“I don’t, but I’d like to learn.”
She sat back in her chair, the blue in her eyes cooling to a color somewhere between silver and blue steel. “The Middlemist Red Camellia, of course. That’s how you disappear as well. You’re a phantom, just as Red is. A ghost, Jonas, at will. That was why the plant was slated to be stamped out. Red will defend itself vigorously, which is exactly what it did in the early days. Red’s history is every bit as brutal as ours.”
Jonas frowned, rubbing his left temple with the pads of his fingers. How could a plant have anything to do with her security network? Or the fact that he could disappear at will? She wasn’t making sense. “I don’t understand.”
“You know that Dr. Whitney was obsessed with growing exotic flowers, right? He keeps greenhouses at the various laboratories he frequents. When he isn’t present to tend to his plants himself, he hires specialists to look after them. If any plant dies, he kills the person that let it happen. He’s ruthless when it comes to his flowers. If there is one thing he loves above all else on this planet, it’s his exotics.”
He nodded his head for her to continue.
Camellia tapped her fingers on her thigh. A strange habit for someone who didn’t strike him as a nervous person. She had to be weighing how much she was going to tell him. He couldn’t blame her. He was a stranger to her and yet he wasn’t. They didn’t feel like strangers. They felt as if they belonged. That was probably the biggest hurdle he had to overcome with her. Nothing real happened this fast.
It occurred to him that if she was leery, he should be doubly so. He had his team, women and children to protect after all.
“You must feel threats before they manifest, right? You know things when you’re out with your team on a mission, no matter where you are.”
How could she know that? He narrowed his eyes, focusing completely on her, watching every small movement, missing nothing. The entire situation with her was strange, even to a man used to constantly encountering weird shit.
She was right that he felt threats to the team when no one else could. They all had built-in radar when it came to feeling danger. The animal genetics embedded in their code gave them all kinds of abilities to know when an enemy was near, yet Jonas had the ability in spades. He always detected potential threats far in advance of the others. The team had come to rely on his early warning system.
Ryland had asked Jonas once how he did it, and when he said he didn’t know, he knew Ryland thought he was lying. That he’d dodged the question because no one wanted their talent documented for fear it would somehow fall into Whitney’s hands. But the truth was, Jonas didn’t know how he did most of the shit he could do.
So how did this woman, whom he’d just met, know about the capabilities he’d never discussed with anyone?
Camellia laughed softly, shocking him. “Now you don’t trust me. Just a minute ago, you were trying to convince me that because we’re so connected, I had no reason not to trust you, but I can feel the waves of your suspicion rippling through my veins. No, you’re not giving anything away on your face, you don’t need to for me to read you. Just the way you can feel my emotions, I can feel yours.”
“This is bullshit, Camellia.” He didn’t like what he didn’t understand. “Just come out with it and tell me what’s happening to me.”
Camellia leaned toward him, her eyes pure blue, all cat, those dark lashes longer than he’d first thought. “It’s the mycelium running beneath the ground. You’re connected to that wherever you are. Whitney made certain of it, just like he did with me. That’s one of the many reasons we’re so connected. It’s how you were able to get into the garden. You were welcomed in. The garden thought you belonged. You do know what mycelium is. I know you do. You’ve studied plants. Mushrooms. How it’s all connected.”
He couldn’t stop his instinctive revulsion, an aggressive refusal that exploded through his entire being. He would not have fungus inside him on top of everything else. He was like some modern-day Frankenstein, a freakish monster, created by Whitney and programmed to kill. The perfect killing machine. Jonas rubbed his temples. He had killed. Many, many times. And now this. Fungus. Disgust permeated his mind. Abhorrence. What the fuck was this shit going to make him do?
Jonas became aware of the stillness first. There, in the garden, it was as if even the breeze had ceased. Seconds ago, he’d felt connected to Camellia on a molecular level, but suddenly she was gone, no longer in his mind. That song running through his veins had fallen silent. He searched for the connection, studying her averted face as he did so. She was looking out into the garden, her attention seemingly riveted on one of the exotics growing a few feet from the narrow path leading to her home.