Page 33 of Beyond Reason

Northman died in the fire, but Nathaniel was still alive and breathing… and potentially sending men to clean up whatever had been left behind in the wake of the flames.

I frowned and shifted back and forth. He had a gun pointed at my chest, and I still wasn’t at my best.

I wasn’t sure how I would have handled it before, but it felt…. wrong to rush him. Which meant maybe I could smooth-talk him until I figured something out.

“Listen.” I tried to shrink in on myself, to look like the small scientist that I knew Marshall Lister had been when he was alive. “I don’t know exactly what you’re looking for. I… I can’t really remember much. I was in a fire, and I had a head injury.” I brought one hand up and touched my temple, but I was mostly watching for how quick he was with his gun if I started to move. I didn’t know if it was my wide eyes or the way Marshall’s small frame was far less imposing than I would have been in a past life, but he didn’t shift.

It was good, but not moving meant that the gun was still trained at the center of my chest.

Pros and cons, I guess.

“If that’s the case, you won’t have any trouble leading me back to the house that you’re staying at so you can hand over the drive and any electronics you have, right?” The man’s smile wasn’t convincing. It was practically spelling out the fact that he didn’t care if I was helpless, if I had no memory.

He’d been sent to do a job, and he was going to do it.

I fucking hated people who were so efficient they were boring. Where was the fun in any of it?

“I can’t do that.” I tried to smile sweetly and dropped my hand back to my side. He did jerk the gun this time, shifting it from pointing center mass to my head.

Worse, he took a few quick steps forward. He put himself just outside of touching distance, but there was no way I’d be able to close the space between us without him pulling the trigger before I made any headway.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“If you don’t want to do this the easy way—” He was too fast. He didn’t shoot me, but that didn’t stop his free hand from darting forward and connecting with my jawline.

Either I was in a world of hurt if he dropped his gun, or the asshole was ambidextrous, and it didn’t matter which hand he punched me with. Stars danced across my vision and reminded me of the pain I’d woken with when I’d first come to myself in the hospital.

“Well, shit. You punch like a bitch, you know that?” It wasn’t a good idea to antagonize him, and I was at least a little aware of that. It didn’t mean that I could control myself.

And it probably didn’t help when he took another swing and his hand connected with my forearm.

Fuck, that hurt. I’d stopped him from hitting me in the face, but that didn’t mean a damn thing when the meat of his fist still made my fingers nearly go numb.

I wanted to say it was just the smaller body I was in.

I wanted to blame it on Marshall fucking Lister and a lifetime of not working out, of not taking care of himself.

But I knew it was more than that.

I was still weak from the injuries I’d had. Maybe I wasn’t pushing myself hard enough.

Maybe I’d made getting Axel’s attention more of a priority than my own physical fitness?

No, if I was going to regret anything, it wouldn’t be the way he’d finally let me touch him earlier. Even if being angry with him was the entire reason I was here.

I—

I had to get out of this so I could get back to Axel. What the fuck would he do if I died on him twice? I hadn’t imagined the haunted look in his eyes, or the way his breathing sometimes came rapidfire, like the world around him was closing in. Like he was seeing things I couldn’t remember.

So I couldn’t die.

Not today.

“Could you maybe fuck off instead of trying to kill me?” I asked in the sweetest tone I could muster, even as I darted around him and threw a punch at his side. The pained groan that tore from his throat told me I’d hit over something important, something that at least hurt him enough to make him whine.

That was good.

It would have been better if he didn’t immediately whirl and hit me with the butt of his gun. The metal was worse than his fist, and a sharp burst of pain danced along my cheekbone a moment before I felt a warm streak of liquid slowly trickle down my face.

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