In loving memory of my father,
Russell Kanduha, for always believing.
And my aunt and uncle, Sue and Sid, for
wounderful childhood memories.
You are dearly missed.
PROLOGUE
BUFFALO GAP, VIRGINIA BREED COMPOUND, SANCTUARY
He was a beast, an animal. He was a creation, the blending of man and lion, and the beast was caged within him. Powerful, strong. The ability to run, to hunt, to scent the enemy on the wind and taste it in the breeze was chained in the dimmest part of the man’s subconscious.
How was it fair that it was locked away? it roared. The man was given leave to walk the land, and yet the beast was forced to hide. It stared out of the man’s eyes, it pumped the blood in the man’s body, and forever it was leashed, restrained.
But it was growing stronger. The drugs that had kept it leashed had worn off; the years of freedom that the man had known, the false sense of security that the man had developed, would aid the creature hiding inside him.
The beast waited. It prowled. It roared out in nightmares as it bided its time. The man was certain of his control. Certain that the drugs the scientists had given him in those labs, and his own control, had killed the animal that fought with such ferocity to survive.
But it wasn’t dead. It had never left. For a time, it had slept. A forced sleep. A sleep that built the anger growing inside it, and now it was awake. It was awake and clawing to be free.
But it was patient, or so the animal thought. It could hold on until the man let it free. It was part of the man, part of who he was, what he was. The man would release the animal soon. As soon as the animal was strong enough. It was tired. The attempts to kill it had nearly succeeded. Only by slipping so deep within the man’s primal unconsciousness that even the most vital parts of it were hidden, had it managed to survive.
But when it slipped back, the drugs had built an unbreakable fortress of bars around it. They pressed into the animal. Drove spikes through its soul and filled it with pain. And weakened it. Weakened it as surely as a fatal wound would have killed the man.
And the man stayed diligent. The man had no reason to give rein to his heart, or to open his soul. For the man believed his soul lost. Only the animal knew better. And the animal waited . . . Waited for the man to find his soul.
“Have you finished the tests?” Jonas stepped into the small lab, as Jackal trailed behind him. Damned security personnel. Callan had given the order that with Jonas’s own force of men now protecting Vanderale’s glorified clerk, Jonas had to have a bodyguard. A human bodyguard at that. It was a damned good thing he could at least get along with the other man.
He stared at Elyiana Morrey’s back as she tensed, her hand lifting to rub the back of her neck. The muscles stiffened beneath her white lab coat as the scent of her irritation began to bloom around her.
She was doing that a lot lately. As soon as he found the time, he would remind her who was the boss here. He didn’t have time to engage in power plays with her.
“I finished the tests.” She picked up a folder, turned and strode to the counter beside him before slapping it down and returning to whatever she was working on before. Completely ignoring both him and his bodyguard, Jackal.
Silence filled the lab as Jonas stared at the file, quirking his brow at her obvious ill temper. Breed females didn’t have PMS, so he couldn’t explain her mood swings as well as he could those of the few non-Breed females in the compound.
He had decided months ago that Ely was just contrary.
He liked that about her though. Sometimes. He understood it and could deal with it. But she was being unusually contrary and that didn’t set well with him.
“Would you like to explain the tests you ran?” he finally asked her.
“It’s in the file.”
“I don’t want to read your scientific gibberish.” He allowed a primal growl to vibrate in his throat. “Tell me what I need to know.”
She turned back to him slowly, and he saw the anger burning in her eyes.
“Your games are out of hand,” she hissed, her gaze flickering nervously to Jackal. “Your manipulations and conniving machinations are going to get someone killed. And this conversation is none of his business.” She pointed her finger at the bodyguard as her gaze snapped with ire.
Jonas stared at her in surprise. Hell, he thought she liked Jackal. He rubbed at his chin thoughtfully as he tried to figure out what had her so incensed. He could only come up with one thing.
“Are you still pissed over Dawn and Seth?” It was the only explanation he could find for her anger. He had ordered to have the hormonal treatments in Dawn’s body leveled off when the mating hormone in Seth’s system had begun disappearing. Dawn was losing her mate, and Jonas hadn’t been willing to allow that to happen no matter how much he disliked Seth Lawrence personally. But then, there were few men that Jonas liked. Hell, few people he could say he liked period.
The rest of that mission had gone to hell in a handbasket though. He had succeeded in ensuring Dawn and Seth stayed together, but the blood that had been spilled was cause for concern.
Ely’s lips pressed together in stubborn anger.
Jonas breathed out in resignation, picked up the file and opened it.
Within seconds his brows lifted and his gaze moved back to hers.
“I thought the drugs the scientists gave him in the labs reversed this?”
“He hasn’t been on the drugs in seven years,” she snapped. “And that isn’t his actual state at the moment. That’s what happened when I ran the mating test with that of Ms. Rodriquez.”
Now this was interesting. Jonas rubbed his jaw as he continued to read through the tests Ely had run.
The tests she had designed to determine mating compatibility were complicated. A mix of saliva, blood and semen samples from the male, combined with saliva, blood and female hormonal samples.
“Jonas, he killed people when he rampaged in the labs,” Ely whispered worriedly.
Jonas waved his hand at that. “He had lost his friend . . .”
“His mate,” she snapped. “The mating hormone was in his blood. We’ve excused that episode the entire time he’s been off the drug therapy, because it was his mate. This woman is not his mate and the feral adrenaline is there in his blood. He’s going into feral displacement again and you can’t deny it. That report proves it.” Her finger stabbed in the direction of the file.
Jonas shook his head again as he continued through the report.
She cursed. “Damn you, you think you know it all. I saw the videos of his rampage when he learned that lioness had died. He killed a doctor, a trainer and two of the Coyotes that attempted to take him down. He was nearly rabid. If this woman is brought here . . .”
“Then he’ll protect her with the same ferocity that he used when those bastards took someone he cared for,” he snapped back at her. “This is not proof that he’s returning to the feral state. And it’s not proof that he will, so why are you so upset over it?”
Ely was usually the calm head where the Breeds were concerned. The one who looked for alternative answers and for the reasons tests came out as they did. She wasn’t the one to jump to conclusions on any test. That was his job.
“Because you won’t tell him.” He could hear her teeth grinding. “I know you. You’ll play games with him, and you’ll endanger him . . .”
“Son of a bitch,” he snapped back as his own anger began to rise. “You think this is all a game to me, Ely? That I don’t give a fuck about my men or the people I’m busting my ass to fucking save? Do you think I risk my goddamned life daily against the Supremacists and Breed Law for fucking thrills?”
He felt like hitting something. And if Ja
ckal’s anger didn’t burn down behind him, then he was going to hit him.
Jonas inhaled sharply at the sign that his temper was unraveling. Forcing it back always took effort; releasing it had never gained him a damned thing, so why expend the effort?
“I don’t know why you do it, and I don’t care,” she whispered. “But you have to warn him.”
“No.” He closed the file and snapped it back to the counter.
“I knew it,” she sneered. “You just answered your own question, Jonas. You enjoy risking your damned life.”
“I don’t risk my men needlessly,” he snarled. “Neither do I resort to paranoid fears and interfere with the job they have to do, and neither will you. What you will do, my fine little doctor, is keep a very careful eye on him while she’s here. I want blood, saliva and semen tested weekly for the feral hormone. If, and I say if, the mating hormone or the feral hormone makes itself known, then we’ll apprise him of the situation. Until then, you will keep your pretty mouth shut.”
“That might not be good enough. I can’t predict . . .”
He broke in. “Then you better learn how to predict. Merc is alone, Ely. He’s accustomed himself to being alone. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t regret what he thinks he lost. As far as we know, Breeds mate only once. Mercury is convinced that lioness was his mate. Until we see otherwise, you will not give him hope. Until we see otherwise, you will not plant your paranoia in his head. Do you understand me on this?”
She stared back at him in fury. “That lioness was his mate. The mating hormone proved it, Jonas.”
“Do you understand me?” He lowered his voice, determination threading through the tone as he stared back at her.
Seconds later, her lashes flickered and lowered, and she nodded shortly. The small sign of submission would work for now. Once he had time, though, he was definitely going to rein in his little Breed scientist. She was becoming much too confrontational for the job they had ahead of them.
“Very well. Ms. Rodriquez arrives within the next two weeks. When she comes in, take your own samples. There could be a problem with the ones Vanderale’s provided, and run this again. I want to know what it shows when you do. If they haven’t changed, then we’ll watch the situation very closely. It’s all we can do.”
“He could destroy her as well as himself if that hormone releases during a moment of stress.” Her voice was strained as she attempted to override her natural submissiveness.
Damned fucking Breed genetics.
She submitted to him by design rather than choice. It grated at him each time it happened.
“Or he could mate her and live happily ever after,” he retorted sarcastically. “Until we know one way or the other, then our hands are tied.”
“I could warn him that the drugs that recessed the feral genetics may not have done their job,” she suggested.
“And have him run?” He pushed his fingers through his hair in frustration. “You don’t know Merc very well, Ely. I do. Keep your mouth shut and keep me up-to-date on this. I’ll take care of the rest.”
Dammit to hell. He didn’t need this. He needed Merc to keep Vanderale’s little paper pusher out of trouble, not to mate her or go insane on him. And he sure as hell didn’t need Ely wigging out on him.
He turned and left the lab, closing the door carefully behind him despite his need to slam it off the fucking hinges. At times like this, he wished he were a drinking man. A good drunk might have helped.
CHAPTER 1
TWO WEEKS LATER
The private jet taxied into the hangar, pulling into the heated cavern awaiting it, and huge metal doors closed to trap the heat inside as its motors stilled.
Long minutes later, the door opened, and Ria Rodriquez stepped out onto the top step the pilot had lowered. She stared around the hangar.
A long black limo was parked well out of the way of the jet’s wings, and as she watched, a door opened and Mercury Warrant stepped from the car.
She wanted to groan at the sight of the man sent to meet her. Or rather the Breed.
She stared at him curiously. She had seen his photos over the past months, knew as much about him as her boss Dane Vanderale could dig up, and still, the sight of him was like a punch of reaction deep inside her stomach.
His features weren’t those of a man’s. Nor were they those of the lion his genes had been merged with. If a sexier than hell version of both could be created, then that was Mercury Warrant.
Slanted amber eyes, the line of the lids black, as though someone had applied the lightest layer of eyeliner. She knew his lashes were thick. His nose was long and straight, though a bit flatter, a bit more arrogantly defined than possible in a normal male.
His lips were just a bit thin, but that lower lip, it had a tempting fullness at the center of it that had had her tongue running over her own lips whenever she had noticed it in the pictures she’d studied of the Breeds she would be in contact with.
“Ms. Rodriquez, we’re heading to Venezuela to pick up Mr. Dane. Should you need us, don’t hesitate to call for pickup.”
She turned and looked at her pilot. Bush pilot. Scruffy, his eyes flat and hard, but there was a twinkle of warmth in them when he looked at her.
She was used to working with the hidden Breeds of the world. The ones the Vanderales has slipped from the labs, or from missions. The ones that were listed as dead. Such as Burke had been.
“Tell Mr. Dane to please remember the bling he promised me,” she murmured. “I’m about to earn it.”
Burke glanced to the limo and the Breed awaiting her. “He’s a fine specimen,” he said quietly. “Dangerous though. More dangerous than we might realize.”
Ria shrugged. He wasn’t the one she was after. She’d already drawn her initial suspicions and sent them to Dane. The person or persons they were after would never stare back at her with such captivating eyes, or with such savage interest.
“He’s going to be my bodyguard, not my mark,” she reminded Burke with a smile.
He snorted at that. “I’ll inform Mr. Dane to add to the bling. Because if that’s your bodyguard, I’m not certain which one of you I should feel the most sorry for. But I like you best.”
“You’re a good man, Burke.” She smiled smugly as she patted his arm. “Tell Mr. Dane the emeralds looked especially fine next to the diamonds. I’m very eager to see just how much he appreciates the risk I’m taking.”
Burke chuckled as he escorted her down the steps and over to the limo.
“Mr. Warrant. I see Director Wyatt couldn’t awaken in time to meet me.” Ria restrained the urge to check the thick bun she had rolled her hair into on the plane, or the dowdy outfit she had donned.
Damn, she was really going to miss her finer clothes. But she knew the persona that garnered the greatest results. And as much as she disliked that persona, she owed the Vanderales. She owed them her life.
“Director Wyatt was detained in D.C.,” Mercury informed her as he glanced at the pilot curiously.
“Anything more that I should tell Mr. Dane?” Burke asked her as she released his arm and he turned to help the copilot with her luggage and laptop case.
“Yes, inform him I won my end of that bet we made. Director Wyatt didn’t show up after all.”
She caught Mercury’s grimace from the periphery of her vision.
“I’ll make a note of that.” Burke nodded his dark, shaggy head as the trunk opened on the limo and her luggage was stored inside.
As he and the copilot loped back to the plane, Ria turned and stared back at Mercury, trying not to feel too female in his presence.
He was tall, broad and absolutely delicious looking. Savage and male—the combination did something to her feminine core that surprised her.
Her lips twitched as he turned his gaze from the Vanderale pilots back to her.
“They were at the hospital with the first Leo,” he commented. “They’re Breeds.”
She nodded as he reached out and
opened the door for her.
“They are.” She slid into the sumptuous leather, sliding to the other side as Mercury bent and moved in with her, sitting in the seat across from her.
She glanced to the driver’s section to see Lawe Justice. She almost chuckled at his name. She loved some of the names the Breeds had chosen for themselves when given the chance. Lawe Justice, Rule Breaker, two of Jonas Wyatt’s main security force, and Mercury Warrant.
Mercury, the messenger of the gods. It should have been Ares. How apt that name might have been if the scientists that created him hadn’t completely annihilated the primal instincts he had possessed. According to his file, he may have been one of the greatest Breeds to have ever been created.
“Breeds the Leo worked to rescue over the years,” Mercury pointed out coolly. “Rather than working to ensure we were all free.”
She had known there was an edge of anger in the Breeds who had been at the hospital and sworn to silence concerning the first Leo, who had arrived to oversee his son’s well-being.
Callan Lyons, pride leader and the bane of the first Leo’s existence. Leo didn’t share his son’s belief that the Breeds should carve out their place in the world. The only protection they could be certain of, he believed, was in hiding among the non-Breeds until their numbers were greater. And Ria wasn’t certain which side of the argument she felt was right. But for now, both sides still existed.
“I refuse to debate Leo’s choices; they’re his own,” she pointed out, staring back at him.
“But you’re part of his family,” Mercury argued, calmly. He always argued calmly, she had read. “You’ve known what he was all along.”
She smiled at that. “Surprisingly, Mr. Warrant, I’m not a Breed. I’m simply a lowly little clerk that does the Vanderale bidding. Nothing more. I’m very human and I’m a reasonably healthy twenty-eight years old, rather than however old Dane or Leo are. I try really hard not to do the math there.”
They were older than they appeared. Far older. And the secrecy of their existence as Breeds was paramount. And it was at risk if the information Dane had received was right.
“A clerk?” Mercury’s gaze raked over her, and she was glad she had donned her jacket before leaving the plane, because she swore her nipples were hardening beneath the thin blouse she wore. “Why do I have trouble believing that?”
He was suspicious. His gaze was direct, and she almost thought she detected the faintest hint of blue in his eyes.
She almost shook her head when she looked closer and saw only the dark amber shades of the pupil.
“My charming personality?” She arched her brow.
His lips twitched. “I’ve seen your communiqués with Jonas, Ms. Rodriquez. Trust me, charming isn’t an adjective I would apply to them.”
“Firmly enchanting then?” she suggested.
He cleared his throat. “I thought the reaction they produced from our director was interesting. And amusing.”
Ria let her own amusement tug at her lips and wished he would release all that thick, multihued hair from the strip of leather confining it behind his neck.
She wanted to see it flowing around his shoulders, the dark russets, browns and blacks merging together to create a heavy, lionlike mane that made her fingers itch to touch.
Strange, Leo had similar hair and she had never wanted to touch his. Of course, his wife Elizabeth might have cut her hand off if she’d attempted it.
For the most part, Leo used a temporary color on his hair when he was required to be out in public. And like Mercury, he kept it tied back behind his neck.
Leo was considered a rogue, a mercenary and a bastard businessman. But no one had ever breathed the word Breed with his name.
The owner of the multinational Vanderale Industries that his father had left him, Leo Vanderale was a law unto himself. And unto the Breeds that knew him.
“I’ll settle for amusing,” she finally stated.
“You might have to.”
He sat in the corner of the seat, one elbow propped on the padded armrest he had lowered, the other arm braced along the back of the seat.
She glanced to the driver’s section and caught a glimpse of Lawe’s lips twitching as his icy blue eyes flicked to the rearview mirror.
“So, Ms. Rodriquez, what put a burr in the Leo’s tail that he sent you out here only weeks after rushing to his son’s side at the hospital?”
Rather, two months, Ria thought. And unfortunately, if the Leo found out what she was doing and where she was doing it, he was liable to skin her and hang her up to dry. That wasn’t a pleasant thought.
“The Leo is a businessman, Mr. Warrant,” she informed him, following the line Dane had taken. “Sanctuary and its Breeds profit greatly by Vanderale’s largesse. The recent attacks against Sanctuary and the weaknesses within it concern him. Both professionally as well as personally. He would enjoy visiting his son and grandson. He’s spoken of attending when his daughter-in-law gives birth to her second child. He can’t do this as long as there’s a risk of the world discovering who and what he is.”
His lips curled mockingly. The sight of it had her restraining the urge to lick her own lips. Damn him, he made her feel weak-kneed and too much like a woman. She realized that weakness could threaten her job. She was looking for another spy, and the consequences of information possibly leaking out of Sanctuary could destroy the Breed community as a whole. On a different note, allowing herself to get involved with Mercury also had the potential to hurt her personally.
She never got personally involved, she reminded herself. That path led to nothing but disaster, and she really didn’t need more disaster in her life.
“Ms. Rodriquez—”
She invited him to use her name. “Ria please.” Ms. Rodriquez just made her feel old.
“Ria.” His brow arched. “Why do I have a feeling there’s much more to you than meets the eye?”
Her eyes widened as though she couldn’t imagine. Dowdy clothes, no makeup. She did a damned fine job of being the little nobody everyone expected.
“Trust me, Mr. Warrant, what you see is what you get.” She smiled back softly. “Of course, I can be rather ill natured when the situation calls for it. I’m not always nice.”