Free Covert Craving by Jennifer James

nut-job who is going to come kidnap me because I went to some summer camp
when I was a kid? Ain’t gonna happen.”
    She flattened her hair behind her ears, a gesture
he’d begun to associate with nerves, and tucked her hands into her armpits.
“Yes, that’s what I’m saying. You have to get the hell out of here. Get out of
the city. As far away from me as possible.”
    “Chloe, I can’t leave like that. I have a job. A
life.” He stood and accepted the crumpled bundle of clothing she thrust into
his arms. “I’m a cop. I was Army Special Forces. I’m not exactly helpless.”
    If he hadn’t witnessed her ability to fade from
sight and didn’t have the little issue with his own nose, he’d have been on the
phone calling for an ambulance to take her down to County for a psych eval. He
wanted to learn more about how she healed so fast and disappeared in plain
sight, but the whole conspiracy thing struck him as too damn deep and crazy to
be real. This was real life, not a science fiction movie.
    But no matter how nuts it sounded, he knew she
believed it. Every word she said, she thought it was the truth. And part of him
believed it too. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have the drive to investigate. Plus,
when he admitted it to himself, he wasn’t normal either.
    “You have to go. Run. It’s no mistake that we met,
okay? And now…now…oh, God, no—”
    She bolted from the room and into the hall. He
followed her. Someone pounded on her door hard enough to rattle the chain lock.
He ignored the knocks. Chloe slammed the bathroom door behind her and the sound
of water running came through the thin panel.
    “Hey, are you okay in there?” He dropped his shirt
to the floor and stepped into his pants. Even with the water running, he heard
her vomit. “Chloe, let me in. Why are you so upset?”
    “Go away Greiff. Forget you ever met me. Run. Get
out of the city.”
    Crazy woman. No way he’d leave her, even if they
hadn’t had sex. He didn’t bail on terrified women.
    “I’ll get you a glass of water.”
    As he passed the door, the person outside
escalated from knocking to outright pounding. He changed directions and stalked
to the door. A quick glance through the peep hole revealed his partner Spetrino
on the other side of the door, flanked by a thick-necked bald guy. The
expensive cut of his dark suit jacket would hide the lines of his firearm from
the average citizen.
    He stepped back, zippered, and buttoned his pants.
The chief had taken his service weapon at the station as part of his mandated
leave after shutting down the attempted robbery earlier in the day. Crap.
Spetrino didn’t look totally comfortable next to the guy. He’d never gotten
good at reading emotions by scent; now he wished he’d spent more time using his
nose and less time trying to dull the damn thing.
    The crisp, evergreen smell that clung to his
partner was easy to catalogue and ignore. Sour sweat clung to Spetrino’s skin
below his base scents, but Greiff had no way to tell if the sweat was fresh.
The suit with him didn’t smell like anything.
    He backed away and stared at the door knob. Impossible.
Everyone smelled. The oils on skin, perfumes and colognes, deodorants, even the
contact they came into with other people mixed together into a scent.
    “Greiff, it’s me Spetrino. I need you to open the
door, man.”
    No viable way out of the apartment without super
powers. A nose on steroids didn’t count when it came to needing a way through
walls with no one knowing. And there was the Chloe situation. She hadn’t come
out of the bathroom, and if even a tiny bit of the conspiracy stuff she’d told
him was true—and his instinct told him it was—no way he’d leave her here with
some over-muscled suit.
    Fuck. He opened the door, but stood in the
threshold to make it clear that his partner and the guy with him weren’t
welcome inside. Chloe didn’t need to deal with this shit. “Hey man. You lookin’
for another old broad to