The Extinction Series , Ellis, Tara [famous ebook reader .txt] 📗

Moving her hand involuntarily to the scar on her cheek, Peta’s voice dropped to a whisper as she stared out into the darkness and reflected on the deadly car accident that caused it. “I have a habit of thinking I always know what’s best. And it usually ends up with someone getting killed.”

After a long pause, Jason cleared his throat. “Maybe we can settle on agreeing that neither one of us are to blame? That we’re victims of circumstance, or whatever sort of psycho-babble would apply. I have a feeling we’re both familiar with the terminology.”

Chuckling, Peta found herself at emotional odds again. Relieved and comforted by his quick acceptance of their split perspectives, but thrown off by the ease with which he did it. “Sure,” she said, hoping it didn’t show. “I can go along with that. Except—”

Jason looked sideways at her when her voice trailed off. “Go on. You have a captive audience.”

Smirking, she shifted to properly face him, adjusting Tyler’s head at the same time. “I’m curious. I still don’t know how you came to be here with us on this ill-fated adventure and all. Somehow, I don’t think it’s the same reason as my God complex.”

“I think you’ve earned the right to whatever complex you choose to claim, considering where you were thirteen days ago.”

Peta squinted and made a tsking sound. “Flattery doesn’t work on me. And you didn’t answer my question. Things were crazy when we were getting the hell out of that lab, but I’m pretty sure you mentioned something about a daughter.”

His demeanor changing, Jason glanced furtively at her as his shoulders tensed. “I could tell you it’s because my dying friend gave me critical information from his death bed back at Harborview, in Seattle, that could help save the human population. And that I set off in search of someone to give it to, which led me to the CDC lab where we met.”

“You could,” Peta said, more intrigued than ever. She decided silence was the best offense. As it dragged out to the point of being awkward, she made sure her gaze never wavered.

He finally caved, and his shoulders slumped in submission as he forcefully let out a loud breath. “It would be partly true, but my goal from the moment I walked away from that hospital was to find my daughter.”

“At the Libi Nati Resort,” Peta guessed.

“Preserve,” Jason corrected. “It’s not a resort. Why do you keep saying that?”

Peta rubbed at her forehead as she thought it through. “The Libi Nati is a system of hot springs, so it’s possible we’re talking about two different places. Haven’t you been there if you’re going to find your daughter? You must be familiar with the place. At least, more than I am. All I know is what I found online when I still had access.”

Another pause, but Peta was getting used to it, so she just waited for Jason to continue when he was ready.

“I’ve never been there,” he eventually said. Huffing like he was being tortured for information, he gripped the steering wheel and looked pained. “The truth is that I’ve never even met her. She probably doesn’t know I exist. The last time I talked to her...dad, I was threatened with a protection order and offered cash to stay away all at the same time. I didn’t take the money, of course, but it wasn’t hard to convince me that she was better off without me in her life.”

Peta tried unsuccessfully not to react, and grimaced before she could stop herself. She couldn’t imagine how the situation would ever get to that point. “What about her mom? What was her say in all of it?”

The silence lasted for more than a minute that time, and Peta had almost given up hope on the conversation, when he started talking again.

“I met her while I was on deployment. It was a total cliché. You know how it goes. It was a whirlwind romance, and I believed I was in love. I couldn’t stop thinking about her after I got sent back out.” Jason rubbed a hand through his hair and scoffed at the memories. “I tried to talk to her when I got back, but she ghosted me. I discovered years later by total chance that she’d had a child, and the math worked out. When I tracked her down, I found out she’d died in childbirth. Her husband at the time had claimed the baby as his own, but admitted to me that I was the father.”

Jason rubbed at his jaw and kept staring straight ahead. “The way it all played out, it seemed the best thing to do at the time was to walk away. It had already been five years. The guy was some bigshot scientist in charge of studying the hot springs, and he obviously loved her. She had a good life. It wouldn’t be fair for me to go marching in and screw it all up. I’ve kept tabs on her to make sure she was okay, but…I’ve always wondered what it would have been like to be a father.”

Peta sat staring at him, slowly absorbing the information. It was more than he’d said to her in the past three days combined, and she wasn’t sure how to respond. When he turned his head and cocked his chin while raising an eyebrow in an “I warned you” gesture, she laughed. “Okay,” she said, raising both of her hands in surrender. “I concede. I asked for it.”

Growing more serious, she leaned forward across Tyler’s sleeping form and put a hand on his arm. “I think it’s a good reason, Jason. What’s her name?”

His smile was genuine, and the rough demeanor was replaced with a gentleness as Jason stared back at her. “Jessica. Her name is Jessica.”

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