Genesis Rising (The Genesis Project Book 1) Page 2

  I’d also long speculated they’d programmed me not to like being touched either.

  “Cade,” I shouted over the music.

  He looked up at me and waved me over. I grunted at him again but closed the space between us. “Time to go,” I told him. “We’re going to miss our flight.”

  We didn’t really have a red-eye to catch. His boss, our boss, I guess, had sent me to get him. Cade was a phenomenal soldier. How could any man make the SEALs if he weren’t? But he occasionally drank too much and his behavior became problematic when he was drunk. I’d had to step into more than a few fights he’d started just because he drank too much.

  One of his friends told me he didn’t start drinking like this until I showed up.

  I still didn’t know what to make of that.

  Cade squinted at me and nodded toward the woman he was talking to. “I’m busy. I’ll catch the next flight.”

  I sighed impatiently. Now what the hell was I supposed to do? I was programmed to take orders from Cade, but I’d also been ordered to get him out of this bar and back home, which meant I had conflicting orders and I’d have to disobey someone now. And he knew damn well he was disobeying his commanding officer by not leaving with me.

  I was baffled.

  I hated being baffled almost as much as I hated people touching me or having to enter smoky, loud bars in the first place.

  I shuffled my weight between my feet as I puzzled through how to proceed. I was stronger and faster than Cade, but if I tried to force him out and he took a swing at me, there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. They’d made sure of that, too.

  I’d have to stand there and let him beat the shit out of me.

  “There isn’t another flight for a while,” I finally said. “And I can’t leave without you.”

  Cade shrugged and sipped on his drink. “Then stay. Have a drink.”

  I didn’t drink.

  The part of my brain that almost always controlled me fell silent.

  Great.

  I was on my own with the organic part of my brain I’d learned to mostly tune out over the years.

  And the first thought that popped into that part of my brain probably wasn’t a smart one, but it seemed to fly out of my mouth before I could run it through the part of me that was apparently far smarter than the organic half.

  I crossed my arms in mock anger and spit out, “You promised me you’d stop cheating. You’re getting on that plane with me and we’re going home.”

  Cade spilled some of his drink as he looked up at me, momentarily too surprised to even curse me. The woman’s eyes widened and she pushed her chair away from the bar. “I… need to use the restroom.”

  She grabbed her purse and walked away from us, disappearing into the back of the bar.

  I waved my hand toward the doors and Cade finally stormed out. I had a brief second to appreciate the fresh air and merciful emptiness of the sidewalk before he turned on me and yelled, “What the fuck was that?”

  I shrugged. “You wouldn’t get up and I couldn’t leave until you came with me. You should thank me, actually. You disobeyed your CO and you know it.”

  “Thank you?” Cade scoffed. “Drake, I can never show my face in there again! Everyone at the bar overheard you accusing me of being gay!”

  I just shrugged again. I wasn’t stupid. I knew this was a big deal to a lot of men for some reason, but I couldn’t care less what other people thought about me.

  Besides, it had worked, although I wasn’t at all convinced I wasn’t going to get my ass kicked still.

  “You’re an asshole,” he muttered. But he didn’t hit me. He turned around and stumbled down the sidewalk so I followed him.

  “Stop following me,” he ordered.

  I sighed and stuffed my hands into the pockets of my jeans as I watched him disappear around a corner then I pulled my cellphone out and called his CO. And just as I’d feared, he told me he was calling the guys back at The Genesis Project to temporarily override my coding so that I didn’t have to obey Cade for the rest of the night. I disconnected and leaned against the side of a building as I waited.

  I didn’t have to wait long.

  A brief buzzing in my head made me close my eyes, but it was gone just as quickly as it had appeared. And this wall I’d felt between Cade and me for the past five years was gone.

  I had to run to catch up to him and saw him duck into a different bar farther down this side street. I pulled the door open and managed to reach him before he was able to sit down.

  I grabbed his arm and shook my head at him. “Don’t fight me. They’re losing their patience with you, Cade, and I don’t want to hurt you.”

  He glanced at my hand on his arm then at my face. “You’re kidding me.”

  I shook my head again. “Do I ever kid about anything? I don’t even have a sense of humor.”

  “This is their fault!” he hissed at me.

  I had no idea what was their fault, but at least he wasn’t fighting me, so I pretended to understand. “I know, but this isn’t going to help. Disobeying orders will only make things worse.”

  Cade used his free hand to run his fingers through his hair and exhaled angrily. “Fine,” he mumbled. “I’m assuming you gotta walk me home and babysit me all night?”

  I hadn’t been directed to babysit him all night, but now that he’d mentioned it, I thought it seemed like a good idea so I just nodded. This time, I walked beside him and he didn’t tell me to stop or go back to my own apartment, which would have been pointless anyway since we lived next to each other.

  We walked in silence back to our building and after he dropped his keys while trying to get the door unlocked, I opened the door and offered to get him a glass of water.

  “Beer,” he said as he collapsed onto his sofa.

  I eyed him for a few seconds, but I hadn’t been told he couldn’t get completely shitfaced at home so I got him the beer.

  He gave me a strange look as I handed it to him and sat across from him in his armchair. He narrowed his eyes at me and asked, “Dude, what is wrong with you? Don’t you ever want to get laid?”

  “No,” I answered. “I’m almost positive that requires touching another person and you already know how I feel about that.”

  Cade snorted and shot back, “I thought you said you didn’t have a sense of humor.”

  “That was funny?” I asked seriously.

  Apparently, Cade thought that was funny, too.

  “How long are you off the hook?” he asked me.

  “Off what hook?”

  “My hook.”

  “Don’t know. It could be temporary or permanent. Parker might decide you’ve become too unstable to trust with such an expensive investment anymore.”

  Cade picked at the label on his beer bottle and the room became oppressively silent. I thought he was worried about the potential damage to his career, but Cade was often full of surprises. “Doesn’t it ever bother you that all you are to anyone is an expensive investment?”

  Some croaking sound escaped before I could stop it. He looked up at me, but I didn’t want to answer his question honestly. For five years, I thought I’d done a good job of hiding that I might be anything more than a machine with living parts, but Cade had obviously seen through me. And it obviously bothered him.

  “Yes,” I said quietly. “But it doesn’t change what I am, so why fixate on it?”

  “Because it’s wrong,” Cade insisted. “And now that they’ve succeeded with you, they’re making more. They haven’t admitted it, but we both know they’re trying.”

  “I’m sure they are.”

  “And you’re ok with that?” he asked.

  “There’s nothing we can do about it,” I reiterated.

  Cade shook his head. “We could tell people. We could go to the press. If the public knew…”

  “Stop,” I interrupted. If anyone ever heard him talking like this, he would be dead. And I could be the one forced to kill him.


  He was probably the one person on this entire planet I’d formed any sort of attachment to, and the thought of having to kill him made me sick.

  “You’re going to get called in to talk to your CO tomorrow,” I said. “Tell him you might have PTSD. Tell him you just have a drinking problem. But do not mention this to him or anyone else.”

  Cade glared at me but I wasn’t sure if he was angry with me or The Genesis Project or the Navy or all of us. Over the past five years, I thought we’d all given him plenty of reasons to be angry.

  “I didn’t have a choice, you know,” he said. “They told me I had to show up at that corporation to babysit a goddamned cyborg so I did.”

  “I’m not a cyborg,” I interrupted.

  Cade exhaled a heavy breath. “You’re not a robot. But you have inorganic parts, don’t you?”

  I sighed impatiently back at him. “I know what the definition of a cyborg is. I’m genetically engineered, and the only reason I have inorganic parts is to control my behavior.”

  “And you’re delusional if you think those chips in your brain don’t make you some kind of superman.”

  I waved him off so he flipped me off before I could even tell him why he was wrong. “I can’t fly. Or leap buildings or lift a car with one hand. And if Kryptonite were real, I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t weaken me.”

  Cade snorted again and arched an eyebrow at me. “And now you’re being a smartass. You only pretend you’re not normal. I’m willing to bet you secretly want to get laid, too.”

  “You must be delusional or a hell of a lot more drunk than I thought.”

  Truthfully, I was curious why every single guy I knew spent so much time talking about sex, but curiosity didn’t negate my dislike of intimacy or even casual contact with other people.

  Cade just shrugged and grabbed his television remote, and I was glad I wouldn’t have to converse anymore about what I am or what I’m not and how being responsible for me was ruining his life. I watched TV with him until he fell asleep then quietly left. My apartment was only four doors down the hallway from his.

  I hadn’t chosen where to live and it hadn’t been Cade’s idea either. In fact, he’d had to move.

  It was almost three in the morning by the time I stood in my bathroom, brushing my teeth to get ready for bed, too tired to shower and wash the stench of smoke off of me even though I could still smell it. I caught my reflection in the mirror and straightened to stare at myself as I so often did.

  Even after five years, I had no idea what to think of this reflection. I looked perfectly normal. Actually, that’s not entirely true. They’d apparently designed a face and body that people would find attractive. Women hit on me all the time, but their advances just annoyed me. Those geneticists must have been a bunch of sadistic pricks to ensure I’d get attention but not want it, and I imagined them sitting around some lab laughing about it every time I had to tell some woman I wasn’t interested.

  But even after five years, I still couldn’t figure out what was so remarkable about me. I had the same brown hair and eyes as so many other men, and I couldn’t even grow a beard. At least, I assumed that was important, some sign of virile masculinity or something. I didn’t grow hair on my chest either. Those same asshole geneticists who thought it would be funny to make me attractive but completely asocial must have thought it was wasted effort to plug in the coding for the extra body hair most men have.

  The only thing I ever thought was remarkable about my body was the small black and blue rectangle on my left forearm.

  I despised it.

  If I pressed firmly enough, I could feel the microchip embedded beneath the deep fascia. They’d tested this port to make sure it worked, and the experience had been far worse than when they sent out new directives remotely. I received those as a kind of annoying buzzing in my mind, but directly connecting me to their network had filled my entire body with that invasive vibration. Since Parker had designed me and the communications between his network and my mind to rely on my nervous system to relay messages, connecting me to his computers via that port aggravated every nerve fiber in my body. It was agonizing.

  For fifteen minutes, I’d been completely powerless and helpless, and I’d been convinced those fifteen minutes had actually been hours.

  They tested that port twice before allowing me to leave The Genesis Project’s building with Cade.

  The threat of being reconnected to that terminal made me keep my mouth shut about any doubts or reservations I ever had.

  I lifted my eyes so that I was staring back at myself then switched off the light. I’d seen enough of this man who wasn’t a man. I still disagreed with Cade. I wasn’t a cyborg either.

  The problem was, I had no idea what I was supposed to be, but that was the question that kept me awake every night.

  If I’m not human, then what am I?

  “You lied for me,” Cade said. He handed me a plastic tray and I took one of the hamburgers off of it. This particular restaurant was always crowded, but it was also my favorite place to eat, even if they didn’t have anyone to wait tables and made us pick up our food on cafeteria trays.

  “I kept you from getting court martialed,” I responded. “You forgot to grab ketchup.”

  “Dude, that’s disgusting. You always order the bleu cheese burger and put ketchup on it. There’s something wrong with your programming.”

  I nodded seriously. “There’s a lot wrong with it. Get the ketchup.”

  Cade shook his head just as seriously. “Try it the way normal people eat it.”

  I looked up from my burger and sighed at him. “This is how you repay me for keeping your dumbass out of trouble?”

  “Yeah, I’m teaching you how not to gross out a date if you ever decide to go on one.”

  I snickered but gave up. I’d skipped breakfast to talk to his CO and was too hungry to argue about it anymore. I had lied for him. I’d claimed he’d been really drunk and most likely hadn’t understood me when I first told him I’d been ordered to bring him home. I even said it was likely my fault for not knowing how to deliver that message in a way that could get through to him. So, yeah, I’d lied and pretended I’d only delivered the exact message I’d been instructed to deliver and when Cade left the bar to get away from me, I hadn’t known how to proceed.

  And because those guys at The Genesis Project were still convinced I couldn’t lie, they’d told Cade’s boss he should let him off with a warning because they didn’t want to involve more people in my life than they had to.

  Cade hadn’t admitted it, but this lunch was his way of thanking me. He didn’t even really like the hamburgers here.

  I’d just taken a bite of my burger – without the ketchup – when she approached the table next to us. I stopped chewing. I may have even stopped breathing. Cade didn’t notice right away, but part of me registered he’d been mid-sentence when he stopped talking to glance at the woman pulling a chair away from the table beside us.

  “Drake,” he hissed. “Stop staring. That shit will get you arrested.”

  I blinked at him and whatever spell I’d been under broke. I remembered to finish chewing and tried not to look in her direction again. But I still felt obligated to point out that I was almost certain staring at someone couldn’t get a person arrested.

  “Acting like a stalker will get you arrested,” Cade argued.

  “I can’t possibly be acting like a stalker. I was here first,” I reminded him.

  Cade sighed then glanced at the woman again. He leaned across the table and whispered, “She’s here with another woman and I don’t see a ring. Ask her out.”

  My eyes widened and I shook my head quickly. Ask her out? I didn’t know how to talk to strangers, let alone the only woman I’d ever seen who made me question whether or not I really was as against intimacy as I’d always thought. But Cade was undaunted. He wasn’t about to let me just disappear like I wanted, even if that meant abandoning the rest of my hamburger. />
  “Her friend’s cute, too. I’ll ask her out. It’s called being a wingman.”

  “I don’t care what it’s called,” I insisted. “I just want to get out of here.”

  Cade ignored me and pushed his chair back from the table so he could get the other woman’s attention. My face suddenly felt warm. I watched my hamburger as I hid my left arm beneath the table.

  “Excuse me,” Cade said. “May we borrow your ketchup? Drake here can’t eat his burger without it.”

  I heard the other woman respond but wouldn’t lift my eyes. I had a feeling the beautiful woman with chestnut hair and blue-gray eyes was watching me, and I might as well have I’m not human tattooed across my forehead. I was so busy concentrating on my hamburger and trying my damnedest to wish myself into invisibility that I didn’t even notice both women getting up and moving their chairs to our table.

  By the time she sat next to me, it was too late. I hadn’t disappeared and I couldn’t avoid her anymore.

  “Are you all right?” she asked quietly. I glanced at Cade, who was pretending to be engrossed in conversation with the woman sitting next to him, but I knew he was more interested in what was taking place across the table from him than in the woman he was flirting with for my benefit. Or mostly my benefit. I’d never known Cade to be particularly picky.

  “Not really,” I admitted. “This was Cade’s idea, and I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do here.”

  The woman smiled at me and extended her hand. “You could start by introducing yourself. I’m Saige.”

  “Like the herb?” I asked stupidly.

  Saige laughed and told me, “But with an i, so it’s spelled differently.” She gave me an expectant look and I remembered I hadn’t shaken her hand or introduced myself.

  My face felt warm again, but I lifted my right hand and introduced myself. “Drake.”

  “Cool name,” she said.

  And I thought, That’s how you’re supposed to respond when someone tells you their name, dumbass.

  I kept my left arm underneath the table, even though I wasn’t sure why. Plenty of people must have seen that black and blue rectangle before and assumed it was just a really lame tattoo. Even I had thought it was a tattoo at first. But I didn’t want Saige to see it. I didn’t want her to notice just how different from other men I really was.