Page 157 of Tamed By Her Touch

Behind him, Sendar laughed softly.

“Don’t bother trying to run—the doors will only open for me and I won’t open them until your dear little wifey appears.”

Kaelus turned back toward him, glaring as a red curtain dropped over his vision. Rage rose inside him so quickly it almost frightened him. Perhaps the virus was already beginning its work.

He lunged for the other male, but a blaster suddenly appeared in Sendar’s hand.

“I don’t think so—step back, if you please, Doctor Kaelus,” he said pleasantly.

Kaelus curled his hands into fists.

“You killed your own wife and now you want me to kill mine!” he growled.

Sendar’s expression changed and Kaelus saw not guilt, but smug satisfaction.

“Indeed I did—I don’t deny it. You see, she got into the same records you were perusing just now and made the same conclusions I assume you were making,” he said. “She found out that I was the one who brought the Savage Syndrome virus to the Glenvarren colony.”

“But why?” Kaelus still couldn’t comprehend it. “Why would you do such a thing?”

Sendar shrugged.

“For research, of course. I wanted to see if males as devoted to their mates as Kindred could be turned savage as long as their women weren't drinking the veloria nectar. And guess what—they can. As you will find out firsthand very soon.”

Kaelus felt sick all over again. Sendar’s mate, Galandra had known.

She had discovered what her husband had done, perhaps intending to expose him—and Sendar had murdered her for it. Then he had stood in that ancient containment chamber and spoken of her death as though she had simply slipped beneath the water while he was absent.

“You drowned her,” he growled.

Sendar shrugged.

“I had to—she would have destroyed everything.”

“She was your wife. The woman you were meant to care for and love and protect!” Kaelus said hoarsely.

The other male frowned.

“She was an obstacle—nothing more.”

Kaelus could hardly comprehend his words. On Titus Four, where males dedicated their lives to protecting their wives, Sendar had murdered his own goddess because she had discovered the truth.

And now he intended to turn Kaelus into a weapon against Clair.

As if his thought had given the virus strength, The burning in Kaelus’s neck intensified and heat began spreading downward beneath his skin.

His pulse quickened and his already acute senses sharpened in a way he recognized immediately as abnormal. The lights overhead suddenly seemed painfully bright, and he could hear the faint whisper of air moving through the Archive’s ventilation system. He could smell the sterile crystal surfaces…the ancient, preserved blood samples…Sendar’s sweat…

And beneath it all, faint but unmistakable, lingering on his own clothing from the night before he smelled Clair.

Her scent—sweet, warm, and feminine—filled his senses and his body reacted instantly.

A surge of violent desire slammed through him and his shaft was suddenly throbbing with need.

Kaelus’s stomach dropped—it was beginning. The virus was working on him—soon he would be nothing but a mindless, rutting beast!

Sendar saw his expression and smiled.

“You feel it, don’t you?” he murmured. “You feel the Savage Syndrome taking hold. You feel it changing you.”