If she thought she’d seen this man angry before, that was nothing.
The way he looked at her now … that was pure evil. It reminded her of the look in Blade’s eyes as she hung in that tree, only maybe it was worse. Blade had every right to hate her, to blame her, to want to punish her for her sins, but she’d never done anything to Mark to earn his fury.
“Did you think about the consequences to other people when you decided to try to play hero? Did you think it would turn those monsters into pets if you tried to warn them? You're just a brain, you should learn to know your place. That’s your only worth. Did you think Dr. Gardner would let you go without a fight? You belong to him, baby genius. He bought you fair and square, and if you think you're just going to return to your cushy little lab unharmed, you’ve got another thing coming. I found you, which means I get to decide your punishment, and I can assure you it’s going to?—”
Mark never finished that sentence.
One second, he was leaning down over her, his hand still around her neck, the next, blood sprayed all over her as somebody cut his neck wide open.
The hand on her neck loosened. Mark’s dying body fell, and behind him stood Blade. Like an avenging angel, dressed all in black, his dark hair mussed, the bloody knife gripped in his hand tight enough that she could see his knuckles had blanched.
“Did he hurt you?” Blade growled, his glare fixed on the man lying at his feet but then softened as he looked to her.
Slowly, she shook her head, hardly able to believe he was there. That he’d saved her. That he hadn't abandoned her.
“You didn't leave,” she whispered.
Confusion filled his dark eyes. “Of course not. I told you I was going to kill them.”
“You saved me,” she said in awe. Nobody had ever done anything like that for her before. Without any conscious thought on her part, she scrambled to her feet and threw herself at Blade, who easily caught her. Wrapping herself around him, she clung to him as she buried her face against his neck, all her emotions crescendoing inside her until they had no choice but to burst out into noisy sobs.
He hadn't left.
He’d stayed.
Killed for her.
Saved her.
And now she was more confused than ever about how he felt about her, and about how she felt about him.
Chapter
Ten
January 12th
10:01 P.M.
As Whitney explained, still somewhat hesitantly, like she didn't really believe he was interested, about some theory she had on how to use plants to boost the immune system in a way that hadn't been tried before, Blade still couldn’t get over her reaction to him when he’d killed the man hurting her.
She’d thought he’d left her.
Truly believed that he’d abandoned her and she was on her own.
The look on her face when that last body fell, and she saw him standing there, would forever be etched into Blade’s mind.
There should be no reason that he cared one way or the other how she felt about him. As long as he secured whatever intel she could offer them that would lead them to the man they sought, that was all that mattered.
It should be all that mattered anyway.
But it wasn't.
For whatever reason, he didn't like Whitney’s immediate reaction to just assume that no one was on her side. He got why she thought that way, she’d been sold by her parents to a man who had basically imprisoned her, twisted something she’d intended for good, and then blamed her for its failure by literally putting the deaths of others on her back.
Only that wasn't her cross to bear.
From everything the man he’d questioned told him, and what he’d heard from the man Whitney had told him after the fact was her personal babysitter who enjoyed tormenting her, what she’d told him was true. She had been with Dr. Gardner for a long time, she was the creator of the drug, and Dr. Gardner himself kept messing it up by insisting that he fiddle with it. She was nicknamed baby genius because she was so young, and she’d been bought by the scientist. And she was going to be punished for her brave attempt to warn him and his team of the dangers facing them if they were caught again.
