Vincent smiled proudly at them from the observation window, then came back out into the lab, hands in his pockets. “Now, if you all don’t mind, I need to sleep,” he announced. He went to Marielle. “Will you be okay?”
“I’m going to spend some time with Austin today,” she admitted, and waited to see his reaction.
He glanced at Austin, then back at her, and gave her a forced smile. “Have fun,” was all he said before kissing her forehead and beginning to walk away.
“Wait a moment, Mr. Fabron,” Barbara said, stepping into the conversation. “And everyone,” she continued, turning to the others. “I plan to hold a banquet Friday night here in the office building because of its large foyer. I’ve asked Dr. Rancor to play the piano and sing, and we—the United States government—will announce you as an officially sanctioned organization to the world.”
Everyone in the room looked at one another, eyes wide with excitement.
“You’ve thwarted two major attacks on this building and given a man back his life. I think that deserves recognition, don’t you?” She turned to Liam, and he nodded. “So there will be a banquet. Formal wear… I’ll tell the others later. That’s all.”
Marielle reached out and grabbed Vincent’s hand before he got any farther away from her. Austin was watching them. “Guess we’ll be going to a ball?” she said giddily.
He gave her a soft, adoring smile. “Why don’t you go pick out a dress? My treat.” He glanced at Austin. “Have him take you.” Then he became serious. “I know you’re struggling,” he whispered. Feeling small, she shrank under his gaze. “I know last night was hard, Marielle. Austin will take care of you today.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, mildly annoyed. “Why are you okay with me being with him today?” she asked, shrinking a bit more.
“Because he won’t let any harm come to you,” Vincent replied, tucking several strands of her hair behind her ear.
Austin? Can’t-hit-the-broad-side-of-a-barn Austin is going to protect me? Right… she thought, recalling their training night. She knew they were both painfully aware that Austin was watching them. Well, he did do his best last night.
“I need to rest,” Vincent added.
Before she had much time to process what he’d said, he took his lab coat off and headed for the elevator. Part of her wanted to go with him, but another part realized that he knew what was going on inside of her even though she hadn’t told him, which made her a tad uneasy. He knew so much about her and how her mind worked. Of course, he had flat-out said that they knew one another well in his dimension, so that made sense. Even so, she felt like she was coming apart a little as she contemplated this. The situation was utterly surreal; it was simply too much for the mind to comprehend. What would happen if she actually ran into her double? What would happen to Austin?
She couldn’t let herself think that way right now, so she went to Austin’s side.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
She bobbed her head. “I could eat.” Then she thought for a moment. Down the hall, the elevator doors were closing, and she could see Vincent standing, hands behind his back, on the other side. She knew he needed sleep, but she also wanted to be with him. With a sigh, she said, “He told me we should shop.”
“Fashion show?” Austin asked, his eyes wide with delight. It was the second time he seemed more feminine in her mind without him playing at it.
“Yeah,” she said thoughtfully. “Can we stop off at my place for a second? I want to do a few things.”
He nodded. “Then food.”
They dropped by her apartment, and Austin came in with her to help her feed Felix while she changed and grabbed some of the money Vincent had given her from a secret place in her nightstand.
When she came into the kitchen, Austin was bending down to pet Felix. For a moment, Marielle stood in the arch that led from the living room to the kitchen and watched him. Rubbing the black cat’s back, he whispered, “Hey, buddy.”
She beamed; Austin looked like a little boy. He sat down on the floor, heedless of his dark-gray suit and black button-up shirt as he continued to pet the cat. Felix rubbed against his legs one way, then the other. She could hear him purr from where she stood. Then he meowed.
“Yeah, buddy,” Austin whispered.
For a moment, her mind drifted. What would a relationship with Austin be like? She shook her head. His ex-wife Erin had found that out firsthand, which was why he spent his nights looking for sex in seedy bars and back alleys. But now, watching him in the morning light of her kitchen, with his butt on the floor and knees drawn up to pet the cat, light from the window reflecting off his dark hair, her heart hurt a little.
He can be a friend, even a best friend… nothing more…
For some reason, that thought caused her breath to snag.
He looked up at her, apparently hearing that breath. The light streaming through her kitchen window caught the left side of his face, making that eye a violent, piercing blue. He gave her an expression that said, Caught you looking.
He gave Felix a small kiss on the top of his soft head, then stood and looked her over, dusting himself off a little. “Ready to go?” he asked.
She nodded.
They had brunch at the little French café not far from her apartment. Austin had a sandwich, and she ate soup and salad despite the heat of the day. They people-watched and occasionally played guessing games about the couples who sat at nearby tables or wandered by. At one point, Austin made her laugh by hanging his spoon off the tip of his nose and crossing his eyes when she tried to say something important. She shoved him in the arm. He cackled.
He was a perfect gentleman, and those blue eyes—sometimes hidden behind dark sunglasses—looked at her in a way she knew well. He occasionally fingered his lips or gently bit the bottom one as his gaze shifted to her mouth. He wanted to kiss her so badly, but he never tried. She hated it… She loved it… She hated that she loved it.
***
Marielle groaned from inside the dressing room.
“Well, that doesn’t sound good,” Austin replied.
“None of them feel right.”
“Well, what do any of them look like?” he retorted.
“Right, like I’m going to show you.”
“Why not?” he asked, arms up in a shrug.
She tore the curtain back, revealing herself—and the curve-hugging navy-blue dress that flared out at the hips—to him. He sat on a round couch, leaning a temple on his knuckles and drinking from a glass of champagne the clerk had given him. When he saw the dress, he tried to suppress a small smile. It came through just long enough for her to see it, read it as “cute, but not you,” and dismiss it.
He was dreaming again. She could see it in the way his gaze wandered down her body, mostly taking in the dress… but probably undressing her in his mind, too. He focused on her face again and shook his head. “You’re right, it’s not a good choice.”
“It’s like… a dress I’d wear to tea or something,” she muttered, pulling it down a little at the hem.
“Why blue?”
“Vincent?” she asked as if it should have been obvious. They’d already been to a cleaner and retrieved three different suits from them with Vincent’s ticket. The first two had been royal- and navy-blue with gold trim, while the third had been burgundy. He’d also had three sets of slacks and a long-sleeved button-up shirt.
Austin glanced at the lights above them, scratching his temple with the knuckle of his index finger. Then he looked back at her. “How about that one?” He gestured with his head.
She took it off the door and gave the simple design a once-over. “It feels… old or something.”
“Well, what do you want to look like?”
“I don’t know,” she growled, then turned, went back into the dressing room, and slammed the door. “A goddess.”
Austin chuckled at her frustration. Then he looked around at some of the dresses that had been discarded by other women and were now hanging on the clothing racks, waiting to go back out into the shop. “Why not ditch the blue idea?” She tore the curtain back again and glared at him. “I’m just saying. Vincent likes blue to wear, but what about a different color for you?”
“Yeah, what?” she asked, drumming her nails on her hip.
Cocking his head, he looked her over once more. “Gold?”
She shook her head with a sigh. “It doesn’t look good on me.”
He leaned over his knees. “I doubt that,” he said under his breath as he rubbed his palms together.
She came out of the dressing room, zipper down her back, and walked back out into the dress shop to look through other selections. He glanced over his right shoulder, eyeing the perfection of her bare skin and the way her shoulder blades moved as she passed a hanger to the other side of the bar. It was the most he’d seen of her, and it made his pulse speed up a little.
Austin swallowed and turned away, wanting to stare but knowing the poison in it. He closed his eyes. If he didn’t look, it wasn’t there… If he didn’t look, it wasn’t there… If he…
Marielle came back and went into the dressing room again. She emerged a few minutes later in a knee-length, ruched, emerald-green number that made her eyes intense. There was a small slit up the left knee, and the left shoulder was bare and tantalizingly kissable. Or at least that’s how Austin saw it.
He fingered his bottom lip as a soft smile came over his mouth. “I don’t get on my knees for anyone, but I’d beg,” he said. Then, realizing what he’d said, he pressed his lips together and closed his eyes, wishing he could collect the words back into his mouth. Or praying she hadn’t heard. He scratched at his right arm.
“You are begging,” she retorted with a small eyeroll as she left the dressing room and went to the full-length mirror out where he was sitting. She picked up her long hair and arranged it at the back of her head, mimicking how she would look with it up.
He stood and slipped his hands into his pockets, watching her. “Would you like me to continue on that vein?” he asked casually.
She looked at him in the reflection. “No,” she replied, but it was more flirtatious than she intended. Her lip pouted a little.
Grinning, he bit his lip. He wanted to taste that shoulder so badly. “This is definitely a little more you,” he said.
She nodded. “It is.”
“The other one was too sweet.”
“I agree,” she said, turning her nose up a bit. “This one, I think,” she added, moving her hair up a little more. It exposed more of her neck.
Austin squeezed his hands into fists in his pockets but kept his smile fixed on his face. When the urge to approach her became too strong, he quickly froze his wrists. The effect was jarring and mildly painful, like snapping a rubber band against your skin to remind you not to do something. Regardless, the fantasy was strong in his mind.
Just move up behind her and gently kiss that shoulder. She wants it, Austin… Trust me, she wants it. She wants you. You know she does. You’re noting all of those giggles and hair flips and lip bites, same as she is. Just put your hands on her hips and breathe on her, give her that deliciously icy feeling she desires in this heat. Make her hard, then kiss that shoulder, and up along her neck to her ear… Let her feel your hair against her skin and breathe so she can hear you. Pull her close and let her feel, make her helpless against you. She wants you, Austin, she does—
He froze his wrists again.
“You okay back there? Looked like I lost you for a moment,” she said, dropping her hair and turning to him.
He smiled softly. “Just tired.” False. He checked his watch. “It’s already 12:30. Let’s get back.”
The dress was purchased, and they went back to Valorant.
***
Austin had been right. Sasha was not doing well, but as time went on during their conversation, Marielle learned that Jamie was experiencing something similar, as were Klara and Tayane. It was too disorienting to come face-to-face with a duplicate and be forced to terminate yourself or someone you loved.
Sasha sat in Marielle’s office, his eyes distant, his long blond hair falling into them in a way that suggested that he was trying to hide. Although he had always been on the quiet, contemplative side, she’d never known him to act this way. The placement of his hair appeared too deliberate to be coincidental. He was trying to protect himself.
“How are you sleeping?” Marielle asked gently.
“I dream that I am murdering myself. I dream of suicide. I slit my wrists, or I hang myself… or I use my own drone to shoot myself in the face.” He hung his head even lower. “But there are worse dreams.” Sasha looked off into the distance. “I am… sleeping solidly maybe three hours a night at most.”
Marielle wrote something down. “Do you want to talk about them at all?”
He squeezed his left hand into a tight fist on his knee, then opened it flat against his leg and scratched himself a few times. “I feel…” His chest began to rise and fall more quickly than it had before. “Like I don’t know myself anymore.”
“Have you tried to remind yourself who you are?”
“That’s just the thing, Marielle.” He leaned forward a little. “Who was I?” He lifted an open hand. “No, Marielle, listen… Who was I, really?” A pause, as she considered his question. “Who are any of us?”
She swallowed. “You are the hunter,” she said, trying to project confidence in him.
He leaned back and stared out the window distantly.
***
Marielle knocked on Vincent’s door, but no reply came. She gently pushed it open, his clothing draped over her arm in plastic. The curtains were drawn, and it was dark.
Vincent was asleep, clutching his pillow so close it looked intimate. In his mind, this pillow was a lover. His wife? Marielle herself? She had no idea, but she hoped it was her.
She glanced around the room, her eyes adjusting, and spotted something on the desk. She squinted to see it better; it was small and faint, and it caught the light just a little…
Marielle put her fingertips to her lips. It was his wedding ring. He’d taken it off. She’d never known him to do that, not once. She felt her breath hitch in her chest. That pillow is me, isn’t it?
Her heart sped with excitement. He had said that she occupied most of his thoughts…
She wanted to join him, but decided against it because of the last time she’d tried to wake him. It had been only a few hours, and if Vincent was going to insist on watching her again tonight, he needed his sleep. She wanted to show him the dress, to model it for him and ask if he liked it. Even though she knew what Austin thought, she wanted Vincent’s opinion.
Marielle smiled to herself. It was funny how much something like a dress could make you swirl inside. It was just a dress, right? Just some fabric that covered your body.
Then she shook her head. Of course it changed things. Her heart skipped a beat every time she saw Vincent in his suit rather than the plain white Valorant T-shirt and sweatpants he was wearing now. She had to admit, however, that seeing Austin gave her the same reaction. Clothing mattered when it came to seduction and desire.
She smiled at Vincent softly. He looked so peaceful, his glasses resting on the nightstand. She went to the chair and sat in it as silently as possible, tucking her legs up under her body and setting the clothes on the desk. For a while, she just watched him, hoping he might wake up and look at her the same way she had earlier that morning when they’d had breakfast together.
After about forty-five minutes, he cleared his throat, tilted his head back a tad, and pulled the pillow toward the lower half of his body. She felt her breath go hot. Was he dreaming of making love to her? He didn’t move or stir any further, however. Momentarily, she wondered if he was awake and just doing little things to torment her, but she thought not.
Marielle took one more look at him, imagining being that pillow tucked under his arm and against his most intimate parts, then quietly slipped the clothing over the chair before she turned and left. She had another kind of date, anyway.
Austin was waiting.