The Rift Frequency. Amy Foster S.

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СКАЧАТЬ that question. I don’t really want to know the truth, because if it goes beyond the physical, I wouldn’t know what to do with that. It dawns on me that I might have just made things worse between us by asking him to fess up: opening the door to a series of more tense conversations and weird, awkward silences.

      But there’s no going back now. He’s already started talking.

      “I feel a sense of loyalty toward you, but maybe that’s just because you’re a Citadel. I feel protective of you even though I know you don’t really need my protection. I think you’re strong. I think you’re beautiful, but I also think you’re a pain in the ass, and honestly, I’m not sure I even like you.”

      I sigh and throw my hands up. “Well that’s just great. I can totally see how deprogramming someone who doesn’t even like me is going to work.” I’m relieved. He’s confused. He doesn’t know how to separate attraction and real feeling. No surprise there. Still, the conversation has me a little freaked. Hearing Levi say these things makes my heart race a little. Is it guilt? Because I’m with Ezra and I’m pretty sure this level of openness is inappropriate, but since I’ve never had a boyfriend before, it could very well be that this is the absolute best way to handle a situation like this—by acknowledging it, even if there’s no way to know exactly what “it” is. I should probably say something, but Levi holds out a single hand to stop me from continuing.

      “I wasn’t finished, so calm down.” I let out a low growl that I’m sure he hears, along with an increasingly ascending pulse, but so what? This shit is intense. There is nothing I hate more than someone telling me to calm down as if I’m some crazy Real Housewife who screeches and wails all the time.

      “I don’t know how I feel about you,” Levi admits. “I really have no idea. Mostly I’m just angry and everything else I feel is pretty much a mystery.” Levi stops talking and I sigh. I had been trying to prove a point, that despite our hormones the Blood Lust is not really sexual. I didn’t think Levi understood that, but by the look on his face right now, I know he does. Damn. There is something in his eyes, something lost and bewildered. This is Levi’s version of intimacy. “I am ashamed,” he tells me softly. “I’m embarrassed that, basically, I have the emotional intelligence of an eight-year-old. I know there are other things to feel besides anger and guilt, but fuck, I don’t know how to get to them.”

      “Oh, Levi.” I exhale his name, pressing my palms into my eyes as if I can somehow ignite the right answer inside my brain.

      “Listen,” he says with urgency, seeing me falter. “I don’t think it matters if I like you. I think what matters is that I trust you. With my life. Right? I need your help, Ryn, please.”

      Sometimes I wonder if it’s possible to be a good leader and a good person at the same time, because let’s face it, there are precious few examples. After all I’ve done I think it might be too late for me to ever call myself a good person. But a true leader, the kind that I want to be, doesn’t hold fast to an opinion in the face of overwhelming evidence that it’s wrong. A strong leader is secure enough to change her mind.

      I stare off into the distance at the light reflecting off the water. It’s gorgeous here, but it isn’t real. It’s a plucked moment. A pause before we jump again. Into God knows what.

      There is no absolute right answer here. This isn’t something I can win. This isn’t a contest or a fight. My new partner may or may not have feelings for me that go beyond the way I look in an absurdly tight uniform (I get it, it’s supposed to fit like a second skin, but it’s more Black Widow than real black ops). I shouldn’t deprogram Levi because it’s dangerous and intimate and I have a boyfriend. But if I want to get that boyfriend back in one piece, there’s really only one logical choice.

      As much as it annoys me, Levi is right.

      It would be safer if he were deprogrammed. He’s asked for my help. He’s done it as honestly and authentically as he can. That’s huge for him. I can’t turn away from that. Ezra won’t like this, but again, props to Levi. I’m trying to apply normal relationship logic to this situation and it won’t work. By agreeing to help with the deprogramming, I could very well be saving my own life and the lives of others. It might be suicide—there’s that, too—but I think the odds are in my favor on this one. Ezra will get over it once he takes the time to think it through. Once I explain to him that it is the best chance that all of us have to survive. So, now the real problem is time. Deprogramming takes time, which we are desperately short of. Once we start, we can’t stop; doing so may ruin any chance he has at being cured.

      But really, this mission can’t possibly succeed unless we do it. So …

      “Okay. Since you said that you had considered this, I assume you brought a supply of the drug that leaves you open to suggestion? The red pills?” I ask, just to make sure this is even a doable thing.

      “I have them. And I put some music, shows, and books on my tablet. That’s what we need, right? Sensory reminders of when we were younger? Before this happened to us?”

      I nod my head and zip up my uniform to the neck. But the whole time I want to scream at him: Do you really think that’s all it takes? Listening to some songs? Watching a movie? He has no idea. “Just go take a pill. Take two, actually, just to be on the safe side. We’ll start in fifteen minutes.”

      In the meantime, I’m going to pray to something and hope to hell this works.

       CHAPTER 6

      We are sitting side by side, watching the tide as it pulls out farther with each wave. Levi has taken off his uniform and is in his khakis and a T-shirt. My uniform is on and I have put my blond hair, badly in need of a trim, back and up in a messy bun on the top of my head. I am thinking, though I don’t want to say it out loud just in case it isn’t something Levi had thought of, that me throwing the knife at him after he felt the Blood Lust might have ruined any chance of this working. He got turned on and I hurt him, which is how he was programmed in the first place. I can only hope that the drugs, in conjunction with patience and a true desire to kick this, might override what just happened.

      It occurs to me that in deprogramming Levi’s Blood Lust, I might also need to deprogram myself of my distrust of him.

      Levi has his tablet on his knees. He looks a little nervous. I’m downright scared. When I did this, I had Ezra. Ezra is patient and loving and, for obvious reasons, much more emotionally intelligent than I am. Ezra and I care for each other. Levi and I tolerate each other. If that. But maybe in a way that’s better. Maybe a little emotional distance will be more effective. I have no idea.

      And that’s probably what has me the most frightened.

      “This is the song my mom sang to me every night before I went to bed when I was little,” he says, showing me the tablet. “Don’t ask me why. Weird choice, I know. She did change up some of the lyrics so that it wasn’t a proper love song, ’cause that would be gross, obviously.”

      “Look, you don’t have to defend the choices you make in this process. Ezra read Harry Potter to me. He wore my dad’s clothes. It doesn’t matter. Whatever it is that makes you feel safe and takes you back to that place, is not for me to judge. If you feel like I’m judging you or laughing at you somehow, then we can’t do this. It means that we haven’t created a trusting environment. Your guard will be up and things will go badly. Besides, Dolly Parton is amazing.”

      By СКАЧАТЬ