Chapter 8

“Laura! It’s Blake.”

Laura squeezed her eyes shut at Blake’s announcement. Now, Rinehart knew her secret. She had known who was on the other side of the door before she should have. She hadn’t made a stupid slip like this one since the fifth grade when she’d told her teacher, Ms. Wilkens, that her husband had been in a car accident only seconds after it happened. She remembered that day clearly, and not because of the shock on her teacher’s face, but because of her father’s wrath when he’d come to clean up her mess.

Since then, not one slip had occurred—until now. And, damn it, Laura didn’t know how to explain her screwup any more than she knew how to explain why she had not only let Rinehart kiss her, but damn near invited him to strip her naked.

Another knock jolted her out of her reverie. “Coming!” she shouted automatically.

Rinehart stared down at her, his arms framing her upper body. “Can you have him come back later?” he asked, no doubt because he wanted to discuss her slipup. Or maybe he wanted to get naked. Neither seemed a smart choice at this point, though the idea of being intimate with this man certainly had her body sizzling.

She rejected his suggestion as firmly as the heat swirling in her core would let her. “He’ll think something is wrong. I never send my kids away.” He nodded his understanding, but made no effort to move from on top of her. He was making her insane, messing with her head. Stealing her sense of control! She shoved at his unmoving rock wall of a chest and glared up at him. “Get up,” she ordered.

Piercing determination glared in his eyes. “Not without one last kiss.” And before she’d registered his intention, his lips brushed hers, a fleeting moment of fire before his mouth was near her ear. Wickedly warm breath tickled her neck before she found out his true intention, which was not the kiss—it was a message. “Don’t respond to what I am about to tell you,” he warned, his voice low, barely audible even spoken this close. “Walch has the place bugged. I’m here to get you off this island, Laura, but you must do exactly what I tell you, when I tell you. Meet me at the north docks in an hour. We can talk there.”

His head moved away, eyes latching on to hers, a silent question bordering on demand in those rich blue eyes. His steely body unmoving, telling her without words he would not let her up until she agreed to his request—or rather, demand.

With a sudden claustrophobic need to be free, she nodded, her voice lodged in her throat like her breath, the implications of his words rattling her inside and out. Only minutes ago, she’d nearly told Kresley of her escape plan—thank God she’d followed her instincts.

The instant she signaled her agreement, Rinehart’s big, warm body lifted off of hers. He towered over the couch, offering her his hand. His eyes brushed her bare legs; her skirt was still practically at her waist.

She shoved it down and pushed to her feet, ignoring his hand and the hot look on his handsome face. Her mind raced and her heart pounded as if it might explode from her chest. Who was this man? And did she dare believe he was here to help?

Smoothing her palms fretfully over her wrinkled skirt and wild hair, she realized there was no hope of figuring out answers to the millions of questions in her mind before answering that door, nor was there any way to fix her frazzled attire. “He’s going to know that—”

“—you’re human?” Rinehart offered softly, standing beside her, far closer than she expected. Her chin tilted upward, her skin warmed where it already tingled from his touch.

Another knock, but she didn’t respond. She stood there, feet planted, staring at Rinehart, seeing an offer of support and comfort in his expression—comfort that he didn’t understand couldn’t be found. Not by her. Was she human? Yes. Average, no. And that changed things. But he wouldn’t understand what that meant. How could he? Only a short time ago, she’d almost confessed her escape plans to Kresley. She’d slipped and shown one of her abilities to Rinehart. She was losing her edge, and it was going to get them all hurt. And the only common denominator to all this mess was Rinehart. The faster she got away from him and cleared her thoughts, the better.

She inhaled and rushed to open the door. The minute she pulled it open, Blake started talking. “I was starting to worry. You took forever.”

“Sorry. I was loading the dishwasher, and my hands were wet.” It was a lie, but a well-intended one. An idea dawned on Laura. “I know you worry about Kresley, but she’s fine.” She forced a smile. “I knew it had to be you before you said it was.” She’d long ago figured out his schoolboy crush on Kresley.

Blake blushed. “Oh, ah, yeah. How is she?” He stepped forward as she eased the door back. His tennis shoes moved soundlessly forward, his blue sweats, T-shirt and rumpled dark hair accenting his youthful, frazzled appearance.

“She’s sleeping and she’s fine,” Laura reported, hopeful that Rinehart was buying her trumped-up reason for expecting Blake at the door.

“Good,” Blake said, sounding distracted. “I…Good. That wasn’t actually…” He stopped talking, pausing inside the door, his gaze catching over her shoulder where she knew Rinehart waited. “You have company.” His gaze swept her bare feet and rumpled attire.

Laura ground her teeth against the embarrassment seeping through her. Were her lips swollen? Her makeup smudged? How obvious was it she’d been lip-locked with a man Blake knew she’d met only hours before?

“I do,” she said, trying to sound lighthearted as she sidestepped to motion to her “company.” “You remember Rinehart?”

Blake looked exceedingly awkward. “Yes. Hi.” He lifted a hand to wave at Rinehart. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.” But he didn’t offer to leave, either. In fact, he stepped farther into the room, his fingers flexing, his demeanor wired, edgy.

Laura was aware of Rinehart studying Blake, could feel tension curling in the air around him.

“You’re not,” Rinehart said, his tone friendly, free of any signs of the concern she sensed in him. “And regrettably, I was just paged. I need to take off.”

He turned to Laura, the placid expression on his face a well-worn facade of indifference in the midst of awkwardness. “Thanks for saving me from the mess hall,” he cajoled. His voice lowered slightly, hinting at discreet intimacy. “I enjoyed the pizza. It was different.” The corners of that sensual mouth lifted a second before he surprised her by saying, “Different is good.”

She blinked at those words and wondered if he was talking about pizza or about her. Was that his subtle way of telling her he knew she was different, no matter how hard she tried to cover up her slip? Damn it, she hated the way he had her dancing on eggshells. She did enough of that with Walch.

Rinehart turned to Blake, wished him a good-night and then nodded to Laura, the magnetic pull of his eyes latching on to hers with simmering results. And in that moment, years of skepticism, of worry over people manipulating her, drew forth another suspicion: What was creating this almost hypnotic effect between them? Did Rinehart have some kind of gift? Could he create this heat in her using that gift? Was he truly here to help her escape, or was he here to manipulate her into submission? And as she closed the door behind Rinehart, she decided that these were questions she would have only a short hour to debate. Because friend or foe, she was meeting him on that dock—and because the one thing her instincts were telling her with complete clarity was to get off this island.

The minute the door closed behind Rinehart, Blake went on the attack. “You don’t trust him, do you?”

“I just met him,” Laura countered. “Why? What is wrong with you? What’s happened?”

“I was outside when two of his men came out of the building talking about—”

“Stop!” A alarm was going off in Laura’s head. The bugs. Anything he said would be recorded.

His eyes went wide. “What? Laura, I—”

“What’s going on?”

Laura looked up to see Kresley standing in the doorway. Great. Another obstacle. “Nothing important,” Laura said quickly.

“It is important!” Blake declared in disagreement. “I heard—”

“Blake!” Laura ground out sternly. “Stop.” His pale face was turning red, and this time it wasn’t from embarrassment. It was from anger.

“Look,” she said softly. “I want and need to hear what you have to say, but Kresley is sick. Let’s make sure she is okay first. Okay?” He drew a breath and nodded, but it was clear from his grimace that he wasn’t happy about it.

“What is going on?” Kresley asked. “Where’s Rinehart?” She frowned. “Did you kick him out already?”

Laura put her hand on her forehead, trying to figure out how to handle this. “He got paged.”

“And I bet I know why!” Blake said.

Laura cut him an irritated look as Kresley swiped her hand through the air. “What is going on!”

Ignoring the question, Laura focused on the important issue of the moment. Kresley looked better, less washed out. “Are you feeling any better? Are you up because something is wrong?”

“Nothing besides that you two were loud,” Kresley chided. “And yes, I feel better. My fever broke.”

One good thing, Laura thought. “So you can stay by yourself?”

“I’m fine by myself, except that I really want to know what’s going on.”

“I’ll explain when I know myself.” She considered that answer, and added for clarity, “And that will be in the morning. So go to bed.”

Her attention turned to Blake. “You. Come with me.” Laura pointed to the door and started in that direction, but then hesitated. “After I get my shoes.”

 

Several minutes later, Laura stopped on the beachfront with Blake by her side, her shoes off again and dangling from one hand, sand squishing between her toes. This well-lighted area of the beach that sat directly behind the lab parking lot offered the quickest solution for privacy. Close enough to call for help, but far enough away to avoid listening devices. The water was calm, soothing; the breeze, cool. Laura, however, remained rattled and out of sorts, her skin hot everywhere Rinehart had touched.

“Why are we here?” Blake asked, a hand sweeping the wide-open space of the beach.

“I needed a walk and some air badly,” she explained, knowing the answer wasn’t going to be enough for him, but it was all she had to give. “And I didn’t want to keep Kresley awake.”

He glared at her, arms crossed in front of his chest. “Sixteen does not translate to stupid, you know. I see what’s happening. You think someone is listening in on our conversations.” It wasn’t a question. “You think someone is bugging our rooms.”

Laura laughed, a choked sound that mocked her for the attempted lie. But she couldn’t tell Blake her fears, not Blake. His youth made him impetuous, and she couldn’t risk him doing something rash. “You’ve been watching way too much television. Now. Tell me who and what you overheard.”

His lips thinned and he looked like he might argue. Instead, he said, “Those two men who work with Rinehart—Rock and Max. They came out of the building and walked onto the beach as I was coming in from a run.” He paced back and forth, and then turned to her. “It’s not good, Laura. Not good at all. They said they were going to take us off this island. I think they plan to kidnap us.”

Or help them escape, but she couldn’t say that. Not yet. She had to reason him into letting this go. “Let’s take a deep breath and backtrack, kiddo. Why would they say such a thing in front of you? That makes no sense.” His gaze dropped, and she grimaced. “You were invisible.” Time and time again, she’d warned him about doing that.

“Yes, but—”

“No buts!” She sliced a hand through the air. This was why she couldn’t let Blake in on what was going on. He did rash things without thinking. “What if you would have lost control of your powers and suddenly appeared standing beside them? What then?”

“That hasn’t happened in months!”

“Kresley’s sick. Your blood work says you will be, too. It could have happened.”

“I’m sick?” His eyes were wide with worry. “What’s wrong with us?”

“The flu, Blake, but you can see from Kresley how bad it is. And you know when you get sick, you lose control over your invisibility.”

“Not since the shots, and Kresley hasn’t started a fire since she’s been sick.”

“There hasn’t been enough time to be certain the illness won’t impact control. We can’t take risks.”

“If these men want to kidnap us, what choice do we have?”

Out-of-character impatience bit at her nerves. Time was ticking away to her meeting with Rinehart, and it appeared she would have no opportunity to think through her options before meeting him. But that wasn’t Blake’s fault. He was a kid, caught in a firestorm that he didn’t understand. A kid growing up fast. Too fast. She wanted him to live without having his ability controlling his every move. She wanted her research to matter to him.

She steadied her voice. “Don’t take risks without talking to me first.”

“I didn’t mean to,” he countered. “I took a run, timing myself to see how long I could maintain my control. The next thing I knew, they were just there, talking. I couldn’t help but listen. And besides—” he flung his hands in the air “—you’re missing the point! They want to take us off the island.”

God, she hated lying, so she tried to be as truthful as possible. “I talked to Rinehart about this very subject over dinner. He’s old-school military, like my father was. Has to be prepared for anything and everything.” She rolled her eyes. “The man brought his own security people to a military facility. What does that tell you?”

He looked relieved. “You talked to him about us getting off the island?”

She nodded and sat down on the beach, patting the sand beside her, pleased when he joined her without hesitation. She could feel him beginning to calm down. “Our program is top secret,” she continued, “so clarifying an evacuation plan makes sense.”

“I guess it does,” Blake said, digging his name in the sand with a shell. “It still felt like more than that.”

“Paranoid is my job,” Laura said. “Leave it to me. Leave this alone, Blake. I don’t want anything to go wrong right now. I am close to perfecting your serum. Let me do that for you. Let me give you a life that won’t be in confinement.” He didn’t respond instantly, and she prodded, “Blake?”

His gaze lifted to hers. “I do appreciate all you do for us, Laura.”

“You aren’t going to let this go, are you?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t say otherwise, either.” Blake would act rashly and end up in trouble. Everything was spinning out of control. She had to think. “Head to bed. Your morning tutoring will be here before you know it.” There was no softness to her voice, no understanding. She was trying to help him, and he was going to work against her. She could feel it in every inch of her being.

“What about you?” he asked.

“I’ll be there in a few minutes.” Her tone was short, and she could see from Blake’s expression that he was surprised.

He hesitated, but pushed to his feet. “Just be careful out here alone, okay?”

“I’m always careful,” she said, tired of how true that statement had become. She lived in a shell that was quickly becoming a jail cell. He stared at her a moment longer, then turned toward the parking lot. Over her shoulder, she watched him walk toward the building before her vision drifted across the water, to the twinkling stars in the clear, black sky. When they had first arrived on the island, she had thought it was heaven. Now, it felt like hell. A hell they had to escape.

And she needed help to do that. She’d already decided that when Rinehart had appeared at the opportune moment. Maybe too opportune. Her father’s warnings of caution replayed in her head. Laura leaned back on her hands, sand sliding through her fingers, cool and grainy. And she reached deep, trying to sort through what her instincts told her about Rinehart, and what life and her father had taught her about protecting herself. But there was a potent new piece of the puzzle clouding her judgment—desire. Her attraction to Rinehart was fire in her veins, unnaturally compelling—hypnotic, even.

And that made him dangerous. That made her instincts impossible to interpret. And if she couldn’t trust her senses, she couldn’t trust him. No matter what promises he made tonight, she had to be cautious, had to keep her guard up. And yet, as it stood, he was her best shot of escape from this island.