The sense of betrayal was almost more than she could handle on top of the shock of discovering that Reese was one of the cyborgs … not a hunter/maybe cyborg as the others were, the people she still thought of as people. A cyborg.
Like Dante.
And, like Dante, he had betrayed her trust … except that she’d given her trust to Reese unquestioningly. She’d admired him. He’d been an intergalactic ranger—they’d been told he had come to them from the rangers—and she’d thought he was one of the finest soldiers ever to live—thought of him almost like a …god.
A chill went through her despite the warmth of the water. With a shaking hand, she shut it off and sloughed the water from her body. Reese tossed her the linen from the bed that she’d been wrapped in when the cyborgs had burst into the cabin. She managed to catch it and wrap it around her although a good portion of it dragged through the water that still puddled at her feet.
She didn’t look at Reese as she headed for the door.
He barred her passage as she reached the opening, bracing his arm against the door frame. “I give you my word I will not betray you.”
Amaryllis glanced up at him and then fixed her stony gaze on the floor. “You already did.”
His lips tightened. “I was sent to infiltrate the ranks of the hunters.”
There didn’t seem to be much she could say to that. He was a soldier. He’d followed orders. God alone knew what those orders had included, but she was fairly certain she didn’t want to know.
He wouldn’t let her pass, however. She didn’t know what he wanted from her, but it was obvious her silence wasn’t it. “It doesn’t matter now.”
He caught her chin, forcing her to look at him.
“It matters.”
She frowned, confused by the intensity of his gaze. “Why?”
Catching her shoulders, he dragged her up against his chest and covered her mouth with his own, kissing her deeply, hungrily. Too stunned even to consider resisting, he’d invaded her senses with the bold stroke of his tongue, his heat, his scent, his taste, flooding her body with the drug of desire, and annihilated any chance for thought even before Amaryllis realized what was happening. Heat curled in her belly. Her bones turned to putty. The only thought that flitted through her mind was the half formed one that she’d known Reese’s kiss would be devastating. She staggered when he released her almost as unexpectedly as he’d seized her. “Think about it.”
Think about it, Amaryllis thought blankly? Asifshe could think at all! Feeling very much as if she’d been blindsided, she followed Reese back into the cabin. A fresh stack of garments had been placed on the bunk. She moved toward them when Reese indicated she should put them on, but she was so shaken she couldn’t make heads or tails of the pieces at first. Finally, she managed to dress herself.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked when Reese grasped her arm and escorted her toward the door.
“The barracks.”
Amaryllis glanced at him sharply. Not a cell? Or maybe ‘barracks’ was merely a polite euphemism for prison?
Shewasa prisoner. A four man—make that cyborg—escort constituted an arrest in her book.
She discovered when he had escorted her through the ship that the barracks in question had been set aside for the females. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or alarmed that they were being segregated by sex, but she discovered very quickly that itwasa cell, regardless of what Reese had called it. As soon as she’d stepped inside, the door was locked.
Still, it was a relief just to be free of the overwhelming presence of four enormous cyborg soldiers and the barracks at least had the feel of a barracks, not a jail cell.
She felt less relieved once she’d surveyed the room. Naturally enough the majority of the bunks had already been claimed. It was obviously a sleep period, for the room had been dimmed and the bunks were occupied, but the commotion at the door had roused most of them and she could feel dozens of pairs of curious eyes on her. Stiffening her spine, she moved down the aisle between the two rows, searching for an empty bunk.
“Cyborg whore!” one of the women muttered.
Amaryllis stiffened and glanced toward the sound of the voice. She couldn’t recall her name, but she recognized the woman—a fanatic if there’d ever lived one. Half the hunters referred to her as Psycho.
To Amaryllis’ relief, she saw the woman had been chained to her bunk. She didn’t currently feel up to defending herself from attack.
Deciding to simply ignore the remark, she moved on, wondering what the chances were that her secret would remain a secret. Reese’s comment seemed to indicate that Dante hadn’t betrayed that much, at any rate, but she doubted it would be long before everyone knew regardless.
She’d never made any attempt to socialize with her fellow hunters. It wasn’t encouraged, and, in any case, she’d never really learned how to interact socially with others, never having had much opportunity for it growing up. On the other hand, she hadn’t exactly tried to keep her background secret either. She kept images of her family in her locker and it wasn’t inconceivable that those had been seen by at least some of the other hunters.
And that was just the sort of juicy tidbit people liked to share when they were bored and couldn’t think of anything else to talk about.
Apparently, her whereabouts since take offwasn’ta secret and Psycho’s nasty remark was only a prelude to what she could expect to have to endure.
She selected one of the last bunks for her own, in the corner near the far bulkhead, not so much because she was trying to hide—although she wished she could—but because, strategically, it would be easier to defend if she came under attack.
