Judgement 8 (Subject Alpha #1) (14 page)

I gasped, my fingers clawing at my skull with the pain scorching my head.

“Hold tight, El.”

I frowned, my mother’s voice penetrating the hum that accompanied the thousand wasps stinging my brain. I was tempted to scream but I relaxed instantly when a tiny hand lay on my cheek. “It’s okay, El. Wait.”

“Lettie?” My hope forced me to peel open my swollen eyes. Her beautiful face smiled at me. “Oh my God,” I breathed through the pain. “I missed you. I’m so sorry I left you.”

“You didn’t leave me.” She leaned forward and placed a kiss beside her hand, the softness of her lips sending a shiver of warmth through me. “You’re always in my soul remember?”

I smiled back at her but blinked when she grew serious. I felt the heat seep into my head so I opened to her despite the throb that made me feel nauseous.

“El.”

“What’s wrong, sweetie?”

I frowned at her hesitation.

“Nothing is wrong as such.”

“But?”
I urged her gently.

“Well . . . my Daddy is here.”

I pulled out, staring at her. “Really?”

Janice sighed heavily. “What have you been taught about Cognitive Interaction?”

I turned my head to her, finally acknowledging her. “In Judgement, CI is the only way to keep your guards from torturing us.”

She winced and lowered her eyes, nodding her head. “Yes. I appreciate that, but it’s dangerous. It isn’t because I don’t want you to have the connection with another.”

“What?”

She checked something on the monitor beside the bed, choosing not to look at me. “There’s lots you don’t know, Elina, lots of it from what I have led you to believe.” Her eyes found mine again. “You do know they monitor your brainwaves. And . . .” She tapped her teeth together as though it was painful for her to be truthful. “And they have a program that interprets all your CI conversations?”

“Oh my God!”

She nodded solemnly. “That’s the reason I wouldn’t allow it, because in those private conversations, you are more likely to reveal your secrets than when openly talking. And that, El, is very, very dangerous in the wrong hands. As soon as Reid connected with you, they pinpointed his unique indicator and that’s how they knew where you were. Why I had to send Ruben out to fetch you . . . before they did.”

“What the hell is going on?”

“That’s for another time, when you’re one hundred percent.” Janice turned to Lettie. “Honey, can you go tell your father that Elina is awake, please.”

I gawped at Janice. This wasn’t my mother. She was a clone. A
nice
clone. Something occurred to me. “You knew I wouldn’t die, didn’t you?”

She stilled as she prepped some syringes in the metal tray beside my bed. “I wasn’t sure but I figured it out the day you escaped.”

“How?”

She slid the tourniquet over my arm, tapping at a juicy vein she found. Eventually, she let my arm drop and sighed. “They flooded your chip that day, El. They found out about things and fried your processor. I didn’t realise until I found your faint signal the next day. I thought you had completely broken free. I hid it so they couldn’t trace you. But when you found Reid and he made a connection the night of the storm, your identifier fired up with his.”

“You mean they’ve been monitoring Reid all this time?”

She shook her head. “Not all the time. They can only track him when he links with another.”

“But.” I squinted at her. “If you weren’t tracking him, how did you know he’d been in my head if they weren’t monitoring me either?”

“Because he wasn’t the only one in there. When he made the join, another slipped in with him. They tracked you both through that connection.”

“What? Who?”

She quirked her eyebrow at me. “Blaine’s sister. Heather.”

THE DOOR OPENED, CUTTING Janice off when she was about to say something. My heart seemed to explode in my chest when my gaze found Reid staring at me, his face dark, as if he was brooding.

“Okayyy,” Janice muttered when she witnessed the same specimen as I did. “I’ll leave you two to it.”

Reid moved out of her way then closed the door softly behind him, his eyes never leaving my face.

“You’re okay.” Why did I always say stupid things? If he wasn’t he wouldn’t have been there glaring at me. I gulped when he seemed to grow angrier. “Is there something wrong?”

I backed up a little when he paced across the room, stopping by the edge of the bed, his chest heaving. My eyes widened when he leaned over me, scooped me into his huge arms and walked out of the room.

“What are you doing?”

He carried me through the house and into my childhood bedroom, and lowered me to my feet.

He stood close to me, his breath whispering over my face as his eyes scrutinised every pore, every contour and every inch. A breath left me when he reached up and softly cupped the side of my face, his eyes secured on mine.

“Before you blow anything up. Before anyone bursts in and threatens to kill us. Before that mouth of yours gets you into trouble and before you have the chance to overthink this and get a strop on.” He inclined further, the tip of his nose touching mine. “I’m going to strip you naked and worship every single glorious fucking part of you.”

I nodded, my throat making a funny sound when Reid brushed his lips across mine. His arms curved around me, clamping around my waist as his tongue followed the route of his lips and my legs decided to play silly games and go completely numb.

He scooped me up again and laid me gently on the bed that held so many memories. Now it would hold a new one. A good one that would bury all the bad ones.

He nudged my nose with his own as his lips swept over mine and I gave in, surrendering under him as my own lips parted and I kissed him back. He owned me, his dominance governing every single twist of our tongues, every single bite of lips, and each soft movement of our mouths.

His lips trailed kisses down my neck, his tongue following the ridge of my throat and circling around my Adam’s apple. A moan slipped free when his fingers found the gap between my top and sweat pants, the tips of them tracing the edge and dipping into my navel. I giggled, squeezing my eyes closed in embarrassment.

“You’re ticklish there, huh?”

I looked down at him and nodded. A wicked smile lit his face as his eyebrows rose high on his head. However, he suddenly grew serious, his eyes holding me in his before he leant down and placed a kiss where he’d tickled. He hooked his thumbs under the hem of my t-shirt and slowly gathered it upwards. When the material bunched under my breasts, I took it from him and peeled it off.

His gaze didn’t allow me to move my eyes from his as his thumbs stroked across my ribs, the tips off his fingers brushing the underside of my bra cup.

Reaching down, I snapped the front fastener, my heart racing under the touch of my own fingers as I pulled the lace aside and bared myself to him.

He groaned, briefly closing his eyes before he opened them and greedily devoured what I had exposed to him with just a look. I was on fire, the heat he generated from the awe on his face was mesmerising, holding me hostage under his intense perusal.

He dragged the tip of his nose up the centre of my body until his mouth found the dip between my breasts and then his tongue took over the exploration, its damp trail causing me to shiver when Reid’s breath wisped over it.

“Reid,” I breathed when his lips enclosed my swollen nipple and his tongue swiped across it. My back arched as I pushed myself against him, hungry for more.

He released my flesh and moved slowly across to the other one, his lips kissing their way across. “Your skin is so soft,” he whispered against me.

I gasped when his teeth grazed me. “Tesco peach bath foam.”

He paused, his forehead resting against the rise of my breast as he chuckled. “I’ll remember that.”

I nodded again. “99p.”

His eyes rose to mine, one of his brows elevated. “Elina, don’t be nervous. I won’t hurt you. Ever. We’re in this together. You don’t like anything,
anything
I do, then you tell me. Okay?”

I nodded again and smiled. “Okay.”

He locked my gaze for a few moments before his fingers hooked the waistband of my bottoms and he peeled them down my legs, taking my knickers with them.

I shrank back into the mattress with embarrassment when he slung them aside and knelt up at the bottom of the bed, his scrutiny slowly moving up my body and then back down. “My God,” he breathed. “You’re so beautiful.”

A blush swept from my toes to my hairline, my skin flushing under his idolisation. His eyes found mine and he smiled, a soft one that grew wider. “Are you panting, El?”

I smiled with his shortening of my name, happy he was comfortable enough to use it. “You’re wearing way too many clothes and I’m hungry.”

His eyes popped wide but a chuckle left him as he grabbed the hem of his shirt and lifted it over his head.

“Fuck!” I whined. “Now I’m hyperventilating.”

He laughed as my stare took in the glorious hard ridges that adorned his impressive torso. He was perfection enhanced. “You see.” I tipped my head and studied him. “You can’t be real. I mean, men like you, they only exist on magazine covers and . . .”

He fell on top of me, taking my words and consuming them as he devoured me with as much hunger as I had.

I moaned into him when his hand slid between my legs and he swiped a finger along my sex, making my pussy weep for him.

“You’re so hot,” he murmured when his long finger slipped inside me. He eagerly watched my pleasure as I stared up at him. “And so wet.”

The back of my head pressed into the pillow when he pushed in another finger and his mouth started another round of torture on my breasts. He fucked me slowly with his fingers as he teased my flesh with his mouth, and when he pressed his thumb against my clit, my back shot off the bed. “Oh Christ, Reid. I need you to fuck me.” I gasped at my own outburst.

“I want to feel your pussy feast on my fingers before you get my cock,” he replied from somewhere mid-portion of my body. He chuckled when his words had my walls twitching readily. “You like it dirty,” he whispered.

My body clammed up and I scrambled up the bed, my head shaking from side to side as I tried to push him back with my feet. “I’m not dirty, Reid. I’m not! I’m not!”

“Hey,” he urged softly as he clambered down to the bottom of the bed, moving away from me when he saw my distress. “I know you’re not dirty, Elina. I know you’re not.” His voice was so soft and his face so full of pain. “I won’t hurt you, baby. I promise.”

I sagged into the bed and covered my face with my hands. “I’m sorry.” I sighed, feeling utterly stupid.

“Don’t you dare say you’re sorry for what they did to you!”

My eyes snapped open and I stared at him. “How do you know?” My voice was quiet and tight, my throat constricting and making it difficult to breathe.

He lowered his eyes. “The night of the fire. You were having a nightmare.” He looked back up at me. “You were growing more and more unsettled and your energy was spiking.”

Realisation hit me. My stomach twisted and a sob tore up my throat. “Oh, God, no.” I shook my head, tears pouring from me. “Tell me you didn’t, Reid.”

“Elina . . .”

“TELL ME YOU DIDN’T LOOK!”

“Calm down,” he soothed but I could see it in his eyes, the reflection of my nightmare.

“No. No.” I was too ashamed to look at him. I clambered off the bed, pulling the sheet around my nakedness, fighting with the shame and mortification.

“Elina! Listen to me. I don’t see you any differently. All I want to do is kill all three of them! This is not your fault! It is NOT—your—fault.”

“No.” A quiet voice came from behind me. “It’s mine.”

I spun round. Lettie was standing there, her pale face streaked with tears, her wide grey eyes staring up at me.

“No!” I rushed over to her, kneeling down so I was on her level. “Don’t you ever think that!” I palmed her face, my thumbs desperately swiping at her tears.

Everything was spiralling out of control. Not five minutes ago I was caught up in the pleasure of Reid and now it was all burning to the ground again.

“But it is. You paid so they wouldn’t hurt me.”

“What?” Reid hissed out. I tensed but Lettie moved her eyes to him.

“They were cruel. El let them hurt her.” The sound of her heartbreak tore me in half. “She let them hurt her so they wouldn’t hurt me.” Her weeping was loud and as piercing as mine as I folded her in my arms and shushed her. “I’m so sorry, El. I’m so sorry.”

“Shush,” I whispered to her as I saw Reid move in the corner of my eye. “Listen to me, sweetie.” I lifted her face to mine, cupping her plump cheeks in my hands. “I would take the pain of a thousand deaths to protect you. You’re my sanity, Lettie. I would never have survived in there without you.”

“But . . .” she whimpered.

“Don’t you see? You gave me more than they took. Much more. They can never have my soul because you’re the angel that protects it. The angel that protects
me.
”

“I love you,” she whispered as her arms wrapped around me.

“And I love you, Lettie. More than life.”