‘No!’ I yell. ‘We don’t have time. We need to keep moving.’
‘How?’ he shouts, whirling round. ‘How do you propose we get to the lab? We’re out of gas and we have no solars. We can’t even make it there on what we have left, and we still need to find a clonebox.’
‘We’ll figure something out.’
His eyes blaze. ‘I’ve already figured something out. We go back there and we take our goddamn solars back.’
I run my hands through my hair. He’s literally shaking with anger, his hands in fists as he stares back down the road. My eyes drop to his bandage, where a spot of blood has seeped through the gauze.
Oh shit. He’s not shaking with anger. He’s torn his stitches, and now he’s going into shock.
‘Cole,’ I say, reaching for his arm. ‘You’re –’
He yanks his arm away. ‘We need the solars. We have to go back.’
‘Cole, listen to me. You’re bleeding.’
Scarlet spots seep through the cotton. A sheen of cold sweat glimmers on his chest.
‘I’ll be fine,’ he says.
‘No you won’t. You’re not invincible.’
‘I’ll be fine,’ he says again, then blinks, another tremor racing through his body. His face pales and he stumbles back, falling against the jeep.
‘Oh, no, no,’ I breathe, lunging for him, slipping beneath his arm. His skin is cold and clammy, covered in sweat. ‘You’re freezing, Cole. You shouldn’t be moving.’
‘But we need to –’
‘Get in the damn jeep,’ I say, grabbing his face. ‘You need to rest. I need you. I won’t make it there alone.’
He glares at me a moment longer, and then the anger fades from his face. ‘OK,’ he whispers finally.
We shuffle to the back with the bulk of his weight on my shoulder, and I somehow manage to pull open the rear doors. He climbs in, swaying, and I shove the boxes aside so there’s enough space for him to lie down. He collapses on his side, letting out a grunt of pain. The spots of scarlet on his bandage have spread into a terrifying wash of blood.
‘I-I need to get warm,’ he stutters. ‘My tech is heat boosted. I need to keep my temperature up for it to heal me.’
‘OK.’ I grab one of the Cartaxus sleeping bags and yank it out of its sack, then climb in behind him, crushing the boxes against the side.
‘Just hold still.’ I throw the sleeping bag over him. ‘You’re going to be fine.’
But the calmness in my voice is a lie. Cole’s hands are freezing, and his face is white, his pupils narrowed down to specks. I need to warm him up and get his tech running again. Judging by the way he’s shaking, I need to do it fast.
‘OK, close your eyes.’ I yank my jacket and tank top off.
‘Wh-what are you d-doing?’ His teeth are chattering so badly he can barely form the words, but he still turns his head to look at me.
‘I told you to close your eyes.’ I lie down on the floor beside him, slipping underneath the sleeping bag in my bra, pressing my chest to his back.
‘Y-you have to buy me a drink before you g-get me into bed.’
‘Shut up,’ I whisper, wrapping my arm round his chest.
‘A-after this is over, I’m telling C-Crick you came on to me.’
I snort, pressing my cheek to the back of his neck. ‘Yeah, well, just don’t tell your girlfriend. It sounds like she’d kick my ass.’
He pauses for a moment, still shivering. ‘I-I don’t know, it’s been years. She never sent a message, she –’
‘Shh,’ I say, tightening my grip on him. ‘Don’t think about that, OK? Just try to relax.’
He nods, sliding his hand up, lacing his fingers through mine. I feel his pulse in his hands and in his neck, where our skin is pressed together. We lie in silence until his tremors slow. His body heat rises, his breathing settling into a slow, steady rhythm that tells me he’s asleep.
I keep my cheek pressed to his neck, a hum of pressure rising in my ears. Sparks of electricity seem to dance through me in the places our skin touches. There’s nothing romantic about us lying like this, it’s simply life and death, but for some reason I can’t stop thinking about the way he’s holding my hand.
I know it doesn’t mean anything. We both have other people, and he’s so drunk on anaesthetic he probably doesn’t know what he’s doing. I tell myself this, but all I can smell is his aftershave and the raw, musky fragrance of his skin.
It tugs at something inside me, building like a fire.
Deep breaths, Catarina.
This is going to be a problem.
CHAPTER 16
I fell asleep behind Cole, but we must have moved in the night, because I wake up pressed against his chest, entangled in his arms. His breath is soft on my hair, one hand brushing the back of my neck, and the bare skin of his chest is warm against my cheek.
It’s absurdly intimate, but waking like this shouldn’t mean anything. It’s cold and cramped in the back of the jeep, and it’s normal for people to huddle for warmth in the night.
At least, it would be normal if I hadn’t woken with a sense that some deep, lost part of myself had finally found its way home. It would be normal if I didn’t wake up wrapped in Cole’s scent, pulling him closer, breathing his name.
His name.
I stiffen as soon as the word leaves my lips, and Cole’s ice-blue eyes blink open, meeting mine in confusion. I don’t know if he heard me, but his arms slide away and he rolls to his back, rubbing his face as though dragging himself from a dream.
This is not good.
I scramble to sit up, pushing the hair from my face, kicking my way out of the sleeping bag covering us. I’m still in my bra. My tank top is wedged under a box, and I yank it out, pulling it on clumsily. My heartbeat is a drum.
Cole must hear it. He can surely read the flush of heat on my cheeks and the goosebumps on my neck. I straighten my top, angling myself away from him, trying to hide behind the dark curtain of my hair.
Outside, the morning light is pale. The jeep’s tinted windows show me a landscape of flat, grassy plains all the way to the horizon. My brain is finally starting to adjust to seeing the world without my tech, and it’s almost pleasing to let my focus dance across the land outside. There are no houses in sight, no craters or rusted cars, no sign that anyone lived here even before the plague. The dark curve of the highway stretches for miles, empty and black, until my non-enhanced eyes can’t track it any more.
‘I shouldn’t have parked here overnight,’ I say. ‘It’s not safe to stay near the highways. Lurkers drive along them, hunting people. I should have driven us into cover.’
Cole just grunts, sitting up slowly, leaning against the side of the jeep. The bandage over his stomach is dark with blood, and there are rings beneath his eyes, but he looks better than he did last night. His eyes run over me, from the dirty boots I slept in, to the tangled mess of hair puffed out around my face. I brace myself for questions about what just happened – how I ended up in his arms, why I said his name – but he just nods at my wrist.
‘How’s your arm?’