the same thing, back at Holland’s lab, in wonder that an android would cry.
He froze. With hands that weren’t harsh but weren’t gentle either, Hunter gripped my shoulders and pushed me away, like he’d never meant to hug me in the first place, much less touch my tears.
He turned to the group, who waited in silence. “I think she’s safe. At least for now.”
Without another look at me, he slinked back to join them.
“Can I ditch this now?” Samuel asked, waving his Taser at Daniel.
Daniel grunted, gave a jerk of his head. “Keep it. We’ve only observed her behavior for a short time. We need to make sure before we let our guard down.”
Hunter’s greeting. His embrace.
He’d been acting, in an attempt to see if I was still a threat.
His posture now, with the rigid set of his shoulders, his grim mouth, the evasive eyes—that said it all. I could apologize a thousand times but he would never hear it. He didn’t care about me. He only cared about the next people I might harm. They must have come here to determine that—for now—I was not a threat. Did they know about the bomb? I wondered. Even without a bomb, they knew I could be deadly. They’d seen it.
“Where’s Lucas?” I said.
“He’s inside.” Daniel jerked his head at Samuel, who walked to the RV door.
Lucas—the other human I’d detected. Now their captive?
Storm clouds gathered behind my eyes, filling my skull with rising pressure.
“Send him out,” I demanded, already moving toward Samuel.
Daniel lifted his hands in an attempt to calm me. “He can’t come out right now—” he started, but the squeal of the opening door cut him off.
It revealed Lucas inside. Unmoving. Bound and duct- taped within an inch of his life.
The storm clouds exploded, and I snapped.
Target: Located.
The next instant, I flew toward the door, my fingers locking around Samuel’s arm. With a burst of force, I threw him over my shoulder and he hit the ground in a crash that echoed through deserted parking lot. I wanted to check on Lucas, but my anger burned bright, urging me to turn and bring down Daniel next.
I whirled, setting my sights on Lucas’s captor before launching myself at him.
The electric pulse of a Taser crackled through my sensors, grounding me before I could ever reach my destination. It didn’t come from Daniel, though, because as I fell, I saw his hand still fumbling for the Taser in his pocket. No, this shot had originated elsewhere.
I hit the asphalt hard. Paralyzed and useless, my head lolled to the side.
Warning: Systems—
Syste—
Sy—
My last image was a blurred kaleidoscope of Hunter’s athletic shoes; my last sound, his voice saying, “Got her!”
Then I floated into nothing as my system entered the dead space of shutdown.
System rebooting.
Once the reboot initiated, my return to awareness was quick. No gradual easing into the waters; more like stripping down and diving headfirst.
I sat on the hard dirt, my feet bound and my hands secured behind me to a huge tree. The stone circle of a fire pit sat in the middle of a clearing to my left, with a picnic table a few feet back.
Peeking through the dense cover of trees and foliage, I could just make out the RV in the distance.
We were at a campground.
I returned to look at the objects I’d skipped in my initial assessment. Five camp chairs in greens and blues, arranged around the fire pit. And sitting in one, just to my right, was Hunter.
“Got her.”
His last words surfaced in my brain. “You Tased me,” I said.
“You were attacking us,” came his flat reply. Blue eyes met mine in a stalemate.
I looked around, but didn’t see anyone else. “Where’s Lucas?”
“He’s safe. He was fine when you freaked, too. Just tied up—in case.”
“In case what?”
“In case you attacked us like you did back at Quinn’s,” he said, dragging the pointed end of a stick through the dirt by his shoes. When he glanced up his face was a mask, his body language closed-off stiff. His chair was a good distance from the tree where I was bound, and he watched me with eagle eyes.
Oh.
Oh.
Based on the last Mila they’d seen, they had good reason to be concerned. Scared, even.
Scared of me, because of the terrible things I’d done.
Any remaining hint of anger faded.
They had every right to fear me. They knew what I was capable of.
My throat knotted and my gaze dropped to the floor. How could I face Hunter? Any of them? In