Lion's Heat

by Lora Leigh

  d her.

  She couldn't reach him for a kiss; even with high heels she went only to his shoulders. She did the next-best thing. She grabbed his wrist as he tried to pass, lifted it and sank her teeth into his flesh for a hard, quick bite.

  That stopped him.

  Turning, he stared down at her, the pupil enlarging just enough in his gaze that Rachel could pray there was an edge of sanity returning.

  It took precious moments. The prints of her teeth were in his hard wrist; the taste of him lingered against her tongue as she fought to hold him back, to keep the animal inside him leashed.

  "We will discuss this." There was more than a rumble in his voice now, there was pure intent.

  But sanity was there.

  Holding her arm, he turned away from the ambassador and led her quickly to the wide front doors that looked out on the circular drive.

  There were six Enforcers standing at the ready, weapons held as he rushed her from the house and into the waiting limo. Something had happened, there was no doubt about that. There was a sense of imminent danger surrounding the Breeds, their hard gazes and savage expressions reflecting a heightened sense of awareness.

  Dawn followed, Seth at her side, until the doors closed behind them and the vehicles were speeding away from the Hampton mansion.

  Curving mountain roads were the wrong place for the constant switches the limo made in position with the other two that had pulled out behind them. The six Enforcers as well as two drivers in the other two vehicles were driving like kamikaze racers heading for destiny.

  "What's going on?" Rachel could feel her throat tightening with fear. "Is Amber okay?"

  "Amber's fine. She's currently in a secured room reserved for Sanctuary's children and protected by the Enforcers assigned to give their lives if necessary. The mated parents are with them and looking over them as well as Leo and his entourage of cutthroats."

  If those precautions were being taken, whatever had happened was something with the potential to endanger the mated couples as well as the ruling cabinet.

  She watched wide-eyed as Dawn and Seth worked on a personal slimline laptop, and Dawn spoke urgently, her tone lowered, into a sat phone.

  "Sanctuary was attacked about an hour ago," Jonas stated. "Callan and Merinus's son, David, was nearly kidnapped while on a pre-training exercise with Tanner Reynolds; my sister, Harmony; and her husband, Lance Jacobs. Lance was wounded, which compounded a chest wound he received nearly a year ago."

  "The battle in New Mexico." Rachel nodded, fighting to remain calm. "He was shot in the chest."

  Jonas nodded sharply. "He took a severe blow to the same area tonight. We have a team tracking the attackers now. I'll be joining them as soon as we arrive."

  Rachel clenched her fists in her lap as she stared back at him. First, she had to face the danger to her daughter's life, and now the danger to Jonas. Through the months she had worked with him, he'd kept the more dangerous areas of his life hidden from her. Now there was no hiding it, and it brought to her the realization of how often his life, and the lives of the Breeds in general, were in danger.

  "Is David all right?" she asked, knowing what it would do to Merinus if anything had happened to her son.

  "Physically, he's fine," Jonas stated. "This is the second attack on the boy in the past two years, though. Each time, a friend has been harmed trying to save him. He's inconsolable."

  And Jonas was nearly inconsolable himself.

  Rachel stared into the live color of his eyes and saw subtle, agonizing flame. He cared for his sister and her husband, though she knew he often pretended otherwise.

  Merinus had warned her that Jonas was cold and hard, and if he didn't thaw, if he didn't relent in the constant games he played with his Enforcers, then someone would end up killing him. That or the Breed cabinet would do something themselves to put a stop to his behavior.

  Rachel had never seen cold or hard in Jonas, though. She had never seen a manipulator. He was calculating, no doubt; he had to be to survive. He had to be, to maneuver the people he loved into the lives he knew would benefit them.

  He was a lover, a leader. He was a man who used the training he was given--to kill, to destroy, to sabotage--to build and to nurture instead.

  He just had a rather unique way of doing it in an ass backward sort of way though.

  "Jackal has landed the heli-jet one mile from our location," Dawn stated, her voice calm, though her dark brown eyes raged with anger. "We also have two pickups filled with armed assailants bearing down on us. Prepare to run."

  Jonas snarled.

  CHAPTER 9

  The three limos pulled into the clearing, sliding to a stop within sight of the heli-jet. From the backseat, Rachel swallowed tightly at the sight of the armed men standing outside the pickups that were parked in a diagonal angle to the super-fast helicopter assigned to Sanctuary.

  Dressed in jeans, T-shirts and dark masks, they held their weapons in a relaxed, nonthreatening manner, but there was a tension there that assured Rachel that the nonthreatening part could change in an instant.

  There was also a familiarity to them. Rachel leaned forward, staring out the window, her gaze narrowed as she fought to pinpoint exactly what she recognized about the men.

  "Jonas, a message just came through on the sat channel." Lawe turned in the driver's seat and stared back at Jonas. "They're refusing to identify themselves but they're saying the way is clear. They're here for security and we need to hurry because the real bad guys are only miles away with rocket launchers."

  The Enforcers from the other two limos were moving from the vehicles, surrounding the one they were in as the two Enforcers from the heli-jet joined them.

  "We have a message to tell Rachel to giddy up and go." Jonas's gaze sliced to her as a gasp fell from her lips.

  "It's Diana," she whispered, her eyes widening as she stared back at Jonas. "She left that code for me when she left, just after Amber was born. It's safe, Jonas. And that code means it's imperative we go now."

  "We can't be certain." Jonas was checking the rifle he had jerked from a panel beneath the seat as Seth and Dawn followed suit.

  "I can." Rachel jerked open the door and all but fell out, the heels she was wearing making it more difficult to move.

  "Rachel!" For all his reflexes, Jonas managed only to grab the skirt of her dress.

  "Let me go, Jonas!"

  "Like hell." He was out of the limo, his weapon held ready as a single figure detached from the group.

  A gloved hand reached up and peeled the mask off to reveal the delicate, if stony, features of her beloved sister's face. A face she feared daily she might never see again. The life of a female mercenary wasn't exactly an easy one, or one with any amount of security.

  "Wyatt, get my sister the hell out of here now or I'll take her myself," Diana called out, her tone furious. She meant it. Diana was a protector, and she had decided early in life that her baby sister had to be protected.

  "Fuck!" Jonas turned back to Seth and Dawn. "Go. Move."

  He gripped Rachel's arm as she stared back at Diana.

  "Come with us, Diana," she cried, her tone desperate as Jonas pulled her to the heli-jet.

  Her sister stood still, her gaze narrowed in the bright lights cast by the limos and the heli-jet. She didn't move, nor did the six men standing behind her, their weapons held ready.

  "Vehicles moving in," Jackal yelled out as the door slid open. "Sensors show firepower, Jonas. Let's fly."

  Jonas all but threw her into the seat of the heli-jet as the others rushed in behind her, blocking her from calling out to her sister once again.

  Her heart was racing, fear overwhelming her as she fought against Jonas.

  "Diana!" She screamed out her sister's name as she glimpsed her racing--not for a pickup to escape in but for a defensible position to fire on the arriving attackers.

  "Get her." She turned to Jonas, wild-eyed, terrified. Her sister was there because of he
r, to protect her. If something happened to her, Rachel didn't know if she could bear it. "Make her go with us."

  "She'll blow my head off," Jonas snarled back at her, and even though she knew it was true, Rachel fought the need to beg him to do it. "If she wanted to be here with us, that's where she'd be, Rachel." Turning to Jackal, he gave the order to fly.

  She hadn't seen her sister since Amber's birth. A few quick moments, and Diana had been gone again. What she did and why she did it, Rachel didn't know. All she knew was that whenever she was in trouble, no matter the trouble, Diana was there. There had been only a moment in their lives when she hadn't been there: the months Rachel had spent in Switzerland, fighting to try to get home, her passport stolen, her money depleted. Diana had been nowhere to be found, and Rachel had been alone.

  The heli-jet lifted off, powerful jets kicking in and holding Rachel back in her seat as it turned and headed the short distance to Sanctuary.

  "Diana's group is moving out with time to spare," Jackal called out. "Hell, Jonas, you need to recruit her."

  "She would kill us all," Jonas muttered as the heli-jet streaked through the sky. "Contact Sanctuary; we're flying in. I want Alpha Team One ready to move."

  "Alpha Team One assembled and ready," Jackal called back. "We have sporadic fire on the estate house. Vanderale Team Two has taken to the mountains. We have two prisoners, six enemy causalities, two Breed causalities and nearly three dozen wounded."

  Rachel wrapped her arms around her stomach as information was reported. So many hurt or dead. In the years since the revelation of the Breeds' existence, they hadn't known a moment's peace or true safety.

  Breathing in roughly, she tentatively laid her hand on Jonas's hard thigh. Tension held his body tight, invading every cell as he watched the screen of the small communication and information device an Enforcer had handed him.

  Entering the secure code, Rachel watched as the black screen flickered, cleared, then showed the image of the Breed known as the Leo.

  Gold eyes flamed with fury as he stared back. The two men had some uncannily similar features. It was rumored he was Jonas's father as well.

  She didn't doubt it. Both men were arrogant and calculating enough to be fully related.

  "Status," Jonas snapped.

  "All secure," Leo snarled, strong, sharp incisors flashing at the sides of his mouth. "We still have a few of the bastards to pull in. The main strike escaped, though they left empty-handed."

  "How is Lance?" Rachel could hear the concern, as well as the promise of retribution, in his voice.

  Leo looked aside for a moment, his jaw clenching, before turning back. "Elizabeth and Ely have him. They're confident he's going to pull through, but he's unconscious now."

  "Harmony?" Jonas's voice thickened with concern.

  Leo's lips tightened in fury as his eyes blazed. "She's gone after them, Jonas. I couldn't stop her."

  Rachel looked into Jonas's face and saw, for just a second, pure, naked fear and pain.

  "I'll bring her home," he stated with chilling force. "My ETA is in five."

  "Bring her home," Leo affirmed. "But if you'd left her the hell alone, we wouldn't be worried about her, now would we?"

  "No, we'd be mourning her."

  Jonas didn't give the other man a chance to respond. The communication device flipped off before his hand clenched around it with enough force that the veins bulged in his hands.

  "Harmony's fine." Rachel wanted to console him, wanted to ease the worry, though she knew that wasn't entirely possible.

  His head jerked to her. "Harmony will bathe that mountain in blood if I don't rein her in," Jonas snorted. "We need at least one of those bastards left alive. She'll skin them all. She makes your sister look like the tooth fairy."

  Rachel frowned. "My sister isn't that bad."

  Jonas merely snorted again.

  "If Harmony is that dangerous, then she'll be fine," she reassured him again, watching the clenching of his jaw as he fought to rein in whatever emotions were tearing him apart.

  "I nearly lost her once." He turned back to her, their gazes meeting, locking as she read the worry in his. "She was on a fast track to suicide, and as much as Leo's family cared for her, they couldn't have stopped it."

  "But you did?" She hadn't known this. Merinus had told her very little about Jonas's sister.

  His smile was tight but victorious. "When I met her mate, there was a calm about him, a streak of pure peace that seemed to surround him. The second I looked into his eyes I felt my sister's salvation in him, though I swear to God I don't know how. When his cousin mated one of my Enforcers, I was able to use the blood and saliva samples we require for anyone working with Breeds, from him. They matched what I had acquired of Harmony's from the labs we were bred in. I gave her peace, and this makes twice someone has attempted to steal it from her."

  Which meant someone was going to pay for it.

  "Brandenmore?" she asked. "You think he's behind this?"

  "I know he is," Jonas grunted as his hand lifted to rub at hers where it lay on his thigh. The motion was almost unconscious, as though he was doing it by instinct rather than by design. "There's something he's after--something that has to do with the mating phenomenon."

  "The information regarding the halt in aging?" She knew what it was. She had known, once she had thought about it, why Merinus and Kane hadn't aged over the years when the rest of their family had.

  "Sometimes you're too damned smart." He sighed, but there was a hint of approval in his tone, as well as his gaze.

  Sometimes he was entirely too approachable, Rachel could have retorted. Such as now, when he was reaching out to her, amid the danger and the strife of his life. He was still making room for her, finding a reason, and a chance, to be gentle.

  He wasn't hiding from her. He wasn't manipulating her. And she knew Jonas well enough to know when he was doing exactly that.

  "Sanctuary in sight," Jackal called out. "Prepare to disembark, Director. We have live fire still coming in. Duck and run."

  The heli-jet swooped down, its engines powering down, vibrating through the cabin as it set down as close to the estate house as possible.

  The door swung open. Rachel found herself held tight to Jonas's side, her feet off the ground as he jumped from the craft, raced across the short distance and toward the opened double doors, which led to the large underground lab network beneath the estate house.

  Live fire burst around them from the mountainside. Jonas was shouting orders as Seth and Dawn raced behind them, completely surrounded by a formation of Breeds.

  "We're in. We're in," Jonas called out as steel and cement surrounded them.

  Jonas still held her tight against him, racing down the hallway and up a short flight of stairs before careening through a maze of tunnels until he reached the door he was searching for.

  The door swung open as Merinus stepped out.

  "In here." She was wild-eyed, her face streaked with tears. "Callan, Kane and Leo raced out of here minutes ago, after Harmony. A report came in that she was surrounded and Lance's uncles were unable to get to her. Elizabeth and Ely are with Lance but he's not awakened yet and communications can't contact any of them."

  Rachel was set on her feet, but she found Jonas's arm still around her, his warmth surrounding her as Sherra, Callan's Pride sister and the woman who'd married Kane Tyler, and head of computer security, handed Amber to her.

  Her baby.

  Rachel buried her face against her little girl's neck, tears filling her eyes as her fear began to ease marginally.

  "Rachel. I have to go."

  Jonas was releasing her. His warmth was easing away.

  "No. Not yet." She turned, clutching Amber to her. "Wait. Jonas . . ." She knew he wouldn't listen. She knew he couldn't listen.

  Staring up into his eyes, she saw the torn loyalties. His need to stay with his mate, his need to save his people.

  Swallowing tightly, she forced a smile to her
face. "You have to go."

  "I have to go." His hand lifted, his fingertips running across her lips. "I'll be back for you."

  Fear was a desperate, agonized entity growing inside her. She didn't want to lose him. She'd fought with him for months, ached for him for just as long. She couldn't lose him until she knew where this was going.

  "Hurry back," she whispered through numb lips as she fought to hold back the plea that he not leave at all.

  "I'll hurry," he promised.

  His head bent, his lips feathered over her cheek, and then, he truly was gone.

  Minutes later, Jonas raced from the estate, dressed in black mission clothes rather than the tuxedo he had arrived in. Surrounded by Alpha Team One, which included Lawe, Rule and Mordecai, he ran for the waiting Raider.

  There was no report on Harmony, Leo, Callan, Kane or the team sent in to cover them. They could be deliberately ignoring the calls, or, worst-case scenario, captured or killed.

  He prayed, for the world's sake, that the latter was only a personal fear. There were enough Breeds banded together now that it would take more resources than America had to force them back into the labs, or to kill them.

  The gunfire had stopped from the mountain above, the Breeds Leo had sent into the wilderness having finally succeeded in taking out the last of the sharpshooters firing on the house. It wasn't the men in the mountains he was worried about. It was his sister.

  Harmony.

  Her mate had nearly given his life for her once before; now, he had nearly given it for another, the son of a bitch. Jonas was definitely going to have to have a long talk with him about the proper way to take care of himself. That, or assign a damned detail to keep his ass out of trouble.

  His sister Harmony, once known as the Breed assassin Death, didn't need more heartache in her life. She needed time to laugh, to love, to heal from the horror she had been trained within. A horror Jonas had unknowingly contributed to. And a chance to raise her infant son and watch him laugh, live, love and grow. A chance for more children, a life for herself that didn't include blood.

  Death had been forced to die, and Harmony Lancaster had found a place in life, and in love, in the arms of her mate. Jonas intended to keep it that way.

  "Move out!" he yelled to Lawe as they jumped into the Raider.

  Immediately the vehicle was thrown into gear and raced for the compound's wide gates, which swung open at their impending departure.

  The Raider was within sight of the gates when another came barreling in. Tires screamed as the brakes were applied, the vehicle shuddering to a stop as Lawe cursed and twisted the wheel to keep from running headlong into the other Raider.

  Harmony.

  Jumping from the open side of the vehicle, Jonas stepped toward her, only to come to a hard stop when she, Dane Vanderale, Rye DeSalvo and one of Leo's African Breeds, Burke, jumped out to meet him.

  Harmony reached in and a second later, tossed a wounded human male to the ground.

  The man's knee was shattered. It looked as though it had taken a bullet from the antiquated sniper rifle Harmony still had a habit of carrying. The same rifle slung over her back now.

  Blood congealed at his neck from a shallow knife wound, and if Jonas wasn't mistaken, a portion of hair had been scalped from his head.

  That matching bloodied portion was stuck in the belt Harmony wore.

  "He shot Lance." Harmony glared at him with raging, brilliant green eyes. "Enact Breed Law against me until hell freezes over, you bastard. Anyone that touches what's mine will suffer." She kicked the wounded man as she cast him a scathing glance. "Then they'll die."

  Jonas halted in front of her. The pain that raged in her eyes and twisted her expression was one of the hardest things he had ever faced. He also saw the fear that her brother would find a way to enforce his threat to have her charged with Breed Law for the deaths he was certain she had left on the mountain.

  "Are there any others living?" he asked her. He knew from the reports that had come through that a four-man team had attempted to capture David Lyons.

  Harmony sneered, her green eyes glowing with fire. "They met Death."

  Stepping forward, he held his sister's gaze, feeling that shattered part of his heart that had let her go so long ago ache with a fiery pain.

  So delicate. She had always been too tiny, too easily broken.

  "I would never enact Breed Law on you," he stated softly. "No matter your actions, I would protect you, Harmony, as I have always tried to protect you."

  Surprise glittered amid the stark grief in her eyes.

  "Liar." The look cleared out a second later, and he couldn't blame her for her distrust.

  Jonas shook his head slowly. "Death is gone, little sister. Harmony Lancaster is a mate who deserves the blood she sheds." He reached out, ignored her flinch and rubbed a long strand of dark auburn hair between his fingertips. "I wouldn't have then--and I will not now--see the sister I have always loved suffer. I swear that, Harmony, on the lives I fight to save every day. I swear that to you."

  He sensed it then. That grief inside her became an animal, fighting, clawing for release.

  Her face crumpled and tears filled her eyes. "They shot him," she whispered, speaking of her mate. "Again, Jonas. They shot him again, and I might lose him . . ."

  He had her in his arms. Despite the vague discomfort, he held her against his chest and did what he had never done before. He bent and kissed her gently on the crown of her head before laying his cheek against it while she sobbed in his arms.