‘Right. We shouldn’t stay here for too long. We have work to do.’
That’s enough to turn Hunter serious. ‘And now we have to work around their cameras. They wouldn’t have been using them before – why look at surveillance when there’s nothing to see? They thought the place had been evacuated.’
‘Mmhmm. Now I’m assuming they’ll be taking an interest. Can you—’ I wave a hand. ‘Hack them?’
Hunter tilts his head to one side, probably running through some mental list of things he knows about software systems and cameras. Does he keep the entire Graves system architecture in his head? I’m beginning to think so. And then he grimaces. ‘I don’t see how. There’s no single point of failure, it’s like a parallel circuit. Take one down, and the others pick up the load.’
‘Damn.’
‘Yeah, sorry, it’s well designed.’ His warm brown skin has gone a little paler. ‘Are we trapped in this office?’
‘Nah, don’t worry, they’re not everywhere. This place is on a budget, remember. We can get around the camera placements.’
What I don’t say is that I have plenty of experience at that. I don’t want my presence recorded any more than I can help it.For sure, I don’t want to be seen going into or out of any of my hideouts.
‘You,’ says Hunter, ‘are an incredibly useful person to have around.’
I fan myself. ‘Oh, stop. I bet you say that to all the girls.’
He snorts. ‘Yeah, women love to be told they’re useful. That one always works.’ Then, pausing to consider it: ‘Actually, I guess it’s better than the alternative.’
My own laugh bubbles up. ‘You have no experience complimenting girls, do you? I bet you don’t have to. You just stand there being you, and they try to climb you.’
Hunter bites his lip. ‘Well, I … uh …’
I rest my chin on my hand and inspect him. ‘Do go on.’
‘It doesn’t sound great when you put it like that,’ he admits. ‘Which nobody else ever does.’
He runs a hand through his hair, and I can’t help following the movement. His borrowed T-shirt is smudged with reddish-gray Martian dust from the vent pipes. His hair’s askew, his green eyes alive. He’s still breathing hard, and I can see the pulse at his throat as he tips his head back and closes his eyes for a moment, lashes lowering.
He’s so much more human now than when I first met him. I’m not sure that’s a good thing.
Then he opens his eyes and tilts his gaze sideways in the same moment and catches me staring at him.
My own gaze widens as I scramble for an excuse. I expect him to laugh, or tease me, or preen like a guy who’s used tothe staring and has somehow pulled me into the same net that catches all the rest of them.
But he doesn’t. He just turns his head and studies me in return, his gaze shifting ever so slightly.
For a moment, the rest of it falls away, and I’m absorbed in the green of his eyes, the way the light catches them. In the fleck of dust that’s caught on one of his eyelashes. In the strands of dark brown hair that dip over his forehead, and in the strong lines of his brows.
Our breathing slows and syncs. I’m suddenly acutely aware of the places our bodies touch. And then slowly, so slowly, he lifts a hand, and gently brushes my hair back behind my ear. His touch is feather-light, and sparks zip through me, my skin tingling in the wake of his fingertips.
My mouth is dry and I can’t remember how to move away. I don’t think I want to. Whatever I was expecting from Hunter Graves, it wasn’t a moment like this.
His lips curve to a faint smile, a hint of a dimple showing in one cheek. ‘Hi,’ he murmurs, almost inaudible.
I reach deep inside myself for some sense of self-preservation. Icannotbe enjoying this. My stomach isnotfluttering. And no tingling is happening anywhere.Cleo, get it together!
There are a thousand reasons I can’t: who he is, whoIam, where we are, the mercenaries hunting for us. We’re both riding high on adrenaline, and our judgment is terrible right now. Right?
‘We should concentrate,’ I whisper unwillingly. ‘People are trying to kill us.’
‘I can do more than one thing at once,’ he whispers in reply, and I can’t tear my gaze away from his mouth. But he’s waiting. He’s letting me choose. He could lean in so easily, close that last small distance between us, and find my lips with his. He could set us both on fire.
Instead, this boy who has everything holds himself back, restrained by nothing but his own willingness to let me be the one who decides. It’s a kind of power that sends a shiver through me.
The little Cleo in my head, who hasn’t been kissed in nearly a year, is doing backflips.Get in there, girl!she’s screaming.You know he knows how!
