Useless.
He sighs, long-suffering, then tosses me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
“Put me down!” I shout, thrashing.
“You done?” he asks.
“Go to hell!”
He chuckles. “You first.”
The car door swings open and I’m dumped into the backseat. Before I can sit up, it slams shut and the locks click into place. I lunge for the handle. Nothing.
Then the other door opens.
Asher slides in beside me—already laughing.
Not a smirk. Not a chuckle.
Full-bodied, unrestrained laughter that shakes his shoulders and makes his eyes gleam with something wicked. He tips his head back, hand dragging through his hair as he tries—and fails—to rein it in.
“I— I can’t breathe—” he manages between laughs.
He looks at me, still shaking. “I would’ve paid good money to see my driver’s face. You really thought you had a chance, didn’t you? Watching you try to escape might be the best entertainment I’ve had in weeks.” He clutches his side, still grinning. “The determination. The confidence. It almost makes me want to let you get a little farther next time. Just to see what you’d do.”
Heat burns up my neck as I cross my arms. “It could have worked.”
He grins. “You’re relentless. I’ll give you that.”
I sink back into the seat, seething. He’s enjoying this far too much. I hate how infectious his laughter is. How, for a second, I almost forget that I hate him.
Because like this—unguarded, grinning, and alive—he’s devastating.
I shove the thought away.
“You can’t keep me locked up forever,” I mutter, staring out the window.
His smirk softens into something smug as he leans closer. “Oh, Kitten. You’re going to have to try a lot harder than that.”
The car eases out of the garage.
And as the city slides past, reality settles in.
The second I step into the lab, my entire body locks up.
The scent of sterilized metal and faint acetone hits my lungs, sharp and clinical, a jarring contrast to the damp, muggy air outside. Stainless steel countertops gleam beneath fluorescent lights. Compounds sit in neat, methodical rows. Everything is pristine. Too pristine. Too controlled. Too perfect.
I hate it.
This isn’t like my old dorm room, where chaos ruled and chemistry felt alive—messy, unpredictable, and thrilling. There, I worked late into the night surrounded by textbooks with frayed edges and handwritten notes scrawled across every inch of free space. A tiny hot plate. Stolen glassware. The occasional explosion that sent me ducking for cover.
That was real science.
Even Cami’s warehouse had personality. It smelled like old wood and motor oil, a place where ideas thrived because no one was watching. No one demanded perfection. It had energy. Life. Possibility.
This place has none of that.
It’s cold. Clinical. Soulless. It doesn’t feel like a space for discovery—it feels like a machine. An assembly line meant to strip my work of its genius and turn it into a commodity.
