Chapter 27

 

THERE’RE TIMES THAT even though I love Renee, she tests my temper to the limit. She’s fiery and feisty which I understand is part of her character. It makes her intense and amazing at her job. The fire drives her to do what is necessary but sometimes in the process, she can also drive me nuts.

After seeing what Frei went through when the girl fell, it didn’t take any kind of burden to understand that she felt every loss of a child deep inside. A couple of days after, even though Lilia had called her to tell her the girl was just fine, Frei was still suffering.

I decided, after a weird flash, to cheer her up by taking her a popsicle. The heat was beyond unbearable as it prickled my face as I walked. The ground shimmered with it, buildings too. Walking from the villa to Frei’s building had left me with sticky hands from dribbling popsicles.

There were four students left in Frei’s age-group due to “graduate.” They were busy doing something circus-worthy with their bodies as I headed inside. For somebody who couldn’t touch my toes, I was fascinated at how they could stick their legs over their heads. Nan had always said that if God had wanted her to touch her toes, He would have put them on her knees. I chuckled to myself at that as I stared at these contorted kids. I was fascinated and slightly creeped out.

“Is that for me?” Frei said to my right, making me jump and splatter drops from the icy treats all over the floor.

“Sure,” I thrust one dribbling excuse for a popsicle her way. “Catch it while it’s melting.”

Frei didn’t need asking twice. I’d never seen someone attack a frozen treat with such fervor. My flash must have been right.

“Is it a prerequisite for them to look like they’ve been shut in a suitcase?” I thumbed at the kids as she led me outside to the porch area.

Frei licked her stick clean. I handed her mine.

“You need to get into some tiny spaces.” She took my offered treat like it was treasure and grinned. “But that’s not what they’re doing.” She set about devouring the popsicle. “They’re doing Yoga.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Mrs. Stein went to yoga at the Scout’s Hall back home . . . I can’t see her doing that.”

The visual it provoked made me hope she didn’t either.

“Different levels,” Frei murmured between nibbles. “It’s good for your back. Keeping your spine healthy is key to your body being healthy.”

“My spine is happy holding me upright.” I shrugged as she chuckled. “Yoga looks like it’s for short folks.”

“You think?”

I nodded. I was sure. Small folks could reach their toes ’cause they were nearer to them. Mine were much further away.

“I taught them.” She finished the second popsicle and chewed on the stick.

“You exceed all expectations.” I shook my head at the stick in her mouth. “Next time though, I’ll just bring the cooler with me.”

“I’d give it my best shot.” She gazed out at the baking ground between her building and mine. “Before . . .” She smiled, let out a long breath, and shook her head.

“Tell me.”

Frei met my eyes, hers misting up. “You don’t want sob stories.”

“I do.” I leaned against the wall as she sat on the window sill. “I’d like to know more about you.”

Frei stared out at the buildings opposite. Her back rigid, her eyes intense. “We lived by the sea.”

“Sounds nice.” I’d never seen the sea.

She frowned as she replayed some memory in her head. “I was young. I can only remember snatches.” She frowned. Her blonde brow twitched. “A storm. Big one. Swept a whole load of people away.” She stared off into the distance. “They find a lot of slaves trawling after natural disasters, conflict zones. Easy to assume that the kids are lost.”

“You remember your parents?”

She sighed. “Don’t think life was easy.” She glanced at me. “One memory of them stuck.”

“I’m guessing that’s where your love of the popsicle comes in?”

Her eyes wrinkled up as she smiled. “My sister and I were with them. We sat on a pier. The wood was warm underneath my thighs, the sea was freezing on my feet. My mother had my sister in her arms. I sat beside my father.” Life shone through her, pulsed from her eyes. “We were eating these.” She flicked the stick with her finger. “My sister’s hands were covered with more of it than went in her mouth.” She laughed a laugh from somewhere deep inside. “I can hear my mother telling her that she was always covered in something.”

I smiled. I got the impression that Frei had tried to take care of her sister.

“Didn’t the storm . . . ?” I shook my head. “Sorry, forget I asked.”

“Same day.” Her eyes dimmed, the twinkle gone. “An hour later everything changed. I was holding onto my sister on our roof . . . or a roof . . . she cried. The water swept so much away.”

I put my arm around her and bumped my head to hers. Her voice showed that she’d accepted it some time ago but it was, and would always be, a scar on her heart.

“I can’t remember anyone calling us by name.”

I squeezed her.

Frei nodded. “My mother gave me her wedding ring that day. I used to wear it on a necklace.”

My eye was drawn to her left hand and the silver ring that seemed bonded to her. “You think she knew?”

Frei lifted her hand and flexed her fingers to make it glint. “It’s expensive. Why would you give a child your wedding ring?”

“That’s where Huber found you?”

“Rescue crew who sold us to Huber.” She stared down at the ring. “I tried to find out what would have made her leave, who she was. It was no good.”

It was an elaborate ring with markings I had no clue of what they meant. “Maybe someday you will find out more?”

I watched Jed wander past to my right from the direction of the dining hall. He spotted us and waved, not an ounce of teenage coolness in sight. I liked him.

“Huber doesn’t know. Even if he did, he wouldn’t tell me.”

I wanted to take the ring off her but I knew those burdens were gone too. I could’ve told her where she was from. Maybe I could help her find out.

“I will try again someday.” Frei raised her eyebrows at me. “You’ll all throw a party then. You’ll be Frankenfrei free.”

I sniggered at the nickname I’d given her. “Depends on if you stay the cool person I know now or you stick your walls back up.”

She sucked in a breath. “Sounded loaded, Lorelei.”

“It was.” I rested my head on top of hers.

I weren’t good at showing comfort to folks. I didn’t do physical affection but I could feel sometimes when somebody needed it and something told me, right now, she needed it. When I huddled in, it filled her with the reminder that she wasn’t alone. She didn’t have to fight alone. She was opening up, slowly, but I could feel her starting to trust me.

The more she trusted me, the more I could see past the ice. If that meant I had to hug her every couple of minutes to get her through this, I would. Anything to stop this place getting inside and tormenting her. She had friends. We were by her side.

“Renee, huh?”

I sighed. “Pretty much. It’s so hard to keep up with her moods since . . . well after Oppidum.” I closed my eyes, the cool shady porch lulling me into a doze. “I don’t know if she can stand the sight of me sometimes.”

“She’s been through a lot.”

I “mmmed” my agreement. “So have you, and you ain’t blowing hot and cold on me.”

“Different backgrounds.” Frei sounded as sleepy as I felt. “Don’t give up on her.”

I opened my eyes at that. “I didn’t say nothing about giving up.”

I smiled as Frei crinkled up her brow, confusion in her eyes.

“When I’m on your side, when I care, it ain’t easily changed.” I could see her warring with herself. Did she trust those words. Did she dare let me in. “I got your back.”

A barrier dropped and her eyes filled with warmth. She threw herself into a hug, knocking me off balance. It was like she thought I’d take it back or run.

“You’re something else, you know that?”

“Cozy.” Renee’s venomous tone made me look up. Her gray eyes narrowed, hands on her hips. Anger pulsed from her in waves.

Frei sighed and pulled away from me. She rubbed at her tears as if being given comfort was a crime.

“What’s happened?” I asked. Renee must have been worried or upset to act so strange. Her normal reaction would be to check why, to ask why I was comforting Frei and offer help. Was it her cover?

“Maybe I should be asking you that,” she snapped.

I folded my arms. Frei couldn’t even look at her. She stared at the floor. I wracked my brain, trying to figure out what Renee was so mad about.

Was it code?

Frei couldn’t ask her, she weren’t supposed to know her. She couldn’t look at her because she was staff. Renee must be trying to tell us something.

“Jed get your prize student drunk again, Worthington?” I shot her way in my best bored tone. Jed had been heading toward the gym so I couldn’t see how but maybe that would give her a place to start.

“Missing students,” she snapped back. Her entire focus was on Frei as if she wanted to flatten her just with her eyes. “Six gone from your group. Don’t think I didn’t notice the helicopter.”

I glanced at Frei whose eyes sharpened into chips of ice at the tone. Hurt and anger pulsed up from somewhere deep inside her. I looked from one to the other, not knowing what was going on.

“Why don’t you focus on your own failures, professor?” I hoped my tone told her to quit being so mean.

Renee rounded on me. Her intense focus, a wave of heat. “I don’t have the deputy principal drooling all over me. Maybe that’s why your kids are safe.”

Was she mad about the fact a madman was drooling over me? I was pretty sure she wouldn’t want him finding excuses to “drop in.”

Every day he found something to come and talk to me about. My group found it funny, I didn’t.

“No, but you’ve got the delightful Professor Smarmy to do that.”

Renee blinked a few times like I’d stunned her. “That’s what you think of me? A set of big eyes and I’m easy?”

Now I was confused. That sounded personal and my senses were sounding the alarm that she wasn’t talking as an agent now. What did she want? Why was she mad? Was she mad or pretending?

I needed my burdens.

I missed my burdens.

Did I ask her straight out what was bugging her so I could fix it? I glanced at Frei for help. Her angry bubbling look at Renee made me glad she weren’t armed. At least I hoped she wasn’t.

I’d missed a chapter somewhere along the line and ended up in a different book. I needed Nan. I needed my burdens. Normal sucked.

“I don’t know you, Professor Worthington,” I muttered, Nan would have told me what was happening. “You don’t know me.”

I pushed off the wall to straighten up. “If the deputy principal got better taste than you, what can I say?” I gave her, what I hoped, was an arrogant grin.

Frei’s eyes twinkled with unspilled laughter but Renee looked like she was gonna skew me any second. “Maybe he doesn’t realize how unavailable you are.”

Her blunt tone drove home the insult. Frei’s eyes hardened.

I stood there staring at her. That was way beyond cover. I’d told her stuff in my sessions back in Serenity. I’d told her, feeling vulnerable doing so.

I felt stupid for admitting it. I didn’t know if I could feel the way normal people did. I didn’t know if I was just picking up on what everyone around me felt. It made me feel stupid, inadequate, and made me feel three inches tall.

Anger rumbled up from below. She’d said some mean things but that was by far the worst. It hurt that she had said it. It hurt that she’d even thought it.

“Bite me.”

I stormed off, ignoring her shocked look, ignoring her attempt to grab for me.

Frei’s words not to give up on her rolled around in my mind.

Why did Renee have to be so mean? Why did she say stuff like that? Why was she so intent on pushing me away? What was the deal with her being such a jerk?

I stomped into the gym and over to the weights. She was being a massive jerk and I hadn’t done nothing to provoke it. I’d been a kicking post for most of my life but I weren’t gonna be no more.

For her, or anybody.

 

URSULA STOOD IN the shade of the porch, trying to control her temper. She had a very good idea why Renee just spewed so much venom. Ursula’s withdrawal to the side would have vindicated Renee’s ridiculous thought pattern.

This was madness.

Renee was getting more and more erratic not calmer and it all kept adding up as evidence that Ursula should have medically retired Renee after St. Jude’s.

She’d lost the ability to separate herself from duty and right now she had lost all sense of logic and reason.

“Are you going to try that with me too?” Her tone was cold, flat, and bored but she knew her temper would show through her eyes.

Renee was too busy staring after Aeron.

That’s right, drive her off, you idiot.

“Keeping your job may be difficult should you alienate the boss’s pet.” She hoped Renee would still remember that she was a CIG agent.

“Doubt you would be safe if the boss saw you digging your claws into her.”

There was jealousy, then there was insanity. Ursula would ignore them both, for now.

“I’d say that Samson’s actions would make anyone proud.”

Renee met her eyes but Ursula remained still, impassive, unmoved, at least on the outside.

“Paying for a girl’s medical bills in spite of the fact she knew her all of five seconds, I would say any boss would stand by her.”

Renee’s eyes widened. “She did what?”

“I failed.” Ursula’s voice was still calm and level. She slammed down the feelings bubbling to the surface. “She broke her neck.”

“Then why didn’t she just . . .” Renee shoved her hands in her pant suit pockets. “Do her thing.”

What did Renee think she was, a slot machine?

“Didn’t you see what happened to her the last time?” She blew out a breath. “Didn’t it drill some sense into that hard head of yours?”

“It doesn’t happen every time.”

Ursula pushed off the wall. “You’re an idiot.”

Renee’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, I am? Why? Because I’m not reveling in a return to my criminal past?”

Renee one-oh-one. When cornered, make everybody else feel like crap. “At least one of us remembers who we are.”

“Should I be checking my handbag?”

Rage ignited. Ursula slammed Renee against the pillar. Renee’s eyes widened. She had no idea just how strong Ursula could be when pushed.

Long, slow breaths. Ursula shut her eyes, trying to calm herself. She had to be the better person. She had to be the one to back off. 

“I have work to do. I suggest you do the same.”

She let go and turned back to the building. It was worrying how her temper had flared. Worrying that Renee had wanted to push her buttons.

“That’s it, walk away, you’re good at that.”

Ursula shut her eyes as she held the door handle. Renee was acting like a jealous, spoiled brat. She was no better than the hormone addled kids all around them.

She’d been as reasonable back then, before she wandered off into Yannick’s clutches. Hardheaded, immature, and spoiled. Ursula felt her jaw clench. 

“Get back to work, professor, before you find yourself looking for another job.” Her tone oozed the command and she knew Renee’s inbuilt reaction would be to obey.

If there was an agent still lurking under the chaos of hormones.

Ursula didn’t look back but strolled inside past the students still deep in their routine. She walked into her office and threw the sticks from the popsicles in the trash.

She was more irritated at herself than Renee. Irritated that Renee was being so clouded by . . . something . . . that she couldn’t see the truth anymore. Didn’t any of the things they’d been through tell Renee anything? What was her deal?

What was she jealous of anyway?

Ursula running off with Aeron?

It was nonsensical.

Was she that blind? Even if she did feel anything for Aeron in such a way, which was crazy, did Renee think she’d be that cunning, that cold?

What kind of a callous snake did Renee think she was?

Ursula slumped down into her seat. She shut her eyes, breathing through the hurt, the frustration. Emotions complicated things.

Emotional reactions were unprofessional.

She was the boss. She had to be better than that.

And . . . she’d slammed Renee up against a pillar.

“Not clever. Not freaking clever.” She shook her head at herself and pulled out her cell phone.

Renee was worried that she would “steal” Aeron’s affection. Why the stubborn pig-headed woman couldn’t see that Aeron had enough affection to go around, she didn’t know.

Ursula sighed, the lingering pulses of anger still thudded through her fingertips.

Renee was worried about stealing. Ursula tapped the call button and closed her eyes. Nice to know how much Renee thought of her.