Forgotten (12 page)

            “That’s one way to do it,” I say, when he pulls back.

            “One,” Jack agrees, “but I could have done it plenty of other ways. I kissed you because I wanted to, Celes.”

            “Well, I didn’t think you’d done it just because it was the best way to generate heat between us.”

            Jack smiles. “I think we generated plenty of that. I missed you in the time it took to get back and put the mission together. I wanted to show you how
much
I missed you.” He’s holding my face between his hands, and leans in to kiss me again, so thoroughly my toes curl and I kiss him back with everything I have.

            “You weren’t gone that long,” I say pulling back for air.

            “Maybe not long enough,” Jack says, looking serious for a moment or two.

            “What do you mean?”

            “Maybe if I’d stayed away longer, I could have planned the rescue in more detail. I was in such a hurry to get you out of here after seeing you and Gray together in that video that I just grabbed the first Faders I could persuade to help and came over. That isn’t how you mount a mission in a fortress like this if you want it to succeed.”

            “You got to me,” I point out, but there’s something about the way he said it that’s worrying me. “You do think the others got out okay, don’t you?”

            “You mean Grayson?” Jack asks, just a little bit sharply. The trouble is, that’s what I do mean. Grayson went with the other Faders because that was meant to keep him safe. What if it has put him in more danger, though? I know I can’t say that to Jack.

            “About the pictures Senator Hammond sent you,” I say instead.

            Jack turns away from me, stepping over to the apartment’s small kitchen. “I don’t want you to remind me about that, Celes. If I do, I can’t focus on what has to be done. I know you were with him before you were with me, that you really didn’t break it off with him because of your fading, but it still feels like I was punched in my guts. It still hurts. And the worst part is that I’m still drawn to you regardless of it. I can’t help it, whatever time period we’re in. I can’t help loving you, wanting you.”

            “Is that so bad?” I ask, moving closer to him. “Look at me, Jack. Don’t just shut down and walk away. Really look at me.”

            Jack spins, staring at me with an intensity that has nothing to do with anger. “What do you want from me, Celes?”

            “Everything. Right now though, I want you to believe that I didn’t deliberately set out to hurt you with Grayson.”

            “You kissed him, though.”

            I nod. “I kissed him back when he kissed me. We went through a bit when you were gone. We were knocked senseless, and I had to rely on Grayson to do the most basic things because they made me feel so helpless, so weak. I was vulnerable, Jack, and yes, it was the wrong thing to do. I wish I could take it back, but I can’t. Gray and I have been together for so long before you came along, and things weren’t really resolved, and I was having these dreams…”

            I can practically feel the tension in Jack. Or maybe it’s in me. I don’t know. I want to fight with him. I want to tell him that he’s being unfair by blaming me, except he
isn’t
being unfair. All the time I was with Grayson, I was trying to convince myself that everything was okay, and that it didn’t matter, being that close to him, but it did.

            “Most of what’s on the footage isn’t how it looks,” I say. “Grayson helped me out with getting washed, because I couldn’t get the cuffs off to do it myself.”

            Jack swallows. “I guess I should be grateful that he doesn’t generate enough heat with you to melt them,” he says. He still doesn’t sound happy, but I guess I can’t have it both ways. I’m the one who asked him not to shut me out, and to let me see some of what he’s feeling. If I don’t like that, it’s on me as much as him.

            “What about the kiss, Celes?” he asks me softly. “Was that some kind of camera trick too?”

            It would be so easy to say yes, but I can’t do it. I can’t lie to him. I shake my head.

            “If you tell me that it was all Grayson, I’ll believe you,” Jack says. That’s the part that makes me feel ashamed of what happened. It’s not the hurt or the anger that Jack had before. It’s the way he’s willing to turn around and try to find a way to set it all aside, because he just cares that much, loves me that much.

            And because he cares that much, I owe him the truth. “Grayson started the kiss,” I say, “but I kissed him back. I should have seen it coming too. We were packed together in this place, and I could see that we were getting closer, but I didn’t draw a line there. I tried to, kind of, but I didn’t stop it.”

            Jack winces slightly, and I can see his face sliding into that carefully neutral expression that he uses so much. I reach out, putting my hands on his face.

            “Don’t, Jack. Please don’t. Let me know what you’re feeling. I know it has to hurt.”

            “It’s…” he let’s go of his control, and in that moment, I can see just how hurt he is by it. How vulnerable he is about his love for me. It’s not anger. It’s not resentment. It’s just a deep kind of pain at what has happened.

            “Oh, Jack,” I say, reaching out to wrap my arms around him. He’s held me so many times when I’ve been afraid, or hurt, or unable to cope, so I hold him. I hold him to try to show him that I’m there for him too. That I’ll always be there for him. After all, if my dreams are anything to go by, I always will be.

            He holds me too, for more than a minute. When he finally pulls back, he looks around the apartment with a professional eye. I take a moment to look too. It’s the same apartment I was in with Grayson, so nothing has really changed. It’s modern and elegant, with the sofa and the TV, the doors leading through to the bathroom and the bedroom.

            “It’s kind of tacky,” I say, “putting us in the same place I was in before. It’s like they want to remind us about Grayson.”

            “Maybe,” Jack says. “More likely, this is the only room they have stocked with food and ready to go. Plus, it makes the surveillance easier.”

            I’d almost forgotten that, if they used cameras to get footage of me and Grayson, those cameras would still be there. “So we have to assume that they can see and hear us?”

            Jack nods. “I’m not too worried about that. They’d spot us in the corridors if we left anyway. Besides, there are some things that I want the whole world to hear.”

            He moves to stand in front of me, and the way he looks at me then is so intense. “I want you to know that I love you, Celes. I love you, and I’m willing to fight for you. For us. I’m not going to let anyone take you away from me. Not the Others. Not some senator. Not… anybody.”

            He doesn’t say Grayson’s name, but I know it’s what he means.

            He kisses me gently then, planting a second kiss on the tip of my nose when he’s finished. “Johnny says that you came back for me.”

            I look around. “I guess that makes us kind of even. I mean, you came back for me too.”

            “You followed me through time, Celes. I don’t remember it like you do, or like he does, yet, but I can… it’s like I can feel the memories in me, like I’m some kind of deep pool, and they’re swimming about near the bottom. I don’t actually remember them yet, but it’s like every time we touch, they swim a little closer to the surface.”

            “Then we should be touching a lot more often,” I suggest, half joking.

            Jack smiles. “That’s just what I was thinking. I was also thinking that we should get out of here soon, but those two are almost the same thing.”

            “What do you mean?” I ask.

            By way of an answer, he kisses me one more time. This kiss is as hard and as passionate as anything I’ve had from him before. He kisses me like he plans to keep on going until we both forget to breathe, and his hands press me tightly to him while he does it. I don’t even hesitate; I just kiss Jack back as completely, and as thoroughly, as I can.

            I feel the first stirring of the energy between us then, growing into something bigger. I kiss Jack’s mouth hungrily, wanting more of him in that moment than I have before. Jack’s the one who keeps control of the kiss though. His hands find mine, his fingers intertwining with mine as his lips tease me, moving over my mouth, my jaw, my neck.

            The power in me rushes to the surface in each spot he kisses, and I can’t blame it. Right then, I want to be as close to Jack as I can be too. We kiss, and I know then it’s not just about doing what we have to in order to bring out the power that is glowing around us. Jack’s kissing me because he wants to, desperately, as though his life depends on it. Because I’m as important to him right then as he is to me. The fact that energy
is
glowing around us both, so bright that I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to look at it without my talent, is just a very useful byproduct.

            Jack moves back from me, catching his breath. “Try the door.”

            “Are you sure about this?” I ask. “Before, in the cell, it didn’t work, and these doors will be as strong.”

            “Trust me, Celes,” he replies, “if you can melt their handcuffs, you can deal with a door.”

            I nod, knowing that he has to be right. He has to be. I move over to the door, putting my hands against it, right against where the locking mechanism has to be. For a moment, the material around the door flares as it tries to resist the power I’m putting through it. Then it just… disintegrates. There’s so much heat that most of the door is blasted apart in a rush of power, leaving a hole in it where the lock used to be. Part of the frame is gone too. It’s easy then to just push the door back, sliding it back into the frame, and leaving the doorway to freedom wide open.

            “I wasn’t expecting it to work that well,” I say.

            Jack smiles. “You’re always full of surprises. Now, we should go, because there will be guards along in a minute.”

            He’s right, of course. We’ve just broken out while on camera. There will be people running to stop us even now. I reach out to take Jack’s hand.

            “Let’s get out of here, then.”

FOURTEEN

T
he weirdest thing as we start to make our way through the building is just how empty and quiet it is. I’m expecting alarms, guards, and a constant running battle. Jack obviously is too, because he moves through the place warily, not running, but staying ready to fight.

            “Should we try for Johnny again?” I ask. “I know we have to get out of here, and I’m not sure whose side he’s on, but the thought of him being faded…”

            Jack nods. “We can’t let it happen. We have to find out what he knows. But we can’t stop to talk this time. We go in, we grab him, and we get out. Even then, it probably won’t be easy.”

            I’d kind of guessed that. If I were Senator Hammond, I’d triple the guards looking after his son, or keep him right by me, or something. “If it’s too hard…”

            “If it’s too hard, we’ll have to leave him,” Jack says, “but since nobody seems to be reacting to us breaking out, hopefully we’ll have the element of surprise on our side.”

            “You mean because nobody would think we’d be stupid enough to try to break Johnny out twice?” I ask with a smile.

            Jack returns it. “Exactly.”

            We head on up through the building, and it’s still almost eerily quiet. We make for the lounge room, ready to fight if we need to, but it’s empty. We try the room across the hall. That’s a large suite with views out across the small town that the Hammond Building is on the edges of, in an industrial park. I look out at the place. If the people out there knew what was going on in here, how would they react? Looking down at it, I’m not sure. It’s such a small town. The kind of town, in fact, where almost everybody works for the big local company, and where they wouldn’t want to hear anything bad about it.