The Ties That Bind (5 page)

She said they loved me. But, knowing what I know now ... about the changes that are being made to their brain and the changes that happened to Alex's base personality ... can I rely on that? Do they actually love me, or is it something that I did to them?

The very idea that I had forced my girls to love me, tore me up inside. For my part, I can say that I loved each of them. I didn't want slaves to my biology. The worst part was that if they weren't forced to love me because of some manipulation to their brains, how would I ever know? Would this be in the back of my mind every time they said it? Could I trust myself to believe them? I could feel this worm of doubt in the back of my mind. I knew it would poison my relationship with them, but I couldn't see any way to stop it.

Worse than that, was, how were they infected by me? Was it just when we made love, or was it earlier? Rachel was clearly showing signs of the same kind of change, and I'd never slept with her. If it was earlier, could I ever trust myself to be out among other people? I wanted to make the world a better place, not subjugate it! Yet it seemed like I had no choice. Was I fated to be a monster, regardless of what I wanted?

I was still sitting in the chair hours later when all three girls came back downstairs. I didn't even notice them at first. I was totally lost in my self-loathing. It wasn't until I felt a hand wipe away the tears flowing down my face that I looked up and saw all three of them leaning over me. Zoe and Tami lowered themselves into my lap, each leaning against a shoulder, while Vicky pushed my legs apart and sat between them, leaning her head on my knee.

Zoe was the first to say something, "You're beating yourself up about changing our brains, aren't you?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"Because I'm afraid I made you love me."

"Before we get into if you did or didn't, let me ask. Would that be a bad thing?"

"What?"

"Would it be a bad thing if you made us love you? Do I, Tami or Vicki seem upset to you? Or do we seem happy and content in our love for you?"

"I don't know. I guess happy."

"Look past your self-doubt, Cas, and really consider us. Since Tami joined us, how does she seem?"

"Happy."

Tami reached up and stroked my face, "I really am. I haven't felt this content, ever."

"So, even if you somehow changed our brains and made us love you, so what? We like loving you. We are better for it. But, I don't think you did."

"How would you know?"

"Well, for one, I fell in love with you before we ever did anything, remember? Tami and Vicki also loved you before they slept with you."

"But, what if it is more than just sleeping together, I mean look at Rachel. She is all over me, and I didn't sleep with her."

"Yeah, we still have some stuff to figure out. But since every girl in school
isn't
chasing you, I think it's safe to say that just being around you isn't enough."

"But it could be something else. You three could have been affected
then
fallen for me."

"I guess, but that brings us back to my first point. Who cares?"

"I care."

"I know, and honestly that is one of the things I love about you. We don't care. We are happy. We wouldn't want to change how we feel about you, even if we could."

"Okay. I guess I am just worried that I have turned you into some kind of, I don't know, slave."

Vicky let out a sharp laugh, and Zoe just shook her head.

"You know you're cute when you're being an idiot."

"I guess that works in my favor."

"Do we seem like slaves to you? Do we just blindly follow you around? I can tell you we each have our own will, and none of us feels beholden to follow you. Sure, we are inclined to listen to you because we love you, but if you're being a dumbass, we will tell you. And you know what?"

"What?"

"You're being a dumbass. Now let's go to bed so we can show you just how much we love you."

I was still a little morose when I got up, but the girls recognized my mood and tried to kiss me into submission. I did some more thinking as we ran with the morning group, and realized that Zoe was mostly right. None of them seemed worse for wear and they were all happy, so I could stop feeling bad for corrupting them.

I was still worried about accidentally affecting anyone else and my mind was set that we would avoid anything that might cause more people to be altered. At least until we knew what all the effects of alteration were, and gave those who were going to be altered a chance to understand what they were agreeing to. I had no qualms about evolving more people, but I did have problems with doing it to someone without their knowledge.

I was thinking hard and not really paying attention, when I felt a tug at my sleeve. I turned to find Tami breathing hard and pulling at me. I noticed we had started to really outpace everyone else.

"Slow it down there, turbo. Being in good shape is one thing, but if you start putting down Olympic record times, people are going to notice."

I slowed down to a walk, and she slumped against me, forcing me to put an arm around her to hold her up.

"Damn, I am in the best shape in my life, and catching up to you almost killed me."

"Sorry, Tami, I was just thinking and stopped paying attention."

"Well, you need to be able to do both. This is important!" Her hard tone of voice then softened a bit, "Are you still worried? I thought we cleared the air last night."

"You cleared more than the air."

That statement earned me a punch in the shoulder, "Seriously, no I am not brooding about last night. You were all right; all three of you seem fine in spite of my influence. I was just thinking I wanted to make sure I didn't infect anyone else until we knew more."

"Okay, just no more brooding. We like happy Cas way more than grumpy Cas."

She punctuated that with a deep kiss. As we started to walk towards the locker room area of the school to get showered and changed, I felt another tug on my sleeve. I turned to find Vicki and Zoe.

"Hey, where's ours?"

Both girls were smiling big.

After such a crazy several days, the next few were thankfully pretty quiet. We got everyone in to get tests run by Alex, did homework, and just spent some much needed quiet time, together. It was really nice. Wednesday after class, I had to catch a ride over to Ted's offices for my first company meeting with him and Marcus. They were both in Ted's office when I arrived.

"Hey, guys, sorry you had to wait on the school kid."

Ted was laughing when he stood up to shake my hand.

"Well, I do have my own company to run, Cas. I managed to keep myself busy."

I dropped my backpack next to a chair and flopped down.

"Well, I am here now so let's get to it. You guys are way more versed in this kind of thing than I am, so you kick it off and I will see if I can follow along. Now that we have the money squared away, what's next?"

Marcus pulled out a notepad with his chicken scratch written all over it, "While we were waiting for the money to get into the accounts I went over all my information and sat down with Jonathan. I have to say he is quite the find and he has agreed to handle our legal issues. As long as they don't conflict with your interests he doesn't see there being a conflict."

"We have gone over all my notes and started working on patent findings. He is currently looking up prior patents to make sure we are in the clear. Once that comes back we will file the patent and be ready to start building the prototype."

"Good. I am glad Jonathan was able to jump in. He has had my back before and I trust the guy. So you are on the patent already. Once we are ready to start development of the prototype, what will we need? I am assuming we will need people to help you build it, a space to build it in, and parts?"

"Yes to all of those."

Ted was making notes, "Marcus, get me a list of what supplies you think we will need. For most of it, I will check with my existing buyers first and we can expand past that for items they can't supply. What are you thinking of, as far as crew?"

"I need at least one other engineer, preferably someone who specializes in aeronautics or planes. We will need a couple of good mechanics, one who knows body work and one who knows engines. It would be good if both had experience with military hardware, perhaps someone in or just out of the reserves working in a technical position."

Ted made more notes, "Okay, I will take the lead on finding those guys. I have an idea on the engineer and will start looking hard for the mechanics. Once we have them under contract and get the NDAs signed, I would like for you to go over the specs with them. I think it best if we get second opinions on your plans for the prototype, and their estimates on supplies we need to build it."

I wasn't making notes but was keeping track of everything. "What about the build location?"

"I already scouted out a big enough warehouse for us to build in. It needs a little alteration, but the landlord has already agreed to update the facilities to our requirements. It should be ready by the time we get the crew and patents lined up."

"Great. The last thing I wanted to bring up is securing our work. So far, we are talking about a million dollar investment. Right now, all the stuff is just in a file cabinet in Marcus's office. Once we start hiring and buying, and once the patent is filed, word will be out about what we are doing. I may sound paranoid, but I think we should be locking up everything when we are not working on it. Preferably here and not at a separate workshop that is empty if we are not there."

Ted pulled out a card from his Rolodex, "That's a good idea. I have a guy who put in a safe at my house. I will have him come out and put something in Marcus's office."

"Perfect. Well I guess that means we are on track. We should continue to meet every week even if nothing is going on, just to make sure we stay on the same page. More if we have actual stuff happening."

Both men stood with me and we all shook hands.

"Ted, do you think you can get Mary Ann to drive your business partner home so he can do his homework?"

Both men laughed as we walked out of Ted's office.

Saturday rolled around and the girls were excited. After the game, there was the Homecoming dance at school. I was actually a little nervous. While we hadn't exactly been keeping it a secret, going to the dance with three dates was putting our relationship out there more that it had been.

The girls had already picked their dresses and my suit and had gotten tickets. I offered to help, but they just laughed at me, took money out of my wallet, and told me to just be quiet and look pretty. All three seemed to revel in my uselessness in these kinds of situations. Still, I knew my place and just said yes ma'am and followed their lead.

Before the game was on, I had something I wanted to take care of. I knew Margret worked Saturday afternoons and except for the brief conversation at the bus stop, I hadn't seen Tina since I was kicked out. I missed her and was really concerned so, in spite of having promised Margret I would not come by the house, I decided to go and visit her.

I noticed Margret's car was missing. She didn't used to work on Saturday afternoons, but since she stopped accepting money from me to help with the bills, there is the chance she picked up a second job. I knocked on the door and waited. After what seemed a pretty long time, Tina opened the door with some guy I didn't recognize, standing behind her. I did notice her shirt was on inside out.

"What do you want?"

"I hadn't heard from you in a while. I wanted to check and see how you were doing."

She sighed, "I'm fine. Cas, you don't live here anymore and Mom made it clear she didn't consider you her son and that you weren't my brother. She doesn't want me to talk to you."

"Yeah, I know Margret is unhappy with me and wants me to stay away. Is that what you want?"

"I think it would be for the best."

The guy behind her took this as his sign to step in. He moved close behind her, reached around and put one hand on her breast, and gave me a threatening glare.

"You heard Tina, get lost."

She turned and gently pushed him back, making sure she was between me and him. It was clear she wasn't rejecting him, but trying to keep me from being in reach of the guy.

"Steven, no."

Ahh, so this was the guy Tami mentioned ... the one her sister knew.

"It's okay Tina. I am leaving. But remember, regardless of what Margret says, I still consider you family. If you need anything, you know where to find me."

She didn't respond and shut the door. Steven was still pawing at her as they disappeared from sight. I felt my blood pressure go up but walked calmly away from the house.

I was still in a mood when I got back to the house. Zoe was in the kitchen when I walked in but didn't immediately turn around when she started talking to me.

"How did it ... that bad huh?"

"Yeah. She said she didn't want me to come by any more. Margret wasn't there, but there was a guy there. I am guessing it is this Steven Mertz that Tami's sister mentioned to her. He was really handsy with her while we were talking."