26
Long after midnight, returning from the medical center, Eduard eased Teresa’s half-limp body out of the Bureau Chief’s vehicle. He led her one slow step at a time along the pea-gravel path to the rear of the mansion and through his own private door. She sank into his bed like a snowflake melting in warm water. Teresa lay barely awake, retreating inside herself.
Hot with anger, Eduard looked at her bruised and childlike face. Tenderly straightening the sheets, he leaned down to whisper in her ear. “Just rest here and don’t worry about anything. You need some peace.” He touched her temples. “Hopscotch with me, and I’ll take the pain for a while.”
Her eyes flickered open, large and wide. She looked so lost. “No, Eduard. You’ve already rescued me once tonight.”
He gave her a brotherly frown. “Hey, remember what I used to do for a living.” A few bruises and healing bones couldn’t compare with the unending agony of diseased bodies and severe surgeries. “Besides, you don’t have the strength left to argue with me.”
When he stared deeply into her eyes, touching her head, he felt his consciousness leap across the narrow gulf as they exchanged bodies. Then he blinked to reset his frame of reference.
Eduard lay in the bed, looking up at his own face, noticing the lines of concern written there now that Teresa could see her ugly injuries from the outside. A whirlpool of pain spun through her body, but he pushed it aside. Through the distant fuzziness of drugs, he sensed each one of her broken ribs, wrist, and collarbone, as well as the cuts and contusions.
It wasn’t so bad. He could tolerate it. No problem.
Teresa kissed him on an abraded cheek, and her eyes—Eduard’s eyes—filled with tears. She slumped into the sofa. Finally, after hours of keeping herself strong, denying the seriousness of what she’d been through, Teresa began to sob, great wracking convulsions that came out in Eduard’s deep voice.
Lying in bed, he wanted to get up, to hold her and comfort her, but in this injured body he was too weak. Teresa wanted to be alone, too. He heard her broken-hearted weeping until she finally fell asleep from sheer mental exhaustion, sprawled across the cushions.
“Eduard, wake up.”
He had drifted off near dawn and managed only an hour of sleep in her injured body. Now Teresa stood above him over the bed. He could see his own eyes red-rimmed from crying, his cheeks puffy.
“You have to get up,” she said. “Swap back with me, so you can do your job.”
Eduard tried to sit, felt the wash of pain. Time for more medication. He dosed himself again, waited for the edge of pain to dull all over his body. “Teresa, I don’t want to let you come back into this body. It’s too—”
“No choice.” Her voice was firm. He could see that she had already grown much stronger since last night. “You’ve helped me so much, but I can’t let you get in trouble with your boss. You’ve got too much at stake, don’t you think?”
Eduard knew she was right. He glanced at the clock, saw that he still had a little time. “All right, but you need to promise me you’ll rest—heal yourself.”
“Rest sounds like the best thing in the world right now, no matter which body I’m in.” They touched, and swapped, and Eduard watched her face fall. She must have forgotten how much her injuries hurt.
Eduard’s limbs were stiff from sleeping in an awkward position on the couch. He rubbed his burning eyes. Maybe a hot shower would help. “I’ve got to get cleaned up.” As it was, Ob would scold him for bringing a body that wasn’t strong and refreshed.
As Teresa sprawled on the bed, still getting used to the throbbing lethargy from the potent painkillers he had just taken, Eduard hurried to put together a breakfast. He fed her fruit slices in bed, and she savored each bite.
“I’ll be back in a few hours, depending on what Mr. Ob needs me to do, then I can take another shift in your body. We’ll get through this, together.” He smiled at her. “I’m looking forward to nursing you back to health. I’ve already tried to contact Garth, but he’s not coming back from Hawaii for another two days.”
The painkillers had already begun to work. Teresa looked at him with heavy eyes. “Oh, thank you, Eduard.”
“Hey, it’s what friends are supposed to do for each other.” He gave her his winning smile. “You’re just lucky you sent me that COM message when you did. Otherwise I might have been too late.”
Groggy, Teresa raised her eyebrows. “Never got a chance. No COM terminals inside the togetherments.” Her voice was raspy, thick with impending sleep.
Perplexed, Eduard went off to find Mordecai Ob and begin another workday.
While jogging, Eduard had time to let his mind wander. His anger built into a bonfire as he thought about Rhys and Robertha Chambers. He had experienced Teresa’s physical pain, though he could never feel the mental anguish she was still enduring.
As he ran along in Ob’s physically fit body, he pushed himself harder, jogged faster. Cool morning air cut into his lungs, and perspiration soaked his exercise suit. As he thought more and more about the redhead striking Teresa, kicking her, throwing a hammer at her, he ran twice his usual distance. Ob would probably complain about sore muscles that evening, but Eduard didn’t care. Right now he’d rather be sitting beside Teresa, tending her, trying to make everything better.
But he didn’t know how he could fix the damage that had been done.
As he finished his second circuit of the grounds, at the limits of his stamina, he came across the massive gardener. The Samoan wrestled with a new ornamental tree, trying to heave it upright so he could lash on a support. His arm muscles bulged, but he managed to prop the strut before he exhausted himself. Tanu straightened the bindings and touched some of the bent branches, fixing every detail like a fussy mother tugging the collar of her son’s shirt.
Panting, Eduard stopped short, wiping sweat from Ob’s forehead. Tanu gave a quick wave before turning back to the tree. Making up his mind, Eduard caught his breath and strode over to the gardener. “Tanu, I need to ask you something.”
The Samoan turned to him, his expression open and uncertain. “I have work to do.”
Unable to think of a better alternative, Eduard said, “I want to swap into your body. Just for a little while. I . . . I have a job to do.”
Tanu shook his big, black-maned head. “Lots of people offer for my body, but I don’t like to hopscotch.”
Eduard realized that the Samoan’s physique would have been desirable to many people. He sat on one of the stone benches and folded his hands in his lap. “Tanu, I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t have to. This is important—at least let me tell you about it.”
The Samoan stood like a statue next to his tree as Eduard explained Teresa’s desperate situation, what had happened to her. His expression became grave and deeply saddened. “I’ll think about it.”
Eduard got up again, feeling the stiffness of overexerted muscles. Sweat had dried on his arms and the back of his neck. “Let me finish my exercises. I’ve got to do a few laps in the pool. I’ll shower and change, and then I’ll come back.”
As Eduard jogged off, Tanu trudged toward the rear of the main house, looking through the windows of Eduard’s private rooms. Inside, he saw Teresa’s battered form asleep on the bed. With his large, dark eyes, he stared at her for a long time.
Later, wearing the Samoan body, Eduard felt as if his mind were in the driver’s seat of a massive piece of construction machinery. With rolling steps, plowing through the air as he moved, he returned to the togetherments. He shoved through the building doors without knocking.
The Sharetaker recruits kept busy with menial tasks. One woman stroked a spraybrush over a dried blood smear where Teresa had held herself upright the night before.
Inside the open-structured quarters, Eduard stalked past curious cult members without saying a word. The Sharetakers stared at him, intrigued. They were used to an endlessly changing succession of bodies and identities, but a form as impressive as the Samoan’s was unforgettable.
One lantern-jawed man stepped in front of him. “Welcome! I can answer questions, if you’d like. Have you come to join our group?”
Eduard glowered at him, remembering this man as one of the people who had hurled insults at Teresa. “I want to see Rhys.”
The lantern-jawed man flicked a glance over his shoulder through skeletal arches and halls. “I . . . I think he’s busy.”
“No problem. I’ll find him myself.”
Inside an area strewn with rugs and pillows, he found Rhys busily having sex with another Sharetaker. Eduard clenched his fists at his sides. Rhys had wasted no time in choosing his next victim.
Grunting, sweating, the two thrashed about, oblivious to anyone who might have been watching. Sharetakers were accustomed to being out in the open. The woman rode on top, her head flung back, blond hair tickling her shoulder blades, her mouth open in ecstasy.
“Which one of you is Rhys?” Eduard demanded, satisfied to see them twitch with surprise.
The woman slid off the redheaded man. Her eyes were hard and narrow. Without answering, she reached down to look at her man’s face, touching him. After they swapped, the redheaded man sat up, annoyed at the interruption. “I’m Rhys. What the hell do you want?”
“I’m a friend of Teresa’s.” Eduard balled both fists. Each one looked the size of the abusive man’s head. “Maybe you remember her?”
Rhys shoved the woman away as he scrambled to his feet. Naked, she fled toward the other Sharetakers. “So? What the hell do you want?”
In Tanu’s body, Eduard outweighed Rhys by about two hundred pounds and stood a foot taller. “What I want is to beat the shit out of you . . . just like you did to Teresa.”
Rhys swallowed and backed against an exterior wall. “You’re outnumbered here. The Sharetakers are a group. We stick together.” He put up his fists in a pathetic attempt to defend himself.
“Just like you all stood by Teresa?”
Two of the other Sharetakers clenched their fists and took a step forward, but Eduard whirled on them. He knew it had been foolhardy to come here alone, even in Tanu’s massive body. Normally he would have been more calculating . . . but this was for a friend. For Teresa. With one look at the fury on his face, the would-be defenders hesitated, and all their resistance scattered.
The redheaded man, still naked and sweaty from sex, made a break for it, trying to slip past his attacker. Eduard stuck out one of his muscular arms like a boat oar that tumbled Rhys backward. He then picked the man up by the throat and slammed him against the wall.
Rhys flailed, kicking out with his bare feet. Eduard punched him in the stomach with more force than he knew he possessed. Rhys coughed an explosive breath, then dropped to the floor. He rolled over, got to his knees, and vomited.
“Personally, I’ve never had any desire to pick on people smaller than myself,” Eduard said in a low voice, “but you’ve made me reconsider.”
Rhys tried to crawl away, scuttling on his hands and knees. Eduard kicked him square on the buttocks, which made Rhys skid across the floor on his face and chest.
“Stop! Help me!” Several Sharetakers hurried forward, looking at their leader, but the large angry Samoan held them at bay.
“They won’t help you any more than they helped Teresa.” Eduard watched as they scuttled off like rodents. “They’re no good for anything but watching.” He hauled Rhys back to his feet, and the leader’s legs turned to water.
“What do you want?” His eyes were wide and desperate. “I’ll give you—”
“You can’t give Teresa her innocence back.” Eduard hauled off and punched him in the face. “Rhys.” Blood sprayed from the leader’s smashed nose and split lip. Not fully aware of his new strength, Eduard held up the redhead and struck again, feeling teeth break and bone crack.
He shook his hand, then punched a third time. “Rhys. I want to keep saying your name out loud so that I’ll always connect that name with the sound of my fist slamming into your body.” Then Eduard hit him with the other weapon he had. “Or should I say Robertha?”
Wailing, spitting blood and broken teeth, the redhead collapsed to the floor, shocked to hear the old name. “Did you get tired of sabotage and terrorism? The Beetles know where you are.” Eduard let go of the redhead’s body as if he had soiled his hands.
“Why did you pick Teresa? Did she give too much? Did you choose the most inoffensive person in your enclave? She is so caring and loving and . . . unsuspecting. A ripe target for someone like you.” He grabbed Rhys’s red hair, pulling his head up. “Or do you just like picking on women?”
“You don’t understand anything about women.” Rhys/Robertha touched blood on his lips, looked at his finger as if the color frightened him. His words were slurred through a battered mouth. “Not everyone gets the sheltered, naïve life your precious Teresa had.”
Eduard couldn’t believe the man wanted to have this conversation, now, in his condition. “Teresa has more love to give than you’ll see in your entire life.”
He couldn’t even articulate how vile he found this person, but he glowered, knowing the Samoan’s wide face and flared nostrils looked intimidating. He took another massive step forward and watched as the leader wet himself, pulling up knees and trying to shrink into a ball of garbage. Eduard let him crawl toward the main room, watching how he moved as if on a carpet of broken glass, how he left a pattern of blood and urine like a slug’s trail on the floor. He followed, one step behind him.
Finding reserves of energy somewhere, using adrenaline to push back the pain of his injuries, Rhys snatched a small sledgehammer near the wall and swung the wicked club toward Eduard’s knees.
He saw the blow coming and jumped out of the way. Tanu’s body was large and lumbering, but his muscles were strong, and he skipped just out of the arc of the swing.
The momentum of Rhys’s unconnected blow made the redheaded man fall sideways. Moving quickly, Eduard stomped hard on the hand that had grasped the hammer. With Tanu’s more than four hundred pounds, his heel shattered all the bones in Rhys’s hand and wrist.
The redhead screamed.
Eduard yanked the heavy hammer from the man’s grip. Rhys’s wrist now had the flexibility of a licorice whip.
Seeing a bloodred haze, Eduard raised the hammer. He thought of how Rhys had broken Teresa’s collarbone with a similar tool, how he had kicked her, cracked her ribs, snapped her wrist. His muscles tensed.
Rhys looked up at him with the wide eyes of a sheep in a slaughterhouse. One blow to the head with the pointed end of the sledge—
“You’re not worth the effort. Not in the least.” Instead, Eduard threw the heavy tool across the room, where it left a gouge in the fresh wallboard. He had already won his victory. The great cult leader had been laid bare before his followers, naked in his impotence—and none of the other Sharetakers had bothered to help him. How could the group ever be the same? “If your life was so bad, Robertha, you should have learned to be more compassionate.” Eduard turned his back. “Not how to be a better bully.”
With bloody fists and the crunch of bone still ringing in his ears, he went back to Teresa, satisfied at last.