Tainted Hearts (13 page)

Sydney shook her head. “I don’t take candy
from strangers. You’re acting like I’m ten.”

“These are evil people, Sydney. You have to
understand how serious this is.”

“PURE bad. I get it. Go save the world.”

The newscast resumed and Tuesday scrubbed
her face with both hands. Had it just been coincidence or had Job
made the connection?

Does everything have to be about you?
She sighed and picked up her mug of wine. Sydney was probably
right. She was being paranoid.

The doorbell chimed.

“If it’s Bettencourt, I’ll kill him,” she
muttered, pausing the television with a voice command.

She activated the security screen and her
heart lodged squarely in her throat. Even rumpled and fatigued,
Marc took her breath away. She blinked several times and looked
again. He was really here.

But why? How had he known where she
lived?

The second question was self-evident. Marc
had been spying on her. Marc, General Bettencourt and maybe even
Job. The technician who swept her apartment had been driven to
laughter by the number of recording devices he’d found in her
humble abode. She hadn’t been amused. She’d felt violated and
queasy. Had the technician found them all?

Marc rang the bell again.

Still, Marc’s spymaster tendencies didn’t
explain his presence at her apartment.

She splayed her hand against the door,
wishing she could reach through the wood and touch him like she did
in her fantasies, anywhere she pleased. Her fingers tightened on
the handle of the coffee mug. Why was she still holding it?

Rapping his knuckles against the door, he
called out, “Tuesday?”

If she ignored him, would he go away?

“I know you’re in there. If you don’t open
the door, I’ll let myself in.”

She glanced down at her clothes and groaned.
If this wasn’t the height of “dowdy spinster”, nothing was. After
sliding the bolt, she opened the door just far enough to reveal her
face. “Mr. Sinclair.”

“Ms. Fitzpatrick.” He mimicked her serious
tone, then grinned, ruining the effect completely. “Are you going
to let me in?”

“I wasn’t planning on it.”

He laughed. “You’re nothing if not candid.
May I please come in for a few minutes? I’d like to finish the
conversation we started this morning.”

She eyed the duffle bag tucked under his arm
suspiciously. “What’s with the overnight bag?”

“Laura brought me a change of clothes but I
was holding out for a shower.”

“Is there something wrong with yours?”

He put his forearm on the doorframe and
leaned toward her. “I’m tired and grumpy. All I want is a shower.
I’m not here to have my wicked way with you, unless my wicked way
is what you want. So, open the door and let me in.”

“My, Grandma, what big teeth you have.” She
stepped back, allowing the door to swing inward.

“My shuttle is still at the lodge and my
house is across town,” he explained. “I didn’t want to be that far
from Elise. If you really mind, I’ll check into a hotel long enough
to shower but I’m heading back to the mediplex so I didn’t see the
point.”

“How is Elise? Vonne updated me before
leaving for the day, but I haven’t checked her stats yet this
hour.”

“You can monitor her vital signs from here?”
He set the bag down and rolled his shoulders.

“Not exactly. A summary report is sent to my
terminal every ten minutes. It’s not a blip-by-blip transmission.
I’m just a spectator at this range.”

“Understood.”

His brows drew together and she followed the
direction of his curious gaze. “It’s wine. Would you like
some?”

“Do you always drink wine out of a coffee
mug?”

She shrugged. “I drink coffee so often I
guess I just reached for a mug instinctively. You can have yours in
whatever you like.”

“Really?”

Sensual challenge mellowed his tone and
gleamed from his gaze. Tuesday shivered and glanced away. “So long
as it’s in my cupboard,” she clarified.

“But that takes all the fun out of the
offer.”

“How about that shower?”

He retrieved the bag from the floor and
followed her to the bathroom. She handed him a towel and left him
to his own devices.

Collapsing onto the sofa, she rested her
forearm across her eyes. The muted hiss of the shower announced the
beginning of her torture. He was naked! She could picture his
well-defined, muscular body standing beneath the water’s spray.
Rivulets following each rippling contour…

She wanted to be in there with him. She
wanted to rub her hands all over that toned body and feel him wrap
himself around her. As if summoned by her longing, the image formed
within her mind. She saw her soft, round body arching against him,
pressing against him. He grasped her hips lifting her…lifting her?
Yeah, right. She opened her eyes and sat up.

Better stick to reality, Tuesday
.
At least while the subject of your fantasies is in the same
house. Didn’t the lodge teach you anything?

The bathroom door opened and condensation
rolled out into the hall. She smiled. He liked his showers hot.

Hair slicked back from his angular features,
eyes promising trouble, Marc strode out into the hallway wearing
only a pair of jeans. He had the towel draped around his neck and
held a T-shirt in one hand, but his torso gleamed damp and
glorious. Tuesday quickly averted her gaze. It didn’t help. His
image was imprinted, in vivid detail, upon her mind.

“Can I see the latest report on Elise?”

She wasn’t sure what she’d expected him to
say but that wasn’t it. “Sure.” Her voice squeaked and she wanted
to die. She was alone with Marc again and he caught her in flannel
pajamas. Shuffling her wool sock-covered feet, she led him to her
office. She’d never felt less attractive in her entire life. She
brought the current report on screen and moved out from behind her
desk.

Without bothering to sit, he scrolled
through the report as well as the two before it. “Thanks. Now I can
concentrate entirely on our unfinished business.”

Burying her hands in the pockets of her
pajama bottoms, she dragged her gaze away from his muscular chest.
Her imagination hadn’t done him justice. “If we’re…” She crossed to
the doorway, softly clearing her throat. “If we’re going to talk
about PURE, I’d appreciate it if you put on your shirt. I’m not
accustomed to—”

“Tuesday.”

She looked up in time to see his damp towel
come hurling toward her face. She snatched it out of the air and
watched as he shrugged into the snug T-shirt. That wasn’t a whole
lot better. She could still see every bulge and ripple. Damn, the
man had a spectacular body to go with that too perfect face.

“You weren’t scowling while my shirt was
off,” he pointed out with a throaty chuckle. “Are you sure you want
me dressed?”

“What I want…nothing seems to be about what
I want. You wanted a heart for Elise, so you used me to get one.
Now the president wants his daughter rescued from Job and again,
I’m a means to an end. Tell me what I need to know about PURE. Why
do they want you dead?”

He leaned against her desk, his hands
resting lightly beside his lean hips. “One has nothing to do with
the other. Has any of your contact with Job been interactive?”

“No. He sent me several messages, some video
files and other information. I’ve never spoken with him
directly.”

Glancing at her workstation, he asked, “Did
you save any of his messages?”

“Yes.” She eased around him and slipped onto
her desk chair. Accessing the three messages she’d received from
Job, she brought them to the screen in chronological order. “Is
that really him?”

They looked at the motionless image on her
screen. His silvery-blond hair hung to his shoulders, while silvery
blue, star-imprinted eyes stared back at them. “That’s the man who
calls himself Job, the founder of PURE, yes. Who he really is, I
couldn’t say. He’s a phantom, a wraith. He didn’t exist five years
ago.”

“Did anyone suspicious disappear at about
that same time?”

His gaze clouded and his eyes narrowed on
the screen. “Who’s to say? Thousands of people disappear every day
and millions were dying when Job first emerged.”

“My sister called just before you got here.
A PURE recruiter was at her office. Do you think they’re… How
worried should I be?”

“That depends on your sister. Is she liable
to be swayed by their song and dance?”

“Sydney has always felt cheated by life in
general and me in particular,” she admitted in a hushed, regretful
tone. “If I understand how they work, she’s ripe for
recruitment.”

He paused, his gaze clouding with
speculation. “I’ll have my security team assess the situation.”

“She can’t know I had her assessed. She’d
never forgive me.”

“I’ll make sure they understand discretion
is the operative word.”

“Thanks.” A moment passed in strained
silence as she thought about PURE. “What did Bettencourt mean about
Emma’s statement to the press? Did that have something to do with
PURE or was the general just rattling your cage?”

He crossed his arms over his chest and
tilted his chin. “Do you have a photographic memory?”

“No. It just made you furious. I figured it
had to be important.”

“Not important, damning.” He heaved an
irritated sigh and pushed away from the desk. “When Emma took her
life, we—my father and I—did everything in our power to minimize
the scandal. The Methuselah trials had just begun and the epidemic
was at its worst. Everyone was looking for a rock to throw and any
reason to throw it.”

“I remember the trials, but I don’t
honestly… Wait a minute…”

In a sickening rush, it all came back to
her. His wife had intentionally overdosed on Methuselah and
recorded her death as a sick sort of suicide note. No one was sure
if she intended for the file to be circulated but it ended up on
NewsNet. Over and over the revolting images of that poor woman,
contorting with seizures and drowning on her own blood as her
circulatory system dissolved, had been broadcast for weeks. All the
while her voice berated her husband for the evil he had unleashed
on the world.

She swiveled to face Marc but he’d left the
office.

She found him in the living room, stuffing
his dirty clothes into the duffle bag. “I’m so sorry, Mr.
Sinclair.”

“Stop calling me that! I’m not your boss.”
He jerked the zipper and threw the bag into a nearby chair.
“Everyone blamed me for Methuselah Syndrome. How could they not? My
team developed the formula. But Emma lashed out in a way I wasn’t
prepared for. Her rating was 6.1 but her symptoms could have been
controlled with medication. Still, she said she couldn’t watch her
baby die. Elise was sentenced to a slow, painful death because of
me, and Emma was…she wasn’t strong enough to stick it out.”

Unable to stop herself, Tuesday went to him,
wrapping him tightly in her arms. “It wasn’t your fault.”

He pushed her away. “It
was
my fault;
it was all my fault! And I’ve worked damn hard to undo as much of
the damage as I can. I don’t make a penny off the SP-64 cocktail.
It’s my way of…” He closed his eyes, his hands still on her
shoulders. She felt his fingers tighten painfully and then
gradually release. “I had nightmares for years, and then you
released the SP-64. Guilt was eating me alive, but you gave me
hope. You didn’t put one of those crazy things inside my chest, but
you may as well have. My heart didn’t start beating again until
Methuselah babies stopped dying.”

His eyes opened and Tuesday sank into the
intensity of his gaze. Did he really mean it or was this just
another—she stopped herself. He had no reason left to manipulate
her. She was the one who needed him.

“We’re really close to a treatment. That’s
what I thought would save Elise. But she ran out of time before we
could perfect the formula.”

“Who else knows about the treatment?”

“No one outside the research team. We don’t
want to give anyone false hope. But it will happen. It’s only a
matter of time.” He grinned. “I’m doing my best to put you out of
business, sweetheart.”

“Could that be why PURE wants you dead? If
you eradicate Methuselah Syndrome, Job’s principles lose all
appeal.”

“I don’t want to talk about PURE.” He
brushed the backs of his fingers against her cheek. “In fact, I
don’t want to talk at all.” Reaching for the buttons on the front
of her pajamas, he started a slow advance.

She backed up, bumping against the wall. He
was serious! Despite her frumpy appearance, Marc wanted to make
love to her.

His clever fingers had her top unbuttoned
before she could accept the reality. His warm hand cupped her
breast and heat sank deep into her body, awakening dormant
longings, stirring forgotten sensations.

“Are you sure?” she whispered.

He smiled into her eyes. “Am I sure? Good
Lord, Tuesday. How can you doubt that I want you? I’ve been trying
to seduce you since I laid eyes on you.”

She stiffened against the wall. “But that
was—”

“I want you and I’m about to show you how
much.”

Marc left her silly pajama top on, while he
reached beneath and unfastened the bottoms. He knew she was
self-conscious about her body, so he’d take it a step at a time.
Before the night was over she’d be naked and loving it, but he
could be patient for a while. Sliding his hands gently along her
hips, he rid her of the pajama bottoms.

He bent to one knee and tugged off her
socks. “Can’t you afford heating?” he teased, as he tossed the
thick wool to one side.

“My feet are always cold.”

“You just need someone warm to rub them
on.”

She smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Pushing back to his feet, he parted the
pajama top, creating an unexpectedly sexy display. Black panties
showcased her long, shapely legs and rounded hips, while the top
framed her lush breasts. Her thick hair curled about her shoulders,
not quite long enough to interfere with his view. “You are so
beautiful,” he said in a harsh whisper.