Hostage to Pleasure p-5

by Nalini Singh

  “Oh?” He was genuinely interested. “I though M-Psy saw inside the body and diagnosed illnesses.” His family had consulted several when his inability to shift had become apparent. All had been brilliant, but not one had understood what it meant to a changeling to be denied half of who he was.

  Ashaya’s gaze skimmed down his body. “Isn’t that an uncomfortable position?”

  He’d listened to her body, knew she was aware of him on a level she’d never admit. It soothed the cat, even as it ratcheted up his need. “I’m fine, sugar,” he said, fighting the urge to sink his teeth into the delicate curve of her neck. He tended to like his sex slow and intense, but right now, with this woman, his body wanted hard, furious, a little rough. Reining in the leopard’s territorial instincts made sweat bead along his spine. “M-Psy?”

  She became very still, as if she’d sensed his tenuous control. But she didn’t retreat. If she had…

  “Like all Psy designations,” she said, “medical, or M, is an umbrella term that covers a wide range of specializations. It includes those unusual few who can actually heal—”

  “Anything?” He’d never heard of a Psy with that power.

  She shook her head. “No, their scope is limited. Some can reset bones, while others can seal wounds—the types of things that might be needed in the field. The healing abilities apparently appeared in children born during the Territorial Wars, though there’s no proof of that. As far as I know, no M-Psy can psychically cure diseases or reverse hereditary conditions. May I continue?” A scientist’s cool question.

  He wanted to bite her. “Go on.”

  “The scanning you mentioned is the most well-known and prevalent manifestation of the M designation. My ability is a subset of that—I can’t see broken bones or diseased organs, but it’s because my mind sees too deep.”

  “How deep?”

  “To the DNA level.”

  His cat’s attention was momentarily diverted from the seduction of her skin. “No one can do that. It would make you a walking DNA scanner.”

  “Yes,” she said, not seeming to realize she’d maintained constant eye contact. “Only a very small percentage of the M designation possesses the ability. Even fewer master it to the level where we become more accurate than the machines.” Her eyes traced his lips and his entire body grew taut with the caress—she might not call it that, but that’s what it was. She was stroking him. Purring inwardly, he didn’t move, didn’t break the spell.

  “Because of available equipment,” she continued, “it’s a fairly redundant ability in itself. You have to pair it with study—it was my knack for working with nanotech and implants that made me of interest to the Council. My ability gives me an edge with technology at that level of miniaturization.”

  He wondered what she’d do if he gave in to temptation and flicked his tongue along her full lower lip. “How does your gift work?” he asked, curling his hand into a tight fist. “You see me and know my genetic blueprint?”

  She shook her head. “Not quite. Depending on what I’m searching for, it can take hours, days, weeks, sometimes months, to tease apart the DNA.”

  “Why tell me all this?” He was a leopard sentinel. Even half-insane with this unwanted craving, his brain cells were working just fine. And he knew there had to be a reason for her unusual openness. “What do you want?”

  She bit her lower lip.

  His blood rushed to his cock. The roaring in his ears was so loud, he almost missed her next words.

  “I want your DNA.”

  CHAPTER 20

  A kiss is a melding of mouths. I’ve considered every aspect of this form of affection since the last perplexing dream, but I still don’t see the point of it.

  – From the encrypted personal files of Ashaya Aleine

  Surprise hit Dorian hard. “You obviously weren’t this blunt with the Council.”

  “I can play political games if necessary.” Cool voice, jittery heartbeat. “It’s not who I am.”

  He believed her. “Are you planning to mutate my DNA?” he teased.

  “Obviously not.” She straightened out her legs, stretching until her toes touched the clear glass of the French doors.

  He looked at her primly cut, unpainted nails and felt another urge to bite. Then she said, “If I planned to get rid of you, I’d do it silently and with such efficiency that everyone would think you’d died a natural death.”

  If any other woman had made the threat, he’d probably have grinned and said something about never making her mad. But this wasn’t any other woman. Ashaya was a scientist who’d spent years in the arms of the Psy Council. She was also the only female to have ever threatened his control. “You could try.” It was a soft, lethal threat.

  Ashaya hadn’t expected that response, though why, she couldn’t say. It just seemed wrong on a fundamental level. “Would you kill me?”

  “No. There are other ways to break a woman.” An answer that told her nothing, but tore a ragged hole in that primitive core Dorian alone seemed to awaken. She staggered under the mental injury, scrambling to regather her defenses.

  And in that instant, Amara found her again.

  Naughty, naughty, Ashaya. Trying to hide.

  Ashaya broke the connection with the frantic speed of experience, knowing she was only patching up the cracks, only delaying the inevitable… but she didn’t want to kill her twin. Because no matter what else she’d done, Amara had upheld the bonds of sisterhood—she’d never revealed Ashaya’s secrets.

  Feeling psychically battered, she raised her head to find Dorian scowling at her. “Your eyes just bled to pure black,” he said, looking at her with a quiet intensity that reminded her of the predator he was.

  “I didn’t expect you to threaten me,” she said, but couldn’t stifle the urge to ask, “Is Keenan still safe? You haven’t had any reports of problems?” She didn’t care what it betrayed, she had to know her baby was okay.

  “He’s fine—I checked. Cell phones are functioning again.”

  “Thank you.” She wanted to beg for more information, but swallowed the need. To know too much would be the same as going to see him—she’d lead Amara right to his door.

  Dorian continued to stare at her. “Were you playing with me?”

  “What?”

  “The crack about the natural death.”

  She didn’t know how to answer him. So she told the truth. “You weren’t being serious. Neither was I.”

  He blew out a breath. “I’m sorry I snarled.” When she just stared at him, too surprised to respond, his expression turned into a scowl. “How much DNA do you need?”

  She blinked, staring into the extraordinary blue of his eyes. He was so beautiful it seemed impossible that he should exist. “Aren’t you curious as to why I want it?”

  “To see my abnormal genetic structure.”

  Her guard immediately went up—he was being far too cooperative. “Yes,” she said warily. “I want to see why you are as you are.”

  “Why not steal my DNA? Easy enough to come by.”

  “Because,” she said, not trusting the strange light in his eyes, “as telepaths don’t cross certain ethical boundaries, neither do I. And I just need a minute fraction. Give me a moment.”

  Making a quick trip to her room, she grabbed the small scientific kit she’d found hidden in a side pocket of her pack—Zie Zen knew her well—and returned to her previous position. “A slide,” she explained to the cat who’d waited suspiciously patiently for her. “It’s the only one in the kit, so I’ll have to get it right first time. A drop of blood would probably work best—white blood cells ‘show’ better to my mental eye.”

  “I don’t feel like cutting myself.” That strange light glimmered brighter. “But I will… for a price.”

  Freezing, she returned the slide to the tool kit. “I’m not that curious.”

  “Yes, you are.”

  Yes, she was. It was why she was a scientist. “I have nothing to negotiate
with.”

  “I told you, Shaya,” he said, eyes grazing over her lips, causing an almost painful tightness in her stomach, “my cat wants to know what you taste like.” A slow feline smile. “And since you’re Psy, it’s no skin off your back to give up a kiss. Just a primitive animal thing after all. Deal?”

  “I knew your cooperation was too good to be true.” And that apology was too confusing to even think about.

  A grin that creased his cheeks with devastating charm. “I’m a cat, sugar. What did you expect?”

  She decided she’d have to research leopards, learn more about their behavior. But one thing she knew—they were highly intelligent. “I want the blood first.” She didn’t allow herself to think about her end of the bargain.

  “Don’t trust me?”

  “No.”

  Another sharp grin and then, to her shock, a knife was in his hand. He pricked a finger and held it over the slide she hurriedly readied. A single drop and she closed it. To take the mental snap-shot, she’d have to focus on the drop for a long period of time, until her brain saw through the cell walls to the nuclei, to the strands of DNA twisting within.

  Dorian let her put the slide back into the tool kit and close the lid before he said, “Now, pay up.”

  Her heart thudded, her shields began to unravel… and Amara’s presence pushed heavily against the psychic walls of her mind. But she didn’t tell him to stop.

  His lips pressed over hers.

  And her rotting foundations collapsed around her feet. For a second, she thought Amara was in her mind again, but no, this chaos was acting as another kind of anchor, another kind of wall—her twin was being held back, shoved out. A flash fire second of thought and then even thought was lost.

  His taste was inside her mouth, a dark and richly masculine thing at odds with the sheer beauty of him. Protected by the strange, twisting, chaotic shield that blocked Amara, she broke every rule and savored the experience. When his tongue swept against hers, she felt her throat lock. He did it again. Shuddering, she dared explore him in return. His growl poured into her mouth, making her nerve endings sizzle.

  He was the one who broke the kiss. Blinking, she tried to steady her breathing. But his taste lingered on her lips and all she could think was that she wanted more.

  “I can smell something.” His face went quiet, hunting still. “An intruder.”

  Ashaya, what are you doing? Why can’t I see it?

  The words snapped her back to full awareness. The instant Dorian had stopped touching her, whatever it was that had protected her from Amara had disappeared. The shields against the PsyNet were holding—how or why, she didn’t know—but she didn’t have time to consider that miracle, because Amara had broken through again. Her twin fought to retain control, but, her recent slew of emotion-induced mistakes aside, Ashaya had been doing this for years. And now she had Keenan to protect.

  No one would hurt her son.

  Powered by that absolute vow, she got her sister out, though it left her mentally bloody.

  Dorian’s growl raised the hairs on her arms. “It’s gone. What the fuck was in the room with us, Ashaya?”

  This was one secret she couldn’t share. “Nothing.”

  His nostrils flared. “That nothing came through you. Are you a spy, Ms. Aleine?” His eyes held a knife-edge gleam. “Your scent changed.”

  The accuracy of his changeling senses staggered her. “What kind of change?”

  “A lot of Psy”—he sniffed at the curve of her shoulder in a way that was definitely not human—“have this ugly metallic edge to their scent changelings can’t stand. You don’t. But whatever it was, it was close.”

  Perhaps she should’ve been considering the ramifications of the scent and what it denoted about Amara’s increasing strength, but she found herself stuck on the first part of his comment. “That’s good, isn’t it? That I don’t stink.” She stared out at the water as day grew lighter. “It would make it impossible for you to guard me otherwise.”

  Dorian didn’t like the metallic taint he could still feel on his tongue. Reaching forward, he slanted his open mouth across Ashaya’s, knowing he’d taken her by surprise. Heat and ice, honey and spice, the taste of her flooded his mouth. “That’s better,” he said, retreating before the urge to move his mouth to lower, hotter places became irresistible.

  Ashaya stared at him, lips kiss-swollen. “That wasn’t part of the deal.”

  “I decided to demand an interest payment.” The trapped leopard inside him reached out with claws that could never become real. Instead, the echo of them scraped along the insides of his skin, finding grooves laid by a lifetime of futile stretching. The movements of his beast hurt, as if skin were being torn apart. It had always hurt. And Dorian had never told anyone that it did.

  Pity was the one thing he’d never accept or allow.

  Now, the changeling heart of him had him moving his hand to brush over the smooth curve of Ashaya’s shoulder. Hot chocolate and cream, warm and vibrant, the feel of her soaked through his fingertips and into his blood. There was no fear or panic in the profile she showed him, but he felt the faintest of tremors deep within her skin. “How bad are the fractures in your conditioning, Shaya?”

  For the longest time, she said nothing. He closed his hand over her arm, and slid it down, indulging himself in the feel of her even as he pushed her to react. That deep-seated tremor didn’t ebb, and then he saw her swallow.

  “Bad,” she whispered. “The foundation was swept away a long time ago.”

  He hadn’t expected the admission. “And you consider that a flaw.”

  “No,” she said, surprising him a second time. “Psy were always meant to feel. Silence is the interloper. It cripples us even as it saves us.”

  He stopped his stroking of her arm. “Then why not break it fully? Why cling to it?”

  “Because”—her eyes locked with his, eerie in their crystal clarity—“Silence keeps the monsters at bay.”

  “Are you one?” He found he’d moved closer, the exotic scent of her—thick honey and wild roses—seeping into his skin, curling around his senses.

  “Yes.” An absolute whisper. “I’m one of the worst.”

  The bleak darkness of her words should have cut through the strange intimacy growing between them but it didn’t. Dorian raised his hand to cup her cheek, to make her turn and look at him. “What kind of a monster saves the life of not one child but three?” He needed the answer to that question, needed the absolution it would provide.

  He heard his sister’s screams in his dreams. He didn’t want to hear her accusations of betrayal, too. His heart twisted as the leopard withdrew into a tight ball of pain and sorrow, but still he touched Ashaya. “What have you done?”

  Her lashes lifted. “I’ve protected a sociopath for most of my life, someone exactly like Santano Enrique.”

  Fury rose in a blinding wave and his hand tightened on her skin. One second’s loss of control and he could break her jaw. Swearing, he released her and got up, turning to press his palms flat against the French doors. But the coolness of the glass did nothing to chill the red-hot crash of his anger.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw Ashaya get to her feet, begin to move away. “Don’t.”

  She froze, as if hearing the lack of humanity in his tone. Perhaps it was because the beast had been trapped inside him for more than three decades. Perhaps it was because he’d done everything he could to turn himself leopard though he couldn’t shift. Perhaps it was just Ashaya. But at that moment, he was an inch away from losing the human half of his soul and giving in completely to the blind rage of the beast.

  “I—”

  “Be quiet.”

  Dorian’s words were so lethally controlled that Ashaya knew he was fighting the finest edge of rage. She’d miscalculated badly. No, she thought, the truth was that she hadn’t calculated at all. When she was with this changeling, all her abilities at subterfuge and self-preservation seemed to disappear
. With him, she spoke only the truth. But, as she had learned in the twenty-six years of her life, truth was a tool. It should never simply be said. No, it had to be bent, twisted, colored, until it became a weapon.

  Now, she looked at the tight plane of Dorian’s bare back, all taut muscle and golden skin, and knew that self-preservation dictated she should obey him. She should stay silent, give him time to get his emotions under control. But Ashaya hadn’t escaped one cage only to be forced into another. And she didn’t like the idea of a cold, controlled Dorian. It was a dangerous confession, but one that gave her the courage to face down his leopard. “You ask me to tell the truth,” she said, fighting the surely lethal temptation to touch him, stroke him. “And yet when I do, you order me to silence. Hypocrisy isn’t limited to the Council, I see.”

  His head snapped in her direction, his eyes almost incandescent with rage. “Keep going.”

  She might’ve spent her life in a lab, but she wasn’t stupid. She understood he wasn’t giving her permission—he was throwing down the gauntlet. Going against every one of the rules that had kept her alive this long, she picked it up. “You’re attracted to me.” The lush hunger of his kiss had been a living brand, leaving her permanently marked.

  The bunched muscles of his forearms turned to granite. “A Psy expert in emotion?” Mockery laced with the iron strength of an anger that stung at her with the force of a whip.

  “You touched me,” she said. “I don’t have to be an expert to understand the reason behind that.”

  “Do you think that makes you safe?”

  “No.” She took a step forward. Stopped. Because she hadn’t meant to do that. “I think it puts me in more danger. You don’t want to be attracted to me and I unders—”

  “Don’t you dare tell me you understand.” He pushed off the glass to stalk to her. At that moment, she saw not the man but the leopard within. And she realized the truth far too late—he wasn’t human, wasn’t Psy, was changeling. The leopard lived in every aspect of him, from his strength to his anger to his rage.