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“Have your hormonal levels been tested while it’s strongest?” Charity asked her, wincing as Hope checked the tender pads of her feet. “My own tests showed increased hormone levels during ovulation. The scientists later found a slight genetic alteration in the cell structure of the ovaries. Their tests began there. With each successive hormonal treatment I was given, the cell structure has changed further, coming closer to a match with the Wolf Breed sperm. Have you been tested for any of these changes?”
The unique DNA coding of the male Breed ruled out breeding with either Breed, or non-Breed females. Yet the scientists were finding a way to break through this barrier.
“No. ” Hope shook her head slowly. “Wolfe banned any such testing, and honestly, we didn’t see the need. ”
“Hope, that can’t continue. ” Charity frowned fiercely. “Listen to me, your body is changing. Slowly. Evolving to match Wolfe’s enough to breed. This has to be watched carefully. It affects any woman that would mate with a Breed male. The answer to this is in the blood. The anomaly in the Breed blood cells is like a virus to the right woman, if the chemistry is compatible. It then infects the ovaries and the egg, making conception possible with the compatible sperm. ”
“Why would the scientists try to advance this? Or nature?” Shock filled Hope’s expression as she stared up at her in concern. “The original object was to prevent breeding. ”
Charity took a deep breath, trying to tamp back her own fears. “They want the children, Hope, to experiment on. Animals whose organs will come closer to matching human requirements. Disposable creations for experimentation. They haven’t stopped. They will never stop. And no one, not Breed, nor mate nor child will ever be safe from them. Their super Army didn’t come to fruition, so they’ve changed direction now. A direction that could become more dangerous than their original plans. As for nature…”
She took a deep, trembling breath. “I don’t know why, but I know the evolution began in me, afterI the night I swallowed Aiden’s semen. It’s similar to a virus at the cellular level. It’s so complicated even the Council scientists have been unable to figure it out completely. But it begins a slow evolution that I believe will result in conception. As though nature itself has decided that the species will survive. ”
She watched as Hope’s face paled. “Did you tell Aiden this?” she whispered desperately. “Does he know?”
Charity shook her head. “Keegan knew. I assumed he had found time to talk to Wolfe. ”
Hope shook her head imperatively. “Keegan hasn’t said anything, Charity. Nothing. The Winged Breeds disappeared within hours of their rescue. No one has seen them. ”
No one?Keegan held the answers, the key to all this. He had told her, right before the attack on the mountain, that he had figured it out. That he knew what the scientists were doing, and how nature would eventually fight back. He had kept her sane those last days as he connected with her, explaining what her body was doing, and why. He wouldn’t just leave.
“No. ” Charity blinked at her in surprise. “Keegan wouldn’t do that. He knows the experiments. He knows what they were doing, step by step, even when I didn’t. Hope, Keegan is incredibly psychic, with a photographic memory. He was connected to me during those experiments. He knows everything, every last detail, he wouldn’t just leave. ”
Hope stood to her feet
, the first aid kit and Charity’s raw feet forgotten as she panted for breath. “I have to find Wolfe. This is worse than any of us believed. ”
She rushed from the house, the door slamming behind her as Charity covered her face with her hands before pushing her fingers through her hair with weary frustration.
“Where are you, Keegan?” she bit out furiously, rubbing her temples, fighting for the connection he had often kept with her. Unable to believe he would just disappear, just leave. “Damn you, why the hell did you run?”
The mental connection she had once shared with him was absent, though. She felt only silence, only a bleak desertion by the man she had thought was a friend.
It made no sense. Keegan wasn’t the type to just drop a responsibility he had taken on. He knew he would be needed. Knew Charity would need the information he had gathered as he shared those experiments with her telepathically. It was the reason she had allowed him to set up the link in the first place.
Frowning, she fought to re-establish the connection then sighed in bleak resignation. Keegan had always come to her. She had never had to call out to him, to try to find him; he had just been there. A presence she had been able to feel whenever she needed to maintain control, or when the pain became too blinding to focus forherself .
And now he was just gone. Her eyes narrowed. What was he up to? She knew he was calculating, secretive. He wouldn’t have left in such a way unless there had been a reason for it. Unless the danger was increased somehow by his presence. She bit her lip thoughtfully. He was up to something. She could feel it. She knew him well enough to know how he plotted, planned. Now, she just had to figure out what he was up to, and why.
Chapter Eleven
Aiden stood quietly behind the chair Wolfe sat in, while Jacob stood more to his side. His pistol was strapped to his thigh, along the wall behind him a rack of automatic weapons were held, ready for use. As the leader of the controversial Wolf Breed Packs, protecting his life could sometimes become a job in itself. At the moment, the room held not just Wolfe and his mate, but Jacob and his as well. Other than Charity, these two women were the only known mated females. That they were also the mates to the head of the Packs made them even more important.
The news that Hope had brought to Wolfe earlier was already beginning to cause a stir in the small Breed compound. Gathered in the room were the Leaders of the four packs who had pledged their loyalty to Wolfe and to the newly formed Breed Alliance. They all listened with bated breath as Hope explained Charity’s information. Information she had not given him, but had given to another instead.
Information he would have much preferred that she keep to herself for a bit longer.
“To verify this, I’d have to run my own tests. ” Dr. Armani was thoughtful as she watched Wolfe.
“There’s no way I will consider accepting this information on hear-say alone. ” She glanced at Hope apologetically. “Charity’s blood tests alone tell me it’s possible, but I refuse to go in blind. ”
“Charity is already pumped full of the drugs, she would be perfect…” Hope began.
“No. ” Aiden’s head rose in shock and anger as Hope voiced the thought. He speared her with a dark glance, his jaw clenching tightly as he fought to control the instinctive anger. More experiments? The pain he had watched ravage Charity’s body, even while unconscious, had nearly destroyed him. He wouldn’t consider such an action.
“Aiden, hear her out,” Wolfe said quietly.
Aiden growled, for the first time that he could remember, so opposed to his leader that he feared his own reactions.
