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True, he wasn’t the most handsome male she’d ever seen. The aristocracy habitually sent its most beautiful sons to her court in hopes of attracting her eye. Despite the breathtaking power of his body, the shifter’s features were too rough for that kind of perfection. His nose was a bit too flared across the nostrils, his deep-set eyes too feral, his cheekbones not quite knife-edged enough, his chin a little too stubborn.
But it was his mouth that fascinated. His lower lip was full with the promise of lush eroticism, yet his upper lip was thin, with a faint twist that suggested pain and bitterness.
Gold-coin eyes darted up to meet hers. For an instant, they blazed hot with male interest as those beautiful lips curved into a knowing smile. Then he looked away, leaving her heart pounding in desperate lunges as she remembered everything they said about shifters.
She could have him. Have him as she’d not dared to have a man since the regent had ordered her lover’s murder. Six years, she’d lived like a Lady’s nun, not daring to allow so much as a stolen kiss from the beautiful men who surrounded her. Fearing what the regent would do to protect his power and keep the way clear for his son’s claim. Only Gerik had touched her, and his hands had not exactly been welcome.
But she could have this wolf. Buy him. Own him. Take him to her bed.
You’re letting him distract you, her father’s ghost whispered. You’re not buying him for sex. He’s a means to regain our lost honor. That’s all.
Zarifa forced herself to step back. Forced her eyes not to drop to his lengthening cock. “I need a protector. Can you fight?”
White teeth flashed in a hard, reckless smile with just a hint of viciousness. “Yes.”
She flicked a glance at the guards in their gray nanotium armor. “Show me.”
“Now, Lady Selan…” Casus began nervously.
But the shifter was already moving, spinning, one bare heel lashing out to slam into the nearest guard’s armored belly. It must have hurt, but he didn’t even break step, pivoting to ram a fist into the man’s faceplate, following up with a series of furious hammer blows to the ’borg’s head and body. Blood flew in a crimson arc, but it was from the shifter’s own splitting knuckles.
Yet he didn’t seem to feel the pain, his face twisted in an animal snarl as the guard stumbled back from the fury of his attack.
The second cyborg dove at him with a roar. The shifter ducked the charge and danced back, throwing another brutal punch. And then another, and another. More blood flew from his hands.
Zarifa caught her breath. The rage in him, the fury boiling to the surface to spill from his pounding hands and savage kicks—it was as if the Lady herself had given Zarifa’s own frenzied, angry frustration human form.
But human as he was, he couldn’t hurt his guards, could only break himself against their armored bodies.
“Shift!” she snapped, feeling wild and reckless. “Shift now!”
Gold eyes flicked to hers. He bared his teeth.
“No!” the slaver gasped.
But sable fur was already spreading over the shifter’s bare skin, his body bulking even larger, his face lengthening into an elegant muzzle. His ears rose into lupine points as his big hands and feet grew deadly, curved claws. He turned his feral golden eyes on the guards.
“Down!” Casus roared.
The shifter roared in agony and dropped to the ground as if he’d been shot. The fur melted away as his body returned to human form, writhing and kicking in anguish.
Zarifa knew exactly how that felt. The pain. The helpless, searing rage. The black shame of being a puppet to callous men.
Her gaze shot to the slaver, who wore a smile of grim satisfaction now. “I told you what would happen, Mad Dog,” Casus spat. “I warned you.”
The next thing Zarifa knew, her sword was in her hand and pressed hard to the slaver’s throat. A tide of red washed over her vision. It seemed she could almost see the slaver’s blood streaming under her blade. Casus’s thin lips pulled into an O of terror.
She bared her teeth. “Let. Him. Go.”
TWO
Rance peered through the fog of pain to see the woman’s sword digging into Casus’s neck. “Stop torturing him,” she growled. “Now.”
An aristo was defending him?
The slaver’s hand jerked, ready to drop the stiletto he wore in a wrist sheath down into his palm. Rance prepared to drive a kick into the man’s groin, knowing even as he did that he’d pay for it.
“Draw on me and die,” she snarled, angling the sword upward to press it deeper into the skin. A bead of bright blood rolled down Casus’s throat. The man’s hand fell limp at his side.
