Her throat moved as she swallowed. "You don't mind?"
Bo's lips kicked up. "How could I mind?" She might not be ready to share whatever it was that she held inside, but she'd done nothing to hide its existence. "And security chiefs learn patience. It's a prerequisite for the job."
Crawling up close to him, Kaia undid the buttons of his shirt, then slid her arms around him and cuddled in, the side of her face pressed to his bare skin.
Heart an ache, he wrapped her in his embrace, her hair a warm weight over his skin. "I love your hair." The heaviness of it, its coconut and tropical flower scent, the way it fell down her back in a dark waterfall.
She traced a pattern on his chest with her finger and they sat quietly for long, still minutes while the sea crashed beyond. Nuzzling at her when he heard the distant tread of a boot, he said, "Someone's coming this way."
A soft breath, a puff of warmth. "Will you stay with me tonight?"
"Try to drag me away."
Shifting, they buttoned up enough of his shirt that he was decent, then rose and slipped away into the sleeping city. Kaia knew exactly which rooms they'd been assigned. Bo was glad to see they were side by side.
They went into hers.
As he turned after locking the door, his breath rushed out of him, his knees going week. Kaia had already stripped down to the glowing warmth of her skin, strands of her hair brushing the lush heaviness of her breasts, her nipples dark and the curls between her legs even darker.
Naked, his siren walked to him on silent feet. He stood, her prisoner, while she undid the buttons again and this time, pushed his shirt off his shoulders to crumple onto the floor. Stroking her hands up over his shoulders once more, she pressed herself against him. "Love me, Bowen."
His hands on her hips, he buried his nose in her neck, just breathed her in as he lifted without thought and turned to pin her against the door. She wrapped her legs around his waist, her hands shaping his body, her touch caressing and possessive and a branding.
"I'm yours," he said against her mouth, the wrenching he felt inside him a violent thing, as if part of him wanted to tear away and lay itself at her feet.
"Bowen." Her eyes shimmered.
It was inevitable that he'd kiss her, that he'd surrender to the need. She didn't shy. Arms locked around him, she met him kiss for kiss, a sleek, strong creature who was nothing he'd ever dared dream.
Walking backward away from the door, her body held safe against his, he managed to stumble into the bed. He fell back on it with her on top. She laughed in a sudden delight that eased the knot in his heart, before nipping at his lips and kissing her way down his throat.
Bo managed to kick off his shoes, but it was Kaia's fingers that went to his jeans. "You look uncomfortable," she said with a solemn solicitousness belied by the mischief in her eyes. "I think you'll feel better if I undo this."
Beguiled, enslaved, hers, Bo ran his hand over the smooth skin of her thigh, felt her shiver. "How about you come closer first?"
Abandoning his jeans, she leaned in, her hands braced on his shoulders. When he clasped the back of her neck and held her to him for a kiss followed by a soft bite, she melted voluptuously into his body. He moved his hands down the curves of her in a slow exploration, stopping to caress and squeeze and delicately tease every few inches.
Her breath catching, she sucked soft and wet at his throat before demanding another kiss.
Drunk on her, Bo was more than willing to give Kaia everything she wanted. Her nipples rubbed against his chest, the musk of her arousal rising to scent the air. Groaning, and knowing his control was on a razor-thin edge, he flipped their positions so she was on the bottom. And began to kiss his way down the sweet curves of her body.
"Kaia." It was a song in his heart, her name, her scent, her. "My beautiful Kaia."
He gave himself permission to suck on her nipples, having learned exactly what made her back bow and her skin shimmer. But he couldn't linger today; he wanted to drench her in pleasure, wanted to take a little more of the sorrow from her. Because one thing he knew: his greatest weakness now had human form.
He couldn't bear it when Kaia lost her smile.
The curve of her belly quivered under his kiss, her voice a whisper as she said his name. Determined to drown his lover in erotic sensation before his control went up in flame, he licked his way through her delicate folds, one of his hands on her inner thigh to hold her wide open for him.
Her body arched, her hands pulling on his hair. He felt her muscles clench as she came apart for him, and her trust, it was a gift he'd never take for granted.
It was as he was rising up over her, his need as frantic as hers, that the comm panel on the wall began to buzz in an urgent beat.
Chapter 53
Unusual activity spotted in quadrant delta-4. Going to investigate.
--Call-in by Rina Monaghan, DarkRiver leopards
BO HAD TO force himself from Kaia to answer the comm. He did so audio-only. "Has George been spotted?"
"Long way away," was the answer from a familiar male voice. "We have a jet waiting for you on shore." A slight pause. "I'm going to pretend I didn't have to buzz Kaia's room to get you."
Bo told Armand they'd be there soon, then hung up.
Returning to the bed, he brushed tangled strands of hair off Kaia's face. "We're going to have to finish this another time," he said, though his whole body ached.
Eyes stark, she tugged him down onto her. "We'll be quick."
Bowen didn't argue. He sank into her, she wrapped herself around him, and they shut out the deadly countdown for a fraction of time.
* * *
*
GEORGE had surfaced over four thousand miles from Lantia. It was an almost unimaginable distance for him to have traveled so quickly. He must've surfaced at some point to take a high-speed jet to cross over from the North Atlantic to the Pacific, though no one had spotted him. But even if he was extraordinarily fast and relentless in the ocean, on land, he became a man. And the land was Bo's hunting ground.
"San Francisco?" He couldn't believe it. "Why would he emerge anywhere near allies you might contact to capture him?"
"Because they are allies," Armand said, his hair tumbled by the sea breezes today but his black T-shirt perfectly fitted to his body. "The leopards won't react violently if they spot him--they might give him a pointed warning that he's meant to alert them before entering their territory, but they won't harm him."
Bo nodded, frowning. "Could also be that if he does have a buyer for what he's stolen, he doesn't quite trust that buyer."
"Yeah, cats would step in to help him if he asked for it, or if he appeared in distress." Armand folded his arms. "I know you want to bring him in but we can ask the cats to do it."
Bo went to agree; none of this was about ego. "I'll take whatever help I--"
"No." Kaia stepped forward. "George gets frightened easily and he's already emotionally unstable. He could destroy everything if he's scared or startled." Kaia had scared him once, quite by accident, and the resulting carnage had taken the two of them an intense hour to clean up.
Kaia had never said a word about his lack of control, getting rid of the evidence by throwing it in the kitchen recyclers, and she thought maybe that was why he'd become a touch more comfortable with her--enough to ask for a burger every so often. "All he'd have to do was shift form," she explained to Bowen and Armand. "His tentacles are capable of massive amounts of crush pressure." He'd almost wiped her out with one when he shifted so suddenly that time.
"The DarkRiver leopards are deadly, Kaia." Bowen put his hands on his hips, his eyes wholly focused on her in that way he had of doing. "They can take him."
"But will they try to take him alive if he's hurting their people?" Kaia knew the answer and so did Bowen and Armand. "He's one of ours. We have to give him a chance." George was wounded in some terrible way and Kaia understood wounds, understood that the deepest ones never stopped hurting.
&nbs
p; The ruthless and bloodthirsty leader of the Human Alliance gave her a lopsided smile. "I bet you're going to rescue stray cats and dogs and ferrets and fill our house with them."
"Don't forget the mice," she said, playing the game, imagining the impossible dream.
He tugged lightly on her hair in punishment before turning to Armand--who wasn't doing a very good job of hiding a smirk. "How about asking DarkRiver to keep an eye on George as he moves through their territory? No approach, nothing to tip him off." The leopards were stealthy hunters while George was a scientist out of his depth.
"The commander will have to make the contact--strict protocols." Armand stepped out to find their aunt, who happened to be Lantia's commander even when Malachai and Miane were in residence. Each member of the clan had different duties, different responsibilities.
"Are all your male cousins in BlackSea's security forces?"
Kaia shook her head. "Eddie is an explorer. His job is to update our maps of the ocean floor, find interesting new things for our scientists to study, mark any spots that might provide valuable salvage." She smiled. "He found a centuries-old sunken ship full of gold bullion once. Miane's always said he can take a percentage of what he finds because of how risky his job can be, but he usually never does--that time, though, he brought each one of us a coin."
Bowen's eyes gleamed as men's always did when they found out what Edison did for a living. "He ever find any other treasure?"
"New deep-sea life forms, including a bioluminescent shrimp." Laughing at his face, both parts of her happy to simply be in his presence, she said, "Two of the triplets are in security with Armand, but Taji's an architect."
"He moves like he has training in how to fight."
"He started off in the same job as Teizo and Tevesi--I think it's the first time the triplets have diverged on something that really matters."
Bowen's eyes held hers, a sudden intensity in them. "You want children, Siren?"
Stomach clenching, Kaia dared admit one truth. "Yes. Lots of them."
"Cats are on it." Armand walked back into the room on those words, froze. "New rule. No meaningful looks across the room while I'm in the vicinity. Have some respect for those of us who are hopelessly single."
Grinning at his aggrieved tone, Kaia went over to press a kiss to his modelesque jaw. "Single, yes. Hopelessly? I don't think so." Armand's face would fit perfectly under the dictionary definition of "player." Kaia might've worried about Tansy's heart if her friend hadn't already been well aware of Armand's love-'em-and-leave-'em ways.
Regardless, Kaia had still raised the subject with her friend. She adored both Armand and Tansy too much to see either hurt.
Tansy's answer had been simple. "Sometimes, a woman has to walk on the wild side."
Bowen stirred, his lips curved, as Armand pretended to strangle her with one arm around her neck. "Cats agree to the commander's request?"
Armand gave a short nod. "They'd already spotted him by the time we called and were planning to ask him what the hell he was doing in their territory without notice, but the sentinel the commander spoke to has given the order for their people to fall back."
Running his fingers through the relentlessly straight strands of his hair after releasing Kaia, Armand carried on. "I didn't have Bo's contact details, so the commander gave them yours," he said to Kaia. "DarkRiver will keep an eye on George and send updates directly to your phone." Nothing but grimness on his face as he added, "But if George threatens to hurt anyone, all bets are off. Sentinel was very clear about that."
Bo had expected nothing less. The cats hadn't held their territory against all comers--including the lethal SnowDancer wolves--because they were in any way weak. Bo had made one of the worst mistakes of his life in their territory and he was still fixing the damage from that mess, but he had nothing but respect for both the cats and the wolves.
"According to the cats," Armand added, "George is fully dressed and carrying a large pack."
"He only left the station with a small pressure-proof case." Bo had spoken to Oleanna while waiting for the submersible, gotten the dimensions of the case George had been carrying. "Means he must've cached the other gear elsewhere."
"He's been planning this for a long time." Kaia hugged her arms around herself. "I feel like I never knew him at all, that none of us did."
Closing his hand over her nape, Bo ran his thumb in a gentle, soothing motion across her skin. "We'll find the truth soon enough."
Her pulse jumped erratically under his touch.
"Jetboat's ready," Armand said before Bo could ask Kaia if she was still worrying about Dr. Kahananui. "I sent someone to retrieve your gear." His eyes flicked to Kaia. "You ready, Cookie?"
The question seemed natural enough, but the tone . . . Bo watched Kaia's face as she answered, saw the sudden lack of color in it even as she nodded firmly. The tension beneath the surface, he realized, had nothing to do with Dr. Kahananui. This was Kaia's secret, the shape of which his brain had just barely begun to glimpse.
* * *
*
THE sleek silver boat cut through the water like a knife. There was just enough light in the very early morning sky that Bowen clearly saw an orca rise up in the distance. It dived back in in a smash of droplets.
His heart thudded. "Was that one of you?"
Kaia, her eyes focused resolutely forward and her hands fisted to bone whiteness, nodded.
Closing his arms around her from behind, Bo didn't ask probing questions, didn't demand as was his nature. Kaia had told him she wasn't ready to share her secret and he'd honor that wish, but that didn't mean he had to stop looking after her.
Her spine stayed stiff, but she lifted a hand to wrap it over his wrist, and they sliced through the water together, bodies braced against the rolling waves. Armand was piloting the boat while Teizo and Tevesi had jumped in for the ride. All three kept shooting Kaia careful looks that she studiously ignored.
Land appeared on the horizon.
Chapter 54
What I wish for you, my curious little monkey, is adventure, freedom, love. All these things and more. I want the stars for you.
--Elenise Luna to her daughter, Kaia (3)
NAUSEA THREATENED TO steal Kaia's faltering courage as she stepped out of the boat Armand had coasted all the way to shore. Her boots sank into the sand, the water close enough that she could cling to the illusion that she wasn't leaving the blue.
"You have everything?" her cousin asked, but what he was actually asking was: You really want to do this, Cookie?
She nodded and tightened the straps of the little pack that held two changes of clothing, a few toiletries, and a first-aid kit packed with the anti-anxiety medication Ryujin's healer had prescribed her. "Yes," she said simply, because if she turned back now, she'd never again be able to look at herself in the mirror. "Go."
Bowen took her hand into the rough warmth of his. "I'll take care of her," he said. "I'll bring her home."
Kaia could've told all four males she was quite capable of getting home--that wasn't the problem--but Bowen's words made her cousins' shoulders ease, the strain disappear from their faces, so she left it.
"Good luck," Armand said before the three of them pushed out the lightweight craft, then jumped in and started up the engine.
They headed off into an ocean still shrouded in the dark gray of early morning.
While she stood on land.
Far from the safe cocoon of Ryujin.
Swallowing hard, Kaia looked at Bowen. "Our ride will be waiting."
He nodded but took a moment to touch his fingers to her jaw. "Just hold on to me. Whatever it is that's put that look in your eyes, I'll fight it beside you every step of the way."
Kaia squeezed his hand tight.
He never let go of her as she took another step onto land, then another, and another. The thread that tied her to the ocean stretched tauter and tauter and tauter. Her stomach, it threatened to lurch. And her mind, it wanted to d
rown her in the horror of the last time she'd set foot on land.
It had been beside her parents' dying bodies, Kaia running to the jet-chopper as BlackSea paramedics carried her mother and father to the same gleaming machine while a healer worked frantically on them. Dust had swirled in the air, her hand locked safely in Aunt Geraldine's and her dirty summer dress twisting around her knees.
The medication stopped the nausea from becoming sickening reality, but the healer had been very strict in saying she could only take that medication for just over twenty-four hours before her system would begin to violently reject it. "It's powerful stuff, Kaia." Concern in the soft blue of eyes that had known her since she was an infant. "You shouldn't be using it to suppress your emotional hurt. You have a phobia and you need to work through it with counseling and--"
"I don't have the time." Kaia accepted the truth of the healer's words; she also knew that once Bowen left her, she'd have no more reason to ever again step on land or venture beyond the safe seas around Ryujin and Lantia. "I just need to be able to function until we find George."
Adding to the strain on her already stretched psyche was the countdown that continued to tick in the back of her mind.
Twenty-eight hours.
But though it was his life on the line, Bowen kept on going, his concentration a laser.
So would she, Kaia vowed. Never would she give up. Never would she surrender. And never ever would she permit fear to steal her time with Bowen.
* * *
*
THE BlackSea changeling who waited for them beside a beat-up truck had skin the color of strong black coffee and nearly as many wrinkles as Bebe. He also drove like a bat out of hell, rocketing them down the potholed road that looked as if it had come straight out of the nineteenth century.
A surprisingly gleeful Kaia held on to the side of the open-topped vehicle, while Bowen fought his instinct to reach over and grab the steering wheel. The cool air whipped across his face, the weather here not exactly tropical despite the palm trees zipping past the truck.