"There has to be a way to make this right."
"Mari." His voice was low and compelling, washing through her body like the touch of fingers on skin. "You're afraid of me, and you have good reason to be. I don't trust myself and I'm not going to fuck up your life any more than Whitney's already done. The last thing you need is to be tied to a man who could fly into a jealous rage and do you physical harm."
"I'm capable of protecting myself. Ken, and I don't think you're the type of man to be beating women."
"No, just losing my mind and nearly raping one because another man looked at her." He shoved a hand through his hair, leaving it more disheveled then ever.
"I wanted you. I didn't care the circumstances, or the excuse. I wanted you."
"There are things you don't know about me, none of them good. You've been through enough with Whitney and his program. We're taking you to Lily. She'll make certain you're healthy and she'll help you start a new life."
"Lily Whitney, the doc's daughter?"
"Don't say her name like that. She's as much a victim-maybe more-than any of the rest of us."
"You really trust her? I've worked with Whitney on and off for years and I sure don't trust him-or his friends. They know what he's doing; they don't approve, but they don't stop him or even tell someone higher up what's going on."
"Tell us where the compound is, Mari. We'll get the women out."
She shook her head. "You know there'd be a fight. The men would protect the laboratories. Hell. They're under orders. They have to protect the base."
"Then we'll have the admiral shut it down."
"The minute the orders came down. Whitney would move everyone. He's got places all over, and he'd never willingly allow anyone to shut him down. He's protected. Ken. You can't just walk in and get him."
"But you thought Senator Freeman might be able to help you."
"We hoped. His father has a lot of influence with Whitney. We thought if I talked to him and explained what was really going on, he would intercede for us. We know his father is already upset by the experiment. Whitney wants babies. He's certain he can produce the perfect weapons, psychically and physically, so that no one would ever suspect a child of being brought into a country and doing whatever needed to be done."
"Whitney wouldn't just give you that information."
"No, but I have friends. Not everyone involved agrees with what he's doing. One of the women is already pregnant, Ken. He's going to take her baby away from her if we don't get her out of there. I have to go back and help them."
"You wouldn't have to if I let Whitney get to me."
"No! He'd never let you near the others. He'd have you in a lab and dissect you so fast you wouldn't know what happened."
Jack returned, handing Mari the jeans, his gaze narrowing when he saw the blood running down her leg.
"He's thinking of allowing Whitney to take him prisoner," Mari said. "You can't let him do that."
"Actually that's one way, but I'm thinking maybe the admiral can get me assigned to the compound. If he's using the military as a cover, and he has soldiers guarding the place, then we should be able to get assigned," Ken said. "Put your arm around my neck. I'm going to lift you a little so we can slide the jeans on. There's no need for you to be nude with a bunch of men around."
"She's bleeding again. Why the hell is she bleeding so much?" Jack asked.
"Be careful," Ken cautioned as he watched Jack clean up the wound. "Did she reinjure it?"
Jack was gentle as he slid the jeans over the light cast on her leg. The doctor had put on more of a splint than an actual cast, because he wanted air to get to the bullet wound. "Doesn't look like it." Other than the excessive bleeding, her body seemed remarkable, healing at such a rapid rate that both men knew it was impossible even with genetic enhancement. "Whitney shot you full of an accelerant, didn't he?" Jack asked, his voice grim. "I should have expected he would do something like this."
Ken's fingers tightened to the point of pain on Mari's shoulders. "He gave you Zenith? Oh, God, baby, tell me you didn't let him shoot you up with that stuff."
"We're always given a shot of it before every mission, just in case we're wounded. Isn't everybody?"
"When?" Ken snapped, jumping to his feet, Mari in his arms. She had to grab his neck and hold on as he took off for the Escalade at a dead run. "Damn it, Mari, when did he give you the shot? Day and time. Tell me now."
Fear put her heart into overdrive. Both of the Nortons were alarmed. "What do you know about Zenith that I don't?"
"It can kill you, Mari. Tell me now, how long has it been in your system?"
Logan held the door open and Ken practically leapt inside, Jack after him. "Tell Lily to send a plane. Not military, private. One of her company planes."
"We can't risk that, Ken." Logan protested. "What's going on?"
"They shot her full of Zenith before they sent her out." Ken replied. "We have to risk it."
Neil put the vehicle in motion, racing down the road. "I can get us there by morning. We're a few hours out. How much time does she have?"
Ken swore bitterly, his silver eyes glittering with far too much menace as he exchanged a long look with his brother.
"Have Lily send the plane, Logan. Tell her to meet us at one of the labs with a medical facility. Tell her we need the antidote for Zenith."
"Ryland isn't going to let her risk her life." But he flipped open his radio and began talking into it.
Mari held herself very still. They weren't joking around. The tension in the Escalade could have been cut with the proverbial knife. Zenith, the drug used to accelerate fast healing, was dangerous, and they all knew it. Why would Whitney pump all of his men full of it before he sent them out on a mission if he knew the drug was dangerous? And if these men knew it was dangerous, Whitney had to know. He was the inventor of Zenith.
"I should have known; you were healing way too fast even for a GhostWalker. Damn it." Ken smashed his fist on the seat in front of him. "What the hell was I thinking?" But he knew. And Jack knew. He could see it in his brother's eyes. He was so fucked up thinking about sex, he hadn't given much thought to anything else.
"There's an airstrip about eighty miles from here. A small farmhouse with a crop-dusting plane. Lily says to make it there and she'll have a pilot waiting, a friend of hers, not military. She'll meet us at the underground laboratory where Ryland and his men were first imprisoned. It isn't far from her house, and no one would think twice about her going there. She works there often. Kadan will be with her to protect her, along with most of Ryland's crew, so no worries on that score," Logan announced.
Ken leaned close to Mari, his breath warm against her ear. "You're forgetting to breathe. We'll get you there in time."
"How long have you known about Zenith?"
"Lily found the compound in the laboratory with all the data on it. It clearly works to regenerate cells, but if left in the body too long, it begins to break down the cells and hemorrhaging occurs. And yes, Whitney is well aware of it. It's his find, his results. Two men died in his laboratory as well as dozens of research animals," Ken said. "We don't even mess with the stuff short-term."
Mari buried her face against Ken's shoulder, uncaring that the others would see it as weakness. She wasn't afraid of being a prisoner. She could endure torture if she had to. but Whitney's continual betrayal was difficult to take. He'd raised her, had been her only source of information. He'd brought in teachers, but ultimately, she had followed his curriculum. She had learned languages, studied and mastered subjects quickly, and followed the training of a soldier. She was disciplined and proficient with weapons and in hand-to-hand combat, as well as being highly skilled in her psychic talents. Whitney should have been proud of her-of all of them-yet he continued to betray them in every way.