Genesis Rising (The Genesis Project Book 1) Read online

  Saige shrugged and kissed me and after that, I forgot I was supposed to be worrying about spies for the Project and Parker forcing me to lose the one thing that had ever made me feel like a normal man. She made me feel human.

  In the morning, we did run into Cade as we were leaving my apartment and he was coming up the stairs. He looked like he’d had a rough night and was hungover… again. He lifted a hand as a greeting, but kept his eyes on the ground as he headed toward his own apartment.

  “Cade,” I said. “You gonna live?”

  “Debatable,” he mumbled.

  “Call me if you think you’re falling toward the not-going-to-live side,” I told him.

  He lifted a hand again and stumbled inside his apartment.

  Saige looked up at me and whispered, “Does he have a drinking problem?”

  “Yeah,” I said, even though I felt guilty talking about him like this. “It’s not easy for some us, you know? Dealing with the shit we have to deal with.”

  “I’m assuming his CO doesn’t know? Wouldn’t he make him undergo a psych eval or something?”

  I shrugged even though I did know the answer. Cade wouldn’t undergo any evaluations because he’d been entrusted with a secret the government wanted as few people to know about as possible. So what if his life had been ruined because of it? As long as he did his job, he could continue to self-destruct and no one would care. No one except me.

  I took Saige’s hand and pulled her toward the stairs. “Let’s grab breakfast. I’m starving.”

  Saige glanced at Cade’s door one last time but followed me. How could I tell her about the nightmare my only friend had been dragged into because of me? And how could I tell her I had no idea how to save him from the Hell his life had become because I existed?

  Ultimately, I couldn’t tell her anything.

  And I couldn’t save him either.

  Saige laughed as we walked out of the theater because I’d complained, again, that I hadn’t understood most of the movie.

  “What’s there to understand, Drake?” she asked. “Boy meets girl, they fall in love, he does something stupid, she leaves, he begs for forgiveness, they live happily ever after.”

  “That last part,” I said. “He spent the entire movie lying to her. Why would she just forgive him?”

  Obviously, I didn’t add that I hoped this wasn’t just some miracle that only took place in Hollywood. But I’d been horrified throughout most of the movie when I realized the screenwriters might as well be talking about me. I mean, the guy in the movie hadn’t been lying about being human or anything, and maybe lying about a successful career and having this glamorous life was more forgivable than lying about how I existed in the first place, but still.

  I wanted to cling to some hope that Saige would be able to forgive me if she ever found out the truth.

  Saige just shrugged and squeezed my hand. “Movies are like that, Drake. We’re supposed to suspend our belief in what’s possible or realistic for a little while. They’re an escape from the problems of our lives.”

  I swallowed and nodded. There would be no forgiveness for my lies. “Maybe love can cause us to do things we normally think we wouldn’t.”

  “Sure,” Saige agreed. “But there are always limits. And there are always things we can’t overlook. I dumped an ex immediately after he cheated on me and no amount of groveling would make me change my mind. A relationship has to be built on trust.”

  “Yeah,” I sighed. “At least he didn’t cheat on her.”

  Saige snickered and brought my hand to her lips. “And you’d better never even think about it.”

  I smiled down at her and shook my head. “I honestly can’t imagine I ever would. It will always be you, Saige.”

  And for once, I’d told her the truth. If she discovered my deception and left me now, she could never be replaced. I would never want to replace her. I’d already spent five years alone, and I’d rather be alone again than share whatever this life was with anyone else.

  But even in my delusions, part of me already suspected I’d never be able to hide what I am from her forever. This would have to end, we would have to end, because it was impossible to hide forever. And that’s all I was doing: hiding in the hopes I’d never be discovered.

  I should have known from the beginning I couldn’t hide from them. And I should have known from the beginning that what they would demand for my treachery would be far worse than destroying my relationship.

  The only punishment would be to destroy me.

  Chapter 9

  Five months.

  That’s how long I was allowed to live in my fantasy world in which I was a regular man with an extraordinary girlfriend. I had four more perfect, beautiful months since our first night together in which I got to pretend my life was fantastically ordinary, and I spent those months unbelievably happy. Cade and I only got sent out on two other missions and they were as quick as the one during which someone had made a tragic mistake – a mistake no one had taken responsibility for. The rest of the time, I got to leave my apartment everyday at 4:30 so I could be at Saige’s apartment by the time she got home from work. We’d cook dinner together when we didn’t feel like going out and watch television or just sit on her sofa and talk. And I spent most nights with her. My life had become as close to a Heaven as I could imagine.

  During those four months, I’d been lucky. The only directives that had been issued hadn’t come in the middle of the night but I kept my phone buried beneath my pillow, just in case. And like every other lie I’d told her, she believed me because she didn’t know she had any reason not to.

  But if I’d allowed myself to naively believe I could continue living in a fantasy world, I had only myself to blame.

  I’d just put the ziti in the oven to bake when someone knocked on Saige’s door. She tossed the dishrag she’d been holding onto the counter and asked me to set the timer. I pushed the buttons on her stove, not thinking I had any reason to be concerned because a neighbor often stopped by to drop off mail that had been delivered to the wrong box or to ask if her cable was out, too, or a dozen other questions I assumed were common to apartment living.

  I lived in an apartment, of course, but having always been a loner, I guessed people found other neighbors who could answer those questions.

  But I knew something was wrong as soon as she opened the door.

  She didn’t recognize the man standing on the other side.

  “May I help you?” she asked cautiously.

  “I think so,” he said, and my stomach dropped. I recognized that voice.

  I stepped out of the kitchen and glared at Ramirez who looked over Saige’s head and glared back at me.

  “In fact,” Ramirez said, “I know you can help me.”

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  “Looking for you,” he answered, but I didn’t like his smile.

  “You have no reason to be looking for me,” I insisted. “That’s Cade’s job.”

  The words had come out before I realized Saige might want to know what the hell I’d meant by that. But Ramirez’s presence here was freaking me out.

  “This has nothing to do with Cade,” Ramirez said. “But you haven’t been a good boy, have you?”

  I couldn’t even respond. I was horrified and sick.

  Saige glanced over her shoulder at me then turned back to Ramirez. “You need to go,” she demanded.

  Ramirez smiled and lifted a shoulder. “Sure thing. See you around, Drake.”

  Saige closed her door and locked it then spun around, giving me a look that I could easily and immediately interpret as, “What the hell was that all about?”

  So I took a deep breath and told her the truth. Sort of. “We work together and he hates me. He’s never liked me, but I was responsible for getting his best friend transferred out of state and now he’s apparently got some vendetta against me.”

  “You should report him to his CO,” Saige said. “He didn’t
show up at your apartment but mine. Tell him I threatened to call the cops. That should at least initiate some sort of disciplinary action, right?”

  I looked at my watch and took another deep breath. It was almost seven. “I’ll go see him first thing in the morning,” I lied. The problem was, as Ramirez damn well knew, that if I went to Borowitz, I’d have to tell him about Saige. And there was no way I was telling anyone about her. I would call Cade in the morning instead to see what he thought I should do.

  We were both on edge for the rest of the night, but for her sake, I tried to pretend Ramirez’s appearance at her apartment hadn’t bothered me as much as it did. If he knew about us, then others might know, too. And what had been the point in showing up at her apartment tonight? Just to be an asshole? To try to intimidate me? To try to scare her?

  That night, for the first time in four months, I lay awake for a long time watching her sleep. I loved her so much, and I had a horrible premonition this beautiful, blissful life I’d been able to have with her was about to end. I wanted to watch her as long as I could, to preserve these last moments and stretch them out. But, eventually, sleep overpowered me anyway and I fell asleep with my arms wrapped around her.

  My eyes shot open in the middle of the night when that horrible buzzing filled my mind. My heart beat wildly as I tried to make sense of the words being sent to those chips in my brain, but I was convinced this had to be some nightmare. I blinked at the clock and the numbers blinked back at me. 4:03 a.m.

  The order repeated and it seemed louder and more insistent. I pushed myself away from her and slid off the bed, but the room spun and I had to hold onto the edge of the nightstand.

  “Drake?” Saige’s sleepy voice mixed with the painfully loud command in my mind. “Are you all right?”

  I shook my head and squeezed my eyes closed, my fingers curling into tight fists. “No,” I whispered. “You have to get out of here. Now.”

  I heard the sheets ruffle behind me and felt her hand on my shoulder, and I jerked away from her and stood up. “Saige, leave!” I yelled.

  Saige gasped and stared at me, confused and hurt and scared, and I’d never hated myself more than I did right then.

  “You get out!” she shouted back. “This is my apartment!”

  I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes again then backed away from her until I bumped into the wall. I couldn’t seem to force myself to go any farther. “I can’t,” I said weakly. “I want to, but I can’t. Please…”

  “Drake, what is wrong with you?”

  The men back at The Genesis Project somehow knew I wasn’t obeying them. The command came through again, a screeching, mind-splitting demand, and I screamed and covered my ears even though the sound wasn’t coming from outside my head. I sank to the ground and kept my ears covered anyway as if I could somehow block them out and drown out those horrific words.

  You’ve been lying to us, Drake. We are outside your apartment waiting for you. You need to come in for maintenance. Saige Deshotel cannot survive. Kill her then return home immediately.

  I felt her hand on my arm and I opened my eyes.

  “Drake,” she said softly, “please tell me what’s going on.”

  I realized I was crying.

  “You have to get away from me,” I whispered. “They’re trying to make me kill you. Please, Saige. Grab my phone and look for Cade’s name. Call him. Don’t call anyone else. He’ll help you get away from them.”

  What I’d meant but couldn’t say was that he’d help her get away from me.

  Her eyes trailed down my arm, the same one she was touching, and her fingers followed until they rested on the black mark with blue lines. “It’s not a tattoo,” she said.

  “No,” I groaned as the command repeated. It would continue to repeat until I obeyed.

  “They did something to you.”

  I shook my head. “They created me. But I never thought they’d order me to kill you. I swear…”

  “Created you?” Saige asked.

  And then I realized the only way for Saige to live was by losing her anyway.

  “Yes,” I hissed. I grimaced as the command replayed and squeezed my fists into tighter balls to concentrate on the physical pain. “I’m not human. I lied. And if you don’t get out now, you could die.”

  She let go of my arm and I opened my eyes again. I wished I hadn’t.

  I wasn’t sure what her expression meant: fear, horror, disgust?

  But whatever thoughts filled her own mind, she kept to herself. And she finally listened to me. Saige snatched my phone from beneath the pillow then ran out of her bedroom. I listened as she grabbed her keys from her kitchen counter then slammed the door behind her.

  And I buried my face in my arms and kept crying.

  Chapter 10

  I let them lead me into the back of the building where they kept that goddamn machine that would connect to the port in my arm. I assumed they knew I’d disobeyed them, but I could only hope Saige had been able to reach Cade and he’d prove to be as good a man as I’d long believed him to be. Even then, what chance would they have against the most powerful government in the world?

  Parker stood in the open doorway at the end of the hall, his arms folded over his chest as he watched me return home.

  “How did you manage that?” he asked.

  “Manage what?” I asked back.

  “Lying, keeping secrets, disobeying a direct order.”

  I almost asked him what an indirect order was, but I didn’t have the strength left to be a smartass about it.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted.

  “Hm,” Parker responded. He looked me over quickly then nodded to the cot in the room. “Strap him down. Let’s see what’s going on.”

  For the first time ever, I thought I might throw up. My stomach soured and contracted painfully as the two men who had been walking beside me pushed me toward the cot and forced me to lie on it. A third man entered the room to strap my arms down while the other two held them still. Parker sat at a desk on the opposite side of the room and pulled the computer’s keyboard toward him, tapping at the keys as he prepared to invade my body with his machine.

  The three men who were tethering me to this bed had moved on to my ankles and I watched Parker as he continued to type, never once looking in my direction or seeming to understand or even care that he was about to torture someone.

  As far as he was concerned, he’d created me and he owned me and after all, he’d been the one to tell me I wasn’t a man. I wasn’t human.

  And if I wasn’t human, he could do whatever the hell he wanted to me.

  “Don’t,” I pleaded weakly.

  Parker’s fingers paused above his keyboard and he glanced at me.

  “Don’t what?” he asked.

  “Don’t do this to me. It’s painful and you have no idea what it’s like to feel someone invading your entire body.”

  Parker blinked at me then went back to tapping on his keyboard, his eyes fixed to the screen in front of him.

  “It won’t take long,” he said. “It’s the only way to run a full diagnostic and correct whatever the problem is.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with me,” I insisted. “You tried to force me to kill the only person in this world I love and I wouldn’t do it. That doesn’t mean I’m broken.”

  Parker nodded as he continued to type. My heart beat wildly and my stomach turned again. He still didn’t care. “Actually, it does. You shouldn’t be able to disobey any command. You shouldn’t be expressing reservations once those commands are issued. A computer doesn’t possess the ability to grapple with morality.”

  “I’m not a computer!” I yelled.

  Parker sighed and stopped typing one last time. “Yes, you are.” He looked at one of the men still standing by the left side of the cot and told him, “Hook him up.”

  “Goddamn you!” I shouted, but the man placed the cord against the port and I felt the magnets in my skin snapping together wi
th the magnets in the cord. I clenched my jaw and squeezed my eyes shut as every nerve in my body lit up with a fire that couldn’t be extinguished. That buzzing followed the same pathways, and the fire that consumed my body began to vibrate, fanning the flames and spreading them so that every cell within me burned.

  I could only hear snippets of Parker’s commentary through the buzzing in my mind and the overwhelming pain that made me wish I could lose consciousness, but he wouldn’t allow me to pass out. He wanted me awake in order to run his program that searched for abnormalities, errors in coding he thought he could easily fix. I picked out words but without context, they seemed meaningless.

  “… neural… programming… woman… normal…”

  Only one of those words had any meaning to me. He’d mentioned Saige. And even if Cade had agreed to help her, they would both die because of me.

  I opened my eyes and blinked at the black spots floating before me. She might think I was a monster. She might feel disgusted by her relationship with me. But I couldn’t let her die. Not because I’d been so selfish and loved her. She couldn’t suffer for my sins.

  “Unhook me,” I demanded.

  Parker’s voice paused. No more words floated around the room and I only heard that loud, persistent buzzing in my head. I tried again. “Unhook me!”

  I thought I heard someone asking Parker, “How is he doing this?”

  I strained against the straps that tethered my arms to the bed and the pressure against those nerves that were already aggravated by Parker’s program using my nervous system to communicate with the chips in my head screamed at the resistance. I thought my arms might snap off, but I forced myself to acknowledge it was impossible. It was only the pain trying to convince me I should stop.

  I didn’t stop.

  Too many voices spoke at once but even if it had only been one voice, I wouldn’t have been able to understand it anymore. Not through this much pain. I took a deep breath and pulled my arms toward my chest. I heard a snapping sound and the voices in the room grew louder. I opened my eyes again and reached for the cord still connected to the port. As soon as I yanked it off my arm, the fire died and so did the buzzing in my mind.