Pixie’s Prisoner (3 page)

The urge to poke her in the eye reared its ugly head again. “How can Zwiffle test the product properly if he’s not testing it on the client who will be using it? Even the head of QA is bound to make mistakes if he’s not given the proper tools to do his job.”

Éliane rearranged her glasses on the tip of her nose. “You know, I’ve been thinking the same thing.”

A spark of excitement leapt to life in Laela’s belly. It was quickly tempered by a flood of suspicion. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying,” Éliane murmured sweetly, “that you were right. We’re testing on the wrong creatures.”

Laela instinctively reached out and covered the other woman’s hand with hers. “Thank you,” she said, meaning it. “You have no idea how happy it makes me to hear you say that. I have a simulation running in the lab. It’s not perfect, but if you’ll take a look you’ll see that the chameleon genes will react positively when they come into contact with the formula. The chameleon prototype’s erection is almost instantaneous. He goes wild at the first touch of Cum-a-Chameleon, and the effect is only tempered by —”

“You have seventy-two hours.” Éliane returned her attention to the papers in front of her.

Staring blankly while her thoughts raced, Laela opened her mouth to continue, then quickly shut it again. Clearly, she’d missed something. “The simulation is complete. You can see for yourself.”

Éliane’s pretty heart-shaped face seemed at odds with the glint of determination shining behind her glasses. “I have no interest in your simulation. The only thing it proves is that you spend way too much time in that laboratory, fantasizing about a cyber specimen who may or may not have anything in common with a real chameleon.”

Blood rushed into Laela’s cheeks. It was true that she’d designed the prototype to be pleasing to the eye, and she’d taken some measure of enjoyment from experimenting on his digital physique, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t on to something.

“But a real chameleon is impossible to find. You know that as well as I do. They’re recluses, blending in perfectly with humans whenever they must interact with them, and becoming one with their surroundings at the slightest hint of a threat. If we could find one to use as a real test subject, we’d have done so already.”

Éliane shrugged. “Seventy-two hours. Find me a real chameleon and prove the formula works, or I pull the funding on your project. Are we clear?”

The shrill ring of the telephone saved Laela from having to answer. Éliane’s eyebrows rose in unmistakable dismissal before she reached for the receiver.

By the time Laela got to her feet, she was already shrinking, her wings flaring from beneath her shoulder blades. She jumped on the door handle with both feet, dislodging the latch before pulling on the edge of the door. The gap widened just far enough to allow her to fly out into the main hallway.

There, she hesitated. She’d been given seventy-two hours to find the equivalent of a needle in a haystack. Chameleons were as real as pixies and werewolves, yet she hadn’t been able to find anyone who’d seen one — much less interacted with one — since she’d begun working on the Cum-a-Chameleon project. If she’d known it would be so difficult to validate her work, she might have reconsidered pursuing her wild idea in the first place.

But there’d been something so alluring about reaching such a huge, untapped market. Chameleons were out there by the hundreds of thousands, just waiting for someone to create a product that worked with their unique physiology. Sure, the shadowy creatures might have been loners by nature, but they still had sex. And that meant they needed Rookery Cove Aphrodisiacs’ products as much as anyone else.

Three days
.

She was three days away from flushing eighteen months of hard work down the drain. She owed it to herself to at least attempt to accomplish the impossible, if only for the immense satisfaction of seeing Éliane’s jaw drop when she dragged a real live chameleon into the woman’s office.

Whirling in the opposite direction from her laboratory, Laela flew out the side window. Cool air and the salty spray drifting in off the coast of the Atlantic Ocean brushed her skin, causing a light shiver to dance across her flesh.

Sunlight glinted off an oddly shaped octagonal roof in the distance. After taking a moment to orient herself, Laela headed toward it.

Only one person could help her now.

—

“Would you stop pacing for two minutes? You’re giving me a headache.”

“Huh?” Laela brought herself up short. She hadn’t realized she’d been walking back and forth across the top of Okibi’s keyboard.

“Better,” Okibi said. Her red-tipped fingernails whirled across the black keys.

Laela fisted her hands at her sides and willed herself to be still. She’d come here two hours ago looking — all right,
begging
— for help. The least she could do was try not to disturb Okibi while she worked.

But it was impossible not to be restless. She could practically hear the clock ticking down seconds in the back of her mind.

With a sigh, she plopped herself down on the smooth surface of Okibi’s desk. Directly ahead from where she sat, a holographic projection of Okibi as the filling in a Branimir and Viktor sandwich flickered briefly before returning to its full glow.

“Sorry about that,” Okibi said, glancing at the holograph from the corner of her eye. A fond smile tilted the edges of her full lips. “I need to replace the batteries.”

Laela picked at the hem of her lab coat. Try as she might to avoid glancing at the flashing image, she couldn’t keep her eyes off the darn thing. The two men pressed up against Okibi from the front and back, as though attempting to protect, seduce, and possess her all at once.

Laela’s heart skipped a beat. The euphoric expression on Okibi’s face contrasted sharply with the intensity on the faces of her men. The sensual phoenix’s lovers had powerful, incredible bodies. They exuded confidence and masculine allure.

For a brief, logic-free moment, she wondered what it would be like to be loved and cherished by such men.

In varying states of undress, the stunning trio made an astonishing impression. Still, despite the two perfect specimens standing on either side of Okibi, Laela’s focus kept shifting back to the phoenix’s face.

A grimace tugged at her mouth. Laela didn’t think she’d ever looked like that. Nor had she ever had anyone gaze upon her that way… like his entire world revolved around her at that exact moment.

Sure you did
, a small voice taunted her.
That night outside Club Surge. You remember… I know you do
.

She swallowed hard. Oh yeah, she remembered all right. She’d even modeled the digital chameleon prototype after the mystery lover who’d so expertly fucked her in that back alley all those months ago.

But that was a one-time thing. Okibi’s bliss was lasting — which was a completely alien concept to Laela.

Okibi hadn’t seemed any worse for wear after mating with Branimir and Viktor. She certainly hadn’t lost her sense of self-worth or her ambition the way Laela’s sister, Aline, had.

Since coming to live and work at Rookery Cove, many of Laela’s preconceived notions had been tested. She’d seen a number of relationships form over the past year and half. And while she’d kept her distance from the couples as she waited for the inevitable disintegration of the relationships to occur, she’d been stunned when it didn’t happen. In fact, as impossible as it seemed, every union she’d witnessed had lasted. More puzzling yet, each half of a couple seemed individually even more…
complete
than they did before finding their mate. Or mates, as in Okibi’s case.

None of it made any sense at all. Maybe there was something in the ocean spray that kept lovers in a constant state of infatuation. But that didn’t compute, either, since Okibi and her mates balanced their time between Rookery Cove Island and a mysterious castle in Western Europe.

“Aha!”

Okibi’s triumphant shout pulled Laela out of her reverie. She leapt to her feet and peered up at the computer monitor that dwarfed her small frame. “You got something?”

Okibi smirked, the expression at odds with the delicate features of her face. “Maaaay-be.”

Something about the way the pretty phoenix’s eyebrows wiggled made a knot of excitement form in Laela’s stomach. “You’re kidding. You tracked down a chameleon? A
real
chameleon?”

Shrugging uncomfortably under Laela’s enthusiastic praise, Okibi swiped a hand through her spiky black hair. “I called in a favor, that’s all.”

“Wow. And you got a name?”

Okibi’s satisfied grin returned. “I can do you one better. I have a name, an address, a social security number… and a picture.”

A squeal escaped Laela’s lips before she could stop it. She didn’t care if the chameleon was a hundred and eight years old and had a body like a wrinkled sausage. Come to think of it, it might be better for her career if he did. Then she could prove once and for all beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was the best analytical chemist to ever step foot on Rookery Cove Island.

“I think you’re going to be pleased.” With a flourish, Okibi tilted the monitor so Laela could get a good look from where she stood off to the side of the keyboard.

Sultry, hungry, instantly recognizable dark eyes blazed into hers. Laela blinked to clear her vision, confusion streaming through her in hot waves. “My prototype,” she murmured, stepping closer to the screen and reaching out a delicate hand to skim the man’s virtual cheek. He looked so real, she almost expected to feel the brush of stubble across her flesh. “I don’t understand.”

“I don’t know anything about a prototype. His name is Nathaniel Alexis. He’s an ex-Marine.”

Laela’s legs quivered as she slumped against Okibi’s round pencil-holder. If not for the metallic mesh supporting her, she was sure she’d have fallen on her ass, the same way she’d nearly done the first night she’d seen him.

“Nathaniel,” she whispered. Her fingertips tingled where she’d touched his picture. “This must be a mistake.”

Okibi peered down at her, almond-shaped obsidian eyes narrowing in concern. “I’m afraid not. Your chameleon is real. And I think I know where you can find him.”

Nathaniel Alexis was in ninth grade when he realized he was different from the other kids on that fateful day he’d snuck into the girls’ locker room.

He thought he was being clever, hiding behind towel racks and crouching beneath benches. All he wanted was to peek at a few girls who’d never give him the time of day otherwise. He’d devour them with his eyes. No harm in that, right? He’d believed that, right up until the moment his questing gaze caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror.

Or rather,
didn’t
catch a glimpse of himself. When he stared at the spot where his reflection should have been, his heart lurched in his chest. Logically, he knew the spot he’d chosen was completely exposed. If any girl was to turn her head and glance into the full-length mirror that tilted toward the ceiling, she’d see him splayed out on the ground looking up from beneath a low bench.

Except try as he might, he couldn’t see anything beneath that bench. Not his mop of black hair, not his white sneakers, not his gray gym shorts. Nothing at all. It was as though he wasn’t even there.

He still remembered walking up to that mirror on shaky legs and standing in front of it. He even touched it to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. It felt as solid as the ground beneath his feet. The only thing out of the ordinary was him.

He’d peered closely at every scratch and dent in the glass, horrified at not finding the slightest shred of himself in there. Nubile girls in training bras bustled around him; yet enjoying the view had suddenly become the last thing on his mind.

He had no reflection. Nothing made sense. Nothing but the horrifying possibility that he didn’t exist.

Only when the principal’s naked daughter bumped into him did he realize that he hadn’t disappeared altogether. He wasn’t a spirit or a ghost, but neither was he a vampire. The girl couldn’t see him any more than he could see himself. He watched her back up a step and peer right at him, confusion etching a groove in her forehead.

As relief swept through him, Nathan whirled around and stumbled over his feet in his mad rush to get away. Ten minutes later, he was back to normal, once again a mischievous teenager like any other.

Except this teenager had a secret. One he knew he could never reveal if he wanted to be normal.

And he did. More than anything else, he wanted to fit in, to belong. That’s why he’d joined the Marines. Unfortunately for Nathan, becoming one of the few and the proud had been as ill-advised as sneaking into the girl’s locker room. Only that brave adventure had cost him much more than a lesson in self-discovery.

A breeze swept in off the Florida coast, jolting Nathan out of his trip down memory lane. He shook himself back to reality. He couldn’t afford to lose focus. Not now, when one wrong move could cost him everything he’d fought so hard to regain.

A slow, steady ache spread through his shoulders and made his back tingle. He’d been standing with his spine flattened against a lamp post for the past hour, watching zigzagging lasers dance across the pebbled surface of the football field sized parking lot. On the other side, Zone 99’s laboratory compound loomed like a black shadow. No light shone from the small windows, giving the place a sinister feel even if Nathan hadn’t known what was inside.

But he did know… intimately. Unfortunately, despite the fact that he was all too familiar with the interior of the laboratory, this was only the second time he’d seen the exterior. Even though Nathan could camouflage himself, his clothes, and anything he carried, he couldn’t make himself vanish altogether. Nor could he float above the state-of-the-art security system. His only option was to study the flickering lines and make some sense of the ever-changing pattern.

It would have been easy to step inside the gaps and avoid tripping the alarm if all he’d had to worry about was a steady imprint of laser wires. But this security system changed shape, reconfiguring itself every thirty seconds. There was no way he’d make it even halfway across before it caught him off-guard and either brought down the entire base on his head, or fried him on the spot.