“Obviously, and you never do,” complained Elliot. “Come on, the guy’s your nemesis, don’t you want to catch him?”
“Not at the moment, no.” Anthony kissed Elliot again.
“Except your love interests always die when you don’t catch him, and I don’t particularly want to die,” Elliot pointed out.
Anthony looked at him critically. “I thought you weren’t my love interest.”
“Oh, well,” said Elliot, suddenly flustered. “You said I wasn’t important.”
“No, I told Cicero you weren’t important. So he wouldn’t kill you.”
“I know, but you went on for ten minutes about it.”
“Exaggeration.”
“You said I was an analyst.”
“You are an analyst.”
“You never wanted me on this mission.” Elliot didn’t meet Anthony’s eyes. Anthony took him by the chin and corrected his view. He wasn’t the least bit surprised at the level of force necessary to get Elliot to meet his gaze again.
“If it hadn’t been for you, we’d be flying to Bulgaria right now, instead of neutralizing the threat Cicero didn’t even know he had.”
Elliot pressed his lips together, clearly very deep in thought.
Analyzing the facts at hand, no doubt, thought Anthony. It was his area of expertise, after all. Anything Anthony said would surely tip the balance.
“The mission would have gone very differently if you were not,” said Anthony, thinking of every detail he would have missed. The way Elliot had manipulated the video to see what Anthony had missed. The way he’d convinced Anthony that hacking into the facility’s systems was worth the trouble, thereby discovering a wealth of information about schedules and plans.
Then there was Daria, Anthony remembered. Her connection to O’Leary would have died on the plane, more than likely, instead of being safe in an Algerian hospital somewhere.
All good things, all things which Elliot could take pride in having done. Somehow, he didn’t look like he was proud, though. His face was pinched, as if Anthony had said something wrong.
“Oof,” grunted someone from the other end of the room.
Anthony sighed and looked over his shoulder at the scientist crawling out from under the pile of guards. “Do you mind? We’re having a moment.”
“No, we’re not,” said Elliot quickly, pushing Anthony off him. He was gentle about it, but Anthony still frowned as if being rebuked. “Don’t move. We’re arresting you in the name of the DVM.”
The scientist sighed heavily. “Yeah. I know. I don’t plan to run.”
Anthony frowned. “Why not?”
She lifted her hand out of her coat pocket, and Anthony immediately winced. Glass shards from the blue vial she’d grabbed were embedded in her hand, which was now oozing blood that mixed with the blue goop into a purply, foaming substance.
“Oh, that is not good,” said Elliot, going still. “Are you—?”
“Probably?” She shrugged. “Honestly, I hadn’t run human trials yet. But it was 98% effective on mice. Perfect clones, very successful.”
“What happened to the other two percent?”
The scientist pressed her lips together and refused to answer.
“You’re better off with us,” Elliot told her, sounding very sorry about it. “The DVM can take care of you. Whether or not you’re the two percent.”
“Yeah,” said the scientist, but she sounded glum about it.
“I’m Elliot,” said Elliot. “And that’s Anthony.”
“Zayna,” said the scientist.
Zayna refused Anthony’s help to stand up—which Anthony had to admit was probably wise. She didn’t seem inclined to run, either. Facing the wrath of the DVM was probably preferable to dealing with the reaction to the serum by herself.
“They’re not dead, are they?” asked Elliot nervously, looking at the piles of henchmen surrounding them.
“Probably not, since they’re breathing,” said Anthony.
“They’ll be fine,” said Zayna. “Everything needed to be given intravenously to take effect. They might have headaches though. Maybe a strong hankering for tacos at the worst.”
The base was in shambles. It took almost half an hour to pick their way across the rubble and out to open air, where Anthony realized immediately that taking a plane anywhere would not be an option. The airfield was a complete wreck, and the hangar had fallen in on itself. The only vehicle capable of motion was the golf cart parked right next to the door—but just as Anthony was about to hop on and start the motor, a guard appeared out of nowhere, shoved him out of the way, and took off without a backwards glance, bouncing past the ripped-apart chain-link fence, and straight over the dunes into the desert.
“Did that guy just steal your ride?” wondered Elliot.
“Yeah,” said Anthony, shocked. “He didn’t even look at me.”
Zayna looked at him, though. “Does that happen a lot?”
“Never,” said Anthony.
“Well,” said Elliot, somewhat smug. “Now it’s once.”
Anthony glared, wondering why it felt like Elliot was angry with him. He stood up, brushed himself off as if guards shoved him into the dust every day, and started walking toward the fence.
“Come on,” he called over his shoulder. “We should be on our way before the temperature rises.”
“Oh, no,” said Zayna, alarmed. “I’m not walking through the desert.”
“You’re right. You’re not,” Anthony replied. “Lucky for you, I know where there’s a couple ATVs.”
Elliot’s groan made Anthony’s mouth twist in a grin, even as it made his stomach curl pleasantly. Something to save for later, he decided, as Elliot jogged up to walk next to him.
“Aren’t we supposed to be rescued by a helicopter team right about now?” asked Elliot.
“That only happened once.”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you planned to put me back on an ATV,” scowled Elliot as they stepped through the hole still in the fence.
“Not really.”
“Because you thought I was going to die before we got this far?”
Anthony didn’t answer, he just started walking up the dune. “We should probably talk.”
“Yeah,” spoke up Zayna from behind them. “I’d like to talk about how we’re trekking through the desert and none of us have any water.”
“Do you mind?” Anthony told her. “We’re having a serious conversation here.”
“Uh, no,” said Elliot. “We’re not having a conversation, we’re climbing a dune. With sand. I have no intention of even opening my mouth.”
“Sand is bad for thirst,” agreed Zayna.
“Let me rephrase,” said Anthony. “I need to talk. To Elliot. Specifically.”
“Wow, I’m a third wheel. Again. Great,” sighed Zayna. “Whatever. If I get to the ATVs before you guys, I’m ditching and running to Bali.”
Elliot frowned. “She’s joking, right? Tell me she’s joking.”