“I want you to tell me exactly what happened after you and Melissa entered that room.”
“I told Olivia what happened at least twenty times. Nothing of my story will change.”
Morgan sighed. “I don't want anything to change. I just want you to explain it again.”
Sheridan went through the same song and dance, wishing she'd done more than watch Melissa walk out the door with Raul.
Morgan frowned. “She said you should just go back to Ricardo.”
“Yes, for the tenth time. She practically hissed at me, and she had a really nasty tone. Then she waved her freaking hand at the door, and it opened. She gave me a killer headache until Raul warned her 'he' wouldn't be pleased, whoever 'he' is.
Then Raul put that gun to her head. But there was never any fear in her eyes.
Looking back on it, I should have known Melissa wasn't right.”
“Why?”
“Because after she was brought into the house, I didn't sense any pain in her. I can feel physical injury, Morgan.”
He nodded. “And you can't stop yourself from healing it.”
“Where'd you get that idea?” she asked, surprised.
“Jules and Mrs. Sharpe mentioned it.”
She snorted. “Well, they're wrong. Yeah, the compulsion is there to fix what's broken, but I don't have to do it. I won't break if I ignore someone's pain. But I'm a healer. It's what I do. I like to heal people. But I don't have to,” she muttered.
“Interesting.” His wide smile made him look even hunkier than usual, but it didn't deter her hostility. “I'm doubly grateful you decided to heal me, then.” She flushed, not amused. “It's not like you asked to be shot. And that's what's so weird about all this. Raul helped me escape from that lab two months ago. He had no love for Ricardo. I don't understand why he's suddenly helping him.” Morgan's eyes narrowed. “Are you sure Montaña is behind this?” She hadn't questioned his involvement. “Who else would it be?”
“Who else,” he repeated and paused. “Tell me what you know about Raul.” Before she could answer him, the door opened. Jules stood there, his expression shuttered. “Bring her into Sharpe's office.” He left before she could gather her wits to say anything.
Morgan sighed and stepped back. “After you.”
She gladly walked out of the tiny room into the laboratory corridor. As they moved down the hall, Morgan leaned close. “He never left you completely alone.”
“What?”
Jules disappeared up the stairs ahead of them.
“At night, when Olivia took her break, Jules stayed in front of your door. And he made sure to pop down to 'check your status' nearly a dozen times a day. What do you think that means?”
Sheridan warmed, despite not wanting Jules's actions to affect her. The damned Circ had her tried and found guilty before listening to anything she'd said.
She shouldn't care how often he came near her cell. “Probably felt guilty.” They reached the stairs, and Morgan chuckled. “Jules doesn't do guilty. He leads, we follow. He's a controlling asshole who makes decisions for the whole team, Sheridan. He can't afford to be indecisive or to make the wrong decision.”
“And me? I'm a wrong decision?” she asked, annoyed.
“Not from where I'm standing. Without you, I'd be a dead man.” The earnest thanks in his voice stopped her on the steps. “You mean that.”
“Yeah, I do. Unlike the beasts that live here, I'm more intelligent, suave, and sophisticated. I know how to tell the good guys from the bad guys.” He tugged Sheridan with him up the rest of the steps.
She stared up at him in stunned confusion. Morgan thought she was one of the good guys?
They continued down the hallway to where Jules waited impatiently for them by Mrs. Sharpe's door.
Morgan kissed her on the cheek. “Thanks for saving my life.” The fury on Jules face when they passed him and entered the study almost made her incarceration worth it.
“Morgan, we're gonna talk later,” Jules rasped, his fangs plain to see.
Sheridan didn't know what the hell to think. For three days she'd been cooped up in that small cell with nothing to do but read the few paperbacks Olivia had offered. No one but Olivia had talked to her, and the misery of Sheridan's existence and her doomed future had lulled her into despondency. She had no reason to perk up just because Jules had spent the quiet nighttime hours with her. She hadn't known he'd been there. It shouldn't matter.
But for some odd reason, it did.
“Sheridan, please, come sit.” Mrs. Sharpe pointed her to a chair that seemed to be the center of everyone's attention.
Morgan sat down next to Kisho. Tersch stood by himself toward the back. Mrs.
Sharpe and Ava sat on the couch with Olivia next to them. And of course, Jesse stood near his wife. Sheridan didn't see Jack and didn't want to, not after witnessing his rage. Jules took the seat right next to her, and she tried not to be obvious as she scooted her legs away from the broad spread of his own.
“Sheridan, why don't you tell them what you told me,” Morgan suggested.
Jules turned to Olivia. “I thought I told you not to leave her room.” Olivia didn't meet his eyes when she answered. “Please. She no more staged Melissa's kidnapping than I did, and you know it.”
Jules growled.
“You don't think I did it?” Sheridan had to know.
“I don't. Olivia and Fallon don't,” Morgan said. “But the others aren't so sure.
Just to be clear, Sheridan told me she doesn't have to heal. It's something she needs to do, but doesn't have to do, which sheds a new light on things, eh, Jules?” Sheridan glanced at Jules, who stared at her with a brooding intensity that alarmed her, especially because it turned her on. “Sheds a new light on things?
What's he talking about?” she asked.
“Did you or did you not heal Morgan?” Jules rumbled, his beast staring out at her through a man's eyes.
“You know I did.”
“Why?”
She blinked. “Why? Because a man shot him. He would have died if I hadn't saved him.”
Jules held up a hand, and when his fingers turned into talons, everyone in the room stilled.
“Jules,” Mrs. Sharpe warned.
Jules didn't tear his gaze from Sheridan. He took his forefinger and slashed a deep wound across his forearm. It bled like a sieve, and he stabbed it again when it started to heal. “Fix this.”
Like she was a show pony. “Fix it yourself, you jerk,” she snapped. Her fingers itched, but she refused to be drawn into a game she didn't want to play.
Morgan sighed. “I told you.”
Jules shocked her by grinning. “Hell. That's a relief.” He wiped the blood from his arm but to her dismay, it kept bleeding, slower now, but a continuous flow.
“You're not healed.”
“I nicked an artery.”
“Stupid man.” She reached out and dragged his arm close. Sealing her hand over the wound, she pushed the healing energy into him. The returning lust and boost in energy she subsequently felt didn't surprise her, but it did make holding him awkward, because she wanted to kiss him better.
Dropping his arm, she scooted farther back in her chair and ignored the sudden blaze of desire in his bright eyes.
“So Melissa went with them willingly.” Kisho frowned. “That doesn't make sense.”
“It does if she and Jack have been part of our problem from the beginning.” Ava leaned forward in her chair. “For a while now, we've known someone's been watching us. Hell, Jules. Remember when you first returned from Brazil? You told Mrs. S. that Montaña knew more than he should. How do you think that was possible? Sheridan just got here a few days ago. Not like she could have told him anything about life before you went away, now could she?”
“This sucks.” Tersch grumbled. “I played poker with those two. Hell, I ate Melissa's shitty meatloaf.”