Deeper than the Night - By Amanda Ashley Page 0,91
us dead," Barrett reminded him. "Once we have him again, you can do anything you want to him, except kill him."
"Anything?"
Barrett nodded. "Within reason. But I need him alive, at least until I've obtained a sufficient quantity of his sperm and I can reproduce the healing agent in his blood. And then . . ." He shrugged. "And then he's yours."
Kelsey nodded. "I'll go with the kid to make sure nothing goes wrong."
"I don't need a nursemaid," Hamblin said, bristling.
"Take Kelsey with you," Barrett said. "He can make sure you don't get yourself locked in another closet, and you can make sure he brings the alien back alive."
Mitch and Kelsey glared at each other a moment, then left the room.
Barrett stared after them. This time, he thought, this time he would have it all.
Alexander woke to an intense sense of loss and knew immediately that Kara had left the house. And in that same instant, he knew why.
Sitting up, he buried his face in his hands. She had touched his mind last night, felt his fear, his pain, and she had run away to spare him further anguish.
Cursing himself, cursing the weakness that had overwhelmed him the night before, he rose from the sofa and ran up the stairs to the bedroom. Opening the door, he stepped inside, and her scent embraced him, wrapping around him like an invisible web fashioned of her very essence.
"Kara . .. "
Crossing the floor, he sank down beside the bed and ran his hand over the sheet.
"Kara, what have I done?"
He pressed his face to the mattress, inhaling her scent. He'd been a fool to run away from the lab, a fool to be afraid, when the answer was so simple. Kill Barrett. Destroy his notes. Dispose of the blood samples and anything else Barrett had that related to Alex's existence.
So simple. And yet the thought of killing Barrett sickened him. He had been banished from ErAdona because he had shed a man's blood. And yet, what other choice did he have? So long as Barrett lived, Kara's life, and his own, would be in danger.
Rocking back on his heels, Alex stared at his hands. Strong hands with long capable fingers.
Hands that had killed before. Hands that could kill again.
He stared at the window. It was mid-afternoon. The storm had passed and the sun was shining brightly.
"Kara," he murmured. "Forgive me." Restless with the need to see her, to hold her, he wandered through the house. Never before had it seemed so empty. Never before had he felt so alone. Having known her, having tasted her love, how had he ever thought he could live without her? She had offered him her love. Even after she knew what he was, she had given him her love, taken him into the deepest part of herself. She had saved his life, restored his hope, his reason for living. And what had he done? He had offered to let her stay with him if she would give up all hope of having children, if she would submit to an operation she found repulsive.
She had loved him with all her heart, asking nothing in return. She still loved him, loved him enough to leave him because she thought she was causing him pain.
"Oh, Kara, natayah. . ." How would he ever make it up to her? Would she even let him try?
"Kara. . ."
Alex. Alex . . .
Her voice, calling his name over and over again.
He stared at the window, at the lethal sunlight kept at bay by a layer of heavy draperies. And in his mind, he heard her voice again, low and tinged with desperation.
Alex!
Kara cowered in the attic, listening to the voices below. The inertia that had held her in its grasp the night before fled as adrenaline pumped through her veins. How could she have been so stupid as to stay here? Why hadn't she taken her car and gone to a motel last night? She recognized Kelsey's voice, but not that of the man Kelsey called Mitch. They were here, in the house, looking for her. She could hear them wandering from room to room, opening doors, looking inside closets.
Fragments of their conversation drifted upward.
". . . not here."
"Have to wait . . ."
"Barrett could be wrong . . ."
Kara pressed her ear to the floor, straining to hear more. And then the voices were directly below her, and she could hear everything they said.