Cheating Time (32 page)

So I won't be embarrassed
as you see my battered and bruised body for what it really
is.

So the earlier and much
kinder butterflies won't come back for a visit.

So I won't be reminded how
unbelievably gentle you are when you touch me.

Thorne's response came in the form of
action. He lowered my gown after giving me another sheet to hold up
so I could make sure my body remained covered and I felt
respected.

I didn't need to look down to know what he
found. Like every other MicroPharm recipient, I had a dime-sized
nodule right above my heart. Beneath the skin was a port-a-cath
where the MicroPharm particles could be injected. From the device,
they would travel to the MicroPharm, where, when necessary, they
could be combined and customized in a way that kept my body in the
perfect state at all times.

Decades ago, drugs were compounded one type
at a time and administered orally or through individual injections.
Now, all of the components for every drug known to man existed in
the form of microparticles that could be mixed together and
injected at regular intervals. Depending on the circumstances and
illness, the particles required to resolve the symptom/illness—as
choreographed by the MicroPharm chip's readings and
diagnoses—combined and were released directly into the veins using
a gel-like dissolvable capsule called a MicroShip.

MicroShips were important when it came to
shuttling and releasing the drugs exactly where they needed to go.
Again, Mom and Gran thought of everything and knew how important it
was for a drug's distribution to be as precise as possible. The
MicroShip gave them the ability to ensure the drugs targeted the
cells or organ with the precision never seen before MicroShip's
invention and in such a perfect way that pharmaceutical side
effects were minimized.
Quite nearly
nonexistent.

As if he'd heard the plea in my voice and
his only goal in life was to make me happy, Thorne finished the
refill and the virus scan in record time. I wasn't sure Mom, the
device's inventor, would have been able to beat him in a timed
race. Afterward, he pulled my gown back up and tied it around my
neck.

"Done. That wasn't so bad. Was it?"

I rolled my eyes. "No. I've already told you
you're good at this. You've just proven you're the best at refills.
Maybe even better than Mom," I admitted.

"You're kidding me?" Thorne asked,
surprised.

"Yes, you are. I'll have to tell her next
time I see her. I really mean it. Thanks. You made this as painless
as possible. I appreciate it."

This time, Thorne laughed thoroughly.
"You're welcome, Carles. Though… I'd prefer something like
you're wonderful with your hands
,
or
you're the best doctor I've ever let lay
hands on me
, or
Thorne, I'm
eternally in love with you after that examination. Can I have your
baby?
Really, any of those responses would have been
sufficient."

There was something hilarious about the
reserved doctor before me insisting I praise him like a god and
that I—
cough, cough, cough
—beg him
to let me have his baby that struck me funny. Like him, I laughed
out loud.

"In your dreams," I said, shaking my head
and pushing him away from me so I could hop off the stretcher.

He grabbed my hand in his and squeezed it to
his chest and said, "Yeah, for the last four days, that has been my
dream."

"What's going on here?" Jayden's thunderous
voice ripped through the tent and uprooted our good-natured kidding
with enough force to remind me that Thorne's flirting with me was
dangerous for him. Jayden could kill him in an instant.

"
Damn
Surrogate
," Thorne mumbled under his breath.

Thorne saw in my eyes that I was pulling
away from him and fought against the distance I was making between
us by squeezing my hand tighter before finally relinquishing it. I
spun toward the screen, poked my head around it, and sang, "We're
done here. I'm going to slip my clothes back on, and I'll be
out."

Thorne popped around me. "Yeah. We're
done."

The way he said it was anything but light
and airy. On purpose, he made it sound like there was more going on
than there was.

"I'll be back," he muttered as he headed
toward the door of the tent.

I stared at his back and then the door,
trying to understand what I'd done wrong and why he couldn't accept
me as a friend, why things had to be so complicated with him.

Our parents did a
disservice to both of us.

Jayden interrupted my thoughts. "That gown
can be used as pajamas. Why do you need to change, Carlie?"

Self-conscious, I glanced down. "It's too
thin, and it's kind of itchy. I'd rather have my clothes."

"Well, hurry up. I'm ready to get some
rest," he said, walking over to my cot and, as promised, spreading
his sleeping bag out next to where I'd be sleeping.

For no reason in particular, I took my time
changing from the gown and into my supply tent-issued clothes.
After I'd finished, I came around the screen only to find Jayden
staring open-mouthed and flushed toward the screen behind which I'd
just been changing.

It took me less than a second to put two and
two together. "Were you watching me, Jayden?"

Jayden's face burned a brighter red. "I-I
didn't mean to. I was getting ready for bed when your silhouette
caught my eye. Before I knew it, I was watching you get dressed.
Your shadow getting dressed," he corrected. "I shouldn't have. I'm
sorry."

I had to giggle at my Surrogate. Only he, a
man who was barely twenty, would be blushing and apologizing for
doing something that equated to nothing more than him seeing a
silhouette getting dressed.

"What's so funny?"

I shook my head. "You. You do know you
weren't really watching me get dressed, and I'm not offended,
right?"

He tugged me toward him, "If you knew what I
was thinking while I watched you… how hard it was for me not to
step around that screen and watch you get dressed for real, you'd
be a little less giggly and a lot more offended."

"It's a good thing you stayed on this side.
If you'd have come around there with me—which by the way, I'm not
sure I'd have minded—you'd have had your fantasy destroyed. I'm
covered in bites that will leave very real and very permanent
scars. I'm not sure I'm ever going to go out in anything that
doesn't completely cover my arms and legs," I admitted, trying to
sound like my disfigurement wouldn't bother me. The way someone
real brave would.

Jayden wasn't fooled. He intertwined our
fingers and kissed the back of my hand. "Of course you will, and
you'll still be the most beautiful woman in the world."

Before this week, Jayden had never really
been anything but sarcastic to me. I was still getting used to the
man before me, whose kindness made my stomach flutter and my heart
burn.

"True or not, thanks. It means a lot coming
from you."

"I'm the only person those kinds of things
better be coming from." Jayden snarled while looking toward the
door like he dared Thorne to show his face in
his
infirmary.

"Don't worry about that. There are few men
who will want the damaged and scarred woman standing before you
today. I mean, the entire Aspect Society is built on perfection.
I've never tried to claim that before. Now, I couldn't if I wanted
to."

"It's a flawed way of thinking, and you know
it. Look at Rorie. She's no less of a person and she deserves no
less than anyone else, but if it weren't for Thorne, she'd be in a
home for genetic mutations."

"I know," I said, shrugging my shoulders.
"It is what it is. People can accept me or not. I bet you anything
Tawney would trade my scars for her disease if I asked. Right now,
she's more important to me. I haven't heard from her or Gran.
Tomorrow, we need to see if we can get word on them."

"We will. I promise. Now let's get some
rest," Jayden said, pulling me toward my cot.

A few minutes later, I was tucked under the
blanket and Jayden was lying as close to my cot as he could get.
Surprising me thoroughly, my Surrogate Soldier turned toward me and
hooked his pinky with mine.

Joined together, he and I fell asleep
minutes later.

* * *

Wop! Wop! Wop!
Wop!

"What the hell!" Jayden said, popping up and
putting himself between me and the door that was blowing into the
tent like a tornado had just hit the campsite.

Thorne jumped up from this cot just a few
feet away from my own at the same breakneck speed. He looked toward
Rorie, who was sitting up and shaking like a leaf, like he wanted
to go to her. To take care of her.

As if he and I'd known each other our entire
lives, I understood exactly what he needed. I darted over to Rorie
and put my arm around her shoulder.

"Go. I've got her. Go with Jayden," I
shouted over the roar of the wind, ignoring the whipping of hair
against my face.

Thorne nodded. "Rorie, stay with Carles
until I come back to get you. Don't leave her side. Do you hear
me?"

He waited for Rorie's stupefied nod before
following in Jayden's wake.

"What is it, Carles? What could it be?"
Rorie asked.

Similar to when she was tired, she was too
scared to articulate her words in the perfect manner Thorne had
trained her to use. Her words were loud and thick, and I didn't
care. I was just as frightened as she was.

"I don't know, Rorie. Thorne and Jayden will
find out for us," I consoled, kissing the top of her head and
stroking her hair.

Wop! Wop! Wop!
Wop!

I knew as well as Jayden and Thorne that the
noise was that of rotating drone blades. What none of us could
explain was the sheer number of drones invading the camp. There was
an entire army of them. My heart raced. I was sure this had
something to do with Jayden and me, but Mom and Dad had led me to
believe everything was fine, that they'd smoothed over their
sabbatical from Barone, an act that might be viewed as treason by
some, and told me I'd even be going to the preparatory academy from
camp.

Barone never forgives or
forgets. I know that. Why don't my parents?

I squeezed Rorie tighter and listened,
hearing little over the drones' blades. As if they were all
magically turned off at the exact moment, the forest went silent
and the gusts of wind died down.

When it did, I heard Jayden say, "President
Barone, we didn't expect you, sir."

Dammit! I knew
it.

"Surrogate St. Romaine. It's my
understanding you're the one to thank for saving Carlie. I'm not
sure I, her parents, or Thorne, her fiancé, will ever be able to
thank you enough, son," Barone said, and his every word was as
sugary sweet—
frighteningly
malevolent
—as the Child Catcher from
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
. I'd been traumatized for
months after watching the old show with Gran, and to this very day,
I wondered what kind of people thought it appropriate for
children.

Every single time I laid eyes on President
Barone, I was reminded of the Child Catcher. Because I'd known
Barone my entire life, I'd equated the two instantly. I'm not sure
why, because the Child Catcher had a long, thin face, bags under
his eyes, and caricature-like cheeks, nose, and lips. Barone was
anything but bizarre-looking. He held the perfect features of a
politician. He was the kind of person that people voted for because
of his charisma, charm, and wit.

The most important similarity between the
Child Catcher and Barone was the way the Child Catcher lured the
kids in with promises of sweets, treats, and candy, only to pull it
back, kidnap them from their parents, and leave them locked in a
cell.

President Barone had always brought me
something sweet: a bouquet of head-sized lollipops, a bucket of
bubble gum, or entire vanilla cakes.
I refused
to tell him chocolate was the only kind of cake I ate.
Unmarried and childless, Barone was always trying to lure me into
his world and make me believe I was his favorite girl.
His special little girl.

For my parents' sake, I always went along
with Barone's antics and let him lavish whatever attention he
wanted on me, but my every instinct demanded I stick close to my
family and that I never let him get me alone, because I was sure if
I were ever left alone with him, I'd be as doomed as the children
who'd taken the Child Catcher's candy.