There was no reason to tell him. She was stoic about it—well, usually stoic about it. Sometimes she fought and the guards ended up with broken bones and black eyes, and then they sedated her. She suppressed another shiver and held the shirt to her face, inhaling Ken’s scent, hoping to keep it with her through the coming ordeal.
“What the hell is taking so long?” Sean demanded.
“I was shot, you moron. My leg was broken. Although it’s mostly healed, it’s still sore, so I’m being a little wimpy taking the jeans off. Do you have a date? Am I holding you up from some important appointment, because honestly, Sean, I don’t mind if you want to postpone this little event.”
Sean muttered an obscenity she pretended not to catch. She took a deep breath and let it out before stepping out of the jeans. Just once, one time in her life, she wanted support. It was stupid. Her entire education was about self-reliance and discipline. It was about facing pain and the impossible task and completing the mission no matter what the personal cost might be.
She’d had a small taste of freedom, ironically as a prisoner, and it was much more difficult to face the starkness of her life. Reluctantly, Mari placed Ken’s shirt on the chair and wrapped herself in the gown.
She made a face at Sean as she climbed onto the table. She hated this. Hated it. Whitney knew it too. She’d tried various ways to distract herself over the years, pleaded for music, tried a running dialogue—nothing worked. She was the insect, pinned to the table, strapped down and stripped naked, to be examined and dissected just like the frogs and other animals and reptiles in biology classes.
The light clicked on, bright and hot and shining over her body. They were going to see every mark Ken had left behind. They would photograph and record and turn her one beautiful memory into something ugly and depraved.
She sat up before the doctor could strap her down. “I can’t do this right now. I’m sorry, Sean, I can’t.”
“Don’t go crazy on me, Mari,” Sean said, holding up his hand.
The doctor backed away from her, glancing toward the glass. She followed his gaze to see Whitney standing there watching with his dead eyes.
Mari slid off the table and went to the window. “I can’t. I can’t do this right now. I can’t tell you why, I don’t know why; I just can’t make myself do it.”
“I’m extremely disappointed in you, Mari,” Whitney said through the intercom. “You left this facility without permission and I didn’t even punish you. This examination is necessary. You’ve had them hundreds of times and there’s no reason for you to be upset about it. Get back on the table.”
“My body belongs to me. I don’t want to share it with science.”
“You are a test subject for the laboratory and you follow orders.”
“Is that what I am?” She moved away from the window, sensing Sean closing in on her. “What are you, Sean? Are you a test subject too?”
“You don’t exist outside this facility, Mari,” Whitney said. “Get onto the table or I will have you punished.”
“Are you going to send Brett in? Drug me? Beat me? What will happen to your precious baby if you do that, Doc? Brain damage? Maybe I’ll miscarry. That could happen too, couldn’t it? I’ve never been afraid of your punishments.”
Sean was close. Too close. He was very skilled, and unlike the other guards, he’d actually trained with her and knew her weaknesses. She changed her body position just slightly, enough to be able to move fast and block whatever he might throw at her.
“We don’t have to do this, Mari. You can’t win. Even if by some miracle you managed to put me down, ten other guards would be up here helping me out. What’s the point?”
“I put you down once already. I’ll take my chances.”
“I let you. I had it coming and we both know it.”
“How are you going to get me down, Sean? Slug me in the stomach? Knock me out with the syringe you always carry?” She beckoned him with her finger. “Come on.”
“Wait!” Whitney snapped. “Mari, don’t be ridiculous. No one is going to touch you.” He spoke into his radio and sent her his half smile, the one she detested. “Of course we aren’t going to force you. We want your full cooperation.”
For a brief moment she was elated. She’d been right. Whitney didn’t want to take a chance on possibly harming an unborn child of one of the Norton twins. She studied his face as he waved Sean off. Her heart jumped. He was up to something.
“Mari,” Sean hissed her name, just above a whisper. “Get on the table.”
She shook her head, but her defiance was already ebbing away. Whitney was the only person who terrified her. The more he smiled or looked amiable, the more frightening he became.
She backed away from Sean. If she could just have a few days, maybe the marks Ken had left behind would fade, and they wouldn’t be photographed and recorded and put in a file for Whitney to show whomever he reported to. It was too intimate, too much as if he had witnessed the insanity of their passion together.
“Mari, he’s bringing down one of the other women.”
Mari closed her eyes against the sudden burning. “Are you certain?”
But she didn’t have to ask. Cami appeared, her dark hair tumbling down her back, her one concession to being a woman. She was a fighter all the way, and Whitney detested her almost as much as he detested Mari. Cami walked with her shoulders and back straight—a soldier who had been taken prisoner and refused to yield.
“Mari, you made it back,” she said in greeting. “We were worried about you. The word was, you were shot.”
“My leg. Zenith fixed me right up and then nearly killed me. Apparently when it’s in our systems too long the cells begin to deteriorate and we bleed to death.” Mari smiled at Whitney. “Just one more piece of information that was overlooked when we were being briefed.”
“So why am I here?” Cami asked Whitney.
“I’ll let Mari explain it to you,” Whitney said.
Cami turned her vivid blue eyes on Mari. “It’s all right, Mari.” Her voice was gentle, calm. “Whatever he’s making you do, he can go to hell.”
“I would expect that from you, Camellia.” Whitney continued to smile at them in his usual cold way, his dead eyes regarding them with interest.
“It isn’t worth it, Mari,” Sean repeated. “In the end . . .”