Cheating Time (37 page)

After I'd ducked behind enough trees and
sneaked between almost every tent in the camp, I was sure I'd lost
them all. With the beginnings of a smug grin playing on my face, I
turned toward the forest. I planned to see if there was somewhere I
could go to be by myself.
Thinking is a basic
necessity.
Instinctively, I made a quick pivot and was
about to take off jogging toward the outskirts of camp when I ran
smack dab into a chest. It was one I knew well.

Jayden! Good Lord! This
day just gets better by the second, doesn't it?

"Carlie, what's wrong?" he asked, grabbing
me by the shoulders.

As soon as I got over the shock of
freefalling and then not hitting the ground, I realized Jayden had
saved me, that his hands were on me. I jerked away from him.

"What's wrong with me?" My laugh was
sardonic. "What's wrong with me… you have the nerve to ask?"

Every muscle in Jayden's face contorted from
worried concern to frowning irritation. "Yes. That's what I
asked."

"Could it have anything to do with the fact
that you've been manipulating and using me? You knew I liked you,
and you used that against me. I won't ever let you do that to me
again. Not ever. Now get out of my way," I said, pushing past him,
which wasn't nearly as simple as it sounded.

He was so hard and muscular that I might as
well have been pushing aside a carved marble statue. He didn't
budge.

"I'm not going anywhere until the two of us
talk. We can do it here, or we can find someplace a little more
private. That's your choice, but we are going to talk," he assured
me.

I shrugged. "I'm going for a run. Do
whatever you want."

With that, I took off. The one thing I
needed to do was build up my stamina. My earlier pretend run was
nothing more than a brisk walk. What I really needed was to run
away from all of this.
To run away from all of
these people.
Those last few days of recovery had done
nothing for making me stronger. I felt weaker than ever. Training
would be the only way to get my body back into shape.
And to forget.

* * *

I wasn't sure what the camp's parameters
were, but I didn't care either. If I went outside of them, would it
really matter? I had my own special, jackass Lead Surrogate Soldier
running beside me. We ran for what felt like hours. It wasn't like
running on a road or on a machine. This was up and down hills, over
logs, between trees, under limbs, over tiny brooks, and through
large creeks.

It was just Jayden and me. The more I
thought about what he'd done, the harder I pushed. The more I
thought about how much I missed Mom and Dad, the harder I pushed.
The more I thought about Gran and Tawney, the harder I pushed.

I didn't stop until the forest whirled and a
bout of nausea seized my stomach. It may have been early spring,
but the day was warm, especially when you considered the terrain
I'd been covering at brisk speeds.

I dropped to my knees and heaved. I bent
over and planted the palms of my hands on the forest floor and
threw up stomach acid until my toes curled and tears streamed down
my face.

"
Jesus,
Carlie!
Why did you have to push yourself so hard? Why
wouldn't you just stand still for one second and talk to me?"
Jayden seethed, rubbing his hand up and down my back.

Everything about his touch, his concern, the
fact that he was still with me made me want to turn toward him and
bury myself in his chest. I didn't, though. My heart wouldn't
betray me the way he had.

Soon, my retching stopped. When it did, I
sat back on my ass and scooted until my back was against a tree
several feet away from where I'd thrown up. Jayden slid down next
to me.

"I know you don't trust me. I know I've not
given you any reason to. Still, I want you to. I'm… I'm asking you
to. Everything I've been doing, I've been doing for the good of
Aspect Nation. It's not about you or me. It's about people that
don't have the same luxuries and freedoms you have, Carlie. You are
the one person in this world who I thought would understand that
sometimes there is a greater cause," Jayden said with the emphasis
and passion of a man prepared to change the world.

Jayden was a leader before he was anything.
I wanted to be on board with him because he was right. I did care
about the rights of those who'd had their freedom stripped away
because they were genetically altered Surrogates, or worse yet,
their lives stripped away because of a genetic anomaly passed down
to them by their parents. The problem was I was a teenage girl who
wanted the person she liked—
loved
—to care more about her than his cause.

It was with extreme guilt that I admitted
just that to myself. I knew I was being worse than the most
selfish, self-absorbed brat to ever exist, but that's what I wanted
because Tawney's books had taught me that true love was the kind
where two people are willing to put each other before anything and
everything.

Jayden had just freely admitted his agenda
was more important than keeping me in the loop or telling me the
truth. The fact that he saw nothing wrong with what he'd done and
showed no remorse painted for me a picture worth a thousand words,
and each and every one of them had the same underlying message:

Caution.

Hurt.

Betrayal.

Avoid.

Run.

Ignore.

Lies.

When I looked over at the beautiful man
beside me, I knew it would be easy for me to give in to him. Accept
him and his offer without the first ounce of hesitation and pretend
as though following him blindly was the right thing to do. It
wasn't for me. It never would be for me.

We would be equals, or we
would not be. He would put me before his cause, or his cause would
be all he had.

"I believe you, Jayden. I believe you did
whatever you did for the greater good."

His relief was evidenced in the smile he
offered and the lifting of his weighted shoulders.

"The problem is… I'm not okay with how you
went about it. Will I support you and your cause? Hell yeah! All
day. Every day. Will I follow behind you like a blind warrior who
is willing to take it on the chin the next time it's more
convenient for you to lie to me or manipulate me rather than tell
me what I need to know and give me the option of following along
because it's the right thing to do? Hell no! Not now. Not
ever."

Like the band holding it wide had been cut,
Jayden's face-splitting grin popped and turned into open-mouthed
shock.

"Don't look at me like that. You know me
better than that. I've never mindlessly followed your lead. What in
the round world would make you think I'd do so now?"

With a glare, he said, "I thought since your
father trusted me… since I care for… you. I thought all of that
would be proof enough for you that I'd only do things that are in
your best interests."

"Tell me this, Jayden. If my best interests
and the cause you've embarked upon were at odds, where would your
loyalty lie?"

"I don't answer hypothetical questions.
There's nothing to be gained," he said, swearing under his
breath.

"In other words, you're with me and you'll
fight for my best interests as long as you don't have to put your
plan for Surrogate equality on the line. Here's the thing… Jayden.
I get it. I understand it. Really, I do.

"The problem is I'm worried there's going to
be a day real soon when you're going to have to choose between me,
the original MicroPharm recipient, or your fight for Surrogate
soldiers. If this all gets as frenzied as I suspect it might,
there'll be fanatics who will demand that anyone—Mom, Dad, Gran,
Tawney, and me—associated with the Aspects and MicroPharms be
executed. When that happens… will you stand by and watch or will
you put the family who took you in, the people who've loved you
your entire life, before your cause?"

Jayden looked torn. Like a man who was being
ripped from the inside out. A long while later, too long for me to
believe him, Jayden whispered, "I'd never let anyone hurt you,
Carlie."

His words hurt. Not what he said, but rather
the reality that he'd merely
wanted
to believe them more than he actually did.

"Like I said… I'm there for you. I'll help
in whatever way I can, but I'm the only one who is looking out for
my best interests. For Mom's, Dad's, Gran's, and Tawney's best
interests. They need me, and for me, they are as important as any
cause.

"Without them, there's no cause worth living
for. If I didn't just hear where your loyalty lay, you easily would
have been included in my list of people I'd be watching out for.
Now I realize if the circumstances were right, it'd be you against
me. That hurts, but I'd rather know the truth than be blindsided,"
I said, putting my hand over his and patting.

I didn't want there to be hard feelings
between us. We'd known each other too long for that. There was only
one situation where he and I would be enemies. I didn't have to
pretend we were enemies on every front.

Jayden took my show of compassion, comfort,
and respite as a sign that he'd be allowed to be more to me. He
tried to intertwine our fingers at the same time he leaned over to
kiss me, assuming he'd still be able to hypnotize me with his good
looks, charisma, and strength. Instead of giving in to him, I
pulled my hand back and stood up before he landed anything more
than a brush of a kiss on my chin.

That's when hooting, howling, and hollering,
the kind that reminded me of Gran's black-and-white westerns when
cowboys and Indians were in the heat of battle, rose up behind
Jayden and me at the very instant a machete came swishing toward
Jayden's throat. He ducked in the nick of time, and it was in an
effortless way that made it seem as if he'd known at that exact
moment a blade was going to come out of nowhere and attempt to
behead him.

Either Jayden, a warrior who was prepared
for battle at all times, had heard their approach and expected the
attack, or his reaction time was shorter, swifter, and more
decisive than I could ever have imagined.

Before I could suck in a breath of
astonishment, Jayden gracefully jumped to his feet, chopped the
hand holding the machete, and punched the face of the man hooting a
bizarre war call, knocking him to the ground.

In this situation, there was no such thing
as unarmed or mercy. The derelict man sprawled out before Jayden
had tried to kill him. His fate had been sealed with that decision.
Jayden snatched the machete up and drove it deep into the man's
chest, stopping him mid-hoot as blood spewed from his bearded mouth
and nose like a fountain. The stranger clutched his chest like he
was desperate to seal the fatal wound and ebb the flow of blood
gushing from his chest.

Jayden was all Surrogate Soldier. He spun
around, wielding the machete in front of him and sizing up the
man's gang. The most dangerous of the remaining three was the
banshee woman who was charging Jayden and yelling, "ABOMINATION!
DIE!"

I observed from the side and saw when
Jayden's jaw clenched with her vow. As graceful and beautiful as
any avenging angel I'd ever imagined while reading Tawney's
paranormal romance novels, Jayden stood ready. Stood proud.

When the woman lunged toward the Surrogate,
he whipped the machete through the air before him—exactly where she
was flying—and watched as her stomach was sliced wide open. The
rain of blood splattering and speckling everything near the fight,
including me, felt surreal. I saw it. I felt it. I just couldn't
believe what was happening.

Behind the woman who was now falling to the
ground was a younger man. He couldn't have been any older than
Jayden. He glanced to his side as if trying to decide who would be
the next of them to attempt to murder the atrocity Jayden.

"You'll want to think a little longer and a
little harder before you try to take me on," Jayden warned.

When Jayden, the abomination in this
brainwashed man's eyes, spoke to him, his determination was fueled.
With the same battle cry the first man had bellowed and a gutting
knife in hand like the one Jayden used on the hog, the younger man
put himself between Jayden and the final member of their group.

He didn't sneak around or lunge toward
Jayden. The difference between him and the others was he was nearly
as graceful as Jayden as he danced toward him and his confiscated
machete. The grin the man brandished was almost as sadistic as
Jayden's weapon.