Page 93 of Unnatural
“Who he is?” she asked. “Who are you, Sam? Who do you think you are?”
I’m nobody. I’m a monster. I don’t know. I don’t know.“I’m a murderer, that’s who I am,” he said. It was one thing he knew for sure and something she couldn’t deny. And Autumn, beautiful, precious, miraculous Autumn, deserved better than that.
“You’re not. You’re a savior. You saved me, and you saved that helpless little girl.”
“I didn’t save her. She died.” The picture of her frail, sore-ridden body filled his mind, and a red cloud of rage blossomed in his brain. He’d just gotten control of the monster within, and now it wasback,and he didn’t want that. Autumn didn’t understand the world. She didn’t know how ugly and brutal it was. She didn’tseehim for who hereally was because she insisted on viewing him and the world through rose colored glasses. “That girl died because the very people who were supposed to protect her with their lives left her to die a horrible, miserable death. They let her suffer, Autumn. They were her family, and they let her suffer. They must have heard her, calling for help. And they didn’t answer.”
He’d expected her to look taken aback by his harsh words, but she didn’t. She took a step closer, her eyes so soft he wanted to fall into them. He turned away but felt her hand on his arm. “Did you feel that way too, Sam? All those surgeries, all that pain, did you call for someone who never came? I did.”
He attempted a laugh, but it came out half growl, half some sound he couldn’t describe. “But no one did, did they?” He turned to her, meeting her eyes. Those eyes, those eyes. “You might as well have called into a void,” he told her. It was cruel, yet it was true.
“I wasn’t calling into a void,” she said evenly. “Because you answered.Youcame. You rescued me just like you rescued that little girl.”
“She’sdead.”
“There’s nothing you could have done about that. I think she waited for you, Sam. She waited until she wasn’t alone. Because of you, she didn’t die in a back room, alone.”
Autumn, Autumn, Autumn.He wanted to wail her name, collapse in her arms, take from her until she had no more left to give. He hated himself for it. “You have a way with words. Only words are meaningless in a world like the one we live in.” He pulled in a breath. “Maybe I saved that little girl or tried anyway. But I didn’t alwayssave.Mostly I didn’t. If you…” He released a ragged breath. His lungs felt so damntight. “If you knew all of what I did, if you pictured it, you’d feel differently about me.”
“No, I wouldn’t. I’m sorry I ever gave you that impression. I’m sorry I was ever stupidly scared, even for an instant. I failed you. I was a hypocrite becauseIwas the one who told you truth mattered above all else and then I was afraid to hear yours.”
He almost let out a disbelieving laugh.Shewas apologizing tohim? Did she even hear what he was telling her? He was describing all the ways in which he was monstrous.
“I want you to feel safe with me, Sam, even your darkest parts. Because I want to share your burden.” She put her hand on his arm, her touch gentle, loving, just like her, and it almost killed him. It almost stole his resolve. “Because I realize now that there’s nothing you could do of your own free will that would make me turn away.”
She was wrong though. She had no idea. Some truths were simply too terrible to carry, and he wouldn’t ask her to. He wouldn’t. He steeled himself. He knew how. He’d forced himself to do things he hadn’t wanted to do for all his existence. He shook her hand away. “What does free will mean when it comes to taking a life? The things I did, I knew they were wrong. I knew.” He’d completed many “successful” missions. He’d killed, in ways both bloody and not. He’d looked in men’s eyes and seen their life drain away. He’d been the assassin, maybe even killing men like Adam. Decent men who had families and apple farms and generosity in their hearts. Either way, innocent or corrupt, those faces lived inside his head along with the images of violence. They’d never leave, not as long as he lived. No wonder the program directed them to kill themselves. It was best really, for everyone, especially for them. A small, surprising mercy.There was no life after what they’d become.
She chewed at her lip, seeming to consider what he’d said. “You had limits, Sam. I don’t know that you ever defined them for yourself. But you found a way to follow your conscience, maybe not every time but more than they expected. Do you know how strong you had to be to do that?”
She thought he was strong? Not even close. He was the weakest man on earth. “Oh Jesus, Autumn,” he said. Her continued faith in himhurt.It wasn’t his to keep, and to see a glimpse of it and have to let it go was more painful than all his surgeries and procedures combined. It made him feel desperate and angry. He didn’t want to give it up. He wanted to keep it, to keep her. But he couldn’t, he couldn’t, and he lashed out with the hurt, the unfairness of who he was, who he’d been made to be. “You romanticize everything,” he growled. “It’s fucking stupid because life is not romantic. Life is ugly and awful more often than it’s not. And people are evil. They kill children and they laugh about it. They lie and they cheat and they steal, and they feel no remorse at all, or if they do, they justify it anyway.”
His growl became fiercer, but her eyes grew softer as if she didn’t hear. Okay then, he’dmakeher hear.
“You should know that better than anyone becauseyouwere used. You meantnothingto them, less than nothing. No mother. No father. No one to protect you. So you were simply a body to test their drugs on, no better than a lab animal. They wouldn’t have cared if you died, except that they’d have to find another nothing to replace you with. They would have let you be raped and murdered, and then they would have lied about it and covered it up because you. Meant. Nothing.”
They stood there, toe-to-toe, him breathing harshly, pain etched in her face but fire blazing in her eyes. That same fire that had warmed him—not his body but his heart—so long ago in a cold forest where she’d been left to die. Oh God, he loved her. He loved her so fiercely he wanted to fall to his knees and beg her to forget the cruel words he’d said.
“I’m sorry,” he breathed, turning his head.
“Don’t be,” she said, surprising him. Always surprising him, his Autumn. He turned his gaze to her again. “You told the truth. I did mean nothing to them. At least nothing more than cells and bones and systems they could test their products on in order to become rich and powerful. Theydidleave me to die. And yet…”
She tilted her head, regarding him. He hung on her words. He always had. He supposed he always would.
“And yet you didn’t let me be raped. Or murdered. You stepped in, and you protected me when it might have cost you. Even when you’d been trained to do differently. I might have meant nothing to a soulless group of evil people looking to profit off the backs of the weak and the helpless. But I meant something to you, and that’s what matters to me. That’sallthat matters to me.”
He released a gust of breath. That pain again. The hollow one. The one that stirred his need, made it swirl inside, a bottomless tornado of longing that would only unleash destruction. On him. On her. He stepped back, turned away, looking out the window at the cloud-covered sun. He had to let her go. It was the only way to love her in the way she deserved to be loved. “Your words meant so much to me,” he said. “Every one of them. But they were a child’s words. I should have treated them with the weight of any silly child’s thoughts. You should grow up, Autumn. You should realizethat the world is far different than you envisioned it once. Dreams based on impossibilities don’t ever come true.”
There was silence behind him for a moment. He’d succeeded in hurting her. It made him miserable. “Who’s to say what’s impossible?” she finally said quietly. “When there’s love?”
Love.Oh God. He wanted to scream and howl. And rejoice. And grieve. “I’m a ticking time bomb.” She shouldn’t trust him. He couldn’t even trust himself. And she certainly shouldn’t love a dormant grenade. “My training didn’t just consist of chasing you through the woods. They installed violence into our brains. It lies there in wait.”
Sam startled, his head whipping in the direction of the other room where Eddie shrieked with glee or surprise or outrage or one of the many other things Eddie shrieked about.
“Is that why you’re pushing me away like this?” she asked. “I know you need time to accept the information you’ve been given today. That’s only natural, Sam. And I’ll give you all the time you need. Years if that’s what it takes. But let me help you.” She moved closer. “Help me understand. Are you worried you’re going to mentally blow up someday? Are you worried they planted things so deeply in your mind that they might rise to the surface when you’re unaware because of a smoke alarm or…a shrieking child? Please don’t push me away because you fear what might light some latent fuse—”
“I can’t have children!” he shouted, taking a step toward her, looming. Attempting to scare her, not because he wanted to but because she needed to be scared, and he had to make her seewhy.She arched her back but stood her ground.
“I’m sorry they took that from you without your permission. There are other ways to create families if we decide—”
