Elite Metal-ARE-epub (82 page)

He didn’t ask her to stop crying, which was good because she wasn’t certain she could have if he’d wanted her to.

She closed her eyes and listened to his heart beat. “Rose? Can you do something for me please?”

“Sure.” She didn’t have the strength to do much more than breathe.

“Tomorrow I want you to tell me all about the new season of Doctor Who.”

His words were so surprising, she actually woke up enough to look at him. “What?”

“The whole season. Start to finish. Could you talk to me for hours?”

Rose lost him once and though it might take a long time to really believe they were fine she wouldn’t trade a moment with this man for anything in the universe.

“Sure thing, Elijah. Whatever you want.”

Always.

Rebecca Royce

As a teenager, Rebecca would hide in her room to read her favorite romance novels when she was supposed to be doing her homework.

She is the mother of three adorable boys and is fortunate to be married to her best friend. They are transplants from the northeastern part of the United States to the great state of Texas, specifically Austin.

She is in love with science fiction, fantasy and the paranormal and tries to use all these elements in her writing. In her world anything is possible, anything can happen, and you should suspect that it will.

Read more from Rebecca here

Alpha Rising

Alpha’s Strength

Alpha’s Sacrifice

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By Saranna DeWylde

Mercury’s Poison

By Saranna DeWylde

Text Copyright Saranna DeWylde 2015

All Rights Reserved

Discover more titles by Saranna DeWylde at
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Dedication

This novella wouldn't have been possible without the grand talents of Heather Long, Virginia Nelson and Jeanie Valenzuela. You have all the love and gratitude an Amazon Goddess has in her dark little heart. Also, a big thank you to the other amazing women in this set. I'm humbled and grateful to be part of this.

Mercury’s Poison

By Saranna DeWylde

A scarred, mad genius more monster than man must protect the beauty he's become obsessed with from a beast more terrible than himself.

Serum 17 took his face, took his kindness and took his empathy. It took, in essence, all of John Thrace leaving only the Elite Metal operative "Mercury" in his place. A man marked with a biohazard tattoo because he knows he's incompatible with other living things. Until he becomes obsessed with the seemingly innocent doctor Hazel Brewer and a chance encounter changes everything.

Hazel knows the giant scarred man won't hurt her even though she's in the business of saving lives and he'd rather take them. In fact, she's never felt safer or more alive than when she's with him. Even when a terrible biological weapon forces her into his arms for a night of hot passion she won't soon forget.

Their love could be the redemption he never thought he wanted, or something even more toxic: Mercury's poison.

Chapter One

John Thrace didn’t bother to block the bloodied knuckles that connected with his face. In fact, he laughed. Laughed like a madman as the punches kept crashing into him. He kept waiting for it to hurt, kept waiting to feel something.

Kept waiting for it to matter.

His opponent was some no-name thug from the street looking to make history. Looking to move up in his gang. Maybe even get another teardrop tattoo next to his eye.

He roared, this other man with his bloodied fists and bared teeth. Roared with a rage that was nothing but a drop in the endless ocean of John’s own. So he laughed again, even as the contact spun his head to the side and he spat the blood that dribbled down from his nose and over his lips.

“Hit. Me.” He demanded, punctuating each word. “Otherwise you’re just wasting my time.”

Another blow connected, but still, to his great rage, his horror, and his abject despair, he felt nothing. Nothing at all.

The small crowd that had gathered booed as they watched the giant, scarred man get his ass kicked without putting up the fight they were looking for. The fight they’d bet on. They’d want a piece of him too if he went down easy.

Maybe he’d feel that. Maybe finally, he’d be punished for his sins.

Serum 17 had taken more than his good looks. When it had spontaneously combusted and gone airborne, it tore through the left side of his face with a hundred blades, but it had damaged something deeper. He still hadn’t figured out if it was his pain and pleasure receptors, or the processing centers of his brain.

That seemed pretty inconsequential when he considered what it had done to his team. The whole left side of his body scarred like he’d been dipped in acid, but he still breathed. He hadn’t drowned in his own blood and screams like the rest of the team. He would have, if the project manager hadn’t suited up and dragged him to the decontamination unit. He could still see it so clearly—the cystic blisters blooming, the blood—so much fucking red.

John wouldn’t think about that now, he couldn’t. He had to think about this moment, about how he was going to get his fix. How he was going to make himself hurt on the outside as much as on the inside.

Sometimes he wondered if he could just cut deep enough, break enough, it would be like a steam vent and all the screams in his head would be silent and all the pain would erupt in a geyser. At least enough to breathe.

Not that he deserved it.

Another blow landed and he felt…nothing. Except the rage at the absence of physical pain.

The ref got between them and they were banished to their corners. The crowd was restless, angry. Money kept changing hands fast and furious. The Powers That Be must’ve been pissed.

His opponent watched him, a hunger in his eyes.

A towel was shoved into his hand and he turned to see the source as he wiped the blood from his face.

It was Sachi—Copper. 

“Quit playing with your food, Merc.”

In their world, he wasn’t genius Dr. Thrace. He wasn’t the fuck up who’d managed to poison his whole team. He was her chosen brother, he was Mercury. He had a purpose, and that purpose was what he was best at: death. Just like her. She was a highly trained operative who could be anyone or anything—and for him, the rare magical thing she’d managed to become was his family.

“You got somethin’ better to do?” She didn’t normally hunt him down in these places.

“Yeah. Your little Witch Hazel is out tonight all by herself.”

“Why do you call her that?”

Copper rolled her eyes. “Obviously she’s put some kind of spell on you. Since you stalk her.”

His eyes narrowed, and blood suddenly obscured his vision. He swiped it away. “If it’s stalking why are you helping?”

“Whatever. It’s different for us. I know that. But anyway, she’s out with her charity truck and it’s late. If something were to happen to her… I just don’t want to think about you in that equation. So, let’s wrap this up, okay?”

“Quit talking to the pussy and get back in the ring,” a member of the crowd jeered. “I got money to be made, motherfucker.”

Rather than get offended, Copper just sighed. “I suppose it won’t do any good to tell you I don’t need you to defend my honor.”

“Nope.” That guy didn’t know it, but he’d just signed his own death warrant.

“If I wanted him dead, I could kill him myself.” But she was obviously resigned.

He found himself grinning with a manic kind of glee. Finally, he felt something. He knew she could take care of herself, she could do anything. “But
I
want him dead. The fact he’s breathing air offends me. The world won’t miss him. Neither will the thirteen year old runaway who is testifying against him in court next month that he pimped her out.”

Sachi hissed. “By all means, then. In fact, what the hell is taking so long? Get this show on the road, Merc. Unless you want to give him to me?”

“It would serve him right if I did.”

He took one more pass with the towel over his face, his neck, and the biohazard tattoo on the back of his shaved head.

Warning: Poison. Not compatible with life.

Too bad they hadn’t paid attention.

He thought about the pretty doctor with her kind heart and bravery that bordered on foolishness. Yes, he’d wrap this up just as Copper suggested. He didn’t want her out in that part of Dallas by herself. These were his good deeds, his attrition.

He flexed and breathed, pulling the air in deep and silencing all the racket in his brain. This was when he was silent, when he was killing or feeling physical pain, the screaming stopped.

Mercury had known he was going to kill both of them when he’d entered the ring tonight. He just hadn’t known when. They were both on his radar and had been for a while.

The no-name thug? He was a wrangler for the pimp.

And tonight, a little girl whose innocence had been broken would sleep just a little bit safer.

“Yeah, maybe I’ll get me a piece of that red pussy when my boy here beats your brains in. Would you like that, white boy?”

Mercury didn’t speak. Didn’t form any conscious plan. Instead, he just surrendered to the darkness. He let it take him as if it owned him, and in that moment, it did.

He was its arm, its sword, its reckoning.

In one fluid motion, he pulled the pimp into the ring and as he struggled, Merc watched as the realization dawned on him that this wasn’t just a beating. This wasn’t just an underground match for cash, this fight was for his life.

And he was going to lose.

As an M.D. Merc had specialized knowledge of the human body, as an expert in bio-warfare and death, he had a specialized knowledge for pain. He could make this as slow or as fast as the situation demanded. As much as he’d like to make this man pay for his crimes as only someone in his specialty could, Hazel needed him.

Massive, scarred hands that had once been used for healing twisted his head hard and fast, breaking his neck with an audible snap.

The crowd being comprised of who and what it was, there was barely a ripple through the masses at his actions. They waited with baited breath to see who would win and which way the money would flow.

His opponent punched him, but there was a different kind of frenzy to the attack now. He, too, had realized that this was for keeps. There was more at stake here than the prize pot.

Only Merc didn’t laugh this time. He showed no visible reaction to the contact and when the man punched again, Mercury grabbed his fist, pulled him forward almost like a waltz. He spun, using his elbow to shatter the nasal bone and send the fragments up into his skull.

Ending the match, and his life.

Mercury left him where he fell and merged into the crowd, not even bothering to take his winnings. Hazel was more important.

Copper handed him his worn, leather trench and they disappeared into the darkness that sheltered them both, heading toward the familiar territory.

“I have a thing,” she said with a nod of her head when they approached the Help Van. “Unless you need me.”

“I’ve got it.” His face crumpled with might have been gratitude, irritation, or a little of both. “Thanks for this.”

Copper flashed him a grin. “Any time. Find me later and we’ll do some shots, yeah?” She didn’t bother to wait for his answer, she didn’t need to.

Copper was his heart or what was left of it. She was his best friend. One of the only people he wasn’t afraid he’d hurt. She was made of sterner stuff, his Copper.

But if Copper was his heart, this woman, this doctor… Hazel Brewer was what was left of his soul.

The Help Van, as they’d come to call it, had been started and funded by Lakos Enterprises. They donated tons to Baylor Med, and supported several such vans that sought out the homeless dispersing medical care and other emergency services.

John knew everything about the pretty doctor. He knew she was still paying off student loans living in a crappy neighborhood with a roommate. He knew that she did this for free—donating the nominal salary Lakos offered as compensation back to the program.

He knew that she read for an hour before she went to sleep.

He knew that she loved action movies and Talenti gelato.

He knew that he
shouldn’t
know these things.

But above all, he knew that Hazel Brewer was like a butterfly. He could watch her, enjoy her light and her beauty, he could keep her safe. As long as he kept his fucking hands off her wings.

If he touched her, she’d never fly again.

Maybe never breathe again. Never be sunshine, never bring hope.

No, even in the fevered parts of the night when he wished he knew what it was like to have her writhing beneath him, her pink lips under his, her pale, perfect skin contrasted against his own scarred fingers—when he touched himself thinking of these things, he didn’t want those fantasies to be real.

Because he knew from the gentle way she spoke, her passion for her work, and the way she helped everyone she met, that she was the kind of person who could absolutely fall for a bastard like him—ugly scars and all. She’d think he was some kind of noble beast, and she’d believe with all her heart she could save him.