“You were on the path where Meg was jogging. How did you happen to be there?” Evan pressed.
“I…well, I was….” Creed stammered, unable to meet the intense gaze of those in the room. And just like that, Creed lost all pretenses.
“It’s not a difficult question,” Evan was walking toward the stranger. Alik, completely aware of the change in the temperature of the conversation positioned himself beside his brother facing the interloper.
“Who are you?” Alik asked the stranger point blank.
“I’m...um,” the stranger hesitated, “I’m not sure now’s the time to get into that.” Worry lines etched across his tanned face.
Alik and Evan exchanged glances and without saying a word they moved themselves between the stranger and their family. “Maybe you’d better start talking right now,” Alik warned.
“Listen, if I wanted to hurt her, I could have done it out there on the path when I first saw her collapse and neither of you could have stopped me.” His unfamiliar eyes were both pleading and heated at the brothers’ mistrust. “I know who you are and where you come from, but I don’t know why she’s sick,” the stranger said and anxiously ran his fingers through is hair.
“What do you mean you know who we are?” Alik’s eyes formed into angry slits. From behind the brothers, Margo eased her way to her daughter and put one hand protectively on her feverish arm. Her other hand was clinched into a fist.
“You’re metahumans, like me,” he said simply.
The words felt like ice down Alik’s back. He was stunned into momentary silence. Evan felt punched in the stomach, so he wasn’t talking much either.
The stranger continued speaking. “Ten years ago, you were involved in the research conducted by Dr. Kenneth Williams and were stolen by a woman who worked for his company, Dr. Margo Pullman, now going by the name Dr. Margo Winter…”
Dr. Andrews was at Margo’s side in an instant, ready to lay down his life to protect her.
“Stop right there. You obviously work for Williams. Did he send you to kill my mother?” Alik’s face could not have been redder, seething with fury. He could barely contain himself. But the logical part of him was forcing restraint knowing he needed to gather more information before he broke this guy’s neck.
“Yes,” the man said simply. “That was my original objective, but things have—changed.”
“If you came to hurt anyone in my family, you will not walk out of this room alive. Clear?” Alik’s vein in his forehead was pulsing deep purple with absolute ferocity.
“Crystal.” The stranger met Alik’s glare unflinching.
“We obviously have a lot to talk about. Are you willing?” Margo asked the outsider.
Evan couldn’t stop staring at the stranger as though through new eyes. Of course, he was a meta. His physique was perfect. He looked like he may even be stronger than Alik. Here was the man who had been sent by their enemy to hunt them down. Instead, he just brought Meg to them, ill, but alive. Now he stood in front of them confessing his plot. This was all too surreal.
“So let me get this straight,” Cole spoke up. “This is the guy who found Meg and brought her home yesterday, unconscious, but he works for that whack-job Williams who is bent on killing pretty much everyone in this room just so he can have their blood,” he was so horrified at Creed’s presence in the lab, his outburst left him breathless. He forced a gasp before he continued his angry tirade, “And now we’re welcoming him into the house and sharing a heart-to-heart talk about good versus evil over a cup of coffee?” Cole’s voice teetered on frantic. “And no one else sees this as a bad idea?” Cole blurted looking around the room at the faces of the people he cared for so deeply.
“If he wanted to do us harm, he would have started with Meg,” Evan responded rationally.
“Well, if you haven’t noticed, she’s not doing so great,” Cole quipped.
Margo walked to the stranger and watched his eyes as she responded to Cole. “There was no tactical advantage for him to expose himself as he has, Cole. He gave up his anonymity and blown his own cover. He’s completely aware of how outnumbered he is with all of us and especially outmatched between Alik and Evan. He had no reason to do any of this, yet he did. He’s trusted us enough to offer his vulnerability. We will trust him enough to listen,” Margo’s voice was steady and assured. Creed appreciated her ability to quickly piece together the gravity of the situation and act in a calm, rational manner. He liked her instantly.
She looked deep into his strangely familiar eyes and asked simply, “What is your name?”
“Creed, ma’am.” He stood at attention the moment Margo spoke to him. “My name is Creed Young,” he responded to her questioning as a soldier would a commanding officer.