“He is”—he cleared his throat—“perceptive.”
I narrowed my eyes.
He glanced at the chamber door and lowered his voice. “He knew my allegiance lies elsewhere.”
“And where would that be?”
“I’m a member of a scientific community looking for the cure.”
My jaw dropped. “The Shard.”
His shiny black head inclined. “My history with Aiman coupled with certain”—he rubbed his nape—“skills made me an easy guise to infiltrate his activities and ascertain the cure. I established our partnership but ran into two roadblocks. One, he hadn’t perfected the cure. And two…” He fastened those penetrating eyes on mine.
“Me?”
He swiped blood from his nose. “When I discovered he didn’t have a cure yet, I began plotting my exit. Then, he found you.” He blinked at me under drawn brows. “I couldn’t stop your abduction without unveiling my disguise and surrendering his captured nymphs. As it turns out, all of the nymphs perished anyway.”
I leaned against the wall and wrapped an arm over my twisting gut. “You deceived me.”
He sat beside me, leaning elbows on knees. “Would you have believed the truth?”
“I’m not sure what to believe.” Believing him meant he wasn’t who I thought he was. It meant I’d been a hateful bitch while he risked his guise to protect me.
A bright airy sensation filled my chest. Maybe it was weeks of loneliness slamming into me, but I lifted my hand, held it palm up in his lap.
Quiet floated between us as he stared at it. The wait wilted into sad patience then rejection. The pain of it curled my fingernails into my palm. I pulled my hand away.
He caught it and the moment our fingertips brushed, a jolt of emotion flooded me. Our eyes collided.
His fingers snaked around mine, his other arm supported my back, brought me into his chest. “They’ll come back for you.” His hug tightened. “Your priest was loath to leave. That arrow-wielding savage hauled him out with his axe at his throat.”
Sandalwood smothered my senses. Not cologne. All natural. All him. I nestled my nose further in his neck. “It’s a tomahawk.”
“It’s barbaric.”
“Who else knows the combinations? His escape will be pinned on you.”
“The cook who delivered his food. He won’t be talking.”
I raised my head. “How can you be sure?”
“A fierce woman showed me an efficient way to silence people.”
I shoved him away. “You took an innocent man’s tongue?”
He folded his hands on his hand and looked at me through thick fans of lashes. “Evie, that man beat your priest at every opportunity and fed him only the spoils from the kitchen.”
Oh, Roark. I released a shaky exhale. “So that’s where you’ve been all day.”
For the first time, his gaze scrutinized my face. “May I treat your injuries?”
I wiggled my jaw. Pain shot through my head but nothing was broken. “Tell me about the botched plan first.”
“There are no boats on Malta. The Drone sank them all. The only way on or off the archipelago is by plane. But your savage—”
“Jesse.”
“—came by boat. The boat he planned to leave on once he freed you and your priest.”
“And you’d let me go? Just like that?” I knew he would. I wanted to hear it.
“I would see you safe. Above all agendas.”
I opened my eyes, realizing I’d closed them. “What’s the backup plan?”
“I give you the collar and wait. But when I found you downstairs held down by that…” His lips formed a hard line. Then he stood and paced. “I would’ve hauled you off the island myself if Siraj hadn’t been in the courtyard when we passed. It would’ve been a vain attempt. I had no strategy. I was so…” He cast me dark look then resumed pacing. “This island is guarded by hundreds of aphids, each one linked to Aiman. He sees what they see. We wouldn’t have made it beyond the fortress walls.”
“That’s why you haven’t tried to escape with me?”
He knelt before me. “Think about it. Fill your mind with compassion and you’ll find the truth.”
I licked my lips. I believed him all the way down to the marrow of my psyche. “Can we start over?” I offered my hand.
Fingers slid across my palm. “Call me Michio.”
“Michio, I’m Evie.”
He tightened his grip. “Aiman cannot know my identity. If he gets a hold of your blood, the consequences—”
“Time out.” I pulled my hand back. “You’ve been giving him my blood for weeks.”
He shook his head, sat back on his heels. “A sleight of hand. I always swapped your vial with a substitute. Aiman has been relentlessly studying my blood.”
“He’s got to know.” I patted the bruised vein in my elbow. “Don’t men have an extra chromosome?”
“I suggested you are hermaphrodite or intersex with atypical sex chromosomes.”
“What?”
“Of course, it isn’t true. Besides, looking to chromosomes for gender specification is antiquated. I won’t go into that.”
He rose from his knees and returned to the edge of the bed. “Your blood confirmed what I suspected.” He picked at a fray in the blanket.
“Want to tell me what’s making your face twist like that?”
“You’re faster than them. You can control them acoustically. You could see them outside with Siraj tonight when I couldn’t. Is that right?”
I nodded.
“Then there are the spiders. Your predator. They’re drawn to you. The Drone is especially aggressive toward you. He’s never bit anyone else. It’s his spider genetics, his instinct to do so with you. And there’s something else.” He stood and gestured for me to follow him out of the cell. We stopped before the mirror above the bathroom sink.
A towel appeared in front of me as he removed my borrowed shirt. Then he offered a small mirror from the drawer and turned my back toward the sink. I lifted it as he brushed my hair over my shoulder to bare my back. A nickel-sized black spot tattooed my shoulder.
“This is what you’ve been pestering me about. I really have no idea…” I backed up until my butt hit the sink. The roundness of the dot was unnaturally perfect. I reached across my chest and touched it. “…what this is.” No pain or sensation. A shiver crept over my spine as I caught his awed expression.
“I do.” He tilted my hand. The reflection caught four more black dots, each comparable in size and shape to the first one. Three on one shoulder blade. Two on the other. Like blotches of ink under the skin.
He traced the spots, connected one to the other with an invisible line. “You didn’t have them when I examined you on the jet to Malta. They appeared after you passed out in the hall. Was that the first time you tried controlling aphids?”
The mirror shook in my hand. My throat was dry. “Yes.”
“Each time you signal them, a new one appears. And your eyes…”
“My eyes?”
“I know when you’re communicating because your eyes turn black. Your irises. Your sclera. All pitch black.”
My breathing shallowed. “That sounds…bad.”
He shook his head. “It’s good, Evie. You share the genetic properties of the coccinellidae, the ladybird. You exhibit their strengths and their weaknesses. Yet, you’re still human.” His pupils dilated. “An enhanced human, adapted to kill aphids.”
Tremors infiltrated my body. I handed him the mirror. “I need to go to the bathroom.”
He turned his back and filled the tub. Still didn’t trust me?
“I can bathe myself.”
“Your wounds need cleaning and stitches. I’m still your doctor.”
A crimson slash puckered my arm. Where did that come from? I extended my jaw and thousands of needles invaded my head. The ooze from the gash inside my cheek left a rancid taste in my mouth.
He’d bathed me dozens of times, but this time felt different. I flushed the toilet and curiosity sent me climbing into the tub.
He bent over the edge and submersed a sponge. “We have one week. We’re not waiting for your guardians.”
My guardians?
He cleansed my injured arm and laid it on the ledge. “Let this dry.”
As he focused on the cuts on my face, I realized this bath was different for him too. Beneath his clinical movements was a stirring of something intrinsic to a man in the presence of a naked woman. The bead of sweat on his brow. The shift of his eyes. The tremor in his fingers. I found a strange comfort knowing he was as affected by me as I was by him. It felt human.
He made gentle dabs around my mouth. “You can control the army. We just need to hone your command. You have to block Aiman’s link to his guards. And blind him. Then we have a chance.”
We? My belly fluttered. “Command them how? I get deafening headaches. Nose bleeds. I pass out after mere minutes.”
“Yang.” His voice was soft.
“Yang.”
He lifted his bag onto the toilet and dug through it until a sealed package of needles and thread appeared in his hand. “I can’t explain the pigment changes in your skin and eyes without more testing. I’ve tried to attribute it to bruising, acute shock, blood loss, the spider bites. There’s no medical explanation.” He prodded the gash on my arm. “I’m stitching this first. Ready?”
At my nod, the needle poked my skin. The tugging was uncomfortable but nothing compared to the pain when I stitched myself in Roark’s bathroom.
He clipped the thread, reading my face. “You trust me, don’t you?”
“If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be having this conversation with you while you ogle my tits.”
“I’m not—” His gaze flicked to my chest where my nipples poked above the suds. A blush swept over his golden skin and he steadied the needle next to my smile. “We know the”—he cleared his rough voice—“relax your mouth, Evie.”
My smile widened. Had he always been that easy to unsettle? After a few attempts, I loosened the muscles in my cheeks.
“We know the ladybird is the aphid’s predator. Seeing its physical traits morphing on you…maybe it is mimicry. A form of adaptation assisting you in survival. Or maybe it is teleologic evolution.” He glanced at my face. “A derivative of Aristotle’s four causes where adaptation occurs for a purpose, an end goal.” He pierced another hole. “What we do know is your adaptations are not chance and are undeniable functions of your defenses.”
I chewed on his speculation. “So those are your theories on how I’m…evolving. Why do I go into shock?”
“Flip around so I can do that eye.”
He stared at his lap as I turned. “Are you familiar with Yin and Yang and its relationship to the body?”
“No clue.”
“Yang represents the masculine virtues of nature. The bright burst of a solar flare. The tough shell of a penguin egg. Clay, hardened and fired by the sun. This is balanced with Yin, its feminine polarity. A velvet petal opening under a midnight sky. The roll of a worm pushing soil. A gurgle in an ice water spring.” A pause. “Do you feel cold or slowed down when the vibrations hit you?”
I thought about it. “Yeah, but only once did I let the symptoms go too far. That’s when I passed out.”
His forearms rested on the ledge, drawing his face close to mine. “And that’s when I touched your head in the hall. You were summoning the aphids away from your priest. When I touched you, they stopped.”
“Okay.” I tumbled into his jet eyes, trusting him.
“It was Yang.” He stabbed wet fingers in his hair, making the ends stand in chaotic sexy spikes. “Yin and Yang are always vying for balance. The Yang of day turns toward the Yin of night. Without harmony between the two, the body and mind aren’t healthy.”
“Not sure I’m following.”
“Man or woman, all bodies contain Yin and Yang. Yet you’re only able to tap into the dark, feminine Yin as your fuel, which is why you needed my touch—Yang—to complete the symmetry. Yang is outward Chi flow. Once depleted, your Yin surges to compensate.” He muttered to himself, “Which is why your body goes into shock as you continue to draw from your energy.”
He turned my chin to suture the final gash. His eyelashes lowered and the stone set of his face crumbled away. “I won’t let them hurt you again.”
My heart drummed a furious tempo. “I think you just exposed a feeling, Dr. Nealy.”
His ironbound expression returned. “I’m serious. We need to leave.” His tone matched his glare. “I thought I had more time to get you out safely, but after Aiman took you down there…he’s impatient. Time’s up.”
I reached for the sponge and gestured him closer. When he dipped his head, I rinsed the blood from his nose, his chiseled cheekbones, his full lips. He was so stunning, my heart ached. “I don’t hold it against you for not being there today.”
His eyes leapt to mine. A flux of emotions bounced between us.
“Seeing how you were busy helping the savage free Roark.”
He looked away, but his shoulders moved closer.
“And you still found the time to rescue me.” I lowered the sponge. “Do you forgive me for taking my anger out on you?”
The downcast tilt of his eyes lifted. ”There’s nothing to forgive.” His chest was bent over the tub, arching closer, closer, as if his body was starving for touch. His eyes fluttered closed.
I found myself wishing he would fall in and be forced to remove the shirt that hid his sculpted body. My heart hammered in my ears as I closed the gap.
“Ow.” He jerked back.
“What? What happened?”
He held up the needle and rotated his forearm where he’d pricked himself.
I laughed despite the bite of the stitches around my mouth. “Back to this Yang thing. You know I have those nightmares. When I sleep next to a man, I don’t have them. Could Yang have something to do with it?”
“Skin-to-skin contact? Yes, of course.” His voice jumped. “You’re absorbing Yang, strengthening your subconscious against threats.”
“It sounds”—I scratched my head—“kind of fantastical.”
He released the plug from the drain. “It’s the most fundamental concept in Asian medicine, and very important that you understand. Think of Yin as the body and Yang as the spirit. If the spirit returns to the air, the body is restored to the earth. Without the spirit, you’ll die.” He cupped his hand with water and let it trickle over my leg as I stood. “It could be our way out. We have to test it.” He wrapped a towel around me and dropped his voice. “But only while I fuel your Yang.”
“How will we do that exactly?”