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Just smile through the pain, lock down my freak powers, and wait to be cut loose, dropped into another gauntlet I’ll have to fight to survive.
I don’t expect a break ’til I’m dead.
Even then, I bet I have to run the same hamster wheel in hell and tell the assholes with the pitchforks how much I’m enjoying the steam.
I’m so focused on maintaining the distance between me and the others, maintaining the pace and the appearance of perfect compliance, I don’t realize we’re off course until I’m rocked by the invisible fence.
Lightning fries me from ankle to ass.
I swallow a frothy scream, cracking my tailbone on asphalt hard enough to hear color.
An angry, red buzz.
Leaking a groan, I roll away from the barrier I should never have let sneak up on me. My shins burn and my toes twist, every muscle shuddering with aftershocks.
Petty laughter echoes through my pain.
“Freak!” Elyse calls from the head of the column, sounding more like a tween mean girl than a twenty-something special operative.
The insult doesn’t sting as much as the atomic pins-and-needles.
I shouldn’t have let myself think about that baseball field, even for a misguided second—because then I think about them and the one time I wanted to be the real me, and the fire that I keep so carefully smothered refuses to stay banked.
I snarl.
The rolling sound is tipped in razors.
Between anger and electric shock, my control shatters.
My pheromones break their leash.
The squad senses the change—some shift in the air or my aura—and survival instincts leave alphas quaking in their tac gear.
Their laughter cuts.
The cowards scatter.
Because for the handful of seconds it takes me to pull my shit together, to reel in my scent and straighten my mask, the squad finally remembers why mine’s the only special ability that needs to be muzzled.
It’s quiet when their boot-falls fade. Just my ragged breath and the birds chirping beyond the fence.
Lucky I didn’t pass out this time.
But the ultimate insult?
Now I need to recharge my manacles.
I consider rolling into the road and camping on the double-yellow line, but it’s too early for traffic, and when I die, I’m dragging the base with me to hell.
Everyone but Gary—the beta who works the grill at the mess hall.
He’s good people. Puts extra Swiss on my egg and cheese sammies.
Knowing leadership is watching, I don’t let myself wallow. I work from a crawl to a limp to a lopsided speed-walk, veering back to the main road to finish the circuit.
Nobody can claim I was slacking.
Weight room is next on the morning training schedule, but I hobble past the gym to the medical building. My ankles are shredded, and my legs are jellied. I want an ice pack for my ass before I fake my way through dead lift.
