Page 66 of Unnatural (Men and Monsters #2)

Doctor Jeffrey Heathrow woke slowly, groggily.

His eyes came open, and he blinked up at trees.

The bare gray branches stretched toward him, and he had the strange thought that they looked like skeletal hands…

reaching. His head pounded and his body ached.

He groaned in pain as he attempted to sit up but fell back onto the prickly ground.

Where am I? He attempted to orient himself, to remember how he’d gotten here in the cold woods.

Sam.

Sam’s face appeared in his memory, teeth bared, eyes wild.

He’d destroyed his study. He’d thought he was going to kill him.

But then something had come into Sam’s eyes, something the doctor could not discern.

He’d appeared stunned and then…victorious.

He’d backed away, turned, and left him there.

Headed to Autumn Clancy no doubt. Good. He’d given the order that both of them be taken out.

It would only make things more expedient if they were together.

Regardless, the men sent to kill them would not fail. He could count on them.

With effort, the doctor pulled himself to a sitting position, bringing his hand to his throbbing head.

He’d run upstairs, packed a bag. He’d thought it safer to head to his yacht, the one the program had purchased in a different name, until word came in that Sam and Autumn Clancy were dead. He’d headed for his car when…

He’d seen Morana in the reflection of his shiny Mercedes. He’d started to turn…

The doctor brought his hand to his scalp, feeling the large lump under his sparse hair. She’d hit him over the head.

The wind picked up, whipping sharply and causing him to shiver. He looked around, fear enveloping him now. It was her who had rendered him unconscious and somehow delivered him here. How long had he been unconscious? What the hell was going on?

He stood slowly, bracing himself against the trunk of a tree.

The sky was dim. How long had he been out?

He felt drugged. The doctor turned his arm over and then pushed his sweater up and peered down at the bruised needle prick.

Yes, he’d been knocked over the head and then drugged. Anger mixed with fear.

Morana and whoever else had assisted her would pay a hefty price.

They’d forgotten themselves. The doctor had an army of soldiers at his command. It didn’t matter that two or three had gone rogue. There were plenty more, and they were loyal. Despite the dizziness, the reminder of his superiority boosted his strength.

He whipped his head toward the sound of something moving toward him through the woods. Something large. And it wasn’t attempting to hide its approach.

“Hello?” he said, and though he attempted a commanding tone, his voice sounded frail.

No one answered. But now there was movement to his right and his left as well.

The doctor turned and stumbled forward, falling and picking himself up off the ground. “Name yourself!” he demanded.

A growl to his left. Low laughter to his right.

Fear rose higher, and he turned once again, running this time, though slowly. Too slowly. His limbs were weighted, head foggy with whatever had been injected into him.

He tripped and then pulled himself to his feet. He ran again, weaving through the forest he’d been left in alone.

Exhaustion quickly overcame him as he huffed and stumbled and tried to pull his body forward, but it was as if he were running through molasses. He let out an enraged grunt. Who had dared do this to him?

The things behind him were crashing through the woods now, though he had the impression they were merely walking, footsteps heavy but unhurried as he struggled and sweated.

He tripped again, yelping, just as the first of them appeared through the trees, the others mere seconds behind. His monsters. His creations. They surrounded him.

“Stop now!” he ordered.

They continued forward as though they didn’t recognize him at all.

“I demand you stop now. Do you know who I am?” he screeched.

There were eight of them, no, ten. All the ones who had survived the surgeries and were still alive, except Sam and Morana.

He knew who they were, each one of them.

He’d named them after all—after monsters and fiends.

He’d opened them up with scalpels and saws.

He’d administered pharmaceuticals, both experimental and not.

He’d charted and observed and compared and calculated data about their bodies and their minds.

He controlled them. So why weren’t they listening?

He looked from one face to the next, expressions blank.

They had no emotions. He’d made sure they did not. All machine, no humanity left.

Again, they advanced, a few of them stretching their hands as they drew nearer. He shook with terror. Who knew better than he did what they were capable of?

“It was for the greater good,” he screamed. “You should be grateful to me. I made you! Stop now! Cease!”

A menacing growl. A grunt. He saw the savagery in their eyes. They meant to tear him apart with their bare hands.

“Please!” he begged. He put his palms together in the praying position, tears running down his face. But he had not taught these monsters about prayers or pleas.

A hand wrapped around his throat, squeezing, lifting him off the ground as though he weighed no more than a feather. He shuddered, a gargled cry coming from his throat as the rest of them descended.

“Make it quick,” he begged.

But they didn’t make it quick. They’d been ordered to drag it out for hours, and they were eager to oblige.

And when it was over, when their bloodlust had been satiated and the doctor was nothing but a pile of ruined flesh and broken bones, they too followed the final command they’d been given.