Shadow Game (GhostWalkers, #1)(17)

She stepped to the bars, gripped them with her fingers. "Have you even bothered to wonder why we're so connected? It isn't natural."

Ryland studied her face for a long moment then covered her hands with his own. "It feels natural."

His voice had a way of whispering over her skin like the brush of fingers. Lily's stomach flipped, her heart doing a curious meltdown she couldn't control. "Well, no one feels this much physical attraction without some kind of enhancement."

"How do you know?"

She tilted her chin at him, her eyes beginning to smolder a warning. "Well? Have you? Do you feel this sort of connection with every woman who walks into a room with you?"

That look in her eyes, made him want to pull her right through the bars. The urge to kiss her was so strong he leaned toward her.

Lily shifted away from him in sudden alarm. "Don't!" She glanced again toward the camera. "You know this isn't real. Think with your brain, not other parts of your anatomy. We have to know everything that's going on, not just the pieces of the puzzle."

She was right. The attraction went far beyond anything he had ever experienced. It bordered on obsession. His body was hard and hurting and he knew better. It didn't seem to make much difference though. From the first moment she'd entered the room, he had been wrapped up in her. "What do you think it is?"

"I don't know but I'm going to find out. My father was acting strange that last day, do you remember? He asked me to come here. I was busy and said I had to make it another afternoon, but he insisted, practically ordered me to come." She lifted her fingers, signaling to let her go.

Their voices were pitched too low to be overheard, and both were careful to keep their faces turned away from the cameras so no one could read their lips, but body language could just as easily betray them. Ryland complied with her request very slowly.

Lily took one step back in an attempt to allow both of them to breathe. Skin-to-skin contact served to deepen the physical attraction, the chemistry between them arcing with electricity, sizzling so it seemed alive to her. "He didn't tell me anything about you or what they were doing. I walked into the room and saw you and…"

There was a small silence as they stared at one another. In a rare display of agitation she pushed her hand through her hair. Her hand was shaking and he instantly wanted, needed, to pull her into his arms and comfort her. "The earth moved," he finished quietly. "Son of a bitch. Lily, he was watching us together. That damned cold-blooded scientist was watching us like two insects under his microscope."

She shook her head in denial, but he could see she was computing. She couldn't have it both ways. Either her father had expected something to happen between them when she walked into the room, or he hadn't. Ryland closed his eyes momentarily against the glimpse of her raw pain. It was bone deep and overwhelming. What had possessed him to make such an accusation? She'd lost her father, she didn't need to learn what an all-out bastard the man was. He had crushed her with his careless comment.

"Lily." He said her name very softly, a whisper of a caress. An apology. He breathed it, so that it sounded sensual. So that it connected them intimately.

"Stop it!" she snapped in a low voice. "If this isn't real, if we're being manipulated in some way for an experiment, we need to know."

"Maybe it isn't that," Ryland suggested, wanting it to be real.

"I anchor you, that's all. That's probably all it is. We're different and I have some kind of emotional magnet in me and it enhances…" She trailed off, her mind obviously attempting to fit more pieces of the puzzle together for a logical explanation. "That's got to be it, Captain Miller…"

"Ryland," he interrupted. "Say my name."

She had to take a breath. He managed to turn the mere speaking of his name into something intimate. "Ryland," she agreed. How could she not? She felt as if she'd known him forever. As if they belonged. "We're attracted and somehow our special gifts enhance what we're feeling. That's got to be it. It's the way you smell."

He burst out laughing. The sound was so foreign to him he was as startled as she was. "You're trying to explain away our rather explosive chemistry by calling it enhanced pheromones? That's priceless, Lily." She could even make him laugh in the midst of everything. Lily Whitney was an extraordinary woman and quite unexpected.

"Well," she pointed out, "pheromones can be nasty little traps for the unwary."

He shook his head. "I think we're just attracted to each other, but we'll leave it there if it makes you feel better."

"Whatever the reason, Captain"—a brief smile lit up her eyes as she corrected herself—"Ryland, I think we have enough on our plates without that." She raised her voice to a normal level. "I've read all the reports my father generated for the colonel—I was given copies—but there's no data at all stating how my father accomplished what he did." She looked at him very steadily. You heard what he said to me. He believes you're a prisoner here. I can't find the laboratory he spoke of before they murdered him… She faltered for a moment, and he felt the wrench in the vicinity of his heart. I need the information in that room if I'm going to help you.

"You don't actually think you can find a way to reverse the process when your father couldn't do it?" You have to find it, Lily. Whatever is there is important to us. I don't know if my men can survive on the outside. And if Higgens has his way, some of us will be terminated. I have a feeling I'm number one on his list.