As Cold As Ice (22 page)

I’ve seen everything now. I really have.

“
He needs to stay behind,”
Soren said. “Bad enough that I’m leaving with you.”

Jessica looked up at him, into his honest,
strong blue eyes, and she felt nothing but relief.

Right before that relief turned into
something uglier and more fearful. “Wait! I have a tracker inside
me! My arm. They’ll know where we’re going. Soren, you have one,
too.”

“
No, he doesn’t,” Charles
said.

She looked at him. Jack appeared to be
testing his handiwork. “Can you get out of that?”

Charles tried to move his arms. He couldn’t.
“This is fine. Listen, I didn’t inject Soren with a tracker, but
it’s not a dud, either. What’s inside of him will block any signal
from your tracker until you can both get them out of you
safely.”

“
I left behind enough blood
that they’ll think any tracker was cut out of you,” Ethan said,
still looking pretty pale around the cheeks. The pain must’ve come
back. “They shouldn’t suspect Charles of helping us.”

Jessica thought back to all the times
Charles and Soren had been alone together, the times she’d spotted
them and assumed they’d been in a heated discussion about
something, or even arguing.

All this time, they had been working
together?

Jack stretched out another piece of tape.
“Okay, we’re going to leave you here to be found. Be as honest as
you need to be without giving too much away.”

“
I know how to lie, thank
you,” Charles responded, irritated and frowning as Jack placed the
tape over his mouth.

When Charles turned his eyes to Jessica,
they changed, like he was smiling for real, and he actually winked
at her.

Charles, asshole, sometimes creepy Charles
who was known for overly flirting, standing too close, and
sometimes even putting his balls on women’s desks, was actually one
of the good guys.

She wanted to hit him. She
really did. Jessica knew beggars couldn’t be choosers when it came
to their allies or anything, but
Jesus
.

Jack sloppily taped Charles up to some of
the wire mesh sticking out of the wall, and then went to put
Ethan’s good arm over his shoulder.

They were the last to climb out of the hole.
No one said anything. The factories Head Office was situated near
billowed smoke off in the distance. They’d made it pretty far away,
and there were cars waiting for them on a dirt road.

Jessica knew how vampire mind manipulation
worked. Without Bruce in the vicinity, he wouldn’t be able to put
up that mirage, and soon enough hunters would find the hole and
realize where they’d exited. Jessica was back on the run again,
with her brother and ex-boyfriend this time, having no clue where
she was going. Soren held her hand tightly, checked on the wound on
her head, and kissed her temple as she leaned against him and let
herself pass out.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Jessica dreamed of the dragon. She dreamed
of Soren in his man shape, and in that amazingly beautiful dragon
shape. They were on a grassy hill overlooking the city, out in the
open, no one to bother them, no one to take them away to a lab to
be studied.

She dreamed he and the dragon were two
different entities, and as she sat next to him on the soft, green
grass, their fingers laced together between them, the blue dragon
sat on the other side of her, sandwiching her between the human
Soren and the dragon Soren.

It was nice.

It was especially nice when Soren, the human
one, leaned to the side and kissed her forehead, making her feel
pleasantly warm inside, instead of cold.

She opened her eyes.

Soren pulled back from her, his blue eyes
widening, and then he was smiling, cupping her cheeks with his
hands. His incredibly warm and comforting hands.

“
Hey.”

He looked…happy. He also wasn’t wearing his
usual white lab coat.

“
Were you kissing me just
now?”

God, is that my
voice?
She sounded like a complete train
wreck. Jessica didn’t normally put much thought into how other
people saw her. She liked to look good, sure, but if someone
happened to see her when she looked or felt bad, well, it wasn’t an
issue.

Except when it was Soren. Jessica wanted to
find a mirror, though she wasn’t sure she wanted to look at herself
and see the mess Soren was staring at.

He didn’t stop smiling at her, though. His
hands laced through her hair. “Yeah. Couldn’t resist, though I
avoided your bandage,” he said softly, rubbing her hand in his.

“
Good to know. Now kiss me
again.” Jessica reached up, grabbed onto the back of Soren’s head,
and brought his face down.

She caught the instantaneous look of shock
in his eyes right before their mouths met.

It probably wasn’t so sweet being able to
kiss her, but from Jessica’s end, kissing Soren was the best thing
she’d done since waking up. Since ever. It was a relief and a
rejuvenation. A sudden rush after too long of being without. A lot
yet not enough.

Soren smiled before their mouths parted.
They didn’t separate until after she’d pushed her tongue into his
mouth, and then he started to laugh.

“
That’s cold,” he
said.

“
Sorry,” Jessica replied.
They both sounded winded. Jessica felt all giggly and
happy.

Soren shook his head. “Don’t be. I like that
tingly feeling on my mouth, but you’ve been out for a couple of
days. I don’t want to take too much from you.”

Jessica’s eyes popped wide,
and she was suddenly wide awake. “
Days
? Are you serious?”

“
Try not to move so much.”
Soren put a hand on her shoulder. It was a good thing he did,
because the room spun around her the instant she pushed herself
up.

It wasn’t as bad as it had been when she’d
first had her head bashed in then passed out. She blinked a couple
of times then pushed Soren’s hands away. “I got it.”

He didn’t try to hold her back. He clearly
knew not to.

“
Ethan?”

“
He’s all right, recovering
nicely,” Soren said. “He’s not too happy, and neither is his
boyfriend.”

Jessica frowned. “Boyfriend?”

Soren’s cheeks turned slightly pink with
color. It was actually a little cute. “Oh, uh, I hope I didn’t just
give away anything private.”

Jessica shook her head, though she did it
carefully. “I know my brother’s gay. I just didn’t know he had a
boyfriend.”

The fact that he could have something as
normal as a boyfriend, considering where they were, not to mention
the life of secrecy Jessica had forced him to live, made her happy.
Though, now that she thought about it, Markus had said something
about him running off with a guy who had electrical powers.

Seeing Soren also made her happy. Really
happy.

He sighed, as though pleased he hadn’t just
dropped some secret he shouldn’t have. Jessica wanted to touch his
face in that moment.

“
Yeah, well, Jamie seems
like a nice enough guy. I checked on your bother a couple of times,
and he was always there. I stopped when I figured I was getting in
his way.”

“
You checked on Ethan for
me?”

Did he do that for her? Because he knew
she’d be worried about her brother and would want an update as soon
as possible?

Soren scratched at the back of his neck,
avoiding her eyes. “Yeah.”

Jessica’s chest filled with all kinds of
warmth. She wasn’t used to that feeling, and once again, it only
seemed to happen whenever she was around Soren. She knew what it
meant, and for the first time in her life, she didn’t fear it. She
had feelings for Soren, and she liked that.

Jessica sat up. Soren stood from the chair
he’d been sitting in, reaching out to touch her then pulling back.
“Can I get you anything?”

“
A bathroom would be
great.” Jessica laughed.

As much as she wanted to have ‘happily ever
after’ victory sex with him, she was going to implode if the basics
weren’t taken care of first.

Soren helped her to her feet.

The room she was in was tiny as all hell.
Concrete brick walls, and a small window that was so tiny a child
likely wouldn’t be able to fit through. A long portion of the wall
was a different color than the rest, however. She got the feeling
the windows used to be a lot bigger but were bricked up.

The place had been modified. In case of an
attack? Definitely not the sort of place that would have private
bathrooms attached to each room. Not that she was expecting much
from any form of resistance.

Soren led her out of the small room and into
an equally grey and bleak hallway. The only difference was the
occasional kid’s picture colored in crayons or markers that were
taped up. There were even chalkboards and a few lockers. There were
kids there.

"How did you get out of the shackle?"
Soren's hand was bandaged from when Markus had stepped on it, but
the shackle was gone. It would've had to come off for him to change
in the first place.

Soren's smile was tense. "Had a space key
Markus didn't know about. Always figured it would come in
handy."

She couldn't believe it. "You let him hit
you like that, even with a spare key?"

"It wasn't the right time to make a
move."

Jessica let that sink in. "Why were you
working for him? Markus knew you were a dragon."

Soren sighed. "Honestly?"

She nodded.

Soren looked uncomfortable, but he answered
her anyway. "I went to him in the beginning. Offered my services, I
guess you could say. With my education and the fact that I was a
dragon, regardless of whether or not I could do any of the cool
things he wanted, that made me an asset. Sometimes the dragon can
be a little...angry, I guess you could say, and he had the money
and resources to calm it down. I needed that."

Jessica thought of the needles she'd seen
Soren inject himself with. "Can't you control yourself?"

He nodded. "I know how put together what I
need for control now, and if worse comes to worse, I can always
wear a shackle. I stayed with him because by the time I got that
control, it was too late. There was no backing out, and he said he
would look the other way if he ever found others like me. He
wouldn't hunt dragons, and if any were caught, they wouldn't be
killed or experimented on. They'd be released. All I had to do was
be one of his scientific spokesmen for the cameras. If it ever came
down to that."

"Oh," Jessica said softly. "So, he'll
probably be going dragon hunting, really soon."

Soren wet his lips, and he nodded. "I
know."

Jessica didn't know how much trouble dragons
had with their control. Some thought they were so hard to find
because they were already extinct. Jessica hadn't thought so even
before knowing what Soren was. There had to be more, they were just
hiding somewhere.

Having Markus actively looking for them,
hunting them down, wouldn't help them, however. This had to be
tearing Soren apart inside.

"I'm so sorry."

He looked down at her. "It's not your
fault."

"But this happened to you because of
me."

The corner of Soren's mouth pulled up in a
slight smile. "No. It happened because of me."

He wasn't going to let her accept any of the
blame. Jessica didn't know what to think of that, other than how
much she wanted to hug him, make all the pain he felt go away, and
tell him how sorry she was.

He'd been a prisoner in that place, and
she'd never known it. She hadn't known it when she'd threatened
him, or when he'd started helping her. He'd never thrown it in her
face either.

“
Did you know about this
place?” Jessica asked, needing to change the subject.

“
Sort of,” Soren admitted.
“It’s hard to believe everything you hear in Head Office when some
paranormal kid is being questioned and tortured. Charlie believed
in this place, and it paid off.”

“
Ugh. I can't believe we
owe our escape to that asshole."

Soren laughed.

They arrived at the bathroom. There were
stalls inside, and Jessica kicked Soren out of the room entirely
when it came time for her to do what needed to be done. Whether she
needed his help with that or not, she wasn’t about to ask for it or
accept it. She could pee on her own, thank you very much.

When she headed to the sink to wash her
hands, she took one look at herself in the mirror and winced.

She’d aged ten years, for sure. Her hair was
greasy, and the bandage didn’t make her look much better.

If she was going to have romantic sex with
Soren, she was getting cleaned up first. The problem was that the
bathroom didn’t have shower stalls.

Later. She’d think about that later. There
were so many more important things to be worrying about. Her
brother, for one thing, meeting his boyfriend and making sure the
guy was taking good care of him for another. But what came above
all that was figuring out who ran this place and what they
wanted.

No one offered to help for free. No one.

Despite all that, Jessica still needed to
take the time to splash her face with water from the tap.

The water that came from the sink was room
temperature no matter how much she turned the blue dial, but her
frost helped with that. She had the cold water she needed to splash
her face. Multiple times. Until the bags under her eyes were down.
She couldn’t wash her hair just yet, so she dampened it where she
could and ran her fingers through it instead.