Matthias knew what mating heat was, just as he knew that Grace was his mate. The glands beneath his tongue had been sensitive for weeks, and he could feel them becoming swollen tonight. Those glands were filling with a mating aphrodisiac, a hormone that would push sensuality, sexuality, into the bounds of extremity.
It would affect Grace worse than it would affect him. She would be unable to deny her natural response to him, unable to hide from it. She would be as helpless within it as he would be once he began touching her.
The fine, almost imperceptible little hairs along his body were prickling with another hormone, one more subtle, but no less intense. His c**k was rock hard. His balls were drawn tight. And he had learned in the past week that jacking off only made it worse. There would be no satisfaction until he found his release within the snug depths of Grace's body.
And there the problems would truly begin. If what Wolfe, Jacob, and Aiden had explained to their enforcers months ago were true, then during his mating with Grace, he would become more of an animal than he could have ever imagined.
Even now, as his fingers lingered on the flesh of her knee, he found a pleasure in that small touch that he had never known before. Even in the midst of the most sexual acts he had performed during his sexual training in the labs, he hadn't felt such pleasure as he did now in simply touching. He was one of the younger Breeds. Barely thirty, but he hadn't escaped that phase of training. Not that the scientists had included sexual training for any pleasurable benefits. As in everything else, even that phase of training had held more sinister purposes.
When entranced by their lover, a man or a woman could be convinced to trade their soul for the love of the one capable of giving them such extreme pleasure. Powerful figures could be blackmailed, the sons and daughters of such figures could be used for information. Wives could be seduced, husbands could be tempted. It was all the same to the council. Every weakness could be exploited.
In the years since his release, Matthias had never used the talent he had found to please a woman, to betray one. Until Grace, he had refused to involve any woman in the dangerous, bloody life he led. He was an assassin. The council had taught him how to be an assassin. He carried the scars from his failed attempts during training, and he carried the marks of his successes since his escape. He didn't kill for money, and he didn't kill from hatred or greed. He killed for mercy. He killed to make the world a safer place, not just for his own species, but for the non-Breeds as well. Council members, scientists, trainers, and soldiers many had been released once they were revealed. If they were smart, they lived the rest of their lives without picking up their old ties. If they weren't, then Matthias or one of his kind made house calls. And there were many who eagerly, if more secretly, renewed those old ties.
He had gotten lucky with Albrecht, though. He was impossible to forget. And Matthias just happened to have been at the right place at the right time, before the Breed rescues ten years before. He had seen Albrecht with several scientists, heard the scientists refer to him as "director." Only council members were given that distinction.
Matthias had remembered, and he had given the bastard a chance. A chance Albrecht had deliberately ignored. The proof of that was in the bloody, broken bodies of the mated Breed pairs he had managed to capture over the past years. Young Breeds, independent. Rather than seeking the Wolf or Lion Breed compounds when mating heat overtook them, they had tried to figure it out on their own. And they had died in the effort.
The horrifying evidence that Albrecht was once again experimenting with Breeds was too much to ignore, and Matthias had been called in.
He had used Grace to make his house call, and gaining her forgiveness wouldn't be easy.
"Where are we?" She finally asked wearily, staring up at the ceiling of the SUV, trying to hide her response to his touch.
"We're about two hours from your cabin," he told her softly, enjoying the feel of her satiny knee and the flesh in the curve of her leg against his fingertips.
"You researched me well then," she said, fighting to control her breathing. The scent of her arousal was growing. The glands in his tongue were thickening. He should stop touching her, he should place both hands on the steering wheel and concentrate on driving the vehicle rather than driving them both crazy with lust.
"I researched you for months," he admitted. "I followed you at night when you jogged and tracked your movements otherwise. You were under surveillance for nearly six months." He hurt her. He could smell the scent of her inner pain, and he hated it.
"Why did you choose me? Why not the head of security? Or the head manager? Why a lowly assistant manager with limited power?"
He snorted at that. "You mean the lazy manager who has shifted all the work, responsibility, and information to your shoulders, while claiming the fruits of your labor?" He asked. "I didn't have to smell the laziness on that woman to know the truth of her. All I had to do was read the file that had been prepared on her."
"How did you know Albrecht would be here during the security upgrade?"
"I have my sources." He shrugged.
"How many of you are working together?"
Matthias flashed her a grin. "How many of us did you see?"
"You had help," she bit out. "How else did you manage to get my luggage or have my car moved? You couldn't have done this alone."
"I kill alone and this is all that matters." He wouldn't tell her different. There was always a chance she wasn't the person he thought she was, and he didn't dare betray the others. "Stop asking me questions, Grace. We'll talk when we get to the cabin."
"Stop touching me then. And I swear to God, if your fingers go any higher, the first chance I get I'm cutting them off your hand."
His hand had slid higher, inches above her knee, and despite the vehemence of her order, she was enjoying it. The smell of her arousal was now covering that of her fear. The air around him was indolent with the scent of a wicked storm. He could feel the wild pulse of her blood beneath her flesh, and he knew it matched his own.
"I've been dying to touch you, Grace," he finally admitted. "Holding back these past weeks has been hell on my control."
"Well isn't that just too damned bad," she snapped, though he could hear the breathlessness, the hunger inside her. "Because you don't have a chance in hell now. Unless it's rape you're after, big boy, you f**ked up when you pulled that trigger. I wouldn't sleep with you now if all that mating heat crap the tabloids printed were true."