Nate's Fated Mate(68)

He listened to her walking around and heard her tapping on some sort of keyboard.

"I think my left eyelid is twitching. Make sure you write that down in my record. I don't want them to give me cyber eyelids that blink a thousand times a minute without stopping. It took me months to get used to my new eyes."

Kyra snorted at his joke. "When we met, the first thing I liked about you was your sense of humor. I'm glad to see it survived your cybernetic programming being severely altered. I'm not sure why the rewiring process affected your visual implants. That's a new side effect. But no worries, I can probably fix that if it lingers. I feel certain your legs will return to normal now that you're conscious again. Want some more water?"

"Yes. Please." Inspired to be nice to the lady doctor with the sexy voice, Peyton tacked on the polite word, glad to hear himself sounding normal. He cleared his throat after two more swallows. "So tell me-are you half as dead sexy as you sound?"

Kyra nearly dropped the water cup in surprise at his question. "Captain Elliott-are you flirting with me?"

Peyton laughed at her genuine surprise because it mirrored his. "I honestly don't know where that comment came from. There're not a lot of women out in the field and I don't think I've had leave in a while. At least, I can't remember if I did. You smell really good and I could listen to you talk all day."

Kyra frowned as she studied him. "What's the last thing you do remember?"

Peyton sighed. "Right eyelid starting to twitch. I'm not sure. Let me search my data banks. No-I can't. I guess those are damaged too. My head hurts. Can I answer later?"

"Your data banks are not damaged, just temporarily inaccessible. I unhooked them for your own good. You needed time to mentally adjust from your cybernetic repairs," Kyra explained, carefully choosing her words.



       
         
       
        

She walked to a glass cupboard and drew out syringes and swabs.

"Temporarily inaccessible-that's geek speak, Doc. You must be a cyber scientist," Peyton concluded.

Kyra nodded, then remembered he couldn't see her. "Yes. At least I used to be a cyber scientist. Now I guess I'm a freelance medical professional. I specialize in helping heal cybernetic problems."

Peyton heard some nuance in her voice, one he couldn't identify as a personality indicator, but it made him want to share his true thoughts with her. "When I got the cybernetic enhancements, I thought I would hate them because any cyber scientist could dink with them whenever he or she wanted. But most of the time, I find them useful as hell. Hurt like a son of a bitch when I got combat modified though. The first thing they did was run a frigging wire through my brain. I passed out like a gazillion times during the process. They kept waking me up with some sort of shock therapy. But I guess you know all about that stuff, don't you?"

Kyra swallowed, thinking about the process, and how many times she had assisted when it was done to soldiers. Then she thought about the same process being done on children. There was no getting around full disclosure. But it didn't have to happen today.

"Yes, I know all about that stuff, Captain Elliot. Sometimes I wish I didn't. Sometimes I wish I was just a simple woman with a simple life. Instead of having fun in college, I chose to study science. I'm afraid the novelty of being smart wore off for me long ago."

"Wow-that's deep. And I thought I was jaded," Peyton complained, trying to run analytics to see what had happened to his controller.

Kyra sighed wearily. "I'm in my fifties and have seen too much. I changed when I found out fate was a cruel bitch. Now I'm one too. It's worked out better for me than being nice to everyone. But I am really sorry to have caused you further pain. You've suffered enough."

Peyton snorted at the melodramatic apology, even though her tone carried sincerity. "Don't be so damn hard on yourself, Doc. We all have a job to do. Can I ask what kind of perfume you're wearing? It seems familiar to me."

Kyra laughed out loud. "Perfume? It's called sweat and stink after two days of working on you. Yesterday morning before you got here it was a spritz of citrus body spray after my shower. It took you much longer to wake up than I thought it would."

"You still smell pretty good to me. I sure as hell don't mind being the reason you got all sweaty," Peyton declared, liking her quick indrawn breath. But where the hell was this flirting stuff coming from? He was in no condition to seduce a field medic. Shit. "Geez, I'm sorry, Doc. I don't know why I keep thinking about you that way. I guess it's because I like your voice and it's boring as hell in this chair."