The Dark Inside (A Human Element) Read Online Free PDF Page B

musk–into his mind forever. He wasn't a monster. He hadn't killed her. Dr. Bjord had.
    And the doctor's end would come soon.
    X-10 hugged his first love to his chest and drifted back into his dreams where Sabrina could live again…and call him Charlie.

 
     
     
    The Job
    Felix
     
     
     
    The curl of the woman's hair called to him. It was Laura's hair. Burnt strands of copper and fire. He had seen it a hundred times, in person as well as his dreams and visions. He had tried to keep his presence hidden from Laura over the years, but she knew he watched her. She had caught him once and asked why he followed her. That was the only time he spoke to her before disappearing again. I need to know what you are , he said.
    "Felix?"
    He re-focused his eyes on the flesh and blood woman before him, Maria, who drove him to thoughts of Laura. "We'll do it tonight."
    She nodded, squinting at him, and stood. The angles of her face were sharper than Laura's as if each killing she had performed over time shaped the hardness of her on the outside–as well as the inside.
    "I'll be at the bar at nine then." She gathered up her notes.
    "I'll wait for you to bring the men to the motel room. You're sure you can convince them?"
    "I've never had a problem before. And these two like to share."
    He eyed her figure with a longing never realized. Her body was tight and lithe. The lines of her muscles wrapped around her as if a chisel had etched them from stone. She stretched and his eyes grazed her breasts that thrust outward. He admired their roundness. He could see how they would call a man to mold his hands around them. To feel their supple flesh and lick those nipples into arrow points. Her body was encased in metal, and her breasts were the cannons ready to blast a man's armor away.
    Not his. He was not so tempered by emotion and he didn't want to be. It was not in his nature as a Seeker from his world. He pushed his desire deep down, away from the part of him that was half human. Maria was all human and all emotion. It was in the tremors that flashed through her every muscle and limb, but she controlled it for her purpose. If she had been from his world she would be a Destroyer, violent in her passion to devour flesh through lust or death. He had read her portfolio. He knew the men she seduced, just as she knew the men he killed.
    She noticed his wandering eyes. "I thought your kind could not be tamed by a woman."
    He shrugged, unsure what to say, and stood up. The harsh light in the meeting room cast dark shadows under her breasts. They now seemed the focus of the room. Time to leave. "Nine tonight. Don't be too long."
    She smoothed a hand over her hair, pulling it flat. It bounced back on her shoulder, the curl eager to be free. "It never takes me long." And in that flick of silky rope he saw Laura in a flash–running across a field, her chestnut hair shining in the sun. She too longed to be free in the wide-open spaces.
    "And we'll do it quick before things get involved."
    She smiled at him. "You don't want to watch, Felix? Might change your mind about handling a woman. With your dark looks and body, women would desire you."
    "I've had women." He looked away. An awkward thrill ran through his body but it was subdued, as all his emotions were. They lay there under the surface, never fully explored.
    "Experiments. That's all. Government eyes watching."
    "Experiment or not, the government is always watching."
    She nodded, her smile gone, and stared at him for a long moment. In that stare he saw her bitter shellac melt into sweet wine for a brief instant. She was just a young woman bound to a life she could not escape. Did she too long to be free? An unfamiliar pang hit him. He would be glad when this job with Maria was over. He did not need a woman so close who reminded him of Laura.
    She left and his unease passed. He made his way to his private room in the government facility where he had lived his entire forty-three years. After each