by Zoe Chant
For some reason, that annoyed her. But she didn’t let it show. “Yeah. I’ll let you know when we’re close enough to the Ritz that you should hold my hand or something.”
“Shall we?” He indicated the street.
They hailed a cab to a different hotel near Fiona’s, then walked to the Ritz. The street was alive with locals and tourists, so they didn’t talk. Anything they could possibly say, they didn’t want to have overheard.
But as they came closer to her hotel, she said, “It’s around the corner.”
“Ah.” He put his arm around her waist.
Fiona swallowed. She’d been trying not to think about that one bed, but having his arm around her was really not helping.
Fine, she thought. I’ll think about it. It’ll help me get in character as his girlfriend.
His arm was warm and strong. His hand was settled on her hip in a way that suggested tenderness and sensuality, as if it might slide over—and lower—at any moment. What would it be like to be touched—really touched—by those long, clever fingers? What would his stubble feel like on her face if he kissed her? What would it feel like on her body if he went on kissing her, all over?
Heat pooled in her belly. And lower down. Her heart was beating faster and faster.
That’s enough!
She wrenched her mind away from those fantasies. In-character was one thing. Turning herself on so much that sharing a bed would be horrifically embarrassing was another. This was all strictly business.
With his arm still around her waist and drawing her attention as much as if it was on fire, she strolled up through the lobby and into the elevator. Another couple stepped in with them, so they rode up in silence. It felt like an eternity before they got to her floor. She opened the door to her room. He stepped in. She hung up the Do Not Disturb sign.
The door swung closed behind them, leaving them alone together.
His arm was still around her waist. Probably he’d forgotten it was there, but she hadn’t. She didn’t want to step away from him, but she forced herself to. Once he was no longer touching her, she couldn’t help regretting that she’d moved away.
I had to, she told herself. That was just for show.
He took off his glasses and replaced them in their case. Now that she was facing him in a brightly lit room, her attention was caught by how exhausted he looked. His skin wasn’t just pale, it was white. The shadows under his eyes were smears of black.
“Are you all right?” Then, remembering how he’d been shot and not felt it when they first met, she asked, “Could you have been hit?”
“No.”
“Are you sure? You might not feel it.”
“I checked when I changed my clothes,” he said. “I’m not.”
That answer didn’t satisfy her. “When was the last time you slept?”
He made a sound like a chuckle, but without any real humor. “You caught me. A week ago.”
“A week!?” Fiona stared at him. She’d sometimes gone without sleep for several days, but a week was far longer than even a shifter could manage. “That’s impossible. Three days without sleep, and you start hallucinating!”
“No.” He sighed. “No, not for me. But I do need to let it go.”
“Let what go?”
He gave her a long look, as if deciding whether or not to reply, then sighed again. “I have a... a thing... that lets me go without sleep for long periods. Without food, too. But I’m at my limit for how long I can keep it going. Tell you what. I’ll set an alarm on the door. Then I’ll let... it... go, and we can both get some sleep. We can do our explanations in the morning. I promise you, I won’t disappear in the night.”
“A thing?” she echoed, baffled. “You mean a drug?”
With a long-suffering expression, he said, “Why do people keep accusing me of being on drugs? No, it’s nothing like that. It’s just something I can do.”
Before she could quiz him more, he opened his backpack and took out a small portable alarm, which he attached to the door and activated. It was the sort of thing Fiona would have used herself, if she hadn’t lost her purse.
They knew so many similar things. How to put on a character. How to disguise yourself. How to shoot. How to avoid attracting attention. How to protect yourself if you needed to sleep.
Who was he?
“My name’s Fiona,” she said. “It’s my real name. You don’t have to tell me your last name, but what’s your first? Just so I can stop thinking of you as ‘he’ and ‘you.’”
He didn’t reply for so long that she was about to tell him to forget it, she’d call him Andy. Then he said, “Justin.”
Fiona barely stopped herself from making the idiotic reply, “That’s a nice name.” She couldn’t help thinking it, though.
Before she could come up with anything sensible to say, Justin said, more to himself than to her and in a voice so low that it was almost a whisper, “All right.”
He closed his eyes and seemed to brace himself.
An unsettling feeling of anticipation came over Fiona, as if she was watching a horror movie and didn’t know whether the next scene would be the heroine slaying the monster or being torn to shreds by it.
Her snow leopard let out a long, hair-raising growl.
What is it? Fiona asked silently.
Her snow leopard made no reply in words, but the growl slowly shifted into a purr that made Fiona feel as if her body was vibrating.
What? Fiona demanded. What the hell is going on?
Justin opened his eyes. They were black, so black, but no longer mirrors. At last, she could read them. Could read him. The lines in his face spoke of the grinding weariness of pain, and the darkness of his gaze told her that he hadn’t just been through hell, but was still living there.
But that wasn’t all she saw. The faint lines around his eyes and mouth had been carved by laughter. And beyond what she could literally see, she sensed courage and compassion, endurance and loyalty, a passion for justice and an immense capacity for love.
There was something else, too. Before, her attraction to him had been more of a possibility than a reality: an appreciation of his looks and competence, plus a bit of “I could be into that if he showed a little more emotion.” But the instant that they’d locked eyes, desire caught fire within her. Suddenly, she wanted him on the most primal level possible. She wanted to rip his clothes off, she wanted him to rip her clothes off, she wanted to press their naked flesh together until it felt like they were merging into a single being, a single soul...
Ahhh, said her snow leopard in a rumbling purr. So that’s it.
So what’s what? Fiona replied.
He’s our mate, her snow leopard purred.
“No way!” Fiona exclaimed aloud.
But she spoke in shock, not in denial. Her snow leopard’s words felt deeply right; not simply correct, but expressing a profound truth. How else could she have sensed so much about him just by looking in his eyes? Why else would she have felt so driven to protect him when he was so clearly capable of looking after himself? It had to be because her big cat was right: she and Justin were perfectly compatible. All they had to do now was get to know each other.
My mate, she thought, awestruck.
She’d seen the bonds between mates, and had never imagined that much trust and love could ever be directed at her. She’d done nothing to earn it. But apparently she’d been given that treasure whether she deserved it or not. After a lifetime of loneliness and cold, she’d finally be allowed to come inside and warm her hands at the fire.
Justin recoiled, staring at her in shock and horror.
“No,” he breathed. Like her, he too seemed to be replying to an inward voice. His own voice rose in a startlingly loud shout, “No! I can’t have a mate! I won’t do it! I—”
He broke off, swaying as if he was dizzy. Instinctively, she reached out to steady him. He sprang backward, hands held up to ward her off.
Then his eyes closed. Before s
he could react, he crumpled to the floor in a dead faint.
Fiona dropped to her knees beside him, cursing herself for having been too surprised to catch him and break his fall. She felt at his throat for a pulse, and was immensely relieved to find one. When she rolled him on to his back, she saw his chest moving evenly as he breathed.
He’s probably just exhausted, she thought. Given what he’d said, the only surprising part was that it had taken him that long to collapse.
All the same, she took off his jacket and shirt to check for injuries. She found none, but did notice a star-shaped scar just below his heart. Fiona knew what made scars like that; both Hal and Shane had them. Justin had been lucky to survive getting shot so close to his heart. That must have been a close call.
He lay sprawled on the floor, head tilted back and throat exposed. The position made him look terribly vulnerable. She eased her arms under him, supported his head and neck in the crook of her elbow, took a deep breath, and stood up. Her knees cracked, but her shifter strength enabled her to carry him to the bed and lay him gently down. He didn’t stir as she took off his belt and shoes, then pulled the covers over him.
Once she knew he wasn’t hurt and was as comfortable as she could make him, her urgency faded, giving her space to think about what had happened right before he had collapsed.
My mate, she thought. This man is my mate.
At last, purred her snow leopard. The big cat was so filled with contentment and satisfaction, she was practically licking her paws and sunning herself.
Fiona’s own feelings were considerably more complicated. She couldn’t deny that she felt deeply and instinctively drawn to Justin, nor that she also had more rational reasons for feeling that way. He’d saved her life—twice! He was quick to think and quick to act, skilled at fighting and subterfuge, competent and intelligent and brave. From the first moment they’d met, they’d worked together as smoothly as she did with teammates she’d had for years.
There was also the little matter of him being devastatingly handsome and incredibly sexy. Especially when he was in motion. She’d never seen anything to match his predatory grace, not even from her shifter teammates.
He could be—he was—the partner she’d always longed for, and never believed she’d find.
And yet.
She had so many questions about him. Why was he on the run? What the hell was the thing that enabled him to go without food or sleep for a week, and why had it prevented them from recognizing each other as mates? He was clearly a shifter, since he too had known they were mates, but what sort? Had he been born one, or had he been made into one?
She didn’t even know his last name.
We will learn everything about our mate, purred her snow leopard. When he awakens.
Yeah, Fiona thought grimly. When he wakes up, we’re going to learn a whole lot of things we’d rather not know.
Her snow leopard snorted a dismissive denial.
But Fiona’s mind had already sped back to the moment her snow leopard had told her Justin was her mate. She’d been overwhelmed with happiness—and desire. But though he’d obviously gotten the same news from his own inner beast, whatever it was, he hadn’t been glad. Hearing that she was his mate was such bad news to him that the shock, coupled with exhaustion, had actually made him pass out!
What made it even worse was that she already knew why he’d reacted like that. He must have gotten a glimpse into her soul at the same time that she’d gotten a glimpse into his. And what he’d seen had horrified him.
Did he literally see my past? A wave of panicked shame swept over her at the thought. Does he know what I was—what I am?
Of course not, hissed her snow leopard. As if Fiona was a toddler, the big cat went on, Did you see his past? No? Then he didn’t see yours.
But that didn’t make Fiona feel any better. If Justin had reacted like that just from a general sense of her personality, what would he do if he learned what she’d actually done?
The same thing anyone would, she thought. Run screaming.
Her snow leopard hissed, Does he look like a man who runs? Or screams?
I didn’t mean it literally, Fiona thought. But he wouldn’t want to have anything to do with me.
It was hard enough keeping that secret from her teammates. It would be impossible to keep it from a mate.
She sat in a chair by the bed, where she could keep an eye on Justin, and forced herself to do what she did best: coldly analyze the situation.
Justin obviously needed help. He reminded her a bit of Shane, when Hal had first brought him on the team: wary, haunted, dangerous yet also fragile, as if he had a crack running straight down the center of his soul. But he’d gotten better with time, and much better since he’d moved in with Catalina. He might still bear a scar, but the wound had closed. Maybe if she could recruit Justin for the team, he too could be healed.
But if she wanted him to stick around long enough for her to befriend him and convince him to join her at Protection, Inc., she could never let him get any closer to her than her teammates. A friend could accept being kept at a slight distance. A friend could accept knowing nothing about her past. But her mated teammates kept no secrets from each other. It wasn’t even that they didn’t; as far as she could tell, they couldn’t.
Fiona couldn’t deny the devastating truth. She’d found the man who was supposed to be her true love. And they could never be together.
Chapter Two
Justin
Justin surfaced from a deep sleep, becoming slowly aware that he was warm and comfortable. He wasn’t used to feeling anything pleasant when he woke up after being invincible for that long. But when he reached within himself, as cautiously as if he was prodding a broken bone, he found neither the blank numbness of invincibility nor the physical misery and mental anguish that normally crashed over him when he emerged from that state. He felt dizzy and weak, but nothing worse than that.
Also, he was in a real bed, with a firm mattress beneath him, a pillow under his head, and soft blankets over him. That too was strange. He lay very still, keeping his eyes closed and his breathing exactly the same as before, feigning sleep. He might have been captured—
No, purred his snow leopard.
That was also unfamiliar. His snow leopard hissed and growled, snarled and screamed. He didn’t purr. Justin hadn’t even known he could purr. Until...
With that, his memory returned in a flood. He recalled how Fiona had broken into his hideout, how they’d been attacked and escaped together, and then holed up at, of all places, the Ritz Carlton. He remembered his decision to let go of his invincibility, and how he’d braced himself for the return of gnawing hunger and crushing exhaustion, bitter guilt and bleak despair, a desperate need for sleep and nightmares that would make him wish he’d never sleep again.
And he remembered looking into Fiona’s eyes.
He’d seen them before, of course, but he’d been invincible then and so he’d perceived them without emotion. Just as he’d perceived her without emotion. Both times they’d met, he’d felt driven to protect her. He’d supposed that was due to the remnants of his sense of duty and desire to do the right thing. But it had been a bloodless compulsion, shorn of the blazing determination he’d felt in combat to save his buddies or die trying.
As for Fiona herself, he’d noted that she was tall for a woman and slim, moved like she’d been trained to fight, had blonde hair and green eyes, and was about his age.
When he was invincible, nothing was beautiful. Nor was anything ugly. Everything simply was, with no value attached to it. He could look at a rainbow arching over a green hill and a heap of rotting trash in a dark alley, and have no desire to see one rather than the other.
When he’d taken off his shield of ice and let his snow leopard back into his heart, he’d been deluged with feeling. Fiona wasn’t just a tall blonde woman, she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. She wasn’t just capable of moving quickly, she’d leaped like
lightning to shield him with her own body.
And her eyes—he could have looked into her eyes forever. They were a bright clear green like rain-washed grass, like tiny leaves unfurling in spring, like beach glass held up to the sun. When he’d seen them, really seen them, he’d felt his heart start to open like a flower.
And in that instant of gazing into that incredible green, he’d somehow seen straight into Fiona’s soul. He’d sensed courage and intelligence, discipline and pride, kindness and loyalty and a smoldering passion hot enough to burn him to ash if it ever caught flame. He couldn’t imagine that he’d mind.
For a split second, he’d been overwhelmed with feelings he’d thought he’d never experience again. Hope. Joy. Desire.
Then his snow leopard had purred, She’s the one. She’s our mate.
The big cat’s words sent Justin crashing back to Earth. He couldn’t have a mate. Him, paired with this amazing woman? She should be free to fly to the highest of heights, not be chained down to a broken soldier. His life was a shambles. He’d done terrible things he could never atone for. His body was a ruin, his mind a battlefield.
And he was going to die.
No, his snow leopard had snarled. We will live for our mate!
I will not! Justin had shouted silently, stumbling backward as if his snow leopard had been a real beast crouched in front of him rather than a voice inside his mind. I can’t. I won’t.
You will! His snow leopard’s voice had risen in a terrified—and terrifying—scream. You must!
Do you still think I’m getting a happy ending? Justin had demanded with bitter sarcasm. Seashells and wedding bells and babies on the rug? What a joke! I’m going down in flames, and I won’t take her with me!
Justin frowned, trying to recall what had happened after that. He had a vague recollection of darkness closing in on him, as if he was peering into a shrinking tunnel. He must have passed out. And then Fiona must have laid him on the bed. She’d have to be strong to have wrestled him off the floor—but she must be a shifter too. He wondered what kind. Maybe a big cat, like him. She moved like a cat.
