They"d both changed into wolf form by the time the kids ambled back. Maria, too, had shifted. She was a frisky little wolf, pretty and dainty, even in her animal form. Andrew thought she was sweet enough, but she wasn"t the woman he wanted. That woman was an elegant, long-legged wolf with fur of a rich dark gray, and a distinctly haughty look in her golden eyes when she strolled up to stand beside Hawke.
He wanted to bite her.
Maria nipped his flank instead.
I am so going to kill Hawke for this.
CHAPTER 16.
The juveniles were exhausted that night, crawling into their sleeping bags as soon as darkness fell, but they"d dragged those bags outside, so they could sit and listen to the older members of the pack talk. A few had chosen to remain in wolf form, sitting curled up close to the laz-fire, a portable heating device that gave an excellent approximation of flames but with zero chance of creating a forest fire.
As Andrew watched from his spot on a log opposite Hawke and Indigo, his lieutenant-and yeah, he was discovering quick-fast that he was a possessive b.a.s.t.a.r.d-showed their alpha the little metal ball Silvia had discovered. Hawke played the object over his hand after sniffing at it to see if the wolf"s nose could tell him anything. "We"ll see what Bren and the other techs can do with this," he said. "I don"t like anyone putting their s.h.i.t on our land-Council or conglomerate."
Maria nudged Andrew with her elbow when Hawke and Indigo fell to discussing what adjustments they"d have to make to the watch patrols to free up soldiers for this area.
"Are you off shift next weekend?" she whispered, her breast soft and warm against his upper arm as she snuggled closer. "I have tickets to a new show. It"s got really great reviews."
Andrew kept his arms hanging over his knees, his fingers loosely intertwined. "I thought you were seeing Kieran." He"d noticed-and been grateful-that she"d stopped throwing lures his way after hooking up with the boy.
A sniff, firelight glinting off the soft ebony of her curls as she ducked her head. "Yesterday"s news."
Andrew"s wolf stilled at the deep hurt he sensed beneath the blazing heat of her sensuality. "Come for a walk," he said, knowing she"d never open up within earshot of the others.
She agreed with alacrity. He wondered if Indigo even noticed their departure, she was so deep in conversation with Hawke-and that was one h.e.l.l of a punch to the ego. But he kept that to himself as he led Maria away from the campsite and toward a more private spot, because if security was part of Indigo"s mandate in the pack, this was part of his-looking after those who might not trust their pain to anyone else.
Maria slid her hand over his abdomen as soon as they hit the darkness of the trees, her goal the waistband of his jeans. "Soooooo . . ."
Fully in control, he gripped her wrist, squeezed. "Hush." Then, fingers locked around her wrist, he continued to lead them through the winter green firs.
Maria didn"t resist either his hold or his order, and that was a clear indication that his hunch was right. Young predatory changeling females weren"t at all shy about going after what they wanted, and Andrew had never before been able to discourage her so quickly. Bringing them to a flat glacial rock, he took a seat, tugging her up to sit beside him. "So, he broke your heart, huh?"
"Who?" She wrenched away her hand. "I thought you were bringing me out here to do something interesting, not talk about old rubbish."
"Maria." Reaching out, he did hug her then, rubbing his chin over the softness of those pretty curls. "Talk to me, sweetheart. You know you can."
Another sniff, this one distinctly wetter. "All the girls warned me about him, but I didn"t listen. I thought I could tame him. How stupid!"
Andrew cuddled her closer, until she was almost in his lap. "Tell me."
And she did, pouring out her heart. Kieran, for all his humanity-having been adopted into SnowDancer-was more of a wolf on the prowl than most, leaving a trail of broken hearts in his wake. Maria, Andrew thought, wasn"t the first casualty, nor would she be the last. Her heart would heal, but he sympathized with the burning hurt of the fresh bruise-he knew better than most how badly the heart could ache when the one you wanted didn"t want you back.
Indigo had been a warm, luscious presence beside him all night long, her legs tangled with his, smooth against his rougher skin, but he didn"t make the mistake of thinking she"d changed her mind about his suitability as a lover. Still, she"d responded to him in a s.e.xual way more than once since they"d hit the mountains, the scent of her desire a taunting perfume.
It had taken everything he had not to stroke his fingers up to cup her breast last night after she kissed him, to nuzzle his way down and lap up the warm, erotic scent at the juncture of her thighs, to pleasure her with his mouth and his hands, to adore her in the most rawly s.e.xual of ways.
He"d almost snapped when he"d realized she was fighting against her own body"s needs once again. Sometimes he wanted to shake Indigo, make her see sense. After the arousal he"d scented, he now knew he could seduce her by stoking up the embers of her pa.s.sion until her wolf-sensual, tactile, with far fewer concerns than the human-pushed her into his arms.
But of course, it wasn"t that simple.
Feeling Maria rub her damp cheek against his chest, he pulled his attention back to the present, running his hand over and along her back until she quieted down. "Kieran"s an idiot," he murmured, continuing to pet her with the undemanding caresses of a packmate. "When you grow up a little more and become the woman you"re going to be, he"s going to kick himself. And you can rub his face in it."
Maria gave him a shaky smile, dark eyes near black even to his night vision. "You know how to stroke a woman"s ego."
Using his thumbs, he wiped away the remnants of her tears. "It"s easy with someone like you." Too bad he was stuck on a woman who might just drive them both to insanity with her refusal to even admit the possibility that there might be something between them.
Indigo found herself alone half an hour after Drew left with Maria clinging to him like kudzu. No guesses as to what the two of them were doing, though thankfully, they"d gone far enough out of range that she couldn"t hear or scent their bodies. As for Hawke, he"d noticed that four of the juveniles weren"t as exhausted as their peers and had rounded them up for an exploration of the night-swathed forest.
The eight Hawke had left behind were all lost in deep sleep, their faces-no matter the form they"d chosen-content. Only Indigo remained awake by the fire, her spine stiff, her wolf snarling inside her mind as she stared at the spot where Drew had disappeared into the dark, his arm curled around Maria"s shapely form.
Her eyes shifted without conscious control, until she saw everything with the wolf"s piercing night vision. Furious with her lack of control, she went to the tent-to be confronted by Drew"s sleeping bag. He wasn"t likely to come back here, and even if he did, she sure as h.e.l.l did not intend to sleep next to a male who stank of another woman. Decision made, she rolled up his bag and put both it and his pack in a neat pile against a tree a small distance away, where he couldn"t miss it.
Just being a good packmate, she told herself. It had nothing to do with the fact that an odd kind of anger was boiling through her system. She didn"t want to sleep with Drew. Okay, yes, she did, but she wasn"t going to do it, so she had no reason to be so savagely angry that he"d gone off with another female. There was nothing worse than a woman who played dog in the manger-it would be the worst kind of hypocrisy on her part.
Her mind snapshotted to an image of Drew"s naked body as he dropped the towel the night of the storm, his muscled flesh inviting touch. Maria was probably in raptures-Enough.
Stripping off her clothes, she pulled on a large tee over her panties and slipped in between the unzipped halves of her sleeping bag. She"d ended up kicking off the top half last night, not needing it given the blazing heat of Drew"s body. His heartbeat had been a slow, steady rhythm behind her, his breath warm against her temple. Sometime in the night, he"d spread his hand out over her abdomen and intertwined his legs with her own, the hairs on his thighs rubbing rough and sensuous against her skin. It hadn"t only been comforting to sleep like two tangled pups, it had been . . . more.
Gritting her teeth against the heavy impression of memory, she closed her eyes. Sleep continued to evade her like the most frustrating prey . . . and she was wide awake when she scented two familiar forms coming back to camp. Her hand fisted and she set her jaw, determined not to take a deeper breath, to peel apart the scents in a search for the musky taste of s.e.x.
"Looks like everyone"s asleep." A feminine whisper.
A pause and though Indigo knew it was impossible, she could"ve sworn Drew"s eyes were drilling into her skull. "You better get some rest, too."
Sounds, skin meeting. A kiss? "Good night, Drew. That was really nice . . . thank you."
Nice? Not exactly a ringing endors.e.m.e.nt. She hoped that burned Drew"s ego.
The next sounds were of Maria moving about, heading to her tent. Drew"s heavier tread didn"t follow. Instead, Indigo felt him go to his pack . . . and then more quiet, determined sounds-fabric being unrolled, boots being unlaced and dropped to the ground.
Unable to resist, she opened her eyes and twisted toward where she"d left his gear-to find him stripping off his T-shirt and throwing it on his pack in a way that shouted temper. His sleeping bag lay open beside him. She should"ve closed her eyes and gone back to sleep, but her wolf"s edgy temper prodded her to get up and confront him. "What are you doing?" she asked in an almost subvocal tone, not wanting Maria to hear. The kids were too tired to wake.
Cool blue eyes met hers. "Going to sleep."
The cutting bite of his response took her aback for a second-she"d never really seen Drew angry before. "I thought you"d be sharing with Maria."
"Is that what you think of me?" he asked with a frost in his tone that made her want to wrap her arms around herself. "That I"d take advantage of a girl who"s just had her heart broken?"
"I-what?" She was a good lieutenant, but she hadn"t seen anything in Maria"s behavior to betray that kind of hurt. "Who?"
"Doesn"t matter. She"ll be fine." His hands went to the top b.u.t.ton of his jeans and he flicked it open. "Might as well shift," he muttered, not undoing the zipper. "Since it smells like rain, I don"t think I"ll be getting much sleep tonight if I stay in human form."
The way he said that, the way he looked at her, rubbed her temper raw. "Fine, I misread the situation." She folded her arms, curving her hands into fists. "You"re welcome to-"
"No, thanks." He put his own hands on his hips, his chest a muscled plane only inches from her. "I think I prefer a little rain to being frozen out by Lieutenant Indigo Riviere for daring to ask her to step outside of her safe little worldview."
She saw red. "What"s that supposed to mean?" It was sheer breath-stealing fury that kept her tone low.
"How about I ask a question instead?" Closing the distance between them until they stood toe to toe, the heat of his body a silent challenge, he said, "Why are you out here, sniping at me?"
"I do not "snipe."" Her wolf growled.
"Yeah, sure sounds like you"re being snippy to me." And then the d.a.m.n male did that thing he did-he kissed her. As if he had every right to just take her mouth with the wild heat of his, to cup the back of her head, to bite down on her lower lip and suck her upper one into his mouth.
Her toes curled, the rage in her bloodstream translating into pure wild heat as the touch-hungry wolf took control. She hadn"t even realized she"d unfolded her arms until her palms met the hard wall of his chest. Hot. Strong. Beautiful. Overwhelmed by the sudden blaze of the s.e.xual inferno, Indigo wanted to push him to the ground, claim every solid male inch with her mouth, her hands, and finally, her s.e.x. The hunger was a fever inside, a spiking, thudding pulse.
"d.a.m.n." Drew lifted his head, his chest heaving. "I can scent Hawke and the others."
The words poured cold water on the flames of pa.s.sion. She realized she still had her hands on his body, the fingers of one curved slightly into his flesh, as if she wanted to p.r.i.c.k at him with her claws-as if she was in heat. Shoving away, she stumbled a little. "You lied," she said, taking out her own stunned confusion on him. "All that bulls.h.i.t about everything being back to normal."
"So did you." His eyes gleamed, hard and bright. "You want me, and if you"d stop f.u.c.king lying to yourself for one second, you"d realize we could have something good."
Her wolf, no longer caught in the s.e.xual inferno, snarled at the challenge, at the arrogance of this male who thought he could bring her to heel. "Don"t kid yourself. Yeah, you can kiss-but I need a little more in my man." Harsh, angry words, torn from the part of her that hated how he"d made her feel earlier when he"d gone off with Maria-so vulnerable, so weak. She was never weak. She refused to allow it. "I might play with boys, but I don"t keep them."
Drew flinched, and she knew she"d drawn blood. Somehow, it didn"t feel as good as it should have. But she couldn"t bring herself to take it back, too proud, too confused, too f.u.c.king scared of what Drew was asking from her. She knew how it would end. She"d seen how it would end. The hurt, the pain, the constant effort to make herself less so that he would feel better as a man.
It wasn"t worth it. Not even if it hurt like a b.i.t.c.h to walk away.
CHAPTER 17.
Henry looked at his man. "It can be done?"
"Yes." An unequivocal answer. "However, we"ll have to be quick to get the rest of the operation in place now that they"ve detected us."
"I a.s.sume you have that under way." Henry had chosen this man because of his intelligence and dedication to Silence-and, unlike Shoshanna, he wasn"t about to squander that resource by killing him simply because he happened to be strong enough to be a threat.
A nod. "Even if they somehow discover the first element, the second should give us what we need."
And the war to uphold Silence, Henry thought, would claim another victim.
CHAPTER 18.
Andrew dumped his pack in his room and began to tug off his clothes for the shower. The hike down from the campsite had been undemanding in spite of the rain that had fallen overnight, and, for the juveniles, fun. Most had abandoned their packs for later retrieval halfway down and shifted, gamboling in the pools of water like four-year-olds, their howls of pleasure singing to his soul.
But no matter his wolf"s joy at being with his pack, the trip down had cut at him, made him bleed-because in spite of everything he"d told himself about charm, about courtship, he"d lost his temper the night before and it was still simmering. He"d been in no mood to play-and neither had Indigo.
They"d spoken to each other only when necessary and kept their distance the rest of the time. For Andrew, it had been partly self-preservation and partly because he didn"t trust himself around her. The hunger to touch, to caress, to possess, was a constant craving in his gut by now. He was fully capable of going after her with the intent to claim rights he didn"t have, rights she refused to give him, notwithstanding the addictive musk of her own desire.
Throwing the last of his clothing on the floor, he walked into the shower cubicle and tried to rub away the need, the fury that had him losing his mind. Of course it didn"t disappear, but the time he spent under the deliberately cool spray did calm him down a fraction. He"d made a mistake in challenging Indigo that way-but he wasn"t sorry. Because when it came down to it, he was a dominant same as her. He wasn"t going to lie to her about that. But that didn"t mean he wasn"t also going to use his other skills to burn through the ice of her temper.
I might play with boys, but I don"t keep them.
He clenched his jaw at the memory of her razor-sharp words, refusing to let them push him away. That was what she wanted-it would be the easy way out. And no matter how mad he was at her for what she"d said, he wasn"t going to give her that out. No f.u.c.king way.
Switching off the shower, he got dressed, then scrawled something on a small piece of paper that he slipped under Indigo"s door on his way down to the garage. He wasn"t exactly fit company right now. Better he redirect his anger into something useful, like fixing one of the malfunctioning vehicles. Fact was, he was good with cars, but no expert-which meant he"d have to concentrate.
However, he"d barely reached the underground area that was home to all their vehicles when someone pulled him aside and whispered that he"d been hearing rumors to do with "purity." Freezing, Drew asked for further details, but the mechanic shrugged. "I think it"s something nasty, but no one"s sure quite what."
His anger tempered by the need to protect the pack, Andrew began to do what he did best-talk to people. Over the next few hours, he moved from group to group, eating lunch with the soldiers, playing chess with a few of the elders, hanging out in the infirmary and in the training rooms.
His gut was a knot at the start. The last traitor within the pack had almost killed SnowDancer, stabbing a knife straight into its heart. He wasn"t sure they could bear it a second time.
The pack was too tight a unit, their loyalty to each other the bedrock on which they built their worlds. But what he found was something else, something unexpected.
"An e-mail," he said to Hawke later that day, after managing to get his hands on a copy at last. "Sent from an anonymous account but, from the content, it"s connected to Pure Psy, that group all about maintaining Silence. No one knows where it originated-and a few of the people who received it had enough skill to attempt a backtrace. Nada."
Hawke held his hand out for the e-mail. Andrew pa.s.sed it across, having already memorized the poison.
We invite our brothers and sisters in SnowDancer to help us achieve our aim of a world of absolute Purity. Surely you do not want your blood polluted with those of the other races-surely you do not want your pack weakened by humans.
Hawke threw down the piece of paper, his jaw a brutal line. "Do we have a problem?"
"No," Andrew was happy to say, his wolf"s relief a powerful beat against his skin. "Everyone I ran into who"d had contact with the thing found it ugly and malicious and deleted it immediately. I got this copy from someone"s recycle bin."
Hawke rubbed at his forehead. "Why the f.u.c.k didn"t they e-mail it to me? I need to know about s.h.i.t like this." When Andrew said nothing, his alpha sat back in his chair. "Yeah, yeah, that"s why I have you."
Andrew gave him a wry smile. "Most people just didn"t think it was that important-figured it was a nasty e-mail campaign by some crackpot group but nothing more." Relaxed now, but with a different tension thrumming in his blood, he nodded at the e-mail. "That was a miscalculation on the part of Pure Psy. Almost everyone in the pack has someone human in their family, and they"ve come to see the Lauren children as pups to protect." And wolves, changeling or feral, would give their lives to protect the young. "But I don"t like the fact the sender seems to have targeted people lower down in the hierarchy."
"Means they"ve made enough of a study of us to get a handle on at least a little of how the pack functions." Hawke tapped a finger on his desk. "We need to figure out if they"re trying to recruit outside the den as well."
"I"ve already got my team on it," Andrew told him. "So far, it looks like it was a concentrated e-mail blast to our people in this area."
"Good. The other thing we need to consider is whether they targeted other groups within the city"s population. Something like this could generate serious friction."
"I"ll put some feelers out, see if that"s a possibility."
The wolf apparent in his gaze, Hawke picked up the e-mail again. "They"re not going to get inside this pack," he said with cool finality. "But we need to know how strong they are in the PsyNet."
Andrew didn"t need Hawke to explain why. Given the Psy race"s influence on economics and politics, whatever happened inside the Net had the potential to affect them all. "I"m meeting Judd after this. I"ll see what he can dig up. Last we heard, Pure Psy was mostly a splinter faction."
"Things change fast in that b.l.o.o.d.y hive mind." Lines marred his brow. "Maybe we should talk to the cop as well," Hawke said, referring to Nikita"s new security chief.