Samurai Game (35 page)

She
hated
that he spoke the truth. She’d had no one else but Whitney for so long. “He kept me away from the other girls for the most part. There was one girl he called Winter. She was able to stop a heart from beating just with a touch. He made her practice on me, and she would cry and tell me she was sorry. She tried to protect me, but he’d punish her, terrible punishments if she didn’t do what he said. She snuck food to me sometimes, and once she gave me a blanket. Whitney took it away from me when he said I was bad.”

Sam curled his hand around the nape of her neck. He had a big hand and instead of feeling trapped, she felt safe.

“I should be over it, Sam. I’m a grown woman.”

He laughed softly. “Do you really think that the past doesn’t shape who we are? Everyone has moments of weakness. You didn’t believe you would ever be with a man who would love you, which by the way, makes no sense to me. You have a view of yourself skewed by the things Whitney drilled into you as a child. He was wrong about your gifts, Azami. Totally wrong. If he was wrong about that, then he can be wrong about other things as well. Whitney makes mistakes. And he made a big mistake about you.”

“He destroyed my body,” Azami said, clutching the shirt- tails, her hands two tight fists. “Not just my scars on the outside. My heart was destroyed by him as well.” She raised her eyes to his. “It isn’t normal.” The truth was going to come out whether she wanted it to or not. She
had
to tell him. It was only fair if she wanted a life with him. No lies between them, not even the sin of omission.

Sam stepped closer to her. “Azami, do you think that would drive me away from you? I want you, just the way you are. If your heart is weak, we can . . .”

She pressed her lips together and shook her head. “Not weak. He thought I’d die from his experiment, but I didn’t.” She was going to have to tell him. If she was going to truly give them a chance together, he had to know how much of a mutant being Whitney had made.

“What did he do to you?”

She tried a smile, but knew by the expression on his face she hadn’t quite pulled it off. “I’m kind of like the modern- day Frankenstein monster. Whitney loved his little experiments. When my heart gave out from all the experiments, he decided to make a synthetic heart—one that would prove stronger than a human heart. Well, not exactly synthetic in the normal sense of the word. I wasn’t the first person he tried it on, and the others apparently died. I was a child and the heart he used would ‘power’ an adult. My body tried to reject it, and he didn’t think it was worth it to keep me around long enough to see if the heart worked and my body eventually accepted it.”

Sam frowned, studying her face. She could feel him move through her mind, a soft warm force that made her feel safe. With him filling her mind the way he was, she couldn’t possibly feel alone. In some ways, the sensation was foreign, but already familiar. He was already becoming so dear to her. She felt as if she’d known him forever. He waited her out, knowing there was more—there had to be. How could she teleport with a synthetic heart? It would be impossible for the molecules to break down and then restore themselves—unless they really did move faster than light . . . He shook his head and waited.

“What do you know about nanotechnology?”

He shrugged. “I studied it of course. It’s fascinating and has the potential for changing the world in a number of ways. Basically, it’s engineering functional systems at a molecular scale.” He paused, his breath catching in his lungs.

She nodded slowly. “Whitney is wild about nanotechnology. He’s working on perfecting a way for a device that would travel through the body on a seek and destroy mission of cancerous cells.”

“But he uses humans for his experiments.”

She nodded. “I read one file where he’d deliberately infected one woman several times with cancer.”

“Flame. Iris. She’s married to Gator.”

Azami’s dark eyes regarded him steadily. “Whitney considers that a great waste. He believes she can’t have children, so she rendered Gator useless to him other than as a soldier to prevent the deaths of other soldiers. Basically, Sam, he said the same thing about you. And you’re attracted to me.”

“Even if he could have somehow paired you with me, after you were long gone, how could he have paired me with you? He didn’t know me then. He didn’t have access to you. And you’re attracted, Azami, no matter what you say. Both mentally and physically, you’re attracted.”

A small smile escaped. “I am not arguing that fact, Sam. I’m merely trying to get you to see the big picture before you leap with both feet and your eyes closed.”

“Are you saying he gave you cancer?”

“You know what I’m saying. Nanotechnology doesn’t defy the principles of physics. The possibility of moving or maneuvering something atom by atom in theory can be done. Just as teleportation is not against the laws of physics. Already, nanosystems are being developed with thousands of interactive components, and Whitney is going a step further, developing integrated systems functioning like our own cells with systems inside systems.”

“Are you saying he found a way to construct a heart using carbon nanotube scaffolding?” Sam tried not to sound excited, but who wouldn’t be? “That’s impossible. Bone reconstruction is barely beginning and bones are linear. Carbon nanotubes are one-dimensional. No one has figured out how to shape them.” His gaze locked with hers. “Have they?”

She didn’t answer and his mind was racing with the possibilities. He shook his head, wondering aloud. “One would have to solve toxicity and rejection problems. They’d have to grow the cellular and noncellular components outside the body before replacing the damaged heart with a fully functioning nano heart. How the hell could they do that before transplanting it?” He caught her arms. “It would be a miracle, Azami. It can’t be possible. How the hell would Whitney manage to construct a heart from carbon nanotubes?”

“A heart would only have to function like a human heart, not necessarily be shaped like an organic one,” Azami pointed out.

“No, but the heart still has to perform the same function as a human heart,” Sam argued. “It still has to beat in a cardiac cycle, which puts constraints on the shape. Right now scientists are just beginning to think in terms of using carbon nanotubes for bones because they can’t shape them. A heart can’t be linear.”

“No, even a nano heart would have to go through a pumping cycle that alternates between bringing in the deoxygenated blood and pumping the newly oxygenated blood out to the rest of the body,” she agreed.

“Exactly.”
Sam watched her closely. She was telling him she had a nano heart and his mind couldn’t wrap around the possibility. “That particular aspect of the heart’s functioning can’t really be changed, as the entire rest of the body is set up around it.” But it was possible. Every scientist working with nanotechnology had specific goals in mind, and replacing a damaged heart was on the list. No one could figure out how to shape the carbon nanotubes. The heart would be far stronger if all problems surrounding the growth and transplant could be solved. Whitney had experimented on little Thorn for years. He would have access to cells and anything else he would want or need from her body. But was it possible he’d done what others were just imagining?

“If he managed to give you a nano heart, Azami, the world would . . .”

“No one else survived. And the world would treat me just as he treated me. I’d be a freak and an experiment.” She crossed her arms over her chest and stepped back, her eyes dark with pain. “I have no idea how long the heart will last. I can’t go to a mainstream doctor, not for any reason. What would people call me? Some would go so far as to say I’m not human.”

Sam stepped close to her, covering that small distance with one easy step. He caught the nape of her neck and pressed his forehead against hers. “Listen to me, Azami. Whatever you are, wherever you are, that’s where I want to be. People don’t get chances like this often. I’m no kid, and I never expected to find a woman I would cherish.” He straightened, dropped his hands, and paced away from her and then back to stand in front of her. “I don’t need much, Azami. I built this house because I wanted a home. It didn’t feel like one until you were in it. I want your body just the way it is. And as for your heart, as long as it’s beating, I swear you could have a cyborg’s heart and I’d be happy. Stay with me. The hell with Whitney or anyone else who wants to step on our happiness. When those doors close, it’s just you and me. No one else.”

Sam took both of her hands and pulled them to his chest, holding them tight against him. “I can make you happy. I know I can. Whatever it takes. Whatever you need. Give yourself to me, all of you. Thorn, Azami, good and bad, let me have you.”

“Sammy.” She whispered his name in the stillness of the night. Azami’s heart twisted inside her chest. The mutant organ might not be all human, but it didn’t stop her from falling in love with this man. How could she not? “Are you so certain that you really want me? Have you considered that if he gave me such a heart and the DNA of an animal, that any child we have might be . . . different?”

Sam studied her face. There it was. Her real fear. The number one fear. She’d let him see the truth of her and now she’d just exposed the one thing that made her most vulnerable. This was the reason she thought her father didn’t feel she was fit to become a wife. Not the scars. Not the white hair. A child. Her child.
Their
child.

“Damn it all to hell, Azami,” he said, between his teeth. “Don’t you ever fucking protect me like this again. Hell, woman, I could have had a heart attack at the thought of you leaving me.”

And wasn’t she good to keep it all out of her mind, hiding her true fear from him, masking it with red herrings. She did feel vulnerable. She did feel all those things she’d told him, but combined, they weren’t enough to send her running, especially when he was making love to her without protection. He hadn’t even considered protection. He planned to marry her as soon as it was possible and having children was part of the program. But he hadn’t asked. He hadn’t discussed it with her.

Azami moistened her lips, her gaze still locked with his. “You’re angry now.”

“Damn right, I am. At you. At me for being so dense that I didn’t even discuss children or protection with you.” He shoved a hand through his hair and regarded her flushed face. “Why would you think you couldn’t have a child?”

She took a breath and let it out. “Whitney said I was useless, a throwaway. What does he want most, Sam? Children. Superbabies. He conducted all sorts of experiments on me and then he threw me away. Doesn’t it stand to reason that he believes I either can’t have a child or that it would be defective?”

Sam opened his mouth to protest but snapped it closed before anything could escape. This was a big deal to her. A huge deal. Whitney had colored her entire image of herself. He’d parented her in her formative years, those vital years, and he’d treated her as if she wasn’t human. He took away her self-esteem, her worth as a human being. To a woman, at least to Azami, having a child obviously meant something important.

He took a deep breath, let it out, and pushed away the rage that churned in his gut. Fury at Whitney, that monster who would dehumanize a child so he could use her for experiments, and even more at himself for pushing her so fast because she’d turned his body into a fucking walking hard-on. What he needed to do was defuse the situation and let both of them calm down a little bit and think things through. To Azami, the subject was obviously very emotional and frightening as well as being significant to her. He was sexually frustrated as well as feeling like a complete selfish idiot.

“Let’s discuss this over tea. I’m not going to be great at it, but you can teach me. I’d like to learn how to properly prepare you a good cup of tea. You drank the tea in the war room, but you didn’t enjoy it. This is an important issue to you, Azami. We need to get it hashed out. Let’s do it over a cup of tea.”

“It would be your baby too,” she declared. “It should be an important issue to you as well. You’re so willing to be with me and you don’t fully know all the risks.” She ducked her head. “I should have disclosed everything right away, as soon as I knew you were serious.”

He had said the right thing. The tension drained from her face, and her desperate, vulnerable expression was gone. She had a point. A baby would be his. His child. He had just assumed it wouldn’t matter to her about children, because, although he wanted some, she would always be his first priority. If she couldn’t have them, or didn’t want them, so be it. He turned to lead her out of the room where their combined scents with the oil weren’t so potent. He needed a little relief himself.

He didn’t want to enjoy the fact that she was there with him, a soft whisper of silk moving through the house he’d built with his own two hands, but he couldn’t deny that just knowing she was with him, arguing or not, gave him great pleasure. He felt her fingers push into the back pocket of his jeans as she followed him down the hall to the spacious kitchen. He didn’t turn around, but his gut settled a little. At least she still wanted that physical connection between them. She hadn’t entirely abandoned the idea that they would spend their lives together.

Once in the kitchen, he filled the kettle and set it to heat on the stove before turning to face her. “I don’t have the best tea, just some teabags. I don’t drink it that often.” As in never, but once in a while Ryland and Lily came to visit and he liked to have tea for Lily.

“I brought tea with me,” she confessed. “I always bring tea with me wherever I go.” She disappeared into the large living room where she’d left a small bag with her things in it.

He loved the sight and scent of her moving around his house. He did have a terrible urge to take those pins from her hair and let it fall around her face naturally, push the shirt from her shoulders, and just put her up on the kitchen table. Dessert would be especially nice.

Sammy!

He laughed, joy flooding him. She was calling him Sammy. That was something. And she sounded as if she was laughing rather than being angry. He’d been broadcasting a little too loud there. At least she couldn’t have any doubts that he found her attractive.