“If you really think that, then you don’t know the first thing about us,” Hunt said.
Chase appraised him and the gun he still held, though loosely now. “Maybe it’s you who don’t know me.”
“Whatever, dude. Get to talking.”
Raynar carried in one of those ergonomic seats with knee, ankle, and elbow cushions instead of a back, and placed it in front of Chase. Without so much as a nod of thanks or acknowledgment, Chase slid onto the leather-and-polished-wood contraption, his posture perfect, and studied the five of us, his attention sliding off the others in the room as if they weren’t even there.
“How much do you know about your past and your abilities?”
“Assume we know nothing,” Griffin said, coming to sit beside me on the bed, Layla on my other side.
Chase nodded, his sharp eyes going distant for a few moments. “Across recorded history, and even before then, handed down from generation to generation in oral tradition, there have been legends, stories, and myths of immortal beings. The details vary greatly depending on the culture and its overarching belief system, but it boils down to the same thing: there are those who can outlive death. The topic has long fascinated me.”
None of this was news, and yet I wouldn’t hurry him along. Perhaps we’d finally get some answers.
“I tasked a team of promising young scientists with discovering a source of said immortality. I wanted to replicate it. To be able to create this ability in others.”
In himself, he meant. The billionaire who had everything money could buy, and now wanted what it couldn’t.
Typical. Nothing was ever sufficient for those lucky enough to have their every conceivable need met with ease and luxury.
“When my scientists managed to duplicate the conditions that brought about immortality in the lab, they repaid me by stealing every piece of information that would reveal how they’d done it. Including you.”
“How? How’d they do it?” Hunt asked while tucking the gun into the waistband of his jeans, against his lower back. I knew from watching him practice the move: he could draw a weapon from that position faster than Jaggar could reach his.
“The answer to that question,” Chase said, “is a trade secret. Once I secure your agreement to honor confidentiality, I may be willing to share more of the details with you.”
“Wow,” Layla sneered. “So fucking generous of you.”
Chase slid his stare to her. “If you give me the chance, you’ll find that I’m extremely generous. I can make things very good for all of you.”
“I don’t call being killed and shot at ‘good,’” Brady retorted as the surgeon stitched him up. From what I’d observed from our too-frequent recent experiences with hospitals, surgeons usually left secondary doctors or nurses to do the stitching or stapling. But beneath Chase’s watchful supervision, the surgeon didn’t hesitate to do it himself.
Chase steepled his fingers atop the cushion. “I wouldn’t call that good either. It’s regrettable, but it became unavoidable when my former employees decided to break their agreements and set me back years by stealing from me. I assure you, moving forward, wecanbe friends, and I can make life better for each one of you than you’ve ever dreamed of.”
Layla harrumphed from my left but didn’t say what I was sure she was thinking because I was thinking it too: we couldn’t trust the finely dressed snake as far as we could throw him.
Griffin clasped my hand as I said, “Just like you probably did for the Aquoians?”
He whipped his head to look at me. Deep and penetrating, his stare saw too much and revealed too little. In a clipped tone he hadn’t used with us yet, he said, “I offered them the easy way. I offered them riches so great they could have radically improved the lives of their people for many generations to come. They could have bought back much of their land, perhaps even secured more of their rights with the amount of money I offered them.”
“To think, money can’t buy everything,” I said, a taunt I instantly regretted.
His eyes hardened to brown, brutal flints. “As I told you already, we can be friends. Or we can … not. I think you’ll all much prefer having me as a friend.”
Then, without breaking eye contact with me, he asked, “Dr. Chadbourne, are you finished with your patient?”
“Yes, sir. But I’ve not yet treated the second.”
“You’re excused. All of you, leave now.”
Not even Jaggar complained as he and Raynar collected and holstered their weapons, then hurried to join the others in leaving us alone with the man with more money than sense.
When the door clicked shut, Chase leaned forward onto his elbows. His stare remained as sharp as before. Finally, we were seeing more of what lived beneath that polished exterior.
“This storytelling isn’t suiting us. Let me get down to the meat on the bone. I’m deeply invested in seeing the five of you thrive. I’m uniquely situated to help you understand yourselves, your powers, and to pretty much help you do whatever you want with your lives. With my support, there will be very little you can’t do.”
“And in exchange?” Griffin asked.
