Chase You To The Sun Page 17

  Bruce got up, still looking dazed, and shuffled to the door holding her hand. “Chester?” he called out in a hoarse voice. “Can you start up the system upstairs?” He pulled her along into the living room, looking at his helpers one by one in silence.

  “So, what happened?” Hikaru finally blurted out.

  “We’re taking over,” Bruce replied. “Ivanov Industries is ours.”

  “Taking over?” Shou’s eyes almost popped out of their sockets. “How the fuck did that happen?”

  Lana smiled feebly. “Turns out my dad loves me more than you guys could ever imagine.” The words gave her a warm feeling inside. “He’s giving up everything for me.”

  That seemed to be the signal for everybody to kick into action. Chester ran upstairs to do what Bruce had asked him, John got some special equipment from one of the storage rooms, and the Japanese brothers went outside to fire up the Solar car and drive out to get on the radio with Bruce’s fleet out there somewhere. Bruce stayed where he was, staring at Lana with a kind of awe in his eyes.

  “You did it,” he mumbled. “You made him cave.”

  “I didn’t do anything,” she protested, suddenly feeling guilty for putting her father through hell and secretly hooking up with his tormentor at the same time. It had been almost unbearable to watch the anguish on his face.

  Without saying anything else, Bruce pulled her into a warm embrace, resting his cheek against her forehead. “God, I’m happy I won’t have to hurt you anymore,” he sighed.

  Lana smiled, burying her face in his neck. “Me too.” When she looked up, she was surprised to see Bruce biting back tears. Were they tears of joy, or was something else going on?

  “Come on, let’s go to the computer room,” he said when John brushed past them with all kinds of gear stacked up in his arms. “You’re my way in.”

  A tiny shiver ran down Lana’s spine as they went upstairs and trudged down the hallway toward the room. The first time she’d been in there, they’d hooked her up to the iris and fingerprint scanner and flipped out at her for not being more useful. Suppose something went wrong now – or her dad had been lying?

  “Do you think he was speaking the truth?” she asked Bruce timidly, grabbing his hand more tightly.

  The tall pirate looked sideways. “Yeah,” he nodded. “I don’t think he’s that good an actor.”

  Inside, the room was stuffy and hot, doing nothing to calm down Lana’s nerves. Chester was at the keyboard typing out some indecipherable code, muttering under his breath.”They changed the codes again since last time,” he complained. “This might take a while.”

  “Can’t you just scan my eye?” Lana asked, a bit stumped. “I have clearance now, right?”

  John sighed irritably as he busied himself setting up the device he was carrying. “We have to actually break into the system in order to hook up the iris scanner. Understand?”

  She glared at him. “Oh, grow up,” she quipped, biting her lip when Bruce stifled a chuckle next to her. If there was anyone in Bruce’s company she wasn’t going to miss for one nanosecond, it was John. Lana still couldn’t quite figure out how he fit into the whole equation – allegedly, he was a brilliant hacker, but other than that, he didn’t really seem to be a part of Bruce’s little tribe.

  Suddenly, it dawned on her that she was going to miss this group of people.

  “I’m in,” Chester triumphantly announced right at that instant. “Thanks for the help, John.”

  “Well, Your Highness...” John gestured at the seat in front of the scanner. “Let’s see what you can do.”

  “Go work your hazel magic,” Bruce added with a faint grin.

  Lana tensed up as she sat down and stared into the device, blinking nervously as the thing zoomed in on her iris with a mechanical, whirring sound.

  Just for a moment, nothing happened. The next thing she knew, several red lights on Chester’s screen flashed to green. “Authorized access,” a monotone, female voice stated. “Please press right hand firmly down on fingerprint scanning pad for verification.”

  “Where the hell is that pad?” Chester snapped.

  “Got it.” John shoved another device under Lana’s hand, who sat frozen on her chair. Was this really working?

  Apparently, it was. Both Chester and John howled with elation as a dazzling stream of digits zipped by on the big computer screen. No alarms went off. No computers shut down. Everything looked fine.

  “We’re in the mainframe,” John gasped, staring at the screen as if he’d just encountered God. “I cannot believe this.”

  The two men sat hunched over their keyboards, working their way into whatever system they needed to get into in order to shut down security around the Promethean mines.

  So it was over. With a deep, relieved sigh, Lana pushed her rolling chair away from the scanner, bumping into Bruce inadvertently.

  He smiled down on her. “You want to get out of here?”

  “Yes.” She nodded vigorously. “Yes, please. My work is done.”

  Her presence here had destroyed her father’s company, their family’s position among the Russian Elite obliterated within the blink of an eye – literally.

  Bruce gently took her arm and led her outside into the hallway. As the door shut behind them, Lana turned toward him. “Now what?”

  He paused for a few beats. “Let’s go to your room.”

  “Sure.”

  Inside, the bedroom was bright and sunny in the summer light streaming in through the big window. Lana’s gaze drifted over her open suitcase on the floor, the rumpled bed sheets, and the poetry book on her bedside table. All of a sudden, she wondered if this room would miss her once she was gone.

  “Lana.” Bruce put his hand on her shoulder, turning her around so she was facing him. “You want to sit down?”

  She nodded quietly, tilting her head at the bed. They both flopped down on the foot end, making the bed squeak a little.

  “I’m thirsty,” Bruce said, rubbing his face absently. “I’m gonna grab a can of something downstairs. Can I get you something too?”

  Lana shook her head. “I’m fine.”

  As she watched Bruce leaving the room, she realized she was anything but. She’d go back to her dad, but she’d be part of a world that had irrevocably changed. Or maybe she had changed – all she knew was that going back to her father shouldn’t be the end of her time here. Crazy as it might be, she wanted to help this band of rebels with a cause. Most of all, she wanted to spend more time with Bruce and get to know him better, to see what he could be like, now that he’d beaten the corruption at top-level that had set him on this path of crime in the first place, so many years ago. She wanted to see more of the sensitive, innocent guy he had once been.

  Lost in thought, she actually started with a little gasp when Bruce pushed open the door again. “I brought you some juice anyway,” he said with a smirk, holding up a glass. “That terrible, sour orange juice you made. Didn’t I tell you to add sugar?”

  “I wasn’t paying attention,” Lana mumbled, looking up at him coyly through her eyelashes.

  “Wrong move. Now I’m going to make you drink it yourself.”

  Lana took a sip of the orange juice and pulled a face. Bruce was right – her concoction was cringe-worthy. “Is this how you thank me for giving you Prometheus?” she laughed.

  He put his arm around her shoulder. “There is no way of thanking you for that,” he replied. “And frankly, I don’t want to. I made you do it. I took you against your will and hurt you to gain this victory.”

  She sighed, dutifully drinking some more juice. “But now you’ll let me go.”

  “Yes.” An unreadable expression seeped into his dark, gray eyes. “I’m gonna have to let you go.”

  “Will I finally find out where on Earth this damn house is?” she joked. “When you fly me back home?”

  “I intend to drop you off in England with your friends,” Bruce said. “And no, I won’t show you where this hou
se is.”

  “Oh.” Lana blinked. “But I – maybe I’d like to come back here. Some day.”

  “But you can’t,” he said softly.

  “So how will I be able to talk to you?”

  He shook his head almost imperceptibly. “You won’t.”

  “But –” Suddenly, it felt as if she’d run out of words to say. Bruce had stolen them from her. “But I want to. Talk to you, I mean.” Her voice was taut like wire. “Just – you know. Stay in touch.”

  “Sveta.” The diminutive of her name rolling off his tongue made her choke up unexpectedly. “You have to realize. I’ll be the most-wanted criminal ever after I pull this off. People will want my head. I’ll be on the run, looking over my shoulder at every turn. We can’t stay in touch.” He put a warm hand on her knee and continued more softly: “You don’t want to be with someone like me. Not really. I told you – I’ll just be an unfortunate memory.”

  “Don’t tell me what I want,” she threw back, anguish in her tone. “You don’t know.”

  “Only one week ago, you wanted nothing to do with me,” Bruce pointed out calmly.

  “Things change.” With a trembling hand, she put down her glass on the floor and stood up. “You can’t just – not after opening my eyes. Stop pushing me away.” Her incoherent rant bubbled from her lips like an unstoppable flow. Why was it so hard to think straight, all of a sudden?

  Bruce got up too, steadying her when she swayed on her feet. “You’re going home,” he mumbled, kissing her lips and lacing his fingers through her hair. “I owe that to your father. No matter how much of a bastard I think he is, he loves you. And you deserve love – not some violent rogue like me.”

  “You tricked me,” Lana whispered groggily. “You made me fall for you.”

  Surprise flashed across his face, his gaze softening. “I told you not to grow too attached to me,” he said roughly.

  Dazedly, she blinked up at him. “Well, I’m a silly girl,” she replied, giggling a bit because she couldn’t feel her tongue. What was happening to her? “Bruce – I’m not feeling well.” She followed his gaze, her eyes landing on the glass of orange juice she’d put on the floor. “What – the fuck – you spiked my drink?”

  Bruce smiled wistfully. “You’ll sleep, Lana. And when you wake up, you’ll be with your friends. You can go back to a safe world. Just – think of what I told you every once in a while. Make it a better world.”

  “No.” Lana tried to keep her eyes open, but they kept falling shut. Her eyelids were so heavy – she was too tired to stay awake. Her head drooped, landing on his strong, broad shoulder.

  His lips touched her cheek one more time. “Goodbye,” Bruce said in his dark, gravelly voice.

  And then the world spun away from her, leaving her in utter darkness.

  17.

  It smelled like flowers in here.

  The thought popped into her mind when she woke up with a start, moaning as she tried to swallow. Her throat felt like sand paper. Where was here?

  “You’re awake,” a girl’s voice whispered in relief. Svetlana felt how someone grabbed her hand.

  “Water,” she croaked.

  When she cracked her eyes open just a little, she could see a young woman with black hair and strikingly blue eyes sitting on the edge of the bed, pouring her a glass of water from a jug. “Here, drink this,” she said.

  Slowly, the world came back into focus. Lana gulped down the water like a desperate traveler in the desert, meanwhile taking in the room she was in. Timber walls. Somewhere on Earth, then?

  “I’m Ava Carter,” the girl introduced herself. “You’re in my house. I’m a friend of Alen’s.”

  “Where’s Vitusya – Tori?” Lana mumbled.

  “Tori’s out running some errands with my husband. She asked me to keep an eye on you. Actually, she didn’t leave your side for two days straight. Alen told her to take a break.”

  “Where am I? How did I get here?”

  Ava smiled. “You’re in Sutton on the British Isles, at our farmhouse. We found you in the fields near our house. Mr. Randall sent your dad a message about the location where he dropped you off.”

  He hadn’t been called Mr. Randall for a long time. The memory of Bruce’s remark about his break with the Elite came unbidden, and it choked Lana up. She would never see him again.

  “Is my dad here?” she whispered.

  Ava shook her head. “Not yet. He’s in hiding, so he has to find people willing to get him to Earth incognito. Ever since Bruce Randall hacked into your father’s company system, the Russian Elite have been looking for your father, demanding he does something about the situation. I don’t think he can, though, or can he?”

  Lana shook her head. “He wanted out.”

  “Out?” Ava frowned.

  “Long story.” Lana sat up a bit more, looking down at the unfamiliar pajamas she was wearing. “Can I have some food, actually?”

  The raven-haired girl chuckled. “Of course. You must be famished. Will you be all right if I leave you for a few minutes?”

  “Yes. I’ll be fine.”

  Lana leaned back against the pillows and looked around once more as Ava exited the room. The large window opposite the bed looked out on grassy fields, the tall stalks of wild wheat swaying in the breeze. The blue sky above seemed to want to tell her that all was good now. Except it wasn’t. She felt empty, as though someone had torn her away from people she’d just hesitantly started to consider her friends.

  As she swung her legs over the edge of the bed to try to stand, her eye fell on her old suitcase, sitting on a wicker chair in the corner. Bruce had sent her baggage along, unbelievably enough. It was so absurd and so considerate at the same time that it brought tears to her eyes. Shuffling forward gingerly, Lana made her way to the suitcase on unsteady legs. It felt as if she’d slept for years instead of days. Bruce must have given her the full dose to make sure she wouldn’t wake up before he was far, far away.

  She flipped the lid open. Her throat constricted as she went through the clothes he’d apparently washed for her. Her business suits were here, as well as the jeans she’d been wearing that morning he had kissed her for the first time. Lana sniffed as her fingers hit the old smart phone he’d taken from her. And then, she felt something else. With shaking hands, she slipped it out from between a pile of T-shirts.

  “Oh, my God,” she gasped, a quiet sob escaping her throat.

  It was the Walt Whitman poetry volume.

  By the time Ava returned with some sandwiches and fruit, Lana had crawled back into bed, flipping through Bruce’s book. Somewhere deep down, she was hoping he’d have left a message in it for her, but she knew him giving her the book was enough of a message. He’d truly cared about her.

  And now it was over.

  “Svetlana!” Tori burst into the room just as Ava set down the tray of food on the bedside table. “You’re okay. You’re alive.”

  “I am,” Lana replied hoarsely, flinging her arms around her friend as Tori flopped down on the bed to hug her. The tears she’d been holding back so far wouldn’t be contained anymore. Silently, she cried, violent sobs racking her body. It was all too much – seeing her friend again, being safe at last, losing Bruce, realizing her world was less perfect than she’d always thought. And through her tears, Tori held her tightly, rubbing her back gently.

  “What happened to you out there?” Tori finally mumbled, sitting back a bit to look Lana in the eye. “You got hurt.”

  “Yeah, I did,” Lana fumbled, feeling Tori’s inquisitive eyes on the bite marks in her neck.

  “I put PJs on you,” her friend continued. “You were – covered in bruises. He, uhm, beat you up?”

  Lana mutely shook her head, biting her lip. Even though Ava had left the room to give them some privacy, she didn’t know what to say. Where to start.

  “He raped you?” Tori whispered, mortified.

  It would be so easy to say yes. Far easier than explaining to her fr
iend why she’d allowed herself to be captivated by a violent, dangerous space pirate. Why she’d invited him in, despite his own warnings. Why she’d willingly spread her legs for a man with a past so dark it would blot out the sun if he chased her again.

  “No,” Lana replied honestly, after a long pause. “He didn’t.”

  At that moment, Alen entered the room carrying a big bottle of orange juice, of all things. “Hey,” he said gently. “Ava asked me to bring you some more fluids. How are you feeling?”

  “Shitty,” Lana answered. “But thanks for the juice. I’m parched.”

  He sat down next to Tori. “Well, if you want to come out and sit in the yard, you’re welcome to join us. It’s nice and sunny. It’ll do you good.”

  Lana smiled feebly. “Sounds good. I’ll get changed.”

  Alen nodded and turned around to leave again. “Oh, by the way,” he added, “your dad will be here soon. And there’s quite a bit of news about Prometheus on the net. You might want to have a look.”

  She sighed. Of course, she had no idea what kind of news Alen was referring to, but it would probably not portray the Ivanovs in a very positive light. Still, it was no use hiding her head in the sand – both she and her dad would have to face the music and dance.

  “Lana,” Tori interrupted her train of thought. “What did you mean before? When you said he didn’t..?”

  Lana stared at her hands. “I meant what I said. Bruce didn’t rape me. Nor did anyone else in his group, thanks to him.”

  But...” Tori gaped at her, looking puzzled.

  “We’ll talk later,” Lana cut her off. “Please. Just – let me get dressed. I’ll see you outside.”

  “Okay.” Her friend smiled, letting it go for now. It was one of the things Lana really appreciated about Tori – she wasn’t pushy. “Hey, use the console in the wall to play some music. Ava and Nicolas have some really cool music from the twentieth century.”

  “Thanks. I might.”

  Lana got up and stood there, indecisively staring at the piles of clothes she’d put on the floor. Her Elite business suits suddenly felt strangely inappropriate. They were made for people to wear while bargaining about blood money, for all she knew. Maybe she should just throw on some jeans and a tank top and never look back. Bury the suits in a deep drawer and start to really learn about the world.