by Nalini Singh
Blaise’s eyes held too much hate to accept anything she said, but she told him the truth that had been erased by another man full of bitterness. “We don’t blame the child for the crimes of the father. He could’ve raised you to know you could always come home to BlackEdge. Instead, he chose to raise you in hate.”
“I’m not the only one raised in hate,” Blaise growled back, his wolf coming into his eyes and his claws slicing out. “Your father can’t stand you.”
“That’s the thing, Blaise—I wasn’t raised by my father. And that is a gift for which I’m thankful each and every day.” Stepping back, she said, “I hope you die with courage, finding honor in this at least.”
She disappeared into the trees as he entered the shift, but she didn’t go far. As she’d expected, he lunged in her direction the instant he was in wolf form . . . only to come face-to-face with two gray wolves who had no pity for the killer of their child. A third, more deadly wolf stood farther back.
Vadem, giving his grief-stricken parents the opportunity to strike the first blow.
Seeing they had the situation under control, Selenka left in truth. When a large wolf with fur of reddish brown stepped in her path, she crouched down to hug him around the neck, rubbing her cheek against his fur. “Watch over them, Gregori. Make sure they get the vengeance that may allow them some peace.”
She left to the sound of his answering growl.
Though she’d driven up with Blaise, she ran home, needing to burn up her rage and grief. It was halfway to the den that she felt a shift in the jagged bond that tied her to Ethan and knew her mate was close. She didn’t know if all mating bonds worked this way, but she hoped theirs would always be like this.
Always.
Teeth gritted at the reminder that her mate was in a critical state, she ran in the direction from which she’d sensed him and realized he was coming at her from the site she’d found for the shield experiment.
Ivo must’ve shown it to him, after Margo’s team arrived to clean up the location of the ambush. Nomani, as an enemy of the pack, would not be given a burial. Selenka had made that call at the site. But, because Nomani could’ve been a child of BlackEdge if she hadn’t been twisted by her father, Selenka had ordered that she be taken to the city’s bio-cremation facility and her ashes left there to be collected should she have any family who claimed her.
Unclaimed ashes were returned to the earth.
The pack would do the same for Blaise if there were enough pieces left of him by the time this night was over. The only reason Selenka had made that decision was because she’d seen what bitterness and envy and hate could do to a person—and she’d experienced how it could affect a child. Who would she be today if her grandparents hadn’t taken over the raising of her?
She wanted to believe she’d have found her way, been a good adult, but no one could say that for certain. And because she’d been loved and taught the right path, she could take this small mercy on the children of Andriy Golyas. Mercy she would never show to her father—Kiev had been raised in Yevgeni’s and Lada’s love, too, yet he’d chosen a path that led him to betray the pack.
Growling low in her throat, she exploded out of the trees and saw Ethan looking directly at her. Ivo was nowhere in sight. Coming straight to her, he slid his arms around her waist before bending his head and burying his face against her neck.
Undone by the sudden bolt of affection, of her formerly remote Arrow asking for affection, she forgot her simmering anger and wove the fingers of one hand into his hair, her other hand on his nape. “Hey.” She nuzzled at him, nipping lightly at his throat as she did so.
He held her even tighter, stroking her back and dropping small kisses on her skin. Until Selenka was the one who had her face buried against his neck, and he was the one murmuring to her. She didn’t cry, couldn’t cry. Not yet. “I never truly had a father, so it’s not a loss.” It was a hard thing to accept, but it helped in a way. “But making that final cut, releasing the hope I didn’t even know I’d been carrying around . . . yeah, it hurts. Bad.”
“You are loved.” Ethan’s voice was rough, his words firm. “Your grandfather, your pack. I don’t know if my concept of love is the right one, but I know I would lay down my life for you. I know that when I’m with you, I feel . . . unbroken.”
Selenka’s claws sliced out, her wolf rising. “You’re mine, Ethan.” Jagged pieces and cold and all.
When he kissed her, she went to pull away, tell him they had to take care of what was happening in his brain, but then he said, “Please, Selenka. I need you,” and she crumbled.
Her Ethan wasn’t a man who ever asked for anything. For him to ask for skin privileges so openly, it wasn’t a request she could ever deny. Opening her mouth under his, she sank into the kiss, sank into him.
His breath was fast, his pulse staccato when she dropped her head to kiss his throat. He shifted back only so he could pull off his T-shirt, then closed the distance between them once more, his body all hard lines and ridges.
Grabbing her hands, he put them on the hot silk of his bare skin . . . and shivered. “Beautiful man,” she whispered huskily, petting him with a possessiveness that was only growing as the days passed. “I want to eat you up, Ethan Night.”
About to drop her head to kiss his chest, she found herself being spun around, her jacket pulled off her arms.
A pulse between her thighs, her breasts swelling against the lace cups of her bra.
Jacket off, she raised her arms and Ethan pulled up her tank top to throw it aside without care before he hugged her from the back, his face buried in the curve of her neck. Skin to skin, chest to back, lips to throat.
And yet, he remembered not to put too much pressure on her healing skin, her Arrow who had a vein of protectiveness as wide as the Moskva River. Then he pushed up the lace of her bra to release one breast, and cupped his hand over it with open possession, squeezing and molding.
Moaning, Selenka reached back to scrape her nails over his nape before she turned in his arms, desperate to claim his lips. He met her lick for lick, one hand cupped around the side of her neck, while he tugged at her bra in frustration with his other. Nipping at his lower lip, she reached back to unhook the bra and drop it to the forest floor. His eyes zeroed in on her bare breasts, his erection shoving at the fastening of his pants.
Dropping her hands to her waistband, she flicked open the button . . . then smiled with wolfish intent. “Catch me.”
She kept her speed down because this was play, but he moved far faster than she’d expected. Hooking one foot around her ankle before she’d even exited the clearing, he tripped her—only to catch her so that she fell against his body.
“Caught.” It was a satisfied statement.
“That’ll teach me to underestimate an Arrow,” she said with a soft laugh, delighted by him and this unexpected moment of joy. Claws out, she scratched lightly at his nape as he kissed her again with open-mouthed demand, her breasts pressed to the taut muscle of his chest. There was a layer of hair there, the curls crisp against her nipples.
She rubbed up against him.
Body rigid, he released her only so he could tear at her pants. Aroused by his need, her own body slick, she helped him undress her, and then, somehow, she had her legs around his hips and her back was pressed to a tree trunk—with Ethan’s forearm a barrier between her skin and the rough bark—and he was kissing her as if she was the tastiest dish he’d ever sampled and he’d never get enough.
“This is an advanced position, zaichik,” she said with a smile against his mouth.
“I can learn,” he said with that intense concentration that undid her.
Groaning, she gripped his hair and held on to him with her thighs as he dropped his free hand to his waistband to release his cock from the prison of his pants.
A second later and both his hands were back on he
r and he was nudging at her with the blunt tip of his rigid flesh. Sensation quaking through her, she gripped his shoulders and held on, sure her Arrow would figure this out.
He did.
It took a couple of tries, but he was a man who paid attention, and he was a telekinetic. He knew how to move. Today, he thrust deep into her, making her snarl and rake his back with her nails.
The slightest pause, his eyes on her own. Checking she was with him. She licked his lower lip in answer. Muscles bunched to beautiful tautness, he began to move.
And Selenka danced with her mate, a hard, fast dance that thrust pleasure through them both and left them shaking in the aftermath. She held him close, her Arrow who wasn’t sure he understood love, and yet who held her with such sweet tenderness, his devotion to her a thing written in stone.
“The rogue power,” he rasped at last, “it’s violent.”
Selenka’s fingers dug into his skin, her wolf no longer lazy and lethargic. “Are the new shields holding?”
“Yes, but my mind . . .” Raising his head from her neck, he lifted his lashes.
Selenka sucked in a breath.
Multiple bloody pinpricks dotted the whites of his eyes.
The shields were working . . . but they were also serving to increase the pressure inside his brain.
Chapter 42
Sir, the construct is beginning to fray at the edges. You will have to reinforce it periodically to guarantee continued containment.
—Dr. Rebekah Patel to Councilor Ming LeBon (2080)
SELENKA’S GUT LURCHED, her wolf feeling terror as it had never before done. “That’s it,” she said, gripping his chin. “No more delaying the experiment.”
Blood-specked eyes fading into pure black. “I’ll contact Aden, get the people we need.”
Even with Psy abilities, Selenka knew that would take a little time. Enough for her to wrap her arms around Ethan and just hold him. “You won’t be alone in that room without light, Ethan,” she murmured. “You’ll never be alone again.”
Shuddering, he fell into her and they stayed locked like that until Aden telepathed to say everyone would be at the entrance to den territory in ten minutes. Only then did they break apart and dress. Selenka alerted her team to expect visitors, asking Kostya to escort them to the location she’d chosen for the experiment.
She and Ethan made it to the spot below a small hill with several minutes to spare.
Reaching underneath a fall of vines, she twisted the old-fashioned doorknob. The door opened in smooth silence. “This is a small den created by a pack that was here long before us. We don’t know who they were or when they lived here, but our specialists say it dates to at least four hundred years ago.”
Once inside, Ethan touched his hand to the inner wall, the surface smooth under his palm—as if thousands of hands had touched it before his. “I wonder what a psychometric would read if they placed their hand here.” It felt as if this place was full of untold stories.
Selenka gave him a bemused look. “I’ve never thought of allowing one here, but some are qualified archeologists and historians, aren’t they? Maybe I should think about it—after all, I have my own personal Arrow to ensure they don’t do anything underhanded.”
“The chance to examine an old wolf den would be far too unique for them to risk it,” he said as Selenka picked up a flashlight from a box close to the door. “You’d have the best of the best Ps-Psy fighting to be chosen.”
“You’re selling me on the idea,” she said, switching on the flashlight. A powerful beam of light pierced the dark. “This den’s built similarly to ours, with stone walls and internal rooms without windows. Unlike us, however, they didn’t have artificial light systems.”
In other words, turn off the flashlight and this became a cocoon of pure darkness.
Ethan didn’t say anything until Selenka showed him to the closest internal room. “It’s perfect.” A place that made his breath quicken and his skin grow hot, it was so near the claustrophobia of his old cell.
His mate’s hand closing over his, the scent of her in his lungs. He gulped in air, reminding himself that he wasn’t in a cage, would never again be in one. “I’m in charge of the light,” she said, her fingers tight on his. “And on whether the door stays open or shut.”
She slammed a hand over his mouth when he would’ve argued. “We are not negotiating on this. I will not allow you to torture yourself without reason.”
Ethan looked at his fierce, deadly mate, this woman who fought for him. A woman he’d promised to court and only gotten as far as a single paper wolf. Nowhere near what he wanted and planned. After this, he thought on a roar of determination and pressed a kiss to her palm.
Vow sealed.
Narrowed eyes from his mate before she angled her head to the door. “They’re here.”
Aden had gathered together a team that included Memory and her mate, as well as Sascha Duncan. The person who accompanied the cardinal this time was a green-eyed man with black hair and what appeared to be claw marks on one side of his face. Lucas Hunter, alpha of DarkRiver and Sascha’s mate.
Memory’s right cheek was indented with sleep wrinkles, her curls wild around her head, but her eyes bright with determination. Her mate was a predator on full alert, his gaze taking in everything around them.
Aden stayed with the others, but his mind touched Ethan’s. I’ll keep constant watch.
I know, Ethan said, because Aden Kai was a leader who kept his word.
As for Kostya, the lieutenant had a private update for Selenka. “Blaise’s people are contained, church secured.” His square-jawed face held the echoes of fury. “Ivo’s onsite with Dinara.”
Selenka’s mouth tightened, her eyes turning partially wolf, but she just nodded before leading everyone into the historical den.
Kostya stayed outside, on guard.
Ethan was partway down the entrance corridor when he realized Memory had balked at the doorway. Her mate was arguing with the empath, his growls low and deep, and Ethan knew Alexei didn’t want her to do this.
I was kept captive by a psychopath in an underground cell, my mind caged, for fifteen years.
Setting her jaw as Ethan was about to tell her it was all right, she didn’t have to come, Memory stepped into the den—with her hand locked to bone-white tightness on Alexei’s. The wolf followed, his temper flashing in his eyes . . . but the kiss he pressed to her temple was tender, his body angled so hers was nestled into it.
“She has courage.” Selenka’s voice, low and quiet.
“Yes.” Ethan took his own mate’s hand. “She shows me the life I could have, the life I want.” He stepped forward.
It was time to fight the madness that would steal his future.
Once inside the chosen room, he released his mate’s hand and went into the farthest corner, his path lit by the beam of Selenka’s flashlight. Sealed against the external world, the space was clean except for a musty scent to the air and a bit of dust. His head ready to explode from the pressure of the rogue power, Ethan took one last look at his mate, then turned his back to the doorway and pressed his palms to the wall.
You have permission to enter my mind to watch the results, he telepathed to Sascha, Memory, and Aden.
Sascha and Aden responded with a simple acknowledgment, while Memory remained silent. She understood by now how her mind affected his. But he knew she’d heard and would do as asked; they had to find the answer . . . whether good or bad. Ethan had to know the enemy he faced.
He stared at the wall against which he’d braced his hands.
Should his ability go rogue, the position would minimize the amount of light to which he had access. Shards of stone would ricochet into his face, but that was a small price to pay to keep from becoming an accidental murderer. Closing his eyes, he looked inside his mind. His telekinetic sh
ields were holding with no sign of strain.
However, the far stronger shields he’d constructed against the rogue power bulged outward with every beat of his heart, the surges violent smashes. Yet they didn’t fracture—because unlike with his previous shields, Sascha had designed these to flex.
Swallowing hard against the fear of madness that was his nightmare, he went to begin the experiment . . . and felt strong feminine arms sliding around his body from behind. His back muscles stiffened. “It’s not safe.”
Selenka pressed a kiss to his back. “I’m not letting you do this alone.” Another kiss. “We walk into the darkness together.”
Eyes hot and heart cracking into pieces, he closed one hand over her own . . . and dropped the shields against the rogue power.
Chaos slammed his mind, but it was oddly distant. Overwhelmed by a ferocious wave of protectiveness and concern and an emotion tender and potent and with claws that curved around him in a defensive wall. Love. Even as the winds of chaos howled, he held on to that fierce, beautiful emotion as he looked inward.
His telekinetic shields were holding strong. He would not be a murderer today.
Ethan, re-engage shields.
Aden’s voice came through the chaos crackled with static. But Ethan heard. Pulling up the flexing shields Sascha had designed, he began to corral the rogue power. It didn’t work. The power was too violent, waves of radiant light behind his eyes. Gradient 9 or higher.
Sweat dripping down his brow, he pressed both hands to the wall once more.
Selenka pushed her hand under his clothing to press it flat against his abdomen, the skin-to-skin contact a shock that cut through the nightmare of fighting a battle he could feel himself losing. “Lock onto me,” she ordered. “Sense only me.”