“She’s attending a party for Reynolds, that bastard Bengal. I want her dead before sunrise.” The words choked him. “Mercifully, Chaz, if you please.”
Chaz tilted his head in agreement. “I wouldn’t hurt her, Cyrus,” he promised softly. “I’ll take care of her.”
And Chaz would. He felt affection for Scheme, Cyrus knew that. But unlike Scheme, Chaz understood the future and what they were working toward.
“Do you think allowing her to keep the child would have prevented this?”
That question often haunted him.
“I doubt it, Cyrus. She was working her way toward this since the day her mother died. She’s always known you killed her, despite your story. You would have just had to kill a grandchild later.”
Yes. Cyrus nodded at the assassin’s words. As he had killed his wife, now he was forced to take the life of his child. He couldn’t have borne doing the same to a grandchild he had helped raise.
“Very well.” He nodded, setting the picture back in its place. “I trust you to take care of it then.”
Cyrus rose to his feet, only to pause before turning.
“I couldn’t have murdered my child, Cyrus,” he said. “I would have killed you over a kid, had it been born. You made the right decision. That child would have made us both weak.”
Yes, it would have. Weaker than Scheme had managed to make them. He nodded again. “Mercifully, Chaz. Gently.”
Regret flickered in the younger man’s gaze before he turned and headed to the door. Chaz, like himself, would regret the loss, but he would carry through.
“Good-bye, Princess,” he whispered, his finger reaching out to caress her face in the picture as another tear slipped down his cheek. “I’m sorry.”
CHAPTER 1
She was the epitome of grace, mystery and beauty. Tanner Reynolds watched as Scheme Tallant skirted around the edges of the room, chatting here and there, that cool smile tempting him, challenging him.
He should have ordered her death the moment he learned she had accepted the invitation to the party. But something stopped him. Something always stopped him. Not for the first time where she was concerned, his lust was guiding his actions.
She was General Cyrus Tallant’s daughter. The seed of evil itself. Cyrus Tallant had headed the training program for the Breeds until their rescues ten years before. Manipulative, destructive, he had managed to cover his ass and make certain there was no true proof of the position he had held, but Tanner and the Breeds he had followed out of the labs in New Mexico years ago had known the dark malevolence that infected him.
And it infected his daughter. She worked with him, worked for him. She had signed the orders for Breed deaths and she had destroyed vital information to cover the tracks of the Genetics Council.
They had managed to have dozens of Council members indicted, but the head of the beast was still intact. The twelve-member inner Council head had yet to be penetrated. Until they were destroyed, there would be no peace for the Breeds.
If they could take Cyrus Tallant out, then the head Council would be seriously compromised. Scheme Tallant was her father’s weakness. Unfortunately, no one had been able to get her to talk.
Tanner was certain he could.
A smile curled his lips, one he was certain was filled with lust and anticipation. Tonight. He was going to take her tonight. Jonas Wyatt, the director of Breed affairs, was out of town; he couldn’t veto the mission. And when it was over, Tanner swore he would have the information he needed. Or Scheme Tallant would be dead.
He was sick of Jonas standing between him and the woman. As director of Breed affairs, Jonas had ordered Tanner to wait. To see what happened. To give Tallant a chance to mess up.
Tallant wasn’t going to mess up. He wasn’t going to make a mistake. And neither was his daughter. And Tanner was tired of waiting.
Tonight, he was going to take her. Her father would guess who had her, but he would never have proof. And Tanner knew how to hide her. He could hide her where no man or Breed would ever find her.
It was time to make Scheme Tallant pay for her part in the orders that had sent countless Breeds to their deaths. It was time to take the gloves off and get the information they needed. Not just against her father, but the identity of the spy in Sanctuary and locations of the purist and supremist factions moving closer by the day to penetrating the defenses the Breed compound had managed to put in place.
It was time to fight back.
The golden boy of the Breed society was in attendance and being fawned over and loved by all. Tanner Reynolds. Playboy, PR genius and possibly her executioner if he managed to actually get his hands on her in a dark alley.
She had come to the party to find safety. To find the Breed she had been working with for the past eight years. And he wasn’t here. He wasn’t, but many others were.
Scheme moved slowly about the room, tracking the Breeds present, placing names with the files she had studied over the years. Cabal St. Laurents, Tanner’s genetic twin, wasn’t present, though that wasn’t unusual. He rarely attended the parties.
None of the married Breed couples were present, though Scheme knew they had been invited. There were several enforcers dressed in their black Breed uniforms, the insignia of each particular Breed’s DNA stamped on the uniform’s shoulder. There were many lions, a few panthers, she was certain she had glimpsed a cougar earlier, but no Bengals.
The only Bengal in the room was Tanner, and he wasn’t an enforcer. At least, not that the Bureau of Breed Affairs admitted. But Scheme knew better. She knew the vicious retribution he could mete out when the situation warranted it. Hadn’t she once died after destroying the evidence of his vengeance? That thought had a mocking smile dragging at her lips. Being a double agent for the Breeds could be hazardous to one’s health. Especially when the only Breed aware of her status as a double agent seemed to be MIA at the moment.
Carefully, she made her way around the ballroom. There were at least two dozen Breeds present. But the one she was searching for hadn’t attended. Jonas Wyatt was noticeably absent from this event. Which was rare. Too rare.
Sipping at her champagne, Scheme skirted the edges of the room, heading for the patio doors and the gardens beyond. Escaping the stifling atmosphere of the party filled with suspicious gazes was imperative. Almost as imperative as finding Wyatt. Damn, he was supposed to have been here.
Lifting the skirt of her blazing scarlet evening gown, Scheme stepped from the marble patio, following the stone path that led into the dimly lit gardens. It wasn’t the safest place for her to be, not with the number of Breeds milling around, but she needed the silence, needed to weigh her options now that her main objective had made himself scarce.