Grace Fontenot was in her eighties. Very slender now, so that she looked small and appeared fragile with her thick, silver white hair, braided and looped in a bun at the back of her head. Her skin was thin and pale, the blue of her eyes faded. The color might have faded a bit, but her eyes were sharp and took in everything, including the multitude of gauze strips beneath the thin blouse Zara wore.
Zara didn't want to be rude and pull her feet under her skirt, but everyone was staring and she was embarrassed. She looked around for Gino. The room held women, no men. Bellisia had hugged her too tightly before she got control of herself, and the wounds were throbbing all over again in spite of the painkillers Gino had given her earlier. Now, Bellisia curled up in the chair beside Zara with tears in her eyes. She kept petting Zara because, like everyone else, she didn't know what to do.
Zara couldn't stop looking at her best friend. Drinking her in. She hadn't thought she'd ever see her again, but there were too many people around and she couldn't talk to her alone. The things she needed to say--to know--were locked up tight and she could only sign to Bellisia, using the code they'd perfected after they became aware there were cameras on them at all times, to tell her that she needed to talk.
Thankfully, Bellisia signed back she'd find a way to be alone with her. Ezekiel had given her two more pain pills after Bellisia had hugged her, and she was beginning to feel the effects. Right now, she was beginning to feel very off-balance. As always, when that happened, she looked for Gino.
Wyatt's grandmother took charge. "Back up and give her room," Nonny ordered.
The three women, Pepper, Bellisia and Cayenne, automatically obeyed. It was clear they respected the older woman and her word was law in her home.
Zara took her first real breath since Gino had left her with the women, dragging the scents of the Fontenot home into her lungs. It was ... comforting in a weird way. Spices, delicious smells drifting from the kitchen. Freshly baked bread. Chicken. The chicken smelled like heaven. This was the way a house was supposed to smell. Inviting. Homey. Not like a barracks and rations. Someday, she was going to have a home like this one and fill it with similar scents so anyone coming in would feel instantly welcome.
"It smells wonderful in here," she blurted.
Nonny looked pleased. "I always like to have somethin' on the stove to welcome the boys after they've been out workin' so much. My boys were always hungry when they were growin' up. The ones I have now don't seem to be filled night or day."
Pepper and Bellisia laughed. Cayenne nodded her head, her lips curving, but she didn't make a sound. Zara understood. It was difficult to laugh when for so many years, she hadn't had anything to laugh about. Zara had tried to be "normal" with her friends, with Bellisa and Shylah, but she hadn't been happy at the compound or out in the real world. There didn't seem a place for her. She could tell Cayenne felt a little of that.
Zara wondered what, when Cayenne had total freedom now, kept the woman in a place where she was uncomfortable. Maybe for women like them, there was no place to call home. She studied Cayenne while Nonny examined her feet. A part of her saw Bellisia and Pepper looking at her feet with a kind of horror. Both got tears in their eyes. Cayenne's face gave nothing away.
Zara's heart began a slow acceleration. The room tilted a little, and her stomach lurched. Somewhere there was the sound of dripping water and she remembered the water in the bathroom where Zhu had tortured her. The steady drip she hadn't acknowledged until right at that moment. She hadn't noticed it then, probably because she had other things to worry about, but now she knew she would always connect dripping water with the lash of the whip and the whistle of the cane.
Her body jerked. She felt the strike on her body. A low whimper emerged, and she hastily pressed her fingers to her mouth. Uneasily she glanced at the windows. It was midafternoon. Gino had let her sleep in and then brought her breakfast in bed. He'd had her nap again before getting her dressed to meet the other members of the household.
Zara knew with all the windows, anyone could see into the house. Anyone. Whitney would get the information she stored in her brain from her, dead or alive. He didn't need her alive, just her body. He would keep coming at her until he got what he wanted, and anyone near her would be in terrible danger.
What of Zhu? He would be coming as well. Gino and the others might think they were finished with him, but they weren't. She saw his face and heard his promise. He would come after her and would take pleasure in killing those around her. Whitney might kill them, but there would be no pleasure in it. He would consider them sacrifices for the greater good. Zhu would enjoy the killing, making her--and everyone--suffer in the process. That would be his enjoyment.
Her body gave a shudder she couldn't hide and she looked around. Needing him. Gino. Her shield. It was wrong to force the man into that role. He had rescued her. Taken care of her. Watched over her. And he'd delivered her to Bellisia and was gone. She knew he was probably sick of her clinging to him. Sick of having to hear her whine. How much whining had she done? She didn't even remember. She was getting a little confused because of the additional pain pills Ezekiel had given her. She had to let Gino go. He was probably hiding out, so relieved to be away from her when she looked everywhere for him and listened with everything in her for the sound of his voice.
What was she thinking? Gino had kissed her. He'd declared his intentions, made it very clear that he intended to pursue her, that he wanted them to be in a relationship. He wasn't the type of man to lie to her. Doubling up on pain medication when Gino wanted her to back off from it a bit clearly was affecting her thinking processes. He'd kissed her. He wanted her. She wasn't going to let go of that.
"Zara, would you like a cup of tea before you eat anything? Tea can settle the stomach."
Nonny asked her the question gently, but Zara had the feeling it was to give the other women something to do besides cry over her. God knew, if they saw the lacerations and bruises on her body, they would really fall apart. She couldn't handle that. She felt like she was well on her way to healing, with the exception of her feet, but she knew her body looked as if she'd been through a battle.
She nodded gratefully. She wanted a cup of tea and then a room that was quiet, and mostly, she wanted Gino. She felt scared without him. She couldn't help looking through the windows again, wondering if a sniper was taking aim at her head right that minute. She should have told him the truth about what she'd been doing there in Shanghai. She had to tell him soon. But if she did, he would have to share the information with whoever ran his team, that person would share with the major general and then they'd come for her. There was no way they would leave the intelligence in her head.
"We'll fix you right up, child," Nonny continued. Her thumb very gently brushed over Zara's swollen face.
"It's so much better already," she assured the horrified women. She barely glanced at them. She didn't care how she looked, although always, when she was in public, her looks were her armor. Now, she needed Gino. Her shield. "Gino really helped me. I couldn't open my eyes before."
Pepper, Wyatt's wife, returned with several supplies, sent her a small smile and left again. She was the sexiest woman Zara had ever seen. Her skin was perfect. Her eyes, exotic. The color was difficult to describe, one moment almost a lavender, or deep purple, but there was a strange diamond color that looked like a starburst that spread through that dark purple. She had a natural pout to her full lips and thick, dark hair that had strange patterns in it that seem to come and go with every movement of her head, making the silky mass mesmerizing. Zara could hardly look away.
Gino was around Pepper every single day. He saw that sexy woman. Small, exotic, so sensual she could steal the breath from a man or woman. What he'd seen from Zara was blood and vomit and eyes swollen shut. And don't forget the bathroom. Repeatedly. Lovely. How could he possibly want her after seeing Pepper?
Cayenne was very small, like Pepper, with dark hair so black that it gleamed blue under the l
ight. When she moved a rich, red, hourglass came and went in the long fall. She had an oval face and high cheekbones. Her eyes were a deep green framed with long black lashes. Her mouth was generous. She didn't say anything, but her eyes were watchful, and Zara had the feeling that if she made one wrong move, Cayenne would pounce and end her life instantly.
Ordinarily, Cayenne would have intimidated Zara. Nearly everyone did unless she was lecturing. Right now, she was so miserable she didn't care how watchful and alert Cayenne was. It didn't matter in the least to her. She wanted Gino. She didn't even care that Cayenne, Bellisia and Pepper were beautiful, petite women. Warrior women, and she was ... not. She needed him and she willed him to come to her, but once he'd turned her over to the women, he'd walked out without looking back. She knew he hadn't looked back because she'd watched him walk away from her. She'd watched his back until he was out of sight.
It wasn't like she could blame him. No matter what he felt for her, he had to take a break sometime. She hadn't trusted him enough to tell him the truth about the information stored in her head. She took a deep breath and let it out, afraid she might cry in front of the very sympathetic strangers and Bellisia. Was she still upset with Bellisia? Gino had insisted she shouldn't be. As it was, her skin felt clammy. Cold. She could barely catch her breath. She really needed air because she was getting dizzy, and there was a strange ringing in her ears. How long had she been out of the safety of the bedroom? How long away from Gino? Minutes? A half hour? An hour? It felt like an eternity.
"Zara." Bellisia's voice was gentle but very firm, catching her attention. "What is it? You're having a panic attack."
"Where's Gino? Where did he go?"
"I'll get him for you."
Shockingly, that was Cayenne. One moment she'd been leaning her hip against the wall, draped there so casually and still. The next second she was all movement, slipping from the room before Zara could protest. It was one thing to ask where he was, another altogether to have them go get him. She realized these women were going to get her whatever she indicated she wanted.
"How much time did Whitney give you before the capsule breaks?" Bellisia asked.
Zara bit down on her finger to keep from screaming. She needed air. She needed a way out. Why did she always feel like she was less then everyone around her? She didn't belong anywhere. How many times had Whitney drilled it into her that she was worthless? The other girls had something to contribute to their country, but she was a waste of his time. All the effort he'd put into her, and she was always a disappointment.
"Princess, take a breath."
Gino was there, crouching in front of her, eye to eye. She couldn't look at him, but that terrible burning in her chest, the raw soreness in her lungs eased enough to allow air to slip inside her. He moved right past Nonny's protest and lifted her, settled into the wide, comfortable chair she'd been in and put her on his lap. His arms were familiar to her now. Safe. Comforting. She snuggled into his heat, those firm muscles that went on forever.
Instead of forcing her to talk to him, Gino rocked her gently and addressed Nonny. "What do you think about her feet?"
"It's going to take some time to heal," Nonny answered. "I've got some poultices for her face. I can bring down the swelling faster, but her feet are a problem. I'm thinkin' on the best herbs to help them. Has Wyatt looked at them yet?"
Zara didn't want everyone looking at her mangled feet. They were long and flat like two skis. Everyone really had to stop looking at them, especially Gino.
There was a small silence, and she realized she'd said it out loud. Bellisia broke the spell by laughing. "You always say that about your feet, Zara, and it isn't true."
"They are twice the size of your feet."
The other women laughed along with Bellisia. "My feet are twice the size of her feet," Cayenne shocked her by saying. "She's teeny." Zara knew Cayenne was a couple of inches taller than Bellisia, but not much more, not six or seven inches taller.
"But lethal," Bellisia pointed out. "Zara, your feet are just fine. Whitney is an ass. He likes to be the smartest man in the room, and a woman having your kind of brains didn't fit with his concept of women being disposable. He had to make you feel inferior to him--probably to convince himself as well. He did it from the time we were toddlers. I remember him talking about your feet and your hair and what a mess you were even then."
That didn't make her feel any better, now that everyone in the room knew Whitney despised her from the time she was a baby. She couldn't remember a single word of praise from him. Also, Bellisia was teeny, even smaller than the other two women. If Zara was standing, she would have appeared a giant next to the others. The Amazon woman. The giant woman in the movies that stepped on cities.
Nonny applied a soothing cloth to Zara's feet and then straightened. She was taller than Zara realized because she was so thin and fragile. She held herself straight, unbending, and she clearly didn't care that she was taller than Pepper, Cayenne and Bellisia. She exuded a quiet confidence that Zara wished she could have.
"I was just asking Zara how long Whitney gave her before the virus is activated," Bellisia said to Gino. "I imagine you or Zeke are going to go in after the capsule."
"He's hiding them now," Gino said. His arms tightened fractionally around Zara, as if he didn't like the idea that she could be in any kind of danger. "He put two capsules in Zara, not just one. I'm going to look again, now that I know what I'm looking for. She told me she had about another week and a half."
The room went silent. She tried hard not to tense up when Gino talked about looking again. She had to confess. Tell him everything before he found the SSD in her brain, but not in front of everyone. She desperately needed to talk to Bellisia alone. "Whitney always gave me extra time to get back just in case something went wrong. If it did, Damon came to me to give me the antidote and he'd inject another capsule to give me the time needed."
"Your time was pretty exact, wasn't it, Bellisia?" Gino asked.
Zara did stiffen. There was no way to help it. He knew she was holding something important back, and he wasn't going to let up until he knew what it was. She had to have a little time to think things through. People killed over the kind of information she carried in her head. Certainly, covert agencies would do anything to get their hands on it. She needed alone time with Bellisia to ask her advice. She knew these people and whether or not they could be trusted.
Bellisia nodded. "Whitney liked us to keep to a timetable, but Zara was different in that she was very exposed publicly. He sent her all over the world, not to spy on governments, but mostly research centers and businesses. He likes to know what others are doing and project further out. He is brilliant, I have to give him that."
Bellisia had inadvertently given Zara some breathing room. She still held herself away from Gino. She didn't know if he could be counted on her side now that he knew she was hiding something from him. He didn't like it, that was for certain. She really wished she was a badass agent like Bellisia. The woman could hold her own with anyone. She wouldn't be trembling and sick because Zhu beat the holy hell out of her. She wouldn't be so frightened that she could barely breathe unless a man held her. She wouldn't be upset that she had disappointed the man she had come to care about. More than any other thing, that was what she hated the most--that she knew she'd disappointed him.
"Lean back," Gino instructed.
She sent him one look over her shoulder, intending to tell him silently to back off. Gino's dark eyes glinted with warning. She refused to be intimidated. What could he do to her when they were surrounded by women, including Nonny, Wyatt's grandmother? A wicked gleam shone in the depths of all that obsidian, and he brushed her hair from the nape of her neck with gentle fingers. He leaned into her, his face disappearing. Zara held her breath. His teeth bit into the nape of her neck. She yelped and muffled the sound by putting her hand over her mouth.
"Something wrong?" Bellisia asked.
Zara glared at her. "You
snicker and I'm going to build a robot that gobbles water faster than you can run a bath."
It was a long-standing joke between them. Zara had actually done it and placed the robot in their shared bathroom. It hadn't been easy either. She had to figure out how to dispose of the water and yet not give the robotics' secrets away. She also had to steal the tools to make the robot, one at a time over a period of weeks and months. That was the most difficult part, since Whitney was very precise in his accounting. Fortunately, Zara had learned how to doctor the inventory books without his knowledge--she'd been doing it from the time she was a teenager.
"Not that." Bellisia gave a pretend shudder, her smile wide. It faded fast. "Nonny, can't you make the swelling go down on her face faster? That looks like it hurts."
Weirdly, her face hurt the least of any place on her body. Still, she didn't want Bellisia to call attention to the swelling in front of Gino, not that he couldn't see it. He'd seen her so much worse, but it felt worse in front of the other women.
Gino tugged until she found herself relaxing back into his hold. Now that he was there, she was determined to enjoy herself a little with the other women. "Seriously, Bellisia," she assured. "Gino got rid of most of the swelling in my eyes. I know they're both black and blue, but my face doesn't hurt nearly as much as the rest of me." She wanted them to give him more credit than they were. It almost sounded as if Bellisia had been complaining that he hadn't taken proper care of her.