Remembering You

Playing with fire

He inhaled sharply and took a step back, finally seeming to look at me without his normal hatred. "You need to sleep. So does she. Let me get her to bed, and I promise you can come see her again," he assured me gently.

I didn't want to trust him. There was nothing trustworthy about him. He was a snake, if nothing else, and deserved to rot in hell for all I cared. But he was also my only way to see her. I nodded sadly, reluctantly agreeing to his terms.

Carefully, he removed her from my arms, this time forcing me to reluctantly turn her over to him. He put her down wherever she was sleeping and came back for me. "You promised you would sleep also," he said in the same calm and patient way he had given me my ultimatum.

I was shaking from exhaustion or maybe adrenalin, but almost as soon as I put weight on my legs, they gave out on me, collapsing under my not-overwhelming weight weakly. My knees never hit the floor because I was instantly swung up in his arms, cradled safely despite my exhausted protests.

"I can walk, I'm fine!" I whined even though I didn't know if that was true. He ignored me and carried me easily through the confusing maze of halls. I sighed and leaned my head against his shoulder, exhausted from the long and tiring day. He was wearing a suit, obviously from his meeting, and looked nothing like a bookworm and everything like a dashing gentleman.

His cologne was just enough for me to smell as I drifted off in his arms. It was a light scent of cedar and spices that I couldn't quite place, yet it enticed me and pulled me deeper against him in an almost magnetic way. The last thought I had before falling asleep was that I could understand why I fell in love with him based on that scent alone.

James's POV :

I tried to focus in the meeting, desperately needing to absorb the information they were throwing at me. In most meetings, I could pretend that I was listening, and I didn't really need to since the level at which they spoke was so far below my comprehension I didn't really need their input. I was in the boardroom with the high-ranking officials, though, and the C.I.A. Director on Zoom. I had to focus on the virus. It was a matter of life or death for millions of people.

The virus was a mutation of the typical AIDS virus but on steroids. It was unlike anything we had ever seen before. It attacked the immune system, leaving us entirely unable to combat it as it wreaked havoc on our bodies. A bloody nose was the first sign, followed by a crippling headache. Organ shutdown would follow soon after their death. We only had three cases so far, but it had a hundred percent mortality from what we knew. Our bodies were just entirely unable to fight it off, much like the AIDS virus, only this one was transmittable by shaking hands, coughing, and simply breathing in the same air together.

Saving the world from the next pandemic, which was my very literal job, was important.

My mind was an unfocused mess focused on Anna even though I hadn't seen her in days now. Our marriage was the epitome of a happy life. We had the same sense of humor. The same interests. Such a deep connection it seemed just made in heaven. I wasn't necessarily proud of how we met. 

I was her professor at Harvard before I started my position with the C.I.A. investigating new possible infectious diseases.

**Flashback**

She was one of the younger students there, though I had no idea how young she was then. She was my star pupil, and she surprised me so many times with her abstract theories on D.N.A. and R.N.A. changes that I took her on as an apprentice even though she wanted to go into pediatrics and not infectious diseases. The wrong lighting from the lab was evident during the late night hours, and I rubbed my eyes, exhausted from the long day of research and teaching.