Containing Malice (Rebel Cyborgs #1) - Cynthia Sax Page 0,22

male paused. She’s kind to me.

Malice snorted. They had been brutally tortured for most of their lifespans. Neither of them could process what kindness was.

But she had touched him with passion during the rest cycle. She’d looked at him as though he was all she’d ever wanted. She’d screamed his name when she came. Again and again.

And blast it, she was so fraggin’ beautiful. And clever. And strong.

She has no honor. He didn’t trust her. She processed Bonin would torture me, and she didn’t try to intercede with that.

The female had walked away from him without a backward glance, without a care, and that had irritated the fraggin’ hole out of him.

I witnessed the confrontation through your visual system. Valor’s tone was dry. I saw the way Bonin looked at her.

A growl rose in Malice’s throat. The guard shouldn’t have looked at her at all. She was his.

She’s small for a human female and all of her kind break easily. The E Model had little admiration for their oppressors. Would you have rather she had blocked the blows for you?

The prospect of her standing in the way of the guard’s reprimand stick made Malice’s gaze turn red. She would be crushed, her fragile bones broken. The medic is clever. She could have devised a diversion. She—

The deluge of transmissions stopped. The silence was devastating.

Nooo… Valor howled.

Fraggin’ hole. Malice pressed his fingertips into his palms, seeking to contain his aggravation. Their access to information had been severed with the transmissions.

Had they retrieved enough data? Did they have the inputs they needed to escape?

He looked at the wall panel by the door. Illona claimed the memory chip contained more intelligence. He couldn’t access it now. The monitoring equipment had been re-activated.

The guards usually deactivated the recordings during their torture sessions. He recovered from being stunned quicker than he had recovered in the past.

After they beat him, he could retrieve it.

There could be a virus on the memory chip. He unfolded his fingers, gazed at the light-blue strip of fabric, the remnants of his medic’s flight suit. He would take that risk, would trust her once more.

Malice lifted the fabric to his nose, breathed in her scent.

Valor was right. Illona hadn’t lied about the transmissions, about his brethren being free.

She could be telling the truth about the intelligence.

He couldn’t process her actions, why she was helping them, if she was helping him, what her goals were. His organic brain was clouded from wanting her. He had never experienced such bliss as when he was inside her.

She had been hot and wet and snug around him, had felt perfect, right, like she was manufactured for him. Her soft skin had pressed against his hard muscle. Everything he did to her—and he had treated her brutally—she’d taken.

The pain of her fingernails biting into his shoulders had amplified his pleasure. Her voice in his ear, demanding more, more, more, had pushed him over the edge again and again.

He missed her, missed her chatter, her touch, her scent, and he would believe anything if it meant he could enjoy the ecstasy of breeding with her again.

My processors don’t fully function around the medic. He made that galling confession. This could all be an elaborate trap.

Or it could be our best chance at freeing ourselves. Valor predictably offered a more positive possibility. My processors don’t fully function when I’m alone…which is my reality for 96.2369 percent of the planet rotation. There was a pause. I can’t endure the inactivity, the silence for much longer, Malice. The opening of the transmission lines showed me that.

Malice’s lips flattened. Had that been her goal—to show them what they were missing? Was that a new type of torture she’d devised?

We escape in two planet rotations. He reminded his friend of that timeline. Endure for that duration at minimum. He would risk accessing the memory chip, would negotiate for Illona’s assistance if that was required to free them. We’ll sync our databases now.

They compared the data they’d retrieved, crafted escape plans, chattered about revelations. Malice wasn’t as communicative as Valor was, but he tried to give the E Model the processor stimulation he craved.

He moved toward the door, leaned against it. That was to increase his scanning range, track more movements around him, outside his chamber.

It wasn’t to be closer to her, to his gorgeous little deceiver. He wrapped the strip of cloth around his right index finger. His systems weren’t that damaged.

She would have to be dealt with. He didn’t have to