Forged: An Altered Series Prequel Read Online Free Page B

with Natalia every day. Occasionally, I’d get the afternoon off, but that was only to go to the lab to have more blood work done, more physical exams. I had a few mental evaluations too, but no one told me whether or not I passed.
    I still hadn’t had the chance to escape into town to find a phone to call Anna. Her absence in my life was starting to get to me. Some mornings, I’d wake up, and the first thing I did was hurry to my bedroom door, planning to go see Anna, or make her something for breakfast. And then I’d remember. She wasn’t here. She was a hundred miles away in that crappy house, with our crappy parents, alone.
    I needed to talk to her soon.
    I saw Sam twice more the next week but only briefly. Once in the lounge, just as I finished my breakfast, and again in the lab. Sometimes, I’d knock on his door to see if he wanted to watch TV or work out together, but he never answered, and the door was always locked.
    I started to wonder if he was a ghost, if maybe his room was always empty. I began treating it like a game, like a child checking his father’s desk drawer to see if it was unlocked, to see what he hid inside.
    Before breakfast, I knocked. After dinner, I knocked. I did this for a few days until he finally answered.
    At first, I was so shocked to actually see him inside, to have the door actually open, that I just stood there staring at my raised knocking first as if I were dreaming. Or hallucinating.
    “Hi,” I said, and let my arm drop. “You answered.”
    He smirked. “Well, you wouldn’t stop knocking. I got tired of hearing it.”
    “Sorry. It’s just…”
    I’m lonely.
    I didn’t say it out loud, but I wanted to. I rarely talked to anyone other than Connor and Natalia. I still hadn’t seen that goddamn Fox since the day he brought me here. He was always out or gone or unavailable.
    It was painful for me to admit to anyone that I needed them, but I figured if anyone could relate to the loneliness that came with living here, it was Sam.
    “I’m going crazy here,” I said, and looked at the floor, then back up again. “Come eat breakfast with me?”
    He thought for a second and then nodded. “Lead the way.”
    Breakfast was cheesy eggs, bacon, and oranges. Sam told me about his first days in the building. He told me about his training sessions with Natalia and how she kicked his ass a lot. We laughed about the way she shook her head when we screwed up and made this tsk-tsk sound, as if she couldn’t bear to waste words on our incompetence.
    After that day, Sam and I had breakfast every morning. He told me a lot about his mom and his dad. About where he grew up. He told me about his dream of owning a ranch in Montana someday.
    But the morning ritual lasted only a week. The following Monday, Sam wasn’t there. And his absence in my routine had an effect through the rest of the day. I got through my training with Natalia by some miracle or act of God, but Connor noticed right away that something was wrong.
    “You seem off today,” he said as he walked with me after the training session. He’d been sitting in on them a lot, and I always worked harder when he was present. Today, I could only muster the bare minimum.
    “I’m restless,” I answered. It wasn’t exactly the truth but close enough. “I’m stuck in this building with no one to talk to, nowhere to go. I’m starting to feel like a caged animal. And…” I trailed off.
    I miss my sister , I thought.
    When I agreed to come here, the Fox hadn’t said anything about cutting off communication with Anna. I’d never gone a day without her before now.
    When we reached the hallway of my floor, Connor pulled me to a stop outside my room. I looked down at his hand, his fingers gently wrapped around my wrist, thumb touching index finger. He had nice hands. His fingers weren’t too thin or knobby. The veins running through his knuckles were just present enough to be sexy in a way that was decidedly male.
    He stepped closer