Lion's Heat

CHAPTER 4

Ghost Team moved into Sanctuary late that evening, as Rachel and Amber slept soundly. Called back from a mission that was only partially finished in Guatemala, they were flown into the compound under the dead of night under condition "Alpha." Complete secrecy.

Jonas knew the second they entered his cabin, that sixth sense when it came to the team he had put together himself and commanded for ten years now.

Stepping from his bedroom, he checked the door to Rachel's bedroom, secured it to ensure she didn't step into the room, and faced the six-member team standing silently in the living room.

Ghost Team was the best. They were the most silent, most efficient, killers ever created, and they were also the best-kept secret the Breeds held outside of the truth of the mating heat.

Standing front and center was the team commander, the Black Jaguar Breed, who had excelled in killing at the tender age of five when he had sliced a trainer's throat for daring to backhand him. He was merciless, cold. He was as hard as diamonds and, often, just as cold.

"Your mate?" The commander nodded to the secured bedroom door.

Jonas nodded. "Brandenmore made his move on the files he believes I had. He used the baby against her and attempted to force her to steal them for him."

Fierce black eyes glanced toward the door once more before Jag shook his black head in resignation. "We should just kill him."

"We need to capture him if possible," Jonas reminded him. "But I have a larger problem. He attempted to kidnap Rachel's child. The baby was injected with what Amburg believes was a sedative, but there's a scent to the child now that wasn't there before. Whatever he's doing, it now involves her. I want a net around Rachel, the baby and the other hybrid children here at Sanctuary. I don't have a good feeling about this."

He could feel that odd twist in his guts, the premonition that something was building, that Brandenmore had a plan that they hadn't yet foiled.

"Indigestion," Jag quipped. "Brandenmore inspires it."

That was the damned truth. At this rate, Jonas would be the first Breed to develop an ulcer.

"We came in along the east border of the compound," Lobo, Jag's second-in-command, stated from the shadows along the far corner of the room. "There was a scent marker there, and signs that someone had used the ravine there to make their way into Sanctuary. We followed it until it disappeared along the main road."

"Were you able to detect the scent marker?" Jonas kept his voice low, his senses tuned to the next room.

Jag shook his head. "There was a faint hint of human scent, but it was too old for the trail we found."

"Too old or deliberately laid." The Coyote Enforcer, Loki, stepped forward, his gray eyes dark, the thick black lashes surrounding them looking almost too soft, too seductive, for the most elite killer the world might ever know.

"What did you detect, Loki?" Jonas asked.

Loki shook his head, the thick, straight strands of his devil's black hair feathering over his forehead and along his shoulders. "Don't know, Jonas. There was something odd about it though, as though the scent had been deliberately altered in some way."

Jonas turned to Jag, Lobo and the other members of Ghost Team.

"The rest of us didn't detect that, but Loki's ability to detect scents is better than ours." The other Coyote, Angel, growled the information, which was no less than Jonas had expected.

Watching Angel closely, he noticed the other man watching the bedroom door closely.

"Is there a problem, Angel?" Jonas asked softly, his tone dropping dangerously.

Angel shook his head, his black-and-gray hair shorter than Loki's, but just as silken and straight.

"I've no interest in your woman, Jonas," Angel assured him.

"Then why the interest in the door?"

"He likely senses what I smell." Loki stepped forward.

"And that is?" Jonas's head swung around.

"Your mate is awakening," Angel growled, drawing their attention. "That's what I sense. She'll be out in moments, and I'm certain you don't want us seen."

No one had ever seen Ghost Team other than Jonas. Jonas doubted the six men had ever faced another Breed or human without some sort of camouflage.

"If you see anything, if you learn anything, then let me know." Jonas nodded, still watching Angel closely.

There was no detecting a lie with these Breeds. Like Jonas, they had been taught how to use their emotions to trick other Breeds or animals. How to lie, to manipulate and deceive.

They nodded quickly before disappearing. Between one blink and the next, they were gone. Silently, blending in with shadows, moving quickly, taking advantage of the slightest weakness--that was what they were trained for before escaping into the pre-dawn darkness.

Moving quickly to the bedroom door, Jonas removed the electronic lock just as the doorknob turned and Rachel pulled the door open.

"Good morning." Jonas arched a brow at the glare she gave him.

"Amber will be waking soon." There was an edge of concern in her voice. "I need more formula and diapers before the day is out, Jonas. Elizabeth promised they would be here by time they were needed."

"And so they are. They arrived several hours ago." He nodded. "Her formula is on the counter; the sterilized bottles are beside it."

She moved away from him, the large shirt and even larger men's sweatpants she wore bunching around her small frame as she walked.

"I need a phone," she stated as she moved into the kitchen. "I need to contact my sister."

Jonas grimaced. "Diane is still overseas." He'd met her sister once. The woman was a Breed without the genetics. She would make a man think of suicide if he had to stay around her for long.

"Get me a phone, Jonas, before she has to come looking for me," she warned him as she moved for the bottles after checking out the rather large bag of diapers the Vanderales had had delivered.

"A secured sat phone will be delivered today. It was already arranged." There was no sense in delaying the inevitable. "Baby furniture as well the office will be delivered later today. There's a spare room that leads through that door." He nodded to a door that at first glance could have been a pantry door. "We'll be running things from here for a while."

"What about your schedule?" she questioned him. "You have several appointments this week, as well as the Hampton party you're scheduled to attend."

"That's why I have my own heli-jet." He shrugged.

Hell, there were days he almost wished he wasn't a steel-hearted Breed. Days when he wished he could sort through and understand the emotions that were pricking at him now. Emotions that had been building in him since the first day her sweet scent had wafted through his senses.

She made him . . . different. There was no other way to explain it. She made him want to be different when he knew it was the most dangerous thing he could do.

"Then we'll be running the office from here?" She fixed a bottle quickly. Using the purified water that had been provided and the powdered formula, the bottle was prepared within seconds. Next came a diaper and from the bag beside it, a pack of pre-moistened wipes and a tiny blanket.

"I have a list prepared," she told him as she glanced back. "Amber is going to need at least some of her things replaced. Whoever took care of outfitting her dresser did exceptionally well, but there are still some items missing."

"Taken care of." He leaned against the heavy post that formed the doorway into the kitchen. "Everything will be here before nightfall."

She paused for the slightest second as the heated tint of anger scented the air.

"Well, aren't you just on the ball?" There was just enough of a sneer in her voice to have his hackles rising.

"I have to admit, I think I did rather well," he stated mockingly.

Rachel's lips thinned. The look she shot him was heavy with irritation.

"You're not her father." The words were brisk, decisive, when she spoke again.

Jonas tensed. He knew what she was referring to. A slip of the tongue, no matter how slight, could be deadly in his world. He'd made a hell of a slip the night before.

"Now isn't a good time to push me, Rachel," he warned her as he straightened from the post, his body tightening as he fought back the need to go to her, to mark her, to force her to accept the desire that he'd known for months raged between them.

"Don't push me." Armed with a diaper, wipes and a bottle, she glared at him as though they were her battle armor. "You've drawn me and my daughter into one of your vicious little games . . ."

"You think I'd pull a child into this?" Incredulity rushed through him. She'd accused him of it the night before, but he hadn't thought she'd meant the words. "You think me so heartless, Rachel, that I'd use my mate and the child I've already claimed as my own in this battle against Brandenmore?"

"I believe you'd use whatever weapon you could grasp," she bit out, though she knew a part of her didn't truly believe that. She'd fought with herself over the months where Jonas was concerned, always certain that she would be safe, that Amber would be safe, simply because no one truly wanted to piss him off.

They wanted to kill him, and they often tried, but they never tried to piss him off. They knew better.

She watched as he stepped closer, suddenly more nervous where he was concerned than she had ever been.

"Don't touch me, Jonas." She stepped back quickly, knowing the few rumors, the whispered warnings she'd heard about Breeds when they took their mates.

He stopped quickly. His brow furrowed, the silver color in his eyes flickering and roiling like a storm coming to a head.

"Do you think I'd harm you?" His voice deepened and rumbled as she watched him nervously.

"I think you'd do whatever you needed to achieve your own end, but I don't think you'd harm me." She couldn't allow him to think otherwise; her sense of fair play went too deep. "That doesn't mean I want to tempt that hormonal funky stuff you have going on."

"Hormonal funky stuff?" There was a note of surprise in his voice though his expression became more brooding. "It's called heat, baby, and we call it that for a reason."

She gave a small snort, curiously ladylike, and so damned hot his cock throbbed with a hunger he had never experienced before.

Jonas could feel his teeth grinding together as he fought to pull back, not to touch her, to force her to admit that she was burning for him.

Curiously, she wasn't. There was desire, strong, heated desire. But it wasn't heat. He hadn't touched her. He hadn't kissed or marked her. She was saved from the torturous need that was suddenly afflicting him.

The glands in his tongue were swollen to the point that the tongue itself was thick and heavy. A slight taste of cinnamon and cloves tempted his taste buds and urged him to share.

God, he wanted her lips wrapped around his tongue. First his tongue, then his dick. His eyes narrowed on the luscious curves of her mouth as he fought to hold back the hunger, the absolute craving to fill her mouth with the same tastes that filled his. Her body with the same lusts that were tearing him apart.

"It's called a woman's nightmare," she informed him tartly. "I can't imagine anything worse than being so tied to a man that you can't exist without him."

His gaze slipped to hers as she turned from him.

Merinus had told her about mating heat. In that moment, Jonas knew that the Prima had broken the strictest law of the Breed society. Mates were forbidden to reveal the mating heat to any unmated Breed or human. It was the only protection they had.

"I've yet to see a mate who considers it a nightmare," he snapped as he forced himself to turn from her. "But the subject is moot. If I had intended to follow that path and tie you to me, then trust me, sweetheart," he turned back long enough to spear a hard, cool look in her direction, "you would be tied."

He didn't wait around for her reaction. At that moment, the sound of Amber's protest that she had waited too long for her breakfast echoed through the house as Jonas stalked to his room and closed the door softly.

He felt as though he was going to break apart. Parts of him were shattering on the inside as the animal part of his psyche clawed and roared in protest at being jerked from his mate.

Mark her, it urged.

Tie her.

God help him, that was the last thing he should do.

He'd seen his Enforcers locked in mating heat. He'd seen how it compromised their abilities to maintain control and focus on their assigned missions.

There was something about the hormonal, super-charged aphrodisiac that spilled from a Breed's tongue that made that tie impossible to deny.

It formed a tie that bound him to her, despite her unwillingness to be bound in return.

But wasn't this what he wanted? he reminded himself. He had denied the heat for months. He had forced himself to hold back, deny the instinctive need that ripped through his senses.

Now, in a matter of hours, he was ready to bed her for a single touch.

He was screwed. It was that simple, and he knew it. Just as he knew that there wasn't a damned thing he could do to stop it.

Rachel stared at her shaking hands before breathing in roughly, collecting the items she needed and moving back to the bedroom and to Amber, who fussed for her bottle.

She checked Amber's diaper, changed it quickly and all the while reminded herself, more than once, of all the reasons why she wasn't going to allow herself to touch the man. He was such a fascination to her that she could barely keep her mind, let alone her hands, off him.

And now there was the added complication that he thought she was his mate?

Oh, she knew about the mating. Merinus had been kind enough to go into detail--explicit, amazing detail--before Rachel had taken the job. That was just after Rachel had been asked to sign a confidentiality agreement that didn't just affect her own life, but any heirs she may come to have, and a very subtle warning of the grief family members could suffer if she ever divulged the information. But even if her friend hadn't given her those details, Rachel would have still suspected the truth of the rumors that circulated.

Mating heat. Forced desires. Breed sexual virus. The gossip rags were full of names for it. Merinus's description was kinder. Natural selection, she had called it. God had chosen the perfect mates for the children He had allowed the Council to create bodies for.

Merinus was nothing if not a great believer in a higher power.

So where did that leave Rachel?

As she placed Amber on her shoulder, cuddling the child close to her and rubbing her back soothingly, Rachel began to pace the floor.

Jonas fascinated her too much. That was her problem. That had nothing to do with hormones, pheromones, or anything chemical or biological. It was simply an attraction she had learned to accept.

It was now a complication she was going to have to deal with.

After burping Amber and laying her down for a nap, Rachel let herself linger long enough to smooth her fingers over her child's red-gold locks, and to once again be amazed that such a perfect creation had come from her body.

It wasn't often that she allowed herself to become sentimental or find any regrets in her life. She tried to live in a way that ensured she had as few regrets as possible. But as she stared down at Amber, she wondered if she had made a mistake in informing Amber's father of her birth.

Devon hadn't been perfect, but she had felt he deserved to know about his child, whether she thought he would be interested or not. Now it was something she might regret though. Devon was so firmly against the Breeds that it was hard telling what he would do once he learned where Rachel and Amber were located. And finding her wouldn't be hard. The explosion at her home had been all over the news, as well as reports that Rachel and her child had been flown to Sanctuary. It wouldn't be something he would do out of love for his child, but rather out of pure spite.

Unfortunately, that was Devon's personality.

Breathing out wearily, she leaned forward, kissed her daughter's cheek, then turned on the monitor system beside the crib before leaving the bedroom and venturing to the front porch of the cabin.

The large, single-story structure sat on the hill overlooking the main estate house. The three-story mansion had once been home to one of the labs the Genetics Council had created.

Beneath the historic home, a sprawling cement-and-steel structure had been built. The labs, confinement cells and soldiers' barracks had been completely hidden from the citizens of nearby Buffalo Gap. The mountain had provided a perfect training location, while the area had been a strategic location for the Breeds to come and go from their assigned missions.

Stepping to the railing of the wraparound porch, she crossed her arms over her breasts and fought to hold back the chill working down her spine.

"She's sleeping again?" Jonas stepped out as Rachel turned to him in surprise.

"I thought you'd left." For the barest second, her heart raced, breathlessness assailed her chest and her thighs tried to clench in response to his presence.

He was, quite simply, total male perfection. Savagely hewn, exceptionally built. And those eyes. Staring into his eyes was like staring into a maelstrom of hunger.

She had seen that hunger the first time they'd met, and it had never abated.

"Not yet." Pushing his hands into his slacks, he moved closer and leaned against one of the porch's huge support columns. "I was on the sat phone arranging the packing and delivery of the office here. Everything should arrive in a few hours."

"I'm certain it will, if that's what you ordered." Few people, let alone Breeds, defied Jonas.

His gaze flickered at the irony in her tone.

"Ely called while you were gone. She's hoping that if she adds her plea to Dr. Vanderale's, you'll come to the lab for testing in the morning."

Rachel tilted her head as she stared back at him. "If I have none of your mating heat signs, Jonas, then why should I do that? My time is rather valuable, as I'm certain you know. There's quite a bit that has to be caught up with at the office. Now that you're transferring said office here, there will be only additional work. I doubt I'll have time to pamper Ely or Dr. Vanderale in this matter. But should I change my mind, I promise you'll be the first to know."

Her mocking little speech produced much more of a reaction than she anticipated. For months, she had been throwing out the cute little asides in a particularly cool voice, and for months, Jonas had pretended to ignore them.

He wasn't ignoring it now.

Before Rachel could move to evade, his hands gripped her arms, turning her to face him as his head bent, bringing his lips much too close to hers. Too much temptation, much too close. That's what it was.

"Do you believe this is nothing more than a game?" The rough frustration in his tone scraped over her senses and sent heat coursing through her body.

Backing down would have been the wisest course of action, Rachel thought distantly, but, as her sister had always claimed, backing down just wasn't part of their DNA.

"If I thought it a game, then I would have brought my scorecard," she retorted, her chin lifting, bringing them almost nose to nose. "Now let me go, Mr. Wyatt. I did not give you permission to touch me, nor did I give you permission to berate me."

His gaze narrowed, the liquid silver boiling as a subtle mask of male lust seemed to descend upon his expression.

The look did something to her. It caused her stomach to jump, her womb to tighten. This time, her thighs truly did clench as she fought to hold back a response that seemed more instinctive than hormonal or forced.

"You're giving it to me now," he assured her, his nostrils flaring as he seemed to inhale.

Rachel felt heat flare in her face, both from arousal as well as embarrassment.

"How dare you . . ."

"I dare because I've spent too much time watching you flip around my office like some ice queen that no man dare touch, even after you had Amber. I dare because you know what the hell you're doing to me and you stand there in all your indignation and do it anyway."

And he was right. That damned sense of fair play she felt kicked in and made yet another situation more uncomfortable than it should have been.

"Why shouldn't I do it?" She narrowed her gaze on him, her jaw tightening in anger. "I've watched you fuck your way through Washington as though it were your own intimate little playground. What the hell makes you think I want anything to do with a man that so many other women have already had?"

That wasn't exactly the truth, but what the hell. She was getting mad now. The rules didn't apply with the same strength when she was mad.

"Oh, you want me." A tight smile curled his lips. "You can deny it until hell freezes over, sweetheart, but we both know you want nothing more than my hands on you."

Oh, she hated that arrogant confidence that seemed to ooze from his very pores.

Fighting back the arousal that had slipped past her control wasn't easy, but she managed it. As quickly as the blood had thundered through her veins and rushed to the sensitive bud of her clit, it was settling, easing back into its normal pace.

She'd had to learn how to control herself and her responses so many years ago. She and her sister both had learned the danger of ever giving rein to their desires versus locking them down.

She pulled back slowly.

"Nice little trick." His head lowered farther, his lips so close to her own that she stilled just as quickly, terrified of allowing her own to brush against them.

Merinus had warned her about the potency of a Breed's kiss and the hormone that filled the small glands beneath the Breed's tongue.

"What trick." She didn't dare lick her lips, not yet, not even to soothe their nervous dryness.

"Stilling the desire, the needs that claw at you." Before she could evade him his head lowered, his cheek brushing against hers, much too close to her lips. "Tell me, Rachel, do you truly think you can deny me if I share my kiss with you? If I allow you to taste the hunger that's ripping my guts to shreds?"

Lust. It was no more than lust, and Rachel had sworn to herself that she would never be the object of any man's lust again.

She wanted love, not just desire, or mating heat, or forced hunger. Whatever the description, she didn't want it without his heart.

She didn't want to be bound to a man who she knew would feel no more than an overwhelming responsibility to keep her alive.

"Do you have any idea how much I've wanted you?" Curiously gentle, his voice seemed to wrap around her senses, to stroke them with sensuality rather than lust.

"Let me go, Jonas," she whispered. If she felt the warmth of him surrounding her much longer, she might not be able to hold back the need to experience the taste of that kiss he was threatening her with. "Let me go, now."

He released his hold on her slowly, one finger at a time, reluctance filling each move, before stepping back.

"Do you think running away from it is going to help?" he growled, his voice dark, heavy with hunger.

"Immeasurably," she assured him as she moved away from him. "Trust me, Jonas, it will help immeasurably."

At least, it better. As far as Rachel was concerned, it was the last defense she had against her desire for him.

Mating heat, her ass. As though this could be forced without some kind of hormonal kiss. This was desire. The kind her sister had warned her years ago that she never wanted to know, and never wanted to regret.

It was the kind of desire that ended up breaking a woman's heart and scarring her soul. Rachel had no desire to have her world destroyed by a man as Diana had had her world destroyed once.

"Rachel." The sound of Merinus's voice had her turning and facing the woman who had been her dearest friend for most of her life, despite the gap in their ages.

Merinus Tyler Lyons still looked no more than twenty-four years old. Her skin was unblemished, unlined, her brown eyes still bright and filled with youth.

There was something eternally different about Merinus, though, an aura that she hadn't possessed before, a confidence and sense of power that Rachel had sensed the past year when Merinus had called her to take the job with Jonas.

Merinus had saved her life. Rachel had been in a strange country, alone, newly pregnant and fighting for survival after Devon had deserted her in Switzerland.

She had had to fight to survive those few weeks alone in Switzerland after losing her apartment, her job and her passport. She attempted to convince the ambassador there to provide her a ride back to the States. She was certain she could have eventually convinced him to do so without the night spent in his bed, as he was demanding, but things hadn't been looking good.

She had tried to call Kane, but he had been unavailable. She'd lost touch with Merinus and her brother years before, but she'd been unable to reach her sister and had no idea whom to turn to.

Within hours of the message she'd left on Kane's phone, a Breed heli-jet had landed at the consulate and three Breed Enforcers had informed her they had been sent to escort her back to America.

That was friendship, she thought as Merinus stepped up to the porch, her expression hesitant, slightly guilty.

"How did you know?" Rachel asked, certain that Merinus had to have known that she would be Jonas's mate.

Merinus swallowed tightly. "Remember the blood and saliva tests that were requested before you were allowed to land in Sanctuary on the flight back from Switzerland?"

Rachel lifted a brow. "The ones to ensure that I wasn't carrying the flu or some infection that could affect your precious Breeds?"

Merinus's lips twitched at Rachel's acidic tone. "Yeah, those." She nodded as she came closer before taking a seat in the padded chair that sat against the side of the house. "Actually, that is truly what the blood was for. It's standard procedure to run the mating test against any Breed you may come in contact with, though. Jonas was here at Sanctuary when you called, so the test was run against his." She rubbed at her nose thoughtfully. "I actually thought perhaps Diana would be a better match myself. You surprised me."

Merinus was amused. Why didn't that surprise her?

"Diana would have castrated him," she informed her friend as she leaned back against the railing and faced the Prima of the Feline Breed species.

"She would have." Merinus nodded with a smile before sobering. "What about you, Rachel? Will you kill him, or will you love him?"

"Does it matter?" she asked, knowing that Jonas wasn't a very well-liked person among either Breeds or humans.

Surprisingly, Merinus nodded. "It matters very much. You can be his salvation or his destruction. Jonas is one of the most intelligent of the Breeds, and definitely one of the most dangerous. His very nature is his own worst enemy."

"And you think I can save him?" she asked incredulously. "Merinus, when did you lose your mind?"

A rueful smile curved the other woman's lips. "Let's say I've been warned by someone who cares a great deal for him. If Jonas doesn't learn to temper himself, then he'll self-destruct and we'll lose him forever. Win or lose, stay or go, the only thing that's going to temper him is his mate. Tag, my friend, you're it," Merinus finished with the childhood rejoinder.

"It was my turn last time," Rachel argued. "Remember? When I took on your brother's temper and that mess he called an office?"

Merinus bit her lip to hide a smile, but Rachel caught the merriment in her gaze as she responded. "Oh yeah. My bad."

"Your bad indeed." She crossed her arms over her breasts and glared back at her. "He's a pain in the ass."

"I'm sure he can be." Merinus nodded with no attempt to hide her amusement now.

"He makes me crazy, Merinus."

"He'll make you crazier," her friend promised.

"I refuse to accept this mating crap."

Merinus sighed then. "It doesn't matter if you accept it. You're here; that's all he needed. Like I said, win or lose, accept or reject, it doesn't matter. Whatever Jonas has to face with you as his mate is what he needs."

"You sound as though you've been looking into crystal balls or something." Rachel snorted.

"Perhaps I have," Merinus responded soberly now. "But really, who needs to? You've seen him. You've worked with him. I knew him before he laid eyes on you, before he sensed that you could belong to him." She leaned forward intently. "He's never known love. He's never known a caress that didn't involve some sort of payment, or a kind word that he didn't suspect didn't come with strings. And I know you, Rachel. I've watched you. You might not love him, but you care for him."

"I lust after his body," Rachel griped. "He's seriously ripped. That doesn't mean I want to risk my sanity for it."

"You care for him." Merinus shook her head in denial. "Don't lie to me. We both know you do."

"He's not completely hateful." She shrugged. "He's tolerable. I don't hate him."

"Are you in love with him?" Suspicions suddenly clouded the other woman's eyes.

"Indeed not." Rachel's eyes widened. "I haven't lost my mind yet, you know."

"Give it time." Merinus waved her hand negligently as though losing her mind were a foregone conclusion. "You haven't lived with Jonas yet."

"And you have?" Rachel questioned the confidence in her tone.

"Not on a bet." Merinus laughed. "Not even for the world.

This is one time, my friend, I do not envy you the adventure."

Just what she needed, an adventure Merinus wasn't willing to fight her for.

"You're going to owe me," Rachel promised her.

"And as always, I'll pay up." There was blissful unconcern.

Rachel had a bad feeling, a very bad feeling, things were going to get very, very complicated.

And unfortunately, she had yet to see a time when her bad feelings didn't pan out.

She had a feeling it might have been more prudent to have stayed in Switzerland.