Page 48 of The Love You Hate
It’s been so long since I’ve seen her that I’m starting to forget what her voice sounds like. Save for the virtual Presley moaning in my fucking ear, I haven’t spoken to her to know how she’s doing. “Is… Cohen doing well?”
This garners a wary look. “She is.”
“She was upset when I last had contact.”
“Gray is handling her case with ease.” I bet he is. A pang of jealousy tears through my chest. I should be with her.
“When is the event in Aspen?” I ask.
He leans back in his chair and props his feet on the desk. It’s the most relaxed I’ve seen him in months. “Tomorrow. I’ll fly you to Aspen in the morning. Having you reintroduced in a neutral territory is the best way to go about this.” Cleared. Thank fuck. Escape is imminent. “There will be more reports you’ll have to do at night’s end. One will be for me with a psychology evaluation and your usual nightly reports. I need you to be honest with me, Nate. This is uncharted territory.”
I nod. “I know.”
He tells me there is another check-out test and pushes a tablet to me. I have to respond to about thirty more intrusive questions. I’m almost done rating my sexual desires when the doc says, “There is one more thing I need you to do.”
His face changes and worry creases his brow. “Okay? What is it?”
He presses a button that casts his voice to the offices. “Bring her in,” he says.
My mind raced, and my heart thumps jaggedly as I try to figure out who it could be. He buzzes in Raya, and she pushes her way through the double doors to the training arena. I recognize her long, flowing hair and the set of her eyes. “What is this?” I ask, losing my breath. “What do you want me to do?” I speak before she’s close enough to hear. It’s been years since I’ve seen her. There has been zero contact. I don’t know if she’s married, if she has kids, hell I wasn’t sure if she was alive.
“We need to test something, Nate and this was the only way.”
I exhale. “What do you need to test exactly?”
“No simulations. Real life. We used Raya in your first programming, and I need to know if you’re still immune to her now after this more elaborate training session.” His gaze darts to Raya and he looks quickly away. “You need to have sex with her. Or try to.”
I laugh. “You’re not fucking serious, are you?” There’s no way. This is not in a protocol in any form. The female doctor rushes in and guides Raya to a room off to the side. It’s a fish tank with mirrored walls that she can’t see out of, but everyone on the outside can view in. There’s a bed. “You’re serious.”
He nods. “If you want to leave the facility, we need to know how much of a liability you are to the program. You’ll be surrounded by Charge Men who will be watching when you’re in Aspen. This is nothing to joke about, I’m afraid. It wasn’t my first choice, but Raya was willing because she wanted to talk to you, and there is no better way to test this out.” Raya was willing? That’s another surprise.
“This is fucking insane. If I’m going to be watched in Aspen, why does it matter what happens here today?”
“An extra layer of precaution, Nate. Don’t make this harder than it has to be. Just go in there and tell me if you feel anything. It can be that simple. Raya was told very little about the circumstances, only that we wanted you two to meet again to see if a relationship was possible after all these years. She admitted you were her first love and she was curious. We decided it was too easy and would be best to gauge if this training is becoming obsolete or if it’s holding solid.” He hesitates. “And maybe it would be able to tell us if what you feel, I mean felt, for Presley is… real. Perhaps we’re being too stringent with regard to sexual relations and they’re needed to keep steadfast focus. There are a lot of moving parts and I’m asking that you trust me.”
My face is red and the anger seeping out is blistering. If I wasn’t sure if I was a guinea pig before, now I’m officially a fucking lab rat. Standing without another word, I swagger into the freezing fishbowl room and slam the door behind me. Raya is sitting on the bed, knees pulled up into a ball. Her face is just as sweet as I remember. Like a sunny day, a smattering of freckles ride across her nose and cheekbones. She’s aged well. While she resembled a twenty-year-old when I last saw her in simulation, now she looks her age. My age. I wait for her to say something, but she continues staring, gaze blistering as she sizes me up. Probably doing the same thing I’m doing, trying to pinpoint the things that have changed, and those that stayed the same.
“Why did you come here, Raya?” My voice is terse. I can’t control the rage that they’re now bringing others into this mess. She had to be read in, sign a nondisclosure, and will have her every move watched for the rest of her life. Just for being attached to me for ten minutes. “You didn’t have to come.”
“I wanted to,” she says, a small voice echoing the room. I’m sure there are several doctors seated outside with clipboards and tablets, calculating and analyzing our every move. “Nate,” she says, breathing out heavily, “I’ve missed you so much and had no idea how you’ve been. I wanted to talk to you.” Raya glances at the glass behind me. “Guess this was the only way. I tried to ask your parents once, but they told me you weren’t reachable.”
My heart skips a beat. Not because I feel anything for the woman sitting in front of me, because of the possibility I gave up and didn’t even know. Raya thought about me. If I had known that all these years it might have changed something. Or maybe it wouldn’t have.
I don’t know how much I’m allowed to tell her about why she’s here. “I’m sorry for being shit at keeping in touch. Now you know why, I guess. How have you been?”
“Okay, I left an abusive relationship last year and have been figuring life out.” I sigh. That’s no good, and it pisses me off. Not just from a Charge Man perspective, from the perspective as a man who once cared about her. “No one ever treated me as kindly as you did, Nate.” She stands up and walks toward me. “I call you the one who got away to my friends.” Thank God, she stops before she’s in my airspace. Coldren might have a heart attack if he thinks I’m not immune to her. “Do you feel that way about me?”
I’m sweating. Literally. Droplets are running down the sides of my face. If I was hooked up to a polygraph, I’d be striking lines all over the place. I’m not sure how to fake this, what will give me a passing score? “Raya, we had a wonderful time. We were kids back then. My life is devoted to something else now.” Someone else. “I do think of you fondly.” That’s safe, I think. Plus, it gives her something. She looks hopeful tinged with sadness. Rejection is inevitable, she can sense it.
“Fondly,” she deadpans. “You think of me fondly? We took each other’s virginity. You told me you were in love with me. That I could always call you no matter what happened in life.” She bites her lip to keep it from trembling. “You literally disappeared. It was like you no longer existed—like maybe I was going crazy and you never really existed. That’s how I felt. You didn’t even say goodbye.” My gaze locks with hers and my stomach flips.
“I had nothing to do with that. Well, my decisions had something to do with that, but it’s just the way things work when you do my… job.” I clear my throat. “I’m sorry, Raya.”
“At least I finally get closure if I’m not getting anything else.”
I furrow my brow. “What did you think was going to happen here today? Honestly? In this glass box where strangers are watching your every move. Did you think we were going to fuck once more for old times’ sake?” Raya smirks. “I’m serious. I don’t know what they told you about me or why I’m here or what they hope to accomplish, but as nice and pretty as you are, this ain’t it.” I motion between our bodies with one hand.
“You haven’t changed one bit, have you? Still grumpy and stuck in your ways. Everything according to plan?”
