back to give him a quick kiss, “you just got clean and I’m all gross and sweaty.”
Erik kissed me again and shrugged.
“I’ll just take another shower, with you.”
The huge smile on my lips was genuine now. He was definitely my Erik today, and in an unusually good mood.
“The offer is super tempting,” I said. “But we have a meeting with Victoria in half an hour.”
“No biggie, she loves me,” he replied flippantly, a mischievous look in his eyes.
Erik was right. For some reason, Victoria Walburton did love him. She treated him like a son, indulging his every whim and overlooking his occasional outbursts. It was funny, too, because Erik hated authority on principle, and acted accordingly. Yet snooty, impossibly proper Victoria had never taken offense or become irritated with the disrespectful behavior he was prone to in those situations. Truthfully, I think she found him charming. Which, of course, he could be.
“Right,” I said with a laugh. “Emphasis on you, buddy. Her feelings run a little colder where I’m concerned.”
As much as she loved my boyfriend, Victoria disliked me. Actually, it was more that she feared me, which made her mad at herself. I knew this not because she’d ever have admitted the truth, but because I’d read her mind. Erik and Penny were the two most dangerous Talents in the world currently, having been injected with so much of the Creation drug and so many different Talent Signatures. I was a distant third, at best. Nevertheless, Victoria considered me the largest threat. It bothered her how uncomfortable I made her, and for that she blamed me. She was a good, maybe even great, blocker. But the stress and fatigue that went with her job drilled holes in her mental walls, and I’d seen myself through her eyes.
Truthfully, I enjoyed how much the mere mention of my name irked the UNITED councilwoman. It gave me a heady sense of power. Still, I tried to stay off of her radar. I avoided interaction unless it was absolutely necessary, which was rare. There was a fine line between being powerful enough to be useful and so powerful that she had me contained. The latter was something I still feared. So I had to remain an asset.
“Fine,” Erik gave a tortured sigh, as if it had been eons since he’d seen me without my clothes, “Go shower alone. Later, though, you’re all mine.”
“Deal.”
After giving him one last lingering kiss, I headed to the bathroom.
“I’M READY,” TALIA announced, joining me in our suite’s kitchenette.
I gulped down the last of my coffee before placing the empty mug in the sink. Talia came around the counter and did the same
with hers, and then stood on her tiptoes to place a kiss on my cheek. My eyelids fell shut and I took a moment to savor the feel of her soft lips on my skin. Wrapping my arms around her waist to pull her closer, I had to suppress the urge to work my hands up under the hem of her shirt.
“Come on, we’re late.” Talia brushed a kiss across my lips before stepping back.
Inwardly, I groaned—she had no idea how much of a temptress she could be.
My girlfriend genuinely did not understand the effect she had on me. Insecure wasn’t an adjective usually associated with Talia. But I’d seen the part of her deep down that worried she didn’t measure up to my past girlfriends. That she was not sexy enough. That lying around our apartment in one of my tee-shirts and her workout shorts was inadequate as far as turn-ons went. That maybe she should sneak off during one of our missions on dry land to buy lingerie or at least more revealing pajamas. Which was all absolutely absurd. In reality, all Talia had to do was exist for me to want her, to desire her, to love her beyond compare.
Besides, she didn’t need to buy clothes to make me want her. I just wanted her to take them off.
Talia’s expression shifted under my gaze, her small smile fading and a crease developing between her brows.
“What?” she asked, self-consciously smoothing her silky blue tank-top.
“Nothing. Just thinking about how much better that outfit would look strewn over the bedroom floor.”
My comment was met with a dramatic roll of her velvety purple eyes.
“Has that line every worked for you? Seriously, has a girl ever stripped after hearing those words?”
“Too many to count, Tals. Too many to count.”
“Why does that not surprise me?” she asked with a laugh. “Well, Mr. Kelley, maybe if you’re lucky, you can add me to your list. You know, after Victoria bites our heads off.”
“How many times do I have to tell you? I’m very, very lucky.”
Blood rushed to her cheeks, the true meaning of my statement not lost on her. I loved when she blushed. It made me think of things that were inappropriate considering we were late for a serious, likely somber, meeting with our boss.
I took the black suit jacket Talia had resting over one arm and held it open for her to put her arms through the sleeves. My fingertips brushed the warm, lavender scented skin on the side of her neck as I smoothed the collar into place. Her pulse quickened, a fact I both heard and felt. Of all the abilities the Creation Drug had given me, morphing was my favorite because with it gave me heightened senses. Seeing my girlfriend in sharper focus, smelling the soap on her skin from across the room, hearing her heartbeat increase whenever I was in sight—those were all that kept me going some days. Damn I loved her. More than I’d ever realized was possible.
As I held the door to our apartment open, she ducked under my arm and brushed past me with an impish grin that made me groan again. Once we were in the hallway, I threaded my fingers through Talia’s, settling for handholding in lieu of the more interesting activities playing in my mind. Hopefully she didn’t have any plans for later.
Penny was waiting for us outside the door to her suite. One thin shoulder rested against the wall, a bemused smile toying with the corners of her mouth as she typed furiously on her communicator.
“Tell Brand I said ‘hi’,” I called in greeting, recognizing that look girls get when a guy they’re in to is comm’ing them.
Penny fumbled with the communicator, a crimson flush staining her cheeks the same color as Talia’s.
“Tell him yourself,” she called back. “He’ll be here later tonight.”
“Really?” Talia asked. “Why?”
Never good at hiding her feelings, my girlfriend’s disdain for Penny’s boyfriend, or whatever he was, was evident in her tone. Since Brand was only able to get away from his liaison duties once a week, and he’d been here just the other day, I was actually curious about the answer to Talia’s question. And, unlike Talia, I liked Brand Meadows. He was generally a standup guy. Though I wasn’t crazy about his attitude towards Talia, I made an effort to keep it light for Penny’s sake.
In a way, I guess the animosity between Brand and my girlfriend was understandable. Talia hated Brand for being such a jackass to her. And Brand was a jackass to Talia because he blamed her for Penny being caught and imprisoned. It wasn’t fair to put that on Talia, when it absolutely wasn’t her fault.
But I did understand his anger. We were all angry, for things that had been completely outside of our control.
I’d never pointed it out, I didn’t want to make the situation any worse, but by his logic, Penny’s actions had resulted in Talia becoming Director McDonough’s guinea pig. After all, Penny was the one to inform the Coalition of Talia’s mission to Nevada, the same mission that left her almost fatally wounded and in need of a blood transfusion. That transfusion was how Talia had been infected with the Creation drug. But I didn’t blame Penny, because it wasn’t really Penny’s fault. She had no way to know Talia would be shot on that mission, or that Donavon McDonough would go all white-knight and insist on giving her his tainted blood when the good, uninfected stuff ran out.
When it came down to it, neither of them was to blame for any of it. None of us were. It all went back to Danbury McDonough. He was a manipulative, destructive narcissist who’d played us all like pawns. And I’d made him pay for that.
Thankfully, it seemed like Brand was finally grasping the reality of the situation. The barbs he threw at Talia were no longer tipped with poison and wrapped in loathing. Secretly, I thought they’d both sort of gotten over their differences in the last few weeks, but persisted with the feud because they some got perverse satisfaction out of the continued bickering. My girl was nothing if not stubborn as all hell.
Penny’s voice pulled me out of my dark thoughts and back to reality.
“Not sure, honestly. But I think it might have something to do with why Victoria is here.”
It was startling to realize my mental tangent had only taken the moments between Talia asking a question and Penny’s reply. Having the ability to reason out the problems of the world in nanoseconds still freaked me out. I was a damn Brain.
“Interesting,” Talia commented, sounding bored with the conversation already, even though she’d been the one to ask about the reason for Brand’s visit.
For some reason, we were still just standing in the hallway. Penny was looking at her communicator and Talia was looking at Penny.
“So, as much as I enjoy the company of my two favorite girls, Victoria’s gonna freak out if we don’t get up there,” I reminded them, mollifying Talia with a kiss on the cheek.
She let out a sigh and reluctantly headed towards the elevator, with Penny and me following closely behind.
Instead of a conference room, Victoria was holding the briefing in a theater on sublevel one where films were screened. The wallscreen in the front spanned the entire width of the room. A sprinkling of comfy two-seater couches, beanbag chairs, and small tables provided seating areas for movie-goers. The size of the room and the ginormous wallscreen made it ideal for these depressing, supposedly-motivational gatherings. It was also the only room large enough to accommodate Victoria’s entourage along with the twenty UNITED agents stationed on Eden.
Not surprisingly, between the time Talia had taken to change her clothes three times and tame her curls, my reluctance to leave the apartment and end our quality time together, and dilly dallying in the hallway, we were the last to arrive. Henri Reich, my closest friend other than Talia, and his boyfriend, Frederick, were sitting on a loveseat near the back, laughing like hyenas. Janelle Longpre, a Coalition soldier who’d taken a temporary position with UNITED to help round up the Created, was at a table with two veteran agents. One was a dour woman from the Philippines named Gina, the other a quiet girl from Yugoslavia named Ronnie. If I remembered correctly, Gina and Janelle were suitemates here on Eden.
The rest of the taskforce had claimed the
beanbag chairs and appeared to have mastered the art of sleeping with their eyes open. Given the early hour, I couldn’t blame them. Victoria stood in the front of the room, head bent over a table as she typed angrily on her electronic tablet. Her head snapped up as Talia, Penny, and I entered.
“Good of you three to join us,” she said with a frosty smile.
I was in an unusually good mood, a rarity lately, so her bitchy attitude rolled right off of me. Talia, on the other hand, wasn’t feeling so generous. I squeezed her hand in warning, but that didn’t stop her retort.
“Maybe if you’d given us a little more notice, we’d have been on time, Councilwoman.”
Victoria’s eyes were chips of gold ice, her bright red lips curled into a snarl.
“I apologize, Victoria, it’s entirely my fault that we’re late,” I said calmly, offering Victoria one of my winning smiles. Like always, she ate it up. Her expression instantly morphed into a sheepish grin.
“That’s quite alright, Erik. If you three could take your seats?”
Without looking, I knew that Talia was rolling her eyes. My girlfriend was too stubborn to admit it, but she welcomed the verbal sparring matches with Victoria. They allowed her to blow off steam. Steam that really should’ve been directed at me.
Admittedly, I was having a hard time. Any natural reaction or emotion that I felt had been multiplied by a million because of the Creation drug. It was a nasty side effect of the unperfected formula they’d injected me with. My temper would flare over the most innocuous things, and I couldn’t stop it from overtaking me. Because of that, the second the slow boil began, I’d walk away from Talia, sequestering myself somewhere private before the anger bubbled over. Primal urges to lash out at anyone or anything in the vicinity swept through me, and I became blind with rage. The last thing I wanted to do was direct any of that at Talia, so I would just leave. Which was probably just as bad for her. But I didn’t know how else to handle it. When it came to the wild sensations that assailed me in an instant, I felt helpless. I was helpless.