Free Wired (Skinned, Book 3) by Robin Wasserman

photographs. I realized this was a Riley he hadn't seen in almost two years, and wondered if, finally, something had managed to throw Jude off balance. But he stepped forward with a cool half smile. "Didn't think I'd ever see that face again."
    "Knew I'd see yours," Riley said, and grabbed Jude, pulling him into a tight embrace. Not one of those guy half hugs, with a loose grip and a slap on the back. This was the real thing, the two of them clinging to each other. Jude's hands were balled into fists. His eyes stayed on me.
    He let go first.
    81
    "Welcome." Jude spread his arms as if inviting us into his home.
    I waited for Riley to ask all the questions I was sure he'd been saving up, about where Jude had been, what he wanted, what he needed, what had happened, what would come next ... but that wasn't Riley's style.
    "You keeping it together?" he asked.
    "Always."
    And, apparently, with that he was satisfied. My turn.
    "What are we doing here, Jude?" I asked.
    He laughed. "Still asking the wrong questions, I see. Good to know some things haven't changed."
    "So this is it? The top-secret home base? Where are you hiding the groupies?"
    "No groupies," Jude said. "Not this time. This time we play it safe. This city has been uninhabitable for decades. They didn't just bomb the place; they infested it with radiation. Viral rad, the gift that keeps on giving. No org's coming within fifty miles, not without protective gear and a significant risk of fatal exposure. It's all ours."
    "Ours, as in you're asking us to move in?" I said. " Here? Generous as always, Jude. But there's no way in hell."
    "And you're the boss, right?"
    If he'd been hoping to bruise Riley's masculinity, he was disappointed. Riley just looped an arm around me and grinned. "What else is new?"
    82
    So Jude took a different tack. "We don't have to talk about the future now. There's still plenty of ground to cover in the past."
    This was it, then. Jude was going to blast us for betraying him. He'd lured us to this heap of ruins so he could toss us into some abandoned bomb shelter, lock us up, throw away the key, move on with what passed for his life. And Riley and I, never aging, never dying, would spend the rest of eternity locked up together--how many days and years of apologizing would it take for him to forgive me, out of sheer boredom if nothing else?
    But it was Jude who apologized, to Riley. "I didn't expect you to get caught in the explosion."
    Riley shook his head. "Not your fault. I'm the one who wired most of the explosives. My fault I did it wrong."
    I watched Jude's face carefully, but of course he was no helpless org, hostage to unconscious emotional responses. No eyebrow lifting, no eyes widening, no dropped jaw. Whatever emotion he did reveal would be intentional, theatrics. For now he stayed blank. "Wrong?" he echoed.
    "I'm just glad no one got hurt," Riley said.
    "You got hurt," Jude said.
    "I mean orgs."
    Now Jude did lift an eyebrow. "Wasn't that the point?"
    Riley looked uncomfortable. "You wouldn't have done it."
    Jude nodded, slowly. "Because you would have stopped me. That was the plan, right?"
    83
    "There was no plan," I said quickly.
    "I would have stopped you," Riley admitted.
    "Lucky that it didn't come to that," Jude said, watching me. "That would be awkward, wouldn't it. If you'd set the secops on me. You'd probably be standing here wondering exactly how much I hated you. Whether I'd spent the last six months plotting my revenge, or some such melodramatic scenario."
    Riley gripped Jude's arm. "You know I always have your back. Like you've got mine."
    "Always," Jude said, and disengaged himself, gently but firmly. "Must be strange, not remembering."
    "Yeah."
    It was something else I'd never asked him. I'd waited for him to bring it up in his own time; he hadn't.
    "Feels like another person, you know?" Riley lifted a hand in front of his face, turned it slowly like he was searching for cracks in the synthetic flesh. "Guess it kind of