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The monster he’d become during his last stay in Brandenmore’s research center trusted no one. Never. To trust was to become weak, to chance a mistake that could be stopped, to risk what it had come into being to protect.
A growl rumbled deep and low in his chest, a snarl trembling on his lips. The monster was never far below the flesh, always waiting, taking no chances, ready to spring at a moment’s notice to protect what it claimed.
Taping the bandage into place, he lifted his gaze once again and stared at the face in the monitor.
She was still awake, still staring into the dark, the bitterness and loss she felt still reflected in the deep, golden brown eyes.
He wanted to tell her he was sorry, while he’d been there, and hadn’t been able to. He’d looked into her ey
es and seen the child he’d betrayed with words when he’d severed her belief in his loyalty. He’d wanted to tell her he’d hurt himself far more than he’d ever imagined possible with the words that had flowed from his lips in his attempt to save them both. To save her the pain he could have caused her in accepting that transfusion.
She would want explanations, though, and he couldn’t explain. To even broach why the rage had exploded inside him, why he’d rather have died than take her blood that night, was something he simply couldn’t do. Even for himself. Even at the time he’d not been able to fully understand it.
He’d never been particularly sane, he admitted with a bit of morbid humor. Even at a young age he’d been called feral, untrainable, crazed. That night, the insanity had taken over, leaving him to exist on instinct alone for years.
Until the Council had recaptured him and returned him to the research center. Until the night Dr. Bennett had lifted Graeme’s beating heart from his chest and given the order to find the reason for the odd properties in Graeme’s blood that kept him fighting, that kept him alive.
That night, the monster had leapt forward and there was no ridding himself of it now. He could restrain it now. He could deal with it, live with it. But he’d never be free of it. And over the years, he’d realized he didn’t want to be free of it. The monster had always been a part of him, it had always existed. It only needed the right reason to show itself.
He watched as Cat’s lashes drifted over her eyes, closing slowly as sleep finally came over her.
A second later a single tear rolled from the corner of her eye along the silken flesh of her cheek. Glistening against moonlight-kissed skin, trailing slowly to her upper lip, where it was sleepily brushed away with a muttered little whimper.
A whimper.
Wiping his hand over his face, he forced himself to his feet, ignoring the twinge in his thigh and turning away from the sight of her.
If only fate hadn’t decreed the necessity of Wyatt finding her. If only that bastard Raymond Martinez had known a sliver of loyalty, of honor. If only the Council hadn’t learned she was indeed alive.
The suspected mate of the Bengal that had massacred a lab filled with scientists and soldiers less than twenty-four hours after his third vivisection. Oh yeah, they wanted her, and they wanted her bad. Bad enough that the monster that had slept for a while had awakened once again. And once again, it awoke hungry.
Hungry for blood.
But this time, there was another hunger as well, stronger and far less controllable than it had been when he’d first found her.
That hunger was only growing, while the need for the enemies’ blood was becoming secondary.
The need for her . . .
It had never been secondary.
• CHAPTER 4 •
She was no crazy-ass Bengal Breed’s mate.
Cat still couldn’t believe the insane statement Graeme had made the night before.
She knew what mates were, just as she knew her cousin Isabelle and her friend Honor, who had taken the identity of Liza Johnson twelve years ago, were both mates to Breeds. Isabelle to a quiet, too intense Coyote, and Liza to a huge, dark Wolf Breed. Both women were crazy about their “fiancés” and shared a bond with them that the tigress she was had quietly acknowledged.
The scent of the mating, the physical and emotional needs as well as the bond the couples shared was unmistakable to other Breeds. Some may not have a name to put to it, but the scent of it was a warning to Breeds of the opposite sex, as well as confirmation of a unique, enduring bond.
They loved as well. Even before the mating scent became stronger, deeper, the scent of their emotional bonds had been clear.
She and Graeme had no bonds. What might have grown from those early years, when he’d cared for her in the labs, he’d killed the night he’d vowed to kill her. The night he’d assured her that she’d been nothing but his own personal experiment.
The sheer insanity it had taken to make such a claim almost matched the madness behind the number of cameras he’d placed in the house Reever had offered for her use.
Upstairs, she’d found six, downstairs¸ so far, she’d found four and hadn’t even made it to the kitchen yet. And she had no doubt there were cameras she hadn’t yet found.
