Prodigal (Maelstrom Chronicles) (8 page)

Their room. It wasn’t their room. He was just staying there.

“Is Rainbow Sparkles a good mouser?” The shades didn’t bother with non-sentient animals, so the flora and fauna of Terra was only affected insofar as the humans had changed lifestyles.

“I don’t like cats. I don’t think.” He frowned. “Can you look it up on the internet?”

“Internet doesn’t work the same way anymore.” Half of the sites from before the invasion were gone, and most of the mentions of Adam Alsing on the new, improved internet had nothing to do with whether or not the former action star liked pets. “I could put in a request from Ship, who apparently saved our whole fucking network somewhere, and see if it turns anything up.”

“The soldiers who trained me.” Adam’s fingers on the edge of her desk clenched, knuckles whitening. “I’d like to meet them, see if it jogs my memories.”

Maybe he wasn’t as casually curious about his history as all that.

“They stay aboard Ship. Working. They’re probably busy.” The Shipborn who’d masqueraded as angeli during the initial phase of the invasion weren’t always received warmly when they ventured dirtside. As a result, few did.

“What about contacts from my Hollywood days? Are they still alive?”

“Do I look like a person who keeps up with Hollywood?”

“You look like somebody who remembers more than the past two days,” he retorted, eyebrow arched.

Claire winced. Protecting Adam from the truth was over, but for a moment, she wished she could preserve the guy he’d been today. What if he regained his memories and turned back into…himself? Niko and Gregori said the old Adam Alsing had been a self-indulgent punk. “I’m sorry. That was asinine. I think you lived in California. Any survivors from the West Coast definitely had to relocate and might be hard to find now.”

“People still make movies?”

Claire modulated her voice so she didn’t sound like a total jackass. “Radio shows, mostly. We have too much shit to do in the United States to worry about entertainment. The world has changed, my friend. As far as I know, the really rich people, Hollywood types and CEOs, moved to Europe until immigration got shut down. They still make movies and TV there.”

Adam rested his hands on his thighs. Those damned hands. She was conscious of every twitch of his body, while pretending to half-ignore him, and it bugged the hell out of her. Made her jumpy.

“It’s different in Europe?” he asked.

“It’s not happy times, but it’s not like this. The daemons are showing up on other continents more, mapping food sources, we think. They’re killing more people than they used to, and they’re turning carnivore on us, which—you guessed it—isn’t in Ship’s databanks. But the random shade deaths are only happening in the buffer zone.”

“Why only the buffer zone?”

“Because we’re more spread out? Easier targets? I have no idea.” She hid a yawn. “That’s a question for Ship. I should hook you two up. Ship loves answering questions.”

“Like how the entities find suitable planets?”

“Definitely a question for Ship.”

The Shipborn didn’t fully understand how the entities located inhabited planets or drilled through the dimensional divide. They had no idea what that other dimension was like. Some theorized the only thing on the other side was the maelstrom.

Chaos. Darkness. One endless shade pool. Like the Terran images of Hell.

A line appeared between Adam’s brows, as if he was picturing it himself. “This is all happening to Earth because I didn’t seal the rift in the first place.”

She wanted to smooth out his frown line, his guilt. “It’s shut now, Adam. You weren’t meant to succeed. I’m sure Elizabeth informed you all about it?”

“She did, but…” A rueful expression crossed his face. “Might-have-beens still might be.”

“Bygones,” Claire interrupted. If she wasn’t mistaken, that was a Guy Lassiter line. Shit, she’d forgotten to tell Sarah about his reciting thing. “Moving right along. I’ll tell you something cool.”

Her misdirection was so obvious that his frown faded into a half-smile. “I’d love to hear something cool.”

She eased back in her chair, looking up at him. “The Shipborn say we have sentient creatures in our oceans. Whales and dolphins, some octopi, a couple types of shark. The shades can’t seem to get at them. I guess they just…swim away.”

He swiped the edge of her desk again, and she noticed an odd glint beside his hips, where his fingers had been. The metal surface had a few dents in it. “Have we communicated with them?”

She ran her finger across the dents thoughtfully, her fingertip brushing his jeans. He watched her hand but didn’t move. “We’ve been too busy on this side of the pond, but there’s an oceanography lab in Australia that’s making progress. It’s all above my pay grade, but at least there’s something good happening.”

The dents were smooth, not ragged, nothing broken. When had it happened? Probably a clumsy deputy.

Adam shifted his weight, his legs spreading out and covering the dent. Her gaze was drawn immediately to his…fly. Faded from lots of use, it bulged a little. Because of his stance? Because of his cock?

She was a horrible person.

She pretended she’d been reaching for something on the floor and twisted around, cheeks hot. Not because she was embarrassed, but because her brain had switched from dolphins to Adam’s penis in the space of five seconds, like she couldn’t control herself.

It didn’t seem right to hit on an amnesiac. Even one who’d tried to kiss her.

Even one whose body heat she could feel, at this very moment, because he’d leaned over to see the spot on the floor she was pretending to inspect.

“Lose a contact lens?”

“Noooooo. I have twenty–twenty-thousand vision,” she joked, straightening. Because he’d leaned toward her, their faces were closer than before. “I got it enhanced.”

She should roll her chair back, get away from the electric sensation of his body near hers. But that sweet, sweet anticipation rose in her like heat from a vent. She didn’t have to think about how long it had been since she’d had sex. Eight months and one week before Frances had been born, when she’d seduced Niko and gotten herself knocked up.

She hadn’t had a man between her legs—any part of a man—in going on three years.

He touched between her eyebrows, smiling. She let him. “You’ve got twenty–twenty-thousand vision? You don’t look like a hawk. Your eyes are brown. Like root beer.”

“Root beer. You’re a flatterer.” She laughed awkwardly. “Yours are like mold. Greenish and…”

Growing on her. If the poor guy knew what she was imagining doing to him, he’d run into the street, out of town, and never look back.

Not that he wouldn’t enjoy it, but…

“Greenish and what?”

“I don’t know. Eyeballs, you know. You have exceptionally long eyelashes.”

Adam’s gaze dropped to her mouth, and he slowly quit smiling. His finger traced her eyebrow and started down her temple.

Claire held her breath. His touch was like fire on her skin. He reached her cheek. Her jaw.

Those long lashes swept downward, his gaze rapt. He had that look. That movie hero about to kiss the girl look, and it was directed at her. He bent toward her and—

She swiveled quickly and stood. An ache between her legs let her know her body wanted to follow her imagination into bed with Adam. Worse, he seemed willing—or at least curious to refresh his memory on the whole kissing thing. This was an itch she’d scratched for herself for three years, not needing the entanglement of a man who actually wanted to be with her.

Adam, directionless and confused, had already shown signs of attaching to her.
“I’m staying with you, Claire.”
That hadn’t been a line from a movie. That had been a man stating what he wanted.

She couldn’t act on this, didn’t need to have a fling with the Chosen One, of all people. She had friendships. She had her sister, she had her baby, she had a mission. This life was all she could handle.

“I should take you back to the room and stay with Tracy tonight,” she said abruptly. “Let’s go.”

His voice spoke behind her, a lot closer than expected. “You said you were sleeping in your own bed. Is this because I tried to kiss you again?”

She whirled, and they were nearly nose-to-nose. “Is that what you were doing? I thought I had food on my face.”

“I assume I wasn’t gay,” he said, “based on my urges right now.”

“Can it, Adam.” She raised her hands to shove him, but he caught her.

“You could let me get it over with,” he suggested. “I just want to know.”

“What do you think kissing me is going to tell you?” she asked, struggling a bit. Then more. She wasn’t used to a man—anyone—laying hands on her, and she sure as hell wasn’t used to one restraining her as if he didn’t realize how much effort she was expending.

Perhaps his muscles weren’t just prettied up in a gym, because he was out-wrestling her without even acknowledging it.

“I’m not sure,” he admitted. His green eyes darkened. “I keep losing focus because I want to touch you so badly.”

“That’s not my problem.” Her pulse raced. His dominance was a hell of a lot more arousing than she wanted it to be. She wasn’t scared, but she had this crazy urge to goad Adam into more. “You’re horny. It’s probably been a long time.”

“I don’t feel these urges when I look at Tracy. Or anyone else I’ve met, male or female. Just you, Claire. Maybe I imprinted on you when I came out of the egg. I did see you first.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

He bent his head again, his hands tight around her wrists. She tugged, and he smiled. Oh, God. He was going to do it. His lips brushed her temple, and she closed her eyes, vibrating.

Yes. Yes.

But she whispered, “Let me go.”

He did, immediately. Hands behind his back, he presented her with another charming smile. “You could kiss me instead.”

Her disappointment shamed her. She’d wanted that kiss, but she wanted him to take it. What was wrong with her? Some feminist she was.

“You could go to hell.” She meant that to herself as much as to him.

“Is that any way to talk to a guest in your home?” Unfazed, Adam followed her as she thrust her arms into her parka and gathered her things—armor, weapons, briefcase, lunchbox. He took half of them from her, not all of them, and that struck her as…perfect.

He didn’t think she couldn’t carry her own shit. He just wanted to help.

“I’m not so desperate to re-experience sex that I’d force myself on anybody,” he said quietly. “Don’t sleep on the floor at Tracy’s again.”

His reassurance heightened her shame to new levels. She’d become hardened to get where she was—to survive. She had edges. They cut people sometimes.

But he didn’t seem vulnerable to her edges. He rolled with it. Had she ever had a lover who rolled with it?

She wanted to roll
him
—over and over in the bed, intertwined like a constrictor knot.

What she felt about Adam wasn’t just lust, but goddammit, she wanted to fuck him so badly her thighs were quivering. Trying to ignore it, she stalked into the hallway, yelled at Randall that she was leaving, and stomped out the front door like a toddler having a tantrum.

Chapter Seven

Claire stalked a few paces ahead of Adam down the cold, deserted street. Melting slush puddles reflected the few street lights, and the bitter air burned his nostrils. He watched the strong stride of her legs and the glimpses of her smooth jawline as she surveyed the area, and told himself to get a damned grip.

Not a grip on
her
, which was what he wanted. What he craved. He couldn’t really remember sex, but…yeah.

He wanted to bury himself inside her—find himself inside her. He felt like he was going through all the lusts and desires of puberty in the space of a day, fast-forwarding to adulthood.

The grip he needed to get was on himself.

Definitely he didn’t need to grip the desk. Squeezing it tonight, he’d accidentally dented it like he had the canteen. He’d thought for a moment she was going to mention it, but she didn’t, so he didn’t either, and he’d taken pains to distract her from it.

They passed a bicycle shop and a long, low structure that had been converted into a trading post. Soon they turned a corner toward the building where her room was located. The living quarters, as he understood it, had been barracks in an air force base years ago. The mess hall and other meeting rooms were in a big building everyone called City Hall. Enough people had recognized him in the mess hall that he hadn’t stayed long. Half seemed fascinated with him, staring and whispering, while the other half seemed almost as hostile as Jay Quentin, whom Adam had been happy not to run into.

It was when a young woman had asked if he’d had his body double jump into the nexus to save himself that he’d known it was time to cut his meal short.

“I’m probably going to find out I’m a clone any day now,” he told her, joking around. “When the rest of the clone club start showing up, we can put them to work digging latrines.”

She’d laughed, inching closer. Her friends at another table waved at her frantically to come back—to step away from the guy who’d almost destroyed the planet. “I loved your movies, Adam. I was a big fan.” She paused, licked her lips. “I still, um, have some DVDs. We can watch those when the generator’s running. My favorite is
Guy Lassiter and the Last Amazon
.”

“Thanks.” He’d been about to ask her name, just to change the subject away from himself, but she’d noticed her friends and fled.

He didn’t know what the citizens of Camp Chanute had been told about him and didn’t wanted to piss Claire off blurting out things considered confidential. What had people heard about the silver pod? The fact he’d been stark naked? The fact he had amnesia?

“Claire,” he called. She had a long, fast gait, and he had to jog to catch up. He sensed in himself a desire to walk in a more leisurely fashion. Was that part of him, or was he tired? He had no idea. “Do you know what information has been shared about me? Is there anything we’re trying to keep hush-hush?”

“Besides your very existence?” she quipped. “I think we’re beyond keeping a lid on it after you helped in Riverbend. The cat’s pretty much out of the bag. Sarah submitted the report confirming your identity and health status to the U.S. government.”

He went for humor. He’d noticed that seemed to be his go-to deflection. As with the desire to amble, he didn’t know if it was old Adam or new Adam. “Did it confirm my unusual handsomeness?”

“She already knew about that,” Claire said dryly. She slipped a flashlight out of her pocket as they left the glow of the few streetlights in the main part of town. “It’s hard to overlook.”

He laughed. “I need to find a mirror one of these days. I don’t even know if I’d recognize myself.”

The moon was bright enough that he could easily make out her features and expressions. She cast him a sidelong glance. “That must feel weird.”

“I have nothing to compare it to, so it’s not weird to me. Then again, it makes me a pretty uninteresting conversationalist. I have no stories.”

“Not everybody needs to tell stories.” She arched an eyebrow. “Some people need to listen.”

“I can work with that.” Adam considered his companion, looking for a way to relate. He wished she’d talk to him about her life. Her daughter. Before and after the invasion. Since he had no preconceived notions, he figured he’d be a pretty good listener and nonjudgmental to boot. “So, how’d you end up the sheriff of Camp Chanute?”

Riverbend seemed like a similar-sized community to Camp Chanute, but more spread out. The South Dakota terrain had a lot of lakes and tributaries—waterways for transportation, trade, and fishing. Waterways that hadn’t stopped the shade horde from taking the community out.

He suspected Claire would have planned for such a crisis better than the unfortunate souls at Riverbend.

“Besides the fact it’s a former military base and easy to defend from humans and monsters alike?” she asked, confirming his suspicions. “It’s deep in the buffer zone, close to water sources and far enough from large, existing urban populations, because you don’t want any of that mess, let me assure you. There’s land to farm and be self-sufficient. Sizeable Amish community nearby, too. We help defend them from the dregs calling themselves survivalists; they teach us to farm, churn butter, and smoke meat.”

“Makes sense,” he said, pleased he’d hit on a topic she liked to talk about. “How do you choose who lives here, or do you get to choose?”

“Hell, yes, I choose,” Claire said with a laugh. “You have to be approved to live here. We have a committee for that, and I’m on it. No troublemakers and shit-stirrers inside these walls.” She grinned, her face transforming from stern to striking. “Besides me.”

Lights bobbing in a dark field near the barracks caught his attention. They resolved into a group of armed people hustling across the grounds. Their larger spotlights illuminated the area, revealing footsteps going every direction in the snow.

“Sheriff,” one of them called. It was the driver of the Humvee, Will, who’d been with Claire the day Adam had arrived. “We’ve been trying to reach you on the walkie. We’ve got a situation.”

Claire clapped her hip. “Shit. I forgot the radio at the office.” She glowered, thankfully not at him. He knew why she’d been distracted. “What’s up?”

“Got some drained bodies,” Will said, face drawn. “The Shearers. All of ’em.”

“Fuck me with a rake,” Claire cursed. “Their homestead’s only twenty miles out. Any sign of shades? Daemons?”

“Shade residue, as usual, and a very dead cow, but nary a blip on the radar of any existing monsters, hon.” Adam recognized the petite blond woman who stood in front of the solemn group—Dixie, from the night before. A sensor array glowed around her hair like snowflakes. His other big fan. Now he knew why. “I don’t like this. Not on the same day as Riverbend and Fort Berthold. And Ship told me there was another one. Down in Mexico.”

“Mexico is close to a primary horde.” Claire stuffed her small flashlight in her pocket. “They slipped through New Mexico and swarmed half of Texas.”

“This is southern Mexico. Near Acapulco.” Dixie paused before she added, “I know of at least two settlements that voted to move east after the latest news. Probably more to come.”

“Goddammit.” Claire pinched the bridge of her nose. “We may need to bring in the outwallers.”

“A lot won’t come.” Dixie clicked on a small, backlit tablet and skimmed the data on it. She glanced at Adam a few times, as if wondering what he was doing there, but the others ignored him, clustering around the info and edging him out. “I got a list ready, though.”

“Activate the call tree. Alert everyone within a fifty mile radius,” Claire decided. “If there’s no answer within five minutes, send a squad. We still have a shuttle?”

“Sorry, the medical shuttle’s long gone. Sarah helped Tracy check out the Riverbenders, gave some advice about the field hospital, and headed to Ship with Little Bit.” Dixie tapped her sensor array. “Want me to requisition one?”

Claire’s lips firmed, and her tone sharpened. “Absolutely not. We can handle this with Terran transpo. The Shipborn aren’t made of fuel.”

Dixie lifted her chin. “Neither are we.”

“Ah, but we have ways of making more. They don’t, not in this solar system.” She exchanged a few more words with the group. They split up, jogging into the darkness on various assignments. Claire gestured to the other woman. “Dixie, you and your sensor array come with me. I’m going to the Shearers myself. Who’s on the scene?”

“Bill and Monica,” she said, catching up with Claire. She smiled over her shoulder at Adam apologetically when Claire took off without acknowledging him. “Getting ready for the burials.”

“Dammit, dammit.” Claire punctuated her strides with curses. “What the hell is going on? We’ve lost a few scouts before, but not a homestead. Not like this. How can nobody spot these damned shades sneaking around where no shades are supposed to be? Where they hell do they come from? Where do they go? How can we fight them like this?”

Her voice grew louder as she ranted. Her frustrations were understandable, even if Adam knew there was no way he was seeing the bigger picture.

“Ship asks me to reassure you that there are no tunnels, caves, bodies of water, or underground streams near the Shearer’s farm that the shades could have traveled in,” Dixie said in a soothing voice. “They’ll send angeli for a flyover if we want.”

“We’ll handle the area scan,” Claire said. “No angeli. Shit’s too weird to risk that.”

Adam noticed neither of them mentioned him or the pod as one of the frustrating mysteries in the war against the entities. For that, he was grateful. The attention didn’t need to be on him but on the people in Chanute in danger from a shade attack.

“Oh, since you aren’t wearing your array, you probably didn’t hear.” Dixie angled her glowing tablet to shine light on their path. “Riverbend’s horde got torched back to hell by the army’s cleanup crew, as did the one in Fort Berthold. They didn’t disappear like the little hits. We definitely found and killed them.”

Claire shoved her hands in her pockets. “Have Cullin and the rest come up with anything useful yet, or did he spend the day fighting with Ship about math?”

“If you’re about to accuse the Shipborn of wasting time…” Dixie began.

“I’m not, I’m not. Simmer down.” Claire dismissed the smaller woman’s alarm. Adam remained silent except for his boots crunching through the snow. “I know they’re on our side.”

“Sometimes it doesn’t feel like you think that’s true. Did you ever wonder if being such a grouch makes you blind to help that’s being offered?” They cut through the same big field, but headed away from the barracks. Claire hadn’t sent Adam back to the room, so he figured he’d go wherever she went. It was what he wanted to do, anyway.

“I know you’re half in love with Ship,” Claire mocked Dixie. “I’m not allowed to criticize, am I?”

Dixie laughed. “Ship wants me to remind you that she’s not programmed for feelings of romantic love. That only happens with some android extensions, and she doesn’t have one.”

“Doesn’t have anything to do with you putting it on a pedestal,” Claire said.

“You don’t give her enough credit. She’s crazy about you and that baby of yours.”

“Ship’s a machine.” Adam noticed Dixie called Ship a
she
but Claire didn’t. “Nuts and bolts and blue gooey shit.”

“You are a Philistine.” Dixie reached out and pushed Claire, who didn’t so much as stumble. “You’d be less cranky if you’d get a boyfriend.” While Claire seemed to have forgotten him, Dixie kept shooting him coy glances. He didn’t need sunlight—or his memories—to recognize her interest. “I know it always helps me.”

“Jesus Christ.” Claire halted in the middle of the cold, dark field and threw up her hands. Adam almost ran into her. “Where is this coming from? We just lost eight people to the shades. Maybe more. I don’t care about this shit right now.”

“Your attitude has gotten terrible. It makes working with you harder for all of us,” Dixie said tartly. The tablet lit up her face from below, revealing flushed cheeks. “Especially the past couple days. Wonder why? Leaders can’t just order people around, hon, without listening or being respectful.”

“I don’t have time to—”

“I wasn’t done,” Dixie interrupted. To Adam’s surprise, Claire piped down. The petite blond must be a good friend, because Claire remained impersonal with everyone else. “We all have a load to carry. It would help if you quit taking your bad mood out on other people. Do that, and I’ll quit bringing up methods of stress relief at inopportune moments.” She pretended to notice Adam with theatrical surprise. “Oh, look, it’s the incredibly handsome, popular movie star Adam Alsing, who is tall and blond, just the way I like my men. Tell us, Mr. Alsing, do you find Sheriff Claire Louise Lawson to be a very grouchy ladybug?”

“God, not that book,” Claire said, some of her hostility fading. “Dumb bug.”

“You are that bug.”

When Claire transferred her glare from Dixie to Adam, he shrugged. “You know, Claire, you can yell at us and keep going wherever you’re going at the same time. We’re headed to the Shearer’s homestead, right?”

Her frown disappeared. “Indeed I can. To the garage, then.”

“Come on, Adam.” This time Dixie walked beside him, taking his arm as if he were escorting her down the aisle. “Let’s whisper about Claire behind her back. That parka makes her look sooooooo fat.”

“Stop flirting,” Claire ordered over her shoulder.

“It’s what I do with tall, handsome blond men. You should try it sometime.” Dixie winked at him, but he sensed tension through the pressure of her arm as she tugged him forward. She was clearly pinning a brave front over a worrisome situation.

“Why did Ship want you to tell Claire about caves and rivers?” he asked her. It wasn’t easy for the two of them to keep up with Claire, but Dixie was surprisingly quick for someone whose head barely reached his shoulder.

Dixie kept her voice light, but her arm towed him along. “One of the theories is that being underground blocks the shades from sensors. Ship thinks she’s missing shade blotches since conserving fuel means she can’t maintain constant global monitoring. We disagree. We’re the eyes on the ground, and we never see anything but residue and bodies. Nothing in flyovers, nothing on patrols. There are just no shades out there.”