Kodiak Chained

by Doranna Durgin

  After a moment, she sighed, and turned her hand over beneath his so their fingers intertwined.

  For a few minutes, that was enough.

  Finally, Ruger glanced over to the dark, damp spot where the dirt had soaked up Jack’s blood.

  “Sandy put a stasis warding on him,” Mariska said, and pushed a finger against the bridge of her nose, clearly pulling herself back to the matters at hand. “We were being watched. I’ve disabled the cameras—”

  A snort from Ian let them know just how illusory their personal privacy had been. “She means to say that she obliterated the cameras.”

  “—and we’re jamming the network, too—at least until we can find the tech. That’s how they got Jeck—I mean, Jack.”

  “Watching through the cameras,” Ruger said, as if he didn’t believe it. “Manually triggering the blade.”

  “Freaking Raiders of the Lost Ark,” Ian grumbled from the amulet area.

  “I don’t know what he hoped to accomplish,” Mariska said, a hard expression taking over her features—not an expression any smart man would want to face. “He hasn’t stopped us. And who would even use such a barbaric thing? He already had the hard drives wired—they’re smoked. Useless.”

  “He was making a point,” Ruger said darkly. “And he was making us hesitate.”

  “Damned right,” Ian came up behind Mariska. “Mariska got nailed yesterday. We lost Jack today. The hard drives are gone. Have we even been here twenty-four hours? We’ve totally underestimated this man.”

  “Overestimated him,” Ruger muttered. “We gave him too much credit for being human. We should have known, once we saw those animals...”

  “I want to grab what we can and get out of here as soon as we can,” Ian said. “We’ll analyze what we gather back at brevis, and we’ll blow the hell out of this place. No more playing on Forakkes’ home ground.”

  Mariska climbed to her feet, holding her hand out for Ruger. “You’re okay?”

  “Hungover,” Ruger said, and at Ian’s skeptical expression, closed his eyes long enough to do a quick internal review. He did, at least, have that much skill left. “Seriously. I’ll be fine.” He accepted Mariska’s hand; he accepted her strength. In the warmth of her hand against his, he felt a fleeting echo of their bodies tangled and pounding; her eyes widened slightly, and she pulled her hand away as he came to his feet.

  Ian shook his head and muttered something, and went back to the amulet section. “I’ll be the rest of the morning packing up these blanks,” he said. “Mariska, would you take your gear outside? Make sure we’re not being watched out there?”

  “Of course,” Mariska said—but she gave Ruger an uncertain glance. “I’d prefer it if Ruger came with me, if that’s okay. I’d rather have someone at my back if I’m going to be concentrating on techie tricks.”

  Ian merely looked at Ruger, waiting.

  And Ruger straightened, watching Mariska with narrowed eyes—examining her expression for any sign of pity, condescension or manipulative overtones. ::I’m not for sale,:: he said, a private voice that went to her alone.

  ::I’m not buying you,:: she said without hesitation. ::I have a helluva headache and I don’t want to have to split my attention.::

  “Sure,” Ruger told Ian, who waited so patiently that it couldn’t have been more obvious he knew there’d been a private exchange. “Whatever’s happening with the animals, we clearly can’t stop it. I’ll take stock when we get back inside.” He looked over to that end of the installation and shook his head. “I just hope we can figure out what he’s up to before we run into those workings in the field.”

  But Katie Maddox’s shared vision whispered urgency, and so far they didn’t have a clue.

  Chapter 10

  We don’t know anything. Not nearly enough.

  Mariska stood outside the cabin with the day of work behind her, letting the cool night air wash over her face. Dinner sat uneasily in her stomach; her skin felt tight and warm.

  If she hadn’t been Sentinel, she’d have said she was coming down with something. But she was...and Sentinels didn’t. They didn’t get colds or the flu; they didn’t carry viruses and they weren’t vulnerable to bacteria. The same preternaturally robust nature that allowed them to heal swiftly from near-fatal wounds also protected them from common—and uncommon—ailments.

  Of course, get a little scratch and it took nearly as long to heal as any average human would. Sentinel bodies didn’t waste energy on the little things.

  All of which explained the lingering headache and every other small price she still paid for blundering into an amulet the day before.

  Ruger likely felt the same from whatever damage he’d done himself with that knee-jerk attempt to save Jeckle. Jack. She’d seen him gulp down not two but four ibuprofen over dinner, as casually as he’d tried to hide it.

  Unlike the evening before, dinner had been a somber affair—one less Sentinel at the table, and plenty of stories being swapped between Ian and Heckle, while Sandy’s pale complexion highlighted her red-rimmed eyes and Mariska found her voice going ragged at the most unexpected moments.

  Even Jet—alerted to the situation through Annorah—had been subdued, showing herself only from a distance, and fading quickly back into the woods.

  They hadn’t found additional surveillance gear during their sweep of the bunker area, and then they’d spent the rest of the day cataloging Forakkes’ offenses against the creatures once in his care.

  They still hadn’t made any sense of it. And once Mariska destroyed the cameras, there had been no more workings triggered. Sandy lurked around the edges of the work, furious that her wards had somehow failed to prevent those workings and determined to figure out how.

  All in all, it was a day of win for Forakkes.

  Although it had felt good, taking out his cameras—knowing he was watching it happen and helpless to stop it. One tiny win for Mariska.

  Ruger stepped onto the porch—his shirt unbuttoned and shirttails flapping free, feet bare. Light filtered out from the cabin to paint highlights and shadows over the planes of his chest, picking out the dark hair that barely tapered as it traced a line down abdominal muscles and disappeared behind the black jeans hanging low on his hips.

  She didn’t need to see any more than that. Her body remembered. Her skin reminded her of just that, tightening with a prickle of wishful anticipation. She greeted Ruger with a tired smile. “All quiet?”

  “Everywhere except inside my head,” he said, an honesty she hadn’t expected. “I keep seeing...”

  “All of it,” she finished, when he didn’t. “Does Ian really mean to pack up and leave before we find Forakkes? Or is my inexperience just showing again?”

  He joined her by the porch rail. “I’m not sure what he’ll do. Right now, I think he believes our best bet is to take back what we can and give the brevis teams time to analyze what’s going on.”

  “To be more prepared before we go looking any harder,” she guessed. He nodded, but he didn’t look settled about it. She straightened, trying to interpret that slight frown. “You don’t think it’s the right thing to do?”

  “I’m not going to second-guess how Ian handles his team,” Ruger said shortly—and closed his eyes, shaking his head briefly. “I’m sorry. I’m just feeling...”

  “Bearish,” she said, finishing the thought for him again.

  He flashed her a quick smile; she swallowed hard and pretended it hadn’t so easily quickened her pulse. Not when she’d so thoroughly muddled what might have been between them. “Bearish,” he agreed. “Truth is, I’m not sure we have that luxury of time. Maks obviously only drove Forakkes deeper into hiding, he didn’t stop him—though he hurt him.”

  “His amulets,” Mariska said, remembering the reports—that Forakkes, to Maks’ memory, hadn’t aged at all in the years since he’d once held Maks-the-boy and his mother captive in a breeding program. Not until his amulets were destroyed in a confrontation with Maks, at
which point he aged so rapidly that it had been hard to tell if he was seventy or a hundred and seventy. No doubt he had reapplied his workings, to whatever effect they might have had.

  “The amulets,” Ruger agreed. “But it doesn’t seemed to have slowed him down at all. If anything, I’d say the opposite. He’s not truly hiding any longer. Or he’s frantic to complete what he’s started.”

  “And he’s flaunting what he can do,” Mariska said. “That stuff with the animals this morning—that was neener-neener as much as anything else. It seems like a change of style.”

  Ruger made a noise in his chest—disgruntled agreement.

  “You don’t think we can afford to leave him alone long enough to figure out exactly what he’s doing before we try to stop him.”

  “I think,” Ruger said, looking out over the darkness much as she had been moments earlier, “that Katie’s vision is pretty damned convincing. I think what happened today is pretty damned convincing. He’s got to be stopped, not given time to play.”

  “Even if we’re not ready.” She wasn’t disagreeing—wasn’t arguing. Just stating it out there clearly.

  “Maybe especially if we’re not ready. Maybe we’ll never truly be ready.”

  Before she’d come here, Mariska had felt ready. She’d felt as though she could handle anything. “Jet was right,” she said. “You were right. I don’t have the experience for this kind of fieldwork.”

  He straightened to look at her with surprise.

  “I interfered with the team cohesion,” she said, weary and achy. “I interfered with you. I took the first opportunity to walk into a trap. And the only way I’ve protected you is by hitting you.”

  “Ah,” he said. “Mariska Bear, you’re just tired and hurting.”

  “But I’m not wrong,” she said sharply. “Don’t go patronizing me.”

  He made a gesture of surrender, and when she relaxed slightly, reached out to take her hand. “You need a good humming.”

  “Excuse me?” But she followed the tug of his hand into the cabin and its small common space, back to the couch where she’d found him that morning. Before she knew it, he’d turned, scooped her up, and sat with her on his lap.

  Alarm struck her—surely he wasn’t going to try more healing—and she started a scramble to her feet. Astonishment replaced alarm when she went absolutely nowhere at all—when she realized the ease with which he restrained her. Since when did that ever happen to Mariska Bear?

  And why did part of her like it? His assertion, his strength—and her underlying knowledge that if she’d truly wanted to go, he’d let her.

  Instead, she subsided, although her voice held a sullen note. “If you do a healing thing, I will hit you.”

  “I’m not,” he said, and pulled away the band securing her short French braid. “I won’t.”

  “You’d better not.” But she was already tipping her head at the utter luxury of sensation—his fingers scraping through her hair to work it loose of the braid, combing and touching. Every tug on her scalp felt like a caress; every incidental brush of his hand against her cheek sent a thrill down her spine.

  “Uh-huh,” he said, and the sound hummed against her from his chest.

  “Oh,” she said, as he took a slow, deep breath, slow enough so the contentment of it seeped right into her; she relaxed into his lap. He tipped his head, resting it against the side of hers; his breath stirred her hair and shivered down her neck. One hand rested across her lap to encompass her hip while the other slipped from her hair to rub the back of her neck. Mariska released a contented sigh, and said again, “Oh. Humming.”

  “One bear to another,” he told her, shifting beneath her, but not tensing—not building expectation, even as she felt him harden. Just a gift of comfort and closeness.

  “Oh,” she said, one more time, and her voice was suddenly, unexpectedly thick, “I don’t deserve this. Not after—”

  “Hush,” he told her, a murmur in her ear. “I’m not sure you do. But I want to. And I’ve got you.”

  No question of that. She blinked away tears of emotion she couldn’t quite label, and let him tuck her against his shoulder—letting herself absorb the comfort of his touch, and the comfort of being held in such strength.

  “Better,” he said, stroking her shoulder, down her arm...petting her into submission. His other hand shifted from her hip to her stomach, resting there with a splayed possessiveness.

  She wasn’t sure when he’d slipped it under her shirt, his palm warm against her skin. Or when his thumb had drifted up to stroke the side of her breast. She found herself arching to it—and then stilled. He’d slipped down on the couch, offering her more security, her body angled over his—she’d never felt delicate before. She’d never felt so held.

  She’d never felt so aware that she didn’t deserve such a gift.

  “Shh,” Ruger said, close enough to nuzzle her ear. “I’m being selfish.”

  “Not smart,” she responded, somewhat breathlessly. Oh, hell—not just breathlessly, but completely without air or assertion.

  “Not smart,” he agreed, and did something with his lips behind her ear that sent a sudden shiver through her body. “Just selfish.” His thumb rounded her breast, encroaching more sensitive areas. His breath washed her neck.

  She forgot to think. She only ached and shivered and throbbed beneath his hand, clutching at him. She found the gap in his unbuttoned shirt and slid her hand along his ribs, absorbing the crisp rub of his hair against her fingers, the landscape of muscle across his torso.

  Somewhere along the way his hand slid down her stomach and unfastened her slacks and gently cupped her—so gentle, so quiet. He touched her with whispers, unexpected from those big hands and devastatingly effective. She breathed a moan as her head dropped back, and he took advantage of her bared throat, licking along her jawline, breathing over it, his hips rolling up against her bottom.

  “Ruger—”

  “Shh,” he said, even as she shuddered, as heat and pleasure gathered and built around the movement of his hand, fingers encroaching. His voice came as a wash of heat against her skin. “It’s a moment, little bear.”

  Little. To him, maybe she was. And yes, she felt held and gentled and safe to be who she was, knowing she wouldn’t hurt him, knowing he could handle her. As though for once she could simply...

  Let...

  Herself...

  Go.

  She found herself gasping and limp in his arms, his shirt crimped in her fingers, his breath humming against her neck, his touch turned soothing. “Ruger,” she said, as if that was supposed to mean something.

  He pressed a kiss against her forehead. “Shh, now.” He moved his hand back to the bare skin of her stomach, shifting to settle her more securely—as if she could ignore the great big erection she sat against. She opened her mouth to say something—he covered it with a kiss. A sweet kiss, not demanding. “I’m fine, Mari. Just...give me the moment.”

  Confusion cut through the soft haze of fatigue and satisfaction—the impulse to be doing something, saying something...the feeling that she should be chagrined or abashed, the realization that she wasn’t. In the end, she gave him the moment, and she fell asleep in his arms.

  * * *

  Ciobaka lingered at the rear of his caging area, gnawing a span of deer ribs with his back to the work area.

  “Not still sulking, are you?” Ehwoord’s voice came like the ripple of cold water over rock. Cold, cold water.

  Ciobaka stopped the movement of his jaw without removing his teeth from bone; his ears went flat. “’Ite ’oo.”

  “There will be no biting,” Ehwoord said, without concern.

  Ciobaka lifted his lips in a nasty, nasal snarl, still looking at the wall.

  “You think it unfair to have been punished for circumstances that were beyond your control?” Ehwoord did something on his worktable, heralded by dully clinking metal, the susurrus of material shifting. “In fact, you were not.”

>   Ciobaka went back to his ribs.

  “Like our friends the Sentinels, you believed I would not. Or could not.” Metal slid across the wood of the worktable. Always the thick, dull metal of Ehwoord’s amulets. They filled his pockets; they hung at his neck. And in some way, he had been using them to change who he was—his gray hair now showing streaks of black, his skin less stretched...his form less stringy even as his moods grew more varied. “For that reason alone, you deserved punishment.”

  But Ciobaka had an inbred sense of canine fairness, and he knew better. A proper dominant did not punish simply because he could, or simply to prove he would.

  Ehwoord stopped what he was doing, and sat back in his chair; the squeak of it sounded across the room, cutting through the moans of the caged animals with which he’d been working this day. “They shouldn’t have broken my cameras,” he said, his voice more strident. He glanced at the molded black chest, where for once the lid stood open, and Yovan handled a long metal construct with a certain reverence, putting it to his shoulder, fiddling with settings...making notations in a small notebook. “After tomorrow, they’ll understand that. And if they don’t leave this area—” He stopped, and Ciobaka knew without looking that he pressed his thin old lips together, that his face had flushed—that he would either kill something in this moment, or he would regain his temper, and there was no point in watching either way.

  When Ehwoord spoke again, his voice had regained its cold control. “Well, then,” he said. “Maybe I’ll test this new working sooner than I had planned. Then we’ll see what happens to a Sentinel who is no longer a Sentinel at all.”

  Chapter 11

  Ruger woke with a crick in his neck, his legs weighted down and his body slanted over the couch that wasn’t quite big enough to hold him in any position. How it had held two of them through the night, he couldn’t begin to imagine.