st such a shame? Bad Dawn, being so mean to him.”
Seth stared at her incredulously. Who the hell was this woman? This was not the shadow he had watched slipping around Sanctuary for ten years. This was not the woman who, on the rare occasions they were in the same room, avoided him like the plague.
He clenched his hands again, fighting against the nearly overwhelming need to just touch her. To run his hands down her arms, to feel her hands against his chest again. To take her lips. He didn’t want a cool little brush of lips as they’d had before. He wanted to take her lips, he wanted to devour them, he wanted to lick against them and suck that pretty little tongue into his mouth.
Arousal, almost violent in its extremity, rushed through his system. He could feel the thickening of his cock, the blood pumping furiously to it.
Damn her to hell. He hadn’t been this aroused in his entire fucking life. So aroused he could feel the need in every cell of his body.
“Dawn, don’t push me.” He leaned forward just enough, just that extra bit that would have made the Dawn he knew run for cover.
This one didn’t run. She stuck her chin out further, braced her hands on her hips and smirked. Son of a bitch, she was smirking at him.
“You’re so hot you’re going to catch this room on fire,” she snarled. “Tell you what, Seth, don’t you push me and I won’t push you. And get the smell of your lust out of my face before I have to tell your little girlfriend just how hard you get for me.”
“Dawn, don’t do this.” He wiped his hand over his face, more to wipe the betraying sweat from his brow than for any other reason. “This has been hard enough. For both of us. Let’s just walk away from each other and thank God neither of us ended up too hurt in the process.”
But he saw the pain flash in her eyes, for just a second. It was there, then gone so fast that he couldn’t be certain it had even been there to begin with.
“Of course you didn’t get hurt, Seth,” she murmured, her voice cold, her lips twisting in amused contempt. “You would have had to invest something first, wouldn’t you? As I said, just stay out of my way so I can keep that tight ass of yours alive, and I’ll consider my job done. Now, can I get out of your laundry room? I’m tired of the scent of your dirty laundry.”
Anger and lust beat a tattoo inside his head and his balls. He fisted his hands, fought against the flames racing over his body and knew if he didn’t get out of that room, if he didn’t get away from her, he was going to take her. He would rip her pants from her body, bend her over the fucking folding bench and take her with all the pent-up fury of a lust he thought he had finally conquered years ago.
He would do that to her. Even knowing the hell she had endured as a child. Knowing the brutality those monsters had used, he would still do it and he knew it. He knew it and it sickened his gut.
“Stay out of my way,” he snapped.
She lifted a brow and flashed those pretty little canines in a smile that almost had him drooling with the need to take those lips.
“Stay out of my way,” she amended. “I’d hate infect you again. Wouldn’t that just suck, Seth?”
“More than you fucking know.” He gripped the handle to the door, gave it a vicious twist and slammed out of the laundry room before he ended up doing something that would scar his conscience forever.
“Here’s your room.” Caroline Carrington was icy, contemptuous and corrupt.
Dawn followed her into the room, her brows lifting at the size of it and the clear knowledge that it was a servant’s room. She knew for a fact the Breed Enforcers were being placed closer to Seth’s suite.
“This won’t work.” She turned on the other woman, flashed her canines and watched as Miss Carrington’s eyes flickered with disgust.
Aww, poor little Caro, she didn’t like Breeds.
Too fucking bad.
“I beg your pardon?” Arrogance and imperious demand filled every pore of the bitch.
“I think you heard me, Miss Carrington. Breed Enforcers are being placed on the upper floor, closer to Mr. Lawrence’s suite. You can escort me there now, or I can find it on my own.” She shrugged. “I really don’t give a damn which way it goes, but I’m heading there.”
Put her in the basement, would she? The basement? As though she were a dirty little secret that needed to be kept out of the public eye.
“Security members are employees, not guests,” the black-haired snake snapped.
Dawn ignored her, shifted her duffel on her back and took the stairs to the upper floor two at a time. She could smell her way; she didn’t need Miss Caroline Carrington to show her anything.
The wicked witch of the universe had spied Dawn the moment she stepped into the house and with an arch little voice had informed her that her room was waiting.
Dawn had snorted at that. She had followed her just to see what the hell she was up to, but Dawn knew she hadn’t been expected at all. And what was more, she knew this woman was the one Seth intended to announce his engagement to.
Not on a bet, Dawn thought. If he was sleeping with this black-haired snake in the grass then he wasn’t doing it often enough to leave more than the most subtle of scents on her. He hadn’t claimed her, and he hadn’t marked her. Not with the scent of his passion or of his emotions. But she could smell his lust on her, and that was enough to make Dawn see red.
Fine, she had known they were both in mating heat over the years and she hadn’t done anything about it. Well, where the hell had he been? What the hell had happened to the guy doing the chasing? Was it now a mortal sin? Somehow unmanly? Had the rules managed to change while she was learning how to survive?
“Agent Daniels, this is uncalled for,” Miss Carrington snapped behind her.
Dawn looked back to see the black-haired witch making rather good time up the stairs in those mile-high shoes and that too-short skirt. She wondered if the other woman would split the side of that skirt trying to rush after her.
“Sure it’s called for,” she retorted. “It’s called my job. Check with Seth, he’ll okay it.”
A gasp sounded behind her. “That is Mr. Lawrence to you.”
Dawn snorted. Mr. Lawrence, her ass.
She turned as she reached the landing, followed her nose and, within minutes and, along two different hallways, she found the rooms she was looking for. And if she wasn’t very much mistaken, there was an empty room right beside Seth’s suite. Oh my, how lucky could one little Breed female get? Let him hump and roll while she was sitting right next to his room snarling in fury. It wasn’t going to happen.
“You will not.” Miss Carrington’s voice went from angry to pure fury.
A second later talons gripped Dawn’s arm and the flash of fiery distaste had her jerking back and turning with a feral, enraged snarl, her hand slashing out, gripping Miss Carrington’s throat and, in a second, pulling her to her knees in front of her.
Dawn hadn’t had time to think. There had been no thought. There had only been instinct.
“What the hell is going on here!” Seth’s voice, enraged, furious and incredulous, sliced through the room as Dawn snapped her hand back and glared at him.
“Seth.” The bitch. Carrington whimpered, her face pale, her hand gripping her throat as she stumbled to her feet, pretending shock. “Oh my God, Seth. She tried to kill me.”
“Oh, get real,” Dawn muttered and stared back at Seth as that black-haired weasel ran to his arms.
Ran to his arms. She stared at them, seeing his powerful arms surround another woman, hold her close. As though it were happening in slow motion, as though the world had shifted and ended right there in front of her eyes.
Dawn stepped back, and she stared. Just at his arms. Just at the powerful, corded muscles flexing beneath the tanned flesh, tightening, holding the woman to him. Arms that should have been around her earlier. That should have been holding her.
What was she supposed to do now? She lifted her gaze to Seth’s, seeing the chill in his
expression as she swallowed tightly.
“She caught me unaware,” she whispered, dazed. She felt as though she had taken a blow to the head that she couldn’t recover from. “Behind me. She grabbed my arm.” She lifted a hand, then dropped it as she shook her head.
“Caroline, what the hell happened?” Seth was coldly furious and, Dawn realized, he couldn’t believe her explanation.
She ran her hand down her arm and watched, no longer furious, no longer enraged. He was holding the other woman as she cried, as she babbled…something. Something about being confused, she hadn’t done anything, blah blah blah.
Dawn stared at his hands now. The way they curved over the other woman’s shoulders. So gently. He was holding her gently and the animal inside Dawn was screaming, howling, fighting to break free as agony seared it like a red hot whip.
“Dawn!” The crack of Dash’s voice had her jerking to attention, her gaze swinging to where he and Elizabeth were standing in the doorway. “Is that true?”
“True?” She blinked back at him.
“Did you attack Miss Carrington? Unprovoked?” Dash’s amber-brown eyes were flat and hard, commanding.
“I didn’t.” She shook her head slowly, concentrating on Dash’s eyes. “She grabbed me, from behind.” She turned her gaze back to Seth.
“Dawn!” Dash’s voice jerked her back. “Why would Miss Carrington grab you from behind?”
She swallowed and fought to get a grip on herself, but, God, it was hard. Rage was twisting inside her, instinct screaming, clawing in pain.
“I’m second command,” she told Dash, breathing in roughly. “I need to be upstairs. She tried to place me in the servant’s quarters and I ignored her direction. I followed the scent of my unit.” She indicated the room. “This will be my room.”
She was unaware of her voice strengthening, but Dash wasn’t. He stared at her, terrified he was going to lose her to the instinctual rage of the animal he could see firing in her eyes at the sight of another woman in her mate’s arms.
They were so close. If they lost Dawn, everything she had fought for in the past ten years would be lost.
“Dawn!” He jerked her attention back to him as she turned to stare at Seth again.
“Seth, you have to get Miss Carrington out of here,” Elizabeth whispered at his side. “Now.”
“No!” Dawn snapped, now more tense than ever before, her eyes snapping back to Seth and Caroline Carrington with so much naked agony that Dash wondered how such a slight body could contain it all. “I apologize, Mr. Lawrence. Miss Carrington.” She seemed to sway as the words passed her lips. “I’ll…” She stared around the room. “I’ll change rooms with one of the others.”
She was moving toward the door when Caroline gave a little shriek of dismay and threw herself back into Seth’s arms. Dawn froze. Dash watched the transformation, saw the enforcer’s lips curl, watched as the Feline mate fought for freedom, fought to destroy the woman stealing her place in life.
“Now,” Dash snarled, aware of Seth pushing Caroline toward Elizabeth with a hard, cold voice order to “Go.” But Seth didn’t go with her. He stared at Dawn, watched her carefully, his expression brooding, angry.
“I’ll switch rooms with Lawe.” Dawn inhaled deeply, shaking her head as though trying to shake off a drug. She moved for the door again.
“Stay here.” Seth’s voice was rough, as agonized as the pain tearing through Dawn’s eyes. “Just fucking stay here.”
He turned then and moved from the room, obviously ignoring a distraught Caroline as she rushed after him. Dash turned back to Dawn, his heart aching for the little Cougar Breed that fought so valiantly for the control that meant so much to her.
Her expression flinched and her lashes drifted over her eyes as she turned to him.
“I’m fine,” she whispered. “I’ll be fine.”
And he had to believe it, because he couldn’t order her back to Sanctuary, no more than Callan or Jonas could. Breed Law forbade interfering with mates. And despite the reversal of the hormone, Seth and Dawn were still mates. Though it was Dash’s guess that that reversal was making a sudden turn to renew itself. He had smelled the scent of the hormone on Seth’s flesh, and he had seen the flinch Seth couldn’t control as Caroline threw herself against him.
“Dawn’s awakening,” he heard his daughter whisper behind him, and he turned to her quickly, his eyes narrowing suspiciously as a single tear slipped down Cassie’s pale face. “She’ll wish she had continued to sleep.”
CHAPTER 5
Seth couldn’t get the look on Dawn’s face out of his mind when Caroline ran to his arms with her obviously false tears and accusations. It was in that moment that he knew an engagement to the heiress wasn’t going to happen. Hell, he hadn’t even been in her bed for more than a month and the thought of going to it now was more than he could stand.
He sat in his suite, his head resting on the pillowed back of the couch, and stared at the ceiling.
In that one moment, he had seen so much agony in Dawn’s eyes that he had been shocked to his soul. Or what was left of it. It had burned in her eyes, like live coals stoked to a bitter flame. A pain he couldn’t bear seeing there.
Seeing it—he closed his eyes. Seeing it had destroyed him. He had thought Dawn had gone blissfully through the past ten years unaware of the hell he had endured himself, but looking in her eyes he suspected something far different.
His questions regarding the mating heat had gone largely unanswered over the years. The doctor that monitored the hormone in his blood and attempted to regulate it and bring the symptoms under control hadn’t answered his questions. Jonas had refused, and after that, Seth had just let it go. He had lived in hell; if Dawn had hurt the same, then she would have come to him. Cassie had warned him to let Dawn come to him. To wait. And he had waited, and waited.
He rose slowly to his feet and paced to the balcony doors. Dawn’s room was beside his, but he knew she wasn’t there. She had gone out with the rest of the team earlier to survey the island while Seth and his board of directors met together.
Lawe, Rule, Mercury and Dash had stayed behind to provide security.
Those meetings were finished for the day now, and he had nothing left to do but watch for her. Which wasn’t entirely true. He could have been with Caroline fulfilling his role as host. He could have been reassuring his board members, socializing and attempting to regain control of the company that thought it could outwit him.
A five-year-old could outwit him right now with no problem.
He needed answers and he needed them quickly, before she returned, before she stared at him again with that broken gaze and that soul-deep agony. Because another woman was in his arms.
He shook the image away before pushing his fingers through his hair and pulling himself up from the settee. He moved quickly to his door, left the suite and strode down the hall to where he knew Dash and his family had been assigned.
He knocked quickly on the door, not giving himself a chance to hesitate. If he hesitated, he might act first and ask questions later. And he was suddenly more terrified of adding to Dawn’s pain than he was of living the rest of his life alone.
Dash opened the door and stared back at him quietly. “Cassie said you’d show up.” He stood back and waved Seth into the small sitting room.
“Where is she?” This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to conduct in front of a teenager. No matter how grown-up she thought she was.
“She went out with Dawn.” Dash’s lips quirked somberly. “She’s worried about her.”
“Cassie’s not the only one,” Seth said quietly before turning to Dash’s wife. “Hello, Elizabeth.”
Black-haired and blue-eyed, she was a mature vision of her daughter, and just as lovely, though without Cassie’s more delicate build.
“Hello, Seth.” Her voice was gentle, compassionate. “Would you like me to step out of the room?” She indicated the bedroom next door. “You two could talk.”
He shook his head quickly. “I need to talk to both of you.” He needed to know. What was Dawn feeling? Why was she here after all this time? And why was it beginning not to matter to him why she was there?
“Let’s sit down. Would you like a drink, Seth?”
Seth nodded, requested a whiskey, straight, and moved to the seating arrangement as he watched Elizabeth sit down slowly.
Dressed in tailored, cream-colored slacks and a sleeveless blouse, she looked more like Cassie’s sister than her mother. And he knew the why of that. It was the mating heat and the delayed aging it caused.
“Her eyes—” He stared at Elizabeth. “I saw her eyes.” He shook his head bleakly. “Hell if I know what to do now. I stayed away from her as they asked me to. I waited for her to come to me, and she never did.”
Elizabeth frowned and glanced at her husband. “Who asked you to stay away from Dawn?” she snapped, frowning darkly. “Dash, were you aware of this?”
“It happened before Dash came to Sanctuary.” He inhaled roughly. “Just before. I was trying to…” He grimaced. “I was trying to court her. Two of Jonas’s enforcers showed me to an office in the estate. They showed me what those bastards did to her.” He lowered his eyes as he took the whiskey from Dash. “The videos the Council made.” He could still feel the rage tearing through him. “What they did to her.”
“Who did this?” Dash asked.
“Jonas, Callan.” He shook his head. “They knew what the mating heat would do to her, and once I saw it, I knew as well. It was already strong, Dash.”
“They had no right to ask you to stay away from her,” Elizabeth accused gently. “It’s been ten years. Too long for her to have to fight the effects of the heat alone.”
His head snapped up, his jaw clenching as he stared back at her suspiciously. “The doctor, Ely. She said the heat wasn’t in full effect without the exchange of a full kiss, or more intimate contact than what we had had.”
They were staring at him; Dash’s expression was dark, Elizabeth’s shocked as she looked to her husband.
“Ely has known better than that for several years,” Dash told him. “And I know for a fact Dawn has been in full heat for as long as I’ve known her, Seth. I knew you were her mate, but I also knew that other female Breeds had taken longer to struggle against their pasts enough to go to their mates. I didn’t ask questions.” He shook his dark head sharply. “I should have, but I didn’t.”
Seth came violently to his feet. “She’s suffered like that?” he demanded roughly. “As I did? All these years?”
“Probably worse,” Elizabeth answered him then. “It’s always harder on the women, whether they’re Breed or not. And I can tell you from experience, there’s nothing worse than being in full heat alone. But why would Callan do this?” He watched as she turned to her husband again in disbelief. “He loves her like his own child, Dash, why would he not let Seth know?”
“Unless they thought it would recede in her as it had in Seth.” Dash leaned back in his chair and watched Seth with narrowed eyes. “How intimate was the first contact with her?”
Seth shook his head as he stalked to the doors, much like his own, that led out to the enclosed, private balcony. “Not much. Barely a brush of lips, a touching of hands.” He shrugged. “I was…courting her.”
“Impressive, considering your reputation at the time,” Dash pointed out in amusement.
Seth shot him a glare as he ran his fingers through his hair again.
“What now?” He shook his head at the thought. “I’ll be honest, I don’t want her here. It’s too dangerous, and I’m…” He frowned, fighting the knowledge even within himself. “My control is shot, Dash.” He turned to the other man, frustrated and aware of his own weakness. “I don’t know if I can hold back with her here, in the house.”
Dash sighed roughly. “Jonas and Callan had no right to show you the footage taken from those labs.”
Seth frowned. “I needed to know. The heat was already getting hard to deal with. I would have made things worse.” He wouldn’t have stayed away, and he would have only made her nightmares worse.
“What are you going to do now?” Dash asked.
Seth stared back at him fiercely. “I’ll break off my relationship with Caroline tonight. But I want you to get Dawn back to Sanctuary. Order her back. Kidnap her and lock her in her room. I don’t care what you have to do, Dash, but get her away from this island.”
Dash was silent for long moments. Finally, he nodded his head slowly. “I’ll order her back to Virginia.”
Dash’s compliance had been too easy. There was no argument, no attempt to persuade him otherwise. Seth nodded again in relief. “Thank you. I’ll let you enjoy some peace then, before the party tonight.”
He left the suite, rubbing his chest as he did so, aching at the sense of loss he already felt.
Dawn’s tongue was itching. Her tongue and the fingers that rested on the sidearm strapped high on her thigh as she watched the couple moving gracefully through the crowded ballroom.
Seth Lawrence and his hostess. She snorted silently. Hostess her ass, that woman wanted in his bed so bad that Dawn could smell the stink of her arousal even across the crowded ballroom.
And once again, it was close to destroying her control and her mind. If she thought for a moment that Seth had had sex with the Carrington witch anytime recently, she would have to tear the witch’s throat out.
But it didn’t change the fact that Seth was hanging on to her like a baby to a pacifier. And it wasn’t changing the pain that was growing in her by the moment.
“Lawe, move in on Lawrence, see if you can’t keep him inside,” she ordered the enforcer standing by the doors that led into the cool, sheltered gardens.
“The gardens are secure, Dawn,” Lawe reminded her quietly through the earpiece she wore.
“I don’t care if they’re ringed shoulder to shoulder with guards, do as I said,” she snapped into the wire-thin mic that curved over her cheek as she continued to survey the crowd. “We can’t afford to lose him or his prissy miss.”
Her fingers curled over the butt of her gun as her eyes narrowed on the woman’s bare back. The dress she wore was little more than a scrap of cloth covering her ass. And Seth’s hand was riding on the bare flesh of her lower back as they moved through the crowd.
Were his fingers caressing the woman’s flesh? Her eyes narrowed on the strong hand touching another woman, and the growl that rumbled in her throat couldn’t be held back.
She glanced around quickly to make certain no one else had heard the sound, then she grimaced furiously. She shouldn’t be watching Seth. She was supposed to be watching the crowd, directing the enforcers assigned to guard Seth Lawrence’s ass while he made a fool of himself romancing the hostess with the mostest bare flesh showing.