Cryostorm by Lynn Rush Page A

and I clicked the door shut, then faced Melanie. She glared at me with wide, blue eyes.
    I iced my hand down. “Okay, girl. Start talking. Or I’m going to learn real quick how this mean interrogator thing works.”
    “I have to admit, you had The Center fooled.” Melanie shook her head. “Or should I say, Josiah did.”
    “His name is Nate.”
    “ Josiah , really fooled them. They didn’t ever second-guess his death. God, I remember reading about him. How they created him. Made me want to kill him that much more.”
    “Kill? You work for The Center. They want to study us. Make more of us.” I sat on the table in front of her.
    “Sure. Whatever you want to believe. They’re scientists. They may want to make more of you freaks, but they want you under their control. Like Josiah was for all those years.” Melanie laughed. “He was their pride and joy. Brightest and best. But their only. For some reason they couldn’t replicate him. Always had a flaw.”
    “He’s not programmed. He broke out of there after he realized what you people do is wrong. Why can’t you see that? We just want to live. Be left alone.”
    “Whatever.”
    So, the nice girl-chat approach wasn’t working.
    “What do you want Lois for?” I asked Melanie. “She a rogue Agent?”
    “Please. Lois is a frumpy old Mom.”
    “Who has evaded you, and us for that matter, for months now. How’s that possible if she wasn’t an Agent?” I walked to my backpack. “What do you want her for if she’s just a frumpy old Mom?”
    Then again, I’d thought Zach’s mom was a normal mom. Turned out she’d been there in California when I was taken last summer. Maybe Georgia’s Lois was that, too?
    “Come on, you were so talkative a minute ago.” Damn, she was calling my bluff on the interrogator thing I’d said. One last try before I turned the cold on.
    I reached into my backpack and pulled out the book. “You looking for this?”
    Melanie’s eyes widened, then her lids rested half-mast over her eyes. Her head ticked to the left, then in the next breath, the skin around Melanie’s fingers turned silver. It shot up her arms, shredding through the long, thermal underwear top she was wearing as she instantly buffed into muscle-woman arms.
    Rope shredded as she yanked her hands free, ripped the cloth collar from her throat, and lunged. Her silver hands aimed for my neck. Since I wasn’t gifted with superspeed, I didn’t get out of the way in time.
    Cold fingers curled around my neck while Melanie’s other hand reached for the book. Thankfully, I had super strength, so she wasn’t able to pull it from my grasp. But, she wasn’t wimpy at all as the grip around my throat indicated.
    I iced down my free hand and planted it on her face. Looked like the steel only covered her arms.
    Oh, and her feet as evidenced by the shin she just kicked. Pain radiated up my leg. I swear bones cracked, and I felt my teeth vibrate.
    Melanie stared at me with blank eyes. Before she’d stared at me with such hatred and disgust and anger, but now, it was empty. Nothing—
    Wait, there was something. A faint red pulse in her left eye, the upper left part of it.
    I iced my face down and clanked it against her forehead. She stumbled back but I slammed my frigid fist into her temple.
    The grip around my neck loosened, but she batted me against the wall next to the door. The wind knocked out of me, and I slithered to the floor. I froze down, her fist clanked off my face, thankfully not getting through the ice, and she grunted.
    She wouldn’t relent, though. Fist after steel fist, she rammed against me. I thought sparks would fly soon. She swung for another hit, but I was able to grab her wrist and crank back. Groaning of cold steel stretching, then the ring of its snap reverberated off the walls.
    Still, she didn’t scream. Just a quiet grunt. Wide, worried eyes returned, but only for a flash, then the left one took on that red pulse and went blank again. Then she