She knew what was coming. Natalie was no virgin to be seduced, so she knew where he was headed, and she knew the worst thing she could do was let him actually get his hand in her pants. She would be lost. Any more pleasure, and she would never tear free of him. He would try to own her, control her. She whimpered at the thought and fought for the strength to pull free, to drag his lips from her breast, to pull free of the hand moving closer, closer to the saturated flesh beneath her panties. It was hard to tear him away though when her hands were tangled in his hair and trying to pull him into her flesh. When her thighs were sprawled open, her hips arching, her desperate mewls urging him on.
She sounded like a cat in heat, which might be fitting, considering what he had told her, and when his fingers met the humid, blistering need spilling from her pu**y, she knew she was lost. Natalie’s hips arched, a cry tore from her throat, and rich, sweet, overwhelming lust spilled from his kiss as he took her lips once again.
“I thought she said she was going to kill him. Are you sure you didn’t get that message mixed up, Callan?”
THREE
I t was a science fiction nightmare, and Natalie was caught in the middle of it. The director of the Bureau of Breed Affairs, Jonas Wyatt, and the pride leader of the Breed Ruling Cabinet hadn’t come to whisk their irritating Breed back to Sanctuary. To the contrary. They had brought the heli-jet and whisked Saban as well as her back to the estate and far belowground, where the Breed laboratories were now set up.
It was definitely a nightmare. Hours of tests, drawing blood, examinations that shouldn’t have been so uncomfortable, and questions so damned personal Natalie kept blushing. The explanations were even worse than the examinations and the questions, though. The explanations were nearly more than her mind could comprehend.
Natalie liked to think she was a fairly intelligent person. She was always open to the paranormal; she questioned everything that confused her and tried to understand. She even believed in psychics and reincarnation for pity’s sake. But this?
A pheromonal, biological, chemically based reaction that resulted in the swelling of tiny, normally hidden glands beneath the Breed’s tongue. Those glands then filled with a hormonal aphrodisiac, addictive and potent, ensuring that those affected actually had sex.
When Natalie asked if there was a cure, Elyiana’s only answer was that they were working on it. Does it go away? They were working on it.
They were working on it. The day was over and edging into night when the doctor was finally finished with her, and she knew no more then than she did when she arrived, but she was fairly certain there was a truckload of information they weren’t giving her.
By the time the heli-jet landed in the wide side yard beside her house and she and Saban were reentering her house, she was angrier than she had been when she first called Callan Lyons. Fat lot of help he had been. He and Wyatt both refused emphatically to change her bodyguard, and they refused to keep Saban away from her long enough for her to understand what the hell was going wrong with her own body.
And it was wrong. It had perspiration beading on her forehead, her womb clenching, and the aches at her clit and in the hidden depths of her vagina were nearly too much to bear. She felt off center, uncertain, and scared.
In her life there had been few times she had actually been frightened, but she admitted that she was
definitely scared now. She was tied, bound to a man that she was certain she might not even like. Well, she didn’t actually dislike him, she thought as she stood back voluntarily and let him open the house, let him smell the air then step inside to be certain it was safe while checking the security system wired into it.
“It’s safe, cher .” His voice was gentle, patient, as he returned to the door.
“Someone could have shot me from the road while you were checking the place out,” she informed him, her voice so brittle she nearly winced as he closed the door behind her and locked it.
“The chances were slimmer. My senses are degraded a bit tonight; I wanted to be certain you weren’t walking into an ambush before you came in. The sensors on the heli-jet would have detected weapons in the area or hidden assassins.”
She shook her head. She didn’t want to talk about the heli-jet.
“I’m going to take a shower and go to bed.” She turned away from him and headed for the stairs.
“Cold water won’t help the heat. You won’t be able to sleep through it; you won’t be able to make sense of it or to apply logic to it. But we could discuss it.”
She turned back to him, her jaw clenching as she fought the emotions rising inside her. Damn him, as frustrating as he was, she did like him despite her reluctance to admit it. She had liked him playful, she had liked him teasing, but this part of him, the part she had sensed he was hiding, this she doubted she would like.
He stared back at her, calm, self-possessed, determined. That determination was like a silhouette over his entire body, a shadow he could never escape.
Fortunately, he wasn’t ordering her to discuss it. It was the only thing saving his life at the moment. Natalie met Saban’s eyes. Just for a second, she had been scared to do that, afraid of the satisfaction, the triumph she would have glimpsed there. There was none. Those dark eyes were somber, brooding. And she thought, for a second, she might have glimpsed regret.
“And what would we discuss that I haven’t already learned?” She kept her voice low, though she knew the fear inside her was throbbing through it.
Breeds were amazingly perceptive. Hiding emotions from them just didn’t work. He breathed out deeply before raking his fingers through his hair and stepping one step closer toward her.
“I endured the tests today as well,” he said.
Natalie flinched, those tests had been more than uncomfortable; they had bordered on too painful.
“The heat has advanced further inside me, the hormone building in it.” He came closer. One step.
“Weeks, from the moment I first saw you, I knew what you would be to me. Each day that the heat builds inside, the harder it is to endure another’s touch, no matter male or female, until the effects of the heat begin to ease. My flesh is sensitive, my distaste at another woman’s touch nearly violent.”
Natalie jerked her gaze from his and stared over his shoulder, fighting the tightening of her throat, the tears that wanted to rise.
“Natalie,” he drew the sound of her name out, as though he were relishing each syllable. “I can cook. The steaks are in the freezer. Let me care for you this evening and answer your questions.”