by Nalini Singh
“I don’t know where she gets it from.” The faint smile on his lips faded even as he spoke. “The Marlee you know, she wasn’t that girl in the Net.”
Lara thought back to the day the Lauren family had walked into the den, more than three years ago. Unconscious at the time, Marlee had been in Sienna’s arms, Toby in Walker’s, the boy much shorter and lighter than he was these days. Both children had been hit hard by the backlash of separation from the PsyNet, the psychic network that provided the Psy race with the biofeedback necessary for life. It also kept them leashed, at the mercy of the Council and of a protocol that forbade joy, affection, and love. The only reason the Laurens had survived was that they’d reconnected their minds in a tiny familial network.
Judd was the first one she’d seen, his assassin’s gaze never moving off the grim-eyed SnowDancer soldiers who’d escorted the family into the infirmary. She’d known at once that he’d kill to protect the others. Then her eyes had connected with those of lightest green; she’d seen the way the stranger held the child in his arms, and she’d understood that this man might well be the more dangerous one in spite of his outward calm.
Marlee, when she’d woken at last, had been a shell-shocked waif, all huge eyes the same shade as her father’s in a bone-white face. It had taken months for her cheeky, vivacious personality to emerge. Walker, Lara realized, had had to watch for years as his daughter was taught to be a well-mannered cog in the PsyNet machine, her spirit crushed at every turn.
Cupping his face, she said, “You got her out, made sure she’ll never have to Silence her personality again.”
An unexpected glint of humor. “I dare anyone to attempt to Silence Marlee now.”
Lara laughed, then gasped as his hand moved over her lower curves. “I see you’re fully awake.”
“Hmm.” It was a low, deep sound she’d become used to in the hours since their mating, the sound her mate made when he was far more interested in something else.
Initiating a kiss as he brought her over his body, her nipples rubbing against the crisp abrasion of his chest and one of his hands fisted in her hair, Lara was thinking this was a fine, fine way to wake up from a nap when the comm beeped.
She groaned, her body crying foul. “I have to get that.” As SnowDancer’s healer, she never ignored a comm alert.
Walker was already reaching out to press the audio-only answer key on the touchscreen. “It’s not an emergency code.”
“Doesn’t mean anything. Some of the juveniles break a leg, then don’t use the emergency code because they ‘can take the pain.’” Shifting to lie flat on her back, she wrenched her frustrated body under some sort of control, as Walker said, “Yes?” into the comm.
A startled silence, followed by a hesitant young voice. “Um…can I talk to Lara?”
Recognizing it, Lara sat up. “Silvia?” The girl was one of the most stable teens in the pack, and she wouldn’t be calling Lara now if it wasn’t important. “What’s happened?”
“I just got back on one of the evac transports.”
Inside her, Lara’s wolf raised its head in a howl, happy that more and more of the pack’s young had begun to return to the den from the safe areas where they’d weathered the storm of battle. “Go on,” she encouraged the girl when Silvia hesitated.
“I know you must be exhausted”—apology in every syllable—“but the pup I was buddied up with won’t stop crying because his mom and dad aren’t here. I would contact the nursery, but I know how much Mason likes you…”
“I’ll be right there.” Already up, she began to pull on her jeans, aware of Walker doing the same. “In the meantime, tell Mason his parents are fine. Your group came in a couple of hours early—his mom and dad are still out on the perimeter.”
When she finished dressing and turned, it was to find Walker with a cell phone in hand. “I’ll get in touch with them.”
Promising herself she’d pet her way across that finely honed chest tonight, she blew him a kiss and jogged to the area just outside the den that was the drop-off zone.
“Lara!” Mason whimpered and clung to her like a little monkey the instant he saw her.
“Hush now, baby.” Cuddling him, Lara pulled back enough that she was looking into his eyes. Unlike Silvia, she was an adult, the hierarchy crystal clear—Mason’s wolf snapped to attention, even as his rich brown eyes swam huge and wet. “Your mom and dad are on their way,” she said, certain Walker would’ve ensured that outcome. “They aren’t hurt.”
His lower lip quivered. “Coming?”
“Yes. They’re so excited to see you again.” Kissing his wet cheek, she lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Now your bus has arrived super early and surprised them. Did it have wings?”
The boy shook his head. “No…I didn’t see.”
“Shall we go have a look?”
The three of them were walking around the armored evac vehicle, Mason engrossed with checking every nook and cranny for wings, when two out-of-breath adults burst into the clearing. “Mason!”
“Mommy! Daddy!”
Grinning as the pup, who’d spontaneously transformed into his furry brown wolf shape, was swallowed up in a four-armed embrace, Lara hugged Silvia to her side. “You did well, sweetheart.” She’d used her head, hadn’t lost her courage even when the comm had been answered by an unexpected male voice.
A relieved smile brought a glow to the rich brown of her skin. “Sorry for interrupting you and Walker.”
“How do you know it was Walker?”
Smile turning into a grin, Silvia tapped her nose. “I’m a wolf.” A short pause. “And I saw you two sneaking a kiss a while back.”
Then the teenager was gone in a shimmer of delighted laughter, and Lara’s wolf was turning at the scent of dark water that held a thousand secrets.
“I’m not likely to be an easy mate.”
And though she knew their love was steel strong, would never bend or break, her heart ached as she wondered if he would one day tell her those secrets…or if part of him would remain forever closed, forever a mystery.
Chapter 2
DUCKING INTO HER quarters on their return, Lara glanced at Walker, a lingering trace of anxiety in her gut at the idea of never quite knowing this man who touched her deeper than anyone else ever had, or would again. “I could shower here,” she said, feeling unsure for the first time that day, “and meet you afterward to go find the children.”
He closed the distance between them, cupped her jaw, his gaze direct. “Do you want to?”
“No.” It came out husky, neither part of her wanting to be separated from him. Not yet. Not when the bond was so new, so raw, shocking her senses each time she became consciously aware of it.
A quiet smile that shattered the anxiety, made her stomach clench, her toes curl. “I’ve never shared a shower before,” he murmured.
She wasn’t certain how she made it to his apartment after grabbing a change of clothing from hers. Because she knew that look in her mate’s eyes. It was the same one she’d seen before he decided to “explore the concept of oral sex.” Walker’s version of “explore” had left her an incoherent, trembling, pleasured pile of Lara-shaped jelly.
The man had concentration down to an art.
As he proved once again in the shower, when he ran soap-slick hands over her body and murmured he wanted to “explore” the idea of having sex standing up. Not that Lara minded being pinned to the wet tile by her mate’s hard body, her legs locked around his lean hips and hot water cascading over them both while they “explored” the hell out of the concept.
Unsurprisingly, it took her extra time to get dressed after they exited the shower, her body boneless. “For some reason,” she said, pressing a kiss to the center of his naked back before he pulled on a fresh shirt, “I never expected you to be so physical.” So very demanding in that quiet, determined Walker way that made every feminine cell in her body sing.
He ran a finger under her bra str
ap when she circled around to his front, an easy, affectionate caress. “I have a lifetime of sensation to catch up on.” Tugging her closer with a pull on the strap, he ran his hand down her back. “With you.”
Oh, man. She really stood no chance. “Stop that.” It came out sounding less than firm. “Children, remember?”
Walker angled his head the slightest fraction, as if listening. “Yes, I think we’d better go collect them.” He circled his palm over her back, warm and a little rough, and answered the question she’d been about to ask. “Neither is in distress, but they need to be back with family.”
Lara’s wolf was in full agreement, and it only took her a couple more minutes to pull on fresh jeans paired with a thin sweater in her favorite shade of green. “Let’s go,” she said after slipping on her sneakers.
Toby, who appeared to have grown an inch since the last time she’d seen him—there was no longer any question that he’d end up as tall as his uncles—hugged her with thin but strong arms when she found him kicking a ball around outside, his joy in their mating unhidden. “I’m really happy you’re our family now,” he said. “Even that first day in the infirmary, when I was so scared of everything, I was never scared of you.” Words poignant with memory. “Your hands were gentle. Like my mom’s.”
Tears burned the backs of her eyes. “She loved you very much.” Toby’s mother had fought for him until the violent power of her telepathic gift had sucked her under. A gift her child had inherited, his eyes the night sky of a cardinal, white stars on velvet black. But Toby would never have to deal with his ability in isolation—physical or mental, his support structure a sprawling network of family, other Psy, wolves, and leopards. “I hope you’ll let me love you, too.”
Toby’s smile was sweet…with a fine, fine hint of mischief that told her he might just turn into a hellion juvenile one of these days. “You already do—you love all the pups in the pack. I can sense it.” He hugged her again, whispering, “But if you want to love me and Marlee especially, I won’t tell.”
“Deal.” Laughing, she went to brush his hair out of his eyes when Marlee appeared around the corner with Walker and ran full-tilt to throw her arms around Lara.
“Dad says you’re ours now!” Green-eyed and with a clean line to her features, she was her father’s daughter, but her nature was her own. Uniquely Marlee. “Is it true?” Strawberry-blonde strands kissed her face, having escaped the elastic band at her nape. “Are you?”
Any worry Lara had entertained about Marlee resenting her fell away under the force of the enthusiastic questions. “Yes,” she said, bending down to embrace Marlee’s small body, the girl’s arms wrapping around her in turn. “All yours.”
“Yay!” Dancing away with that sound of uninhibited glee, Marlee caught Toby’s hands, made her cousin spin her around in dizzying circles. “Faster, Toby!” She squealed as her hair went flying, her feet up off the ground. “Don’t drop me!”
Toby laughed at her scream, but it was the good-natured laugh of an elder brother—and that’s what he was, regardless of their actual relationship—his hands gripping hers tight. “Want me to stop?”
“No! Faster!”
Lara looked up with a laugh of her own, caught Walker watching the children, his expression shadowed. Walking to him, she slipped her hand into his, touching the fingers of her free hand to the smoothness of his shaven jaw until he met her eyes. “The Council will never again steal their right to be happy.”
He said nothing, her mate. But she loved him, knew him…and sensed the violent depth of his emotions in the tightness of the arms he closed around her.
His mood seemed much lighter the next day, and when he left to do a rotation on the border that night, he said, “You’re spoiling them.” The brush of his knuckles against her cheek, his lips at her ear.
“I know,” Lara admitted as she put together a tray of chocolate cookies and milk for the children—both currently sprawled on the floor in front of the large comm screen in the living room, hypnotized by a quiz show.
Fiddling with the buttons of his shirt, his chest wide and strong, she said, “It’s okay, isn’t it? For just a few days?” Though she’d taken care of plenty of pups, it had always been short-term, where it didn’t matter if she was indulgent. “I thought after everything, they deserved a little extra pampering.”
Walker wanted only to kiss that rueful smile off of her lips…then realized on a surge of bone-deep pleasure that he could. Anytime he pleased. She’d given him that right. “I can see I’ll have to be the tough one here,” he murmured after both their hearts had turned to thunder.
She scowled even as she smoothed her hands over his chest, affectionate and possessive both. “I can be tough. Just ask the juveniles.”
Yes, she had an unflinching courage, his mate. His pride in her strength of heart and determination was absolute. But he also knew that she was inherently kind, that she forgave far easier and quicker than anyone else he’d ever met, and that she’d cut off her own arm if it would heal another’s hurt. No doubt, she’d spoil the children more than a little…but that was what mothers did. What they should do. He would never stop her.
Because even Marlee, in spite of her chirpy, chatty personality, had an inward maturity he wished she didn’t. His daughter had learned the harsh realities of the world at an age when her spirit should’ve been innocent, without a single bruise. Instead, she’d been kicked in the heart by the very person who should’ve protected her beyond all others.
Never would he forgive Yelene the broken look in his baby’s eyes that ugly day months after their defection when Marlee had turned to him and said, “Daddy, did my mother not want to come with us?”
For the first time in his life, he’d lied to his child, telling her that Yelene hadn’t been able to get out in time. He hadn’t wanted to wound her by sharing the brutal truth—that Yelene had written her child out of her life the instant she became a hazardous inconvenience. But Marlee, his little girl with her wise soul, had shaken her head and hugged him. “It’s okay, Daddy. I know she didn’t love us.”
“Walker?”
He swallowed the memory of the cold rage that had gripped him in its teeth that day as he held his daughter, not wanting the past to taint the wonder that was his family, his mate. “I better go or I’ll be late.”
“Take care of yourself,” Lara said, her eyes seeming to see right through him, to places only she had ever reached.
That tawny gaze ignited a sense of acute and gnawing vulnerability within Walker, but regardless of his discomfort, he fought the urge to close himself off, to attempt to block the mating bond using his psychic abilities. That would hurt Lara on the innermost level, and the one thing Walker would never consciously do was hurt his mate.
“Be good for Lara,” he said to the children as she walked him to the door.
Cookie crumbs wreathing their mouths, they nodded and waved.
“Bedtime in an hour.”
“Dad!”
“Uncle Walker!”
“Forty-five minutes.”
There were no more arguments. Turning to see Lara biting back a smile, he pointed a finger at her. “Early bedtime for you, too”—he dropped his voice—“so I don’t feel guilty waking you when I return.” He hadn’t been a physical man before her, having learned to live with his touch-hunger until it was simply a part of him, but now he wanted to explore each and every sensation with her, then he wanted to do it all over again.
“That’s one thing,” she whispered, rising to press her mouth to his, “you never have to feel guilty about. I’ll wait for my wake-up.”
The taste of her—lush, addictive, exquisitely familiar—lingered on his lips as he went to take his position on the perimeter. While he didn’t often do a security rotation, his assignment being to oversee the education and general development of the ten-to-thirteen-year-olds in the pack, he was on the backup roster. And with a significant percentage of his charges still in the safe zones wher
e they’d been evacuated, it had made sense for him to step up.
However, Walker had also made certain to stay in touch with his group throughout, addressing their worries and questions. They were good kids, belonged to him as much as they did their parents. That was a truth it had taken him a long time to understand—that everyone parented the children in SnowDancer.
An integral aspect of Walker’s job was to make certain no child—dominant or submissive, shy or aggressive—slipped through the cracks. He often had pups seated along the bench in his workshop, doing their homework and eating afternoon snacks. And he’d tucked a few into bed, too, when needed. Perhaps he wasn’t as affectionate as a changeling parent, but the children seemed to feel safe with him, and that was what mattered.
“Part dean, part teacher, part trainer, part mother, part father.”
That was how Hawke had explained the position to Walker when the alpha had first extended the offer.
“You’ll be responsible for making sure each pup navigates this time of growth in a way that leaves him or her with the skills needed for the next stage of their development. If you’re good at what you do, the pups will come to see you as another parent.”
“Don’t you occupy that role as alpha?”
“Yes, but there’s only one of me. That’s why we have people in charge of all the separate age groups—so a child or juvenile never feels lost or isolated, even if their parents have to be away from the den.
“You’ll work closely with the maternals and the teachers, and while they’re responsible for different aspects of the children’s health and education, you’re the one who coordinates everything and makes certain every child in your group gets what he or she needs to feel safe, happy, and challenged.”
Drawing in the crisp night air as he considered possible issues that might arise on the children’s return, he caught an acrid scent, identified it as ash. He was, he realized, about to pass the area that Sienna’s power had denuded, the earth barren…though he saw that someone had been out here since the last time he’d checked, marked out what appeared to be a planting grid.