by Lynn Graeme
His tone remained light as he stroked her hair. “Your guess is as good as mine. Likely a desk job, and likely out of the way of anything requiring delicate communication. Let’s just say my diplomatic skills are lacking. I’ve always been the muscle in the group—never had to bother with tact.”
In other words, he’d be assigned to a job that ill-suited him.
Her suspicions were confirmed when he’d returned from Council HQ a couple of days later, kicking off his shoes.
“They figured out pushing paper and reading reports was the quickest way to send me into a murderous rage. They might move me into comm-central as an operator, but training for that will have to wait until I’m back on-duty.”
Terris had watched him quietly, picking up on the frustration he tried so hard not to reveal in her presence. She tried to imagine him as a dispatcher for his fellow agents. Could he remain cooped up in a room every single day, listening to the agents’ calls and conveying instructions and messages, all without a trace of envy or resentment? Could he bear the painful reminder of what he was no longer a part of?
Should he even have to?
He wouldn’t be happy there. And he wouldn’t be happy if he left the Council either. Terris knew Jamal. His job had been a way for him to remain active, adventurous, a way to channel his innate aggression into something good. It’d given him purpose.
“You could always return to BioSynth,” Terris had ventured cautiously. “I could speak to Overkin—”
“We’ve discussed this. No.”
“It’ll mean getting your old job back.”
“My job doesn’t mean everything,” he’d snapped.
Except, Terris knew, that it did.
There. That was what had woken her up. Terris carefully slipped away from Jamal’s reach—bribing him with a soothing kiss when he grumbled—and searched out her phone. She silence the soft ping and glanced at the screen. Blinking in surprise, she listened to her voicemail.
She nearly dropped her phone in horror. At the same time, she heard a beep coming from outside her bedroom—the sound of someone using a keycard to unlock her front door.
Terris rushed to the side of the bed and shook Jamal awake. “Quick! Get dressed!”
“What?” He roused, groggy, confusion slowing down his comprehension.
“Terris?” a familiar male voice called from the living room.
“Crap,” she muttered as she grabbed a robe.
Jamal reacted instinctively at the sound of the male voice. He hauled Terris onto the bed—a rush of breath escaping her lungs as she landed—and rolled onto his feet in one go. In a quick blur of motion, he swiped a nasty-looking dagger from under the bed.
Terris stared. “Where did that come from?”
“You expected me to be defenseless?”
Jamal wouldn’t be remotely defenseless even while buck naked—which he was. He was dangerous enough without need of any weapons.
“You got that when you went to retrieve your things,” she deduced, wondering what other manner of armory lay hidden underneath her bed.
Jamal scowled at her and placed a finger to his lips.
“Terris, you here?” called the voice. “I’ve been trying to reach you—”
Terris grabbed Jamal’s jeans from the floor and threw it at him. “Put some clothes on.”
He looked impatient as he stalked toward the door. “Shifters don’t give a fuck about nakedness. Don’t move,” he snarled when he saw her rise and belt her robe around her waist. “Call the cops. I’ll deal with the intruder.”
The bedroom door abruptly swung open. A large man with strawberry-blond hair and broad shoulders stuck his head in. His eyes widened on Terris, then whipped around just as Jamal took him down.
The two men rolled on the floor in a vicious flurry of fangs and fists. The newcomer, though bigger, was no match for Jamal’s long years of skills and training in the battlefield. Even one-handed, Jamal easily sent him stumbling back, using his blade to whip out at the other man and forcing him to go on the defensive. The only time the man managed to get a shot in was when Jamal forgot he no longer possessed a right fist and careened off-balance when he swung.
Suddenly reaching the end of his tether, the newcomer roared and wrenched off his shirt, attempting to shift as tawny fur sprouted along his skin.
That decided the matter—Terris wasn’t about to let Jamal shift in kind. “Stop it right now, both of you!”
“Stay out of this, Terris,” Jamal growled, not taking his eyes off his opponent.
“Yeah, sis, stay out of this,” barked the other man as he crouched low on the ground, voice barely discernible.
Jamal’s head snapped back. “Sis?”
Terris took advantage of the situation and leapt between them. She put her hands up to hold the two men at bay from each other.
She glared first at the newcomer. “Change back. Now.”
He responded with a mutinous glare. Then the sprinkling of fur receded into fair skin and hair.
Terris turned to Jamal whose expression was stunned, even as his hand remained lifted and holding the tip of his dagger, ready to throw at a moment’s notice.
“Jamal,” Terris said primly, “meet my brother Roark. Now will you please put some clothes on?”
*
“And shame on you for trying to take unfair advantage of him!”
“Me? Unfair? He’s the deadly Council agent!”
“You saw he had only one hand, yet you tried to shift which meant he would’ve had no choice but to shift himself!”
“I couldn’t see much of anything! I was too busy trying not to get my throat cut! Besides, might I point out he was the one kicking my butt?”
“Good! You deserve it!”
“Fine! Excuse me for being concerned that we’d seen neither hide nor hair from you since you canceled dinner with Mom. This is the last time I’ll worry about you!”
“You keep saying that, and yet it never is!”
Jamal folded his arms across his chest and propped his shoulder against the wall, entertained despite himself. He watched the siblings squabble in the living room as they struggled to keep their voices down, unaware of his presence.
He could see the resemblance between them now. They shared the same nose, the same wide-set shoulders, and—who knew—the same combative stances when they got riled up. Roark towered over his sister, hands on his hips, neck muscles bulging. Terris didn’t look the least intimidated, however. She snapped back at the glowering lion-shifter, her eyes flashing fire.
She was absolutely fearless. Jamal smirked with pride.
Brother and sister both jolted on realizing they had an audience. Roark shot him a black look. Whether it was because of the cuts Jamal had dealt him that were only now beginning to scab, or the knowledge that Jamal had been—energetically—fucking his sister all this time, he didn’t care.
He flashed a smile at the lion. Roark gnashed his teeth in reply.
“You hell-raisers must’ve driven your folks up the wall when you were kids.” Jamal crossed the room over to Terris’s side. “You realize how insulting it is to listen to you rip your brother a new one on my behalf?”
Terris glared. “Well, excuse me for standing up for you.”
“You shouldn’t have to. Go easy on him, you say. He only has one hand, you protest. In other words, you think your mate is incapable of protecting you.”
“This has nothing to do with whether you can kill a man with your bare hands—”
“Hand, singular.”
“See, he was gonna kill me!” Roark interjected. Then he stopped. “Wait, mate?”
“It has everything to do with a level playing field,” Terris continued hotly. “It’s not a fair fight if he can turn cat and you can’t.”
“There’s nothing fair when it comes to combat,” Jamal retorted. “You think rogues and faction members have a single dose of chivalry in their blood? You think they’ll politely sit still and wait for y
ou to shift before they resume their attack?” He raised his ugly stump and shook it at her, a brutal reminder of precisely how merciless they were. “You don’t think about fair, sweetheart. You fight with every single shard of bone in your body until there’s nothing left, no matter what, or else that’s the last breath you’ll ever take in this life.”
Terris looked upset. Blue eyes glistened with frustration, her fists clenching and trembling at her sides.
Jamal instantly regretted his outburst. There he went again, lashing out at the one good thing in his life.
“Don’t you talk to my sister that way, you son of a bitch,” Roark snarled, stalking forward.
“Fuck off,” Jamal told him. He pulled Terris to his chest and softened his tone. “I’m sorry. I am a son of a bitch.”
He kissed her on her temple, on her cheeks, on her nose. He held his breath, not daring to move, only relaxing and allowing an exhale when he felt her soft, tentative hands slide around his waist and cling to his back.
Jamal pinned her to him with his right arm, keeping his left side closest to Roark in case the lion tried anything. His senses stayed closely attuned to any hint of movement, but though Roark bristled, he’d apparently decided against attacking Jamal while his sister was clasping him tightly.
Terris released a shaky sigh before glimpsing her brother out of the corner of her eye. “I didn’t mean to worry you, Roark.”
Roark’s expression remained unwelcoming as he studied Jamal. “You said mate.”
Jamal met his eyes. “I did.”
Shifters didn’t use the term lightly, yet Roark’s suspicious expression didn’t ease. “This is rather sudden.”
“When you know, you know.”
“How did you two meet?”
An innocuous beat before Terris answered. “We met through work.”
“Since when do you cross paths with Council agents? Unless the Council’s investigating Moran Industries again… .”
His voice trailed off as his gaze landed on Jamal’s right stump. His eyes sharpened, darting down to Terris’s left leg hidden beneath the folds of her robe.
His tone turned deceptively casual. “You were excited about BioSynth’s progress last time we spoke.”
Terris colored.
Jamal lifted his chin in challenge. “I used to be one of the trial participants, yeah.”
He emphasized the words used to, but Roark wasn’t appeased. The lion-shifter’s jaw hardened as he turned to Terris. “May I speak to you for a moment, sis?”
“So polite,” Jamal said dryly. “You realize I’d be able to hear you anyway?” He tapped his ear, reminding the man of their shifter hearing.
Terris didn’t move away from Jamal. “I have no secrets from Jamal, Roark. He knows what happened … before.”
“Convenient.”
Jamal gave a lethal growl. “Tread carefully, cat, lest I claw your face off.”
“Now I know how you found your mate so fast,” Roark told him.
Jamal struggled to rein in his temper. Or at least make the effort, considering it was his mate’s brother he wanted to toss off the balcony. “When you find a good thing, you don’t let it go.”
“Terris has had problems in the past with men not wanting to let her go.”
“Roark!”
“He’s not like Rick, sis. He won’t be easily warned off after a stern word from your boss.”
“Terris is intelligent, beautiful, and brave,” Jamal cut in. “Of course no sensible man can resist. But that’s their problem, not hers. She shouldn’t have to deal with their incapability to take no for an answer.”
“Especially if they work for the Council and have all sorts of resources at their fingertips. Resources they could use against her as soon as the relationship ends.”
“Jamal’s not like that,” Terris insisted at the same time that Jamal said, “It won’t end.”
Roark pounced on that. “So you admit you won’t let her go.”
Jamal narrowed his eyes. “I get what you’re doing. And I get why. So what do you say we just get this over with?”
“By all means. There’s a small park behind the condo.”
“Best not to wreck any of Terris’s furniture,” Jamal agreed.
“What are you talking about?” she demanded.
“Two-legged or four?” Roark eyed Jamal’s stump. “Should I go easy on you, lame kitty?”
Jamal sneered. “I can take you down with one arm tied behind my back.”
“From what I see, you’ll have to.”
“By all means, let us go fur.”
Realization struck Terris, and she sputtered. “You are not fighting! Roark, don’t you dare attack him in cat form.”
“We’ll be right back,” Jamal told her as he and Roark headed for the front door.
“Get the med kit ready for when we return,” Roark called back. “Your boyfriend’s gonna need it.”
“Jamal, stop! Roark, I mean it!” She stared as both men turned the corner. “Goddammit. I’m telling Mom!”
Chapter Eight
In the end, brutal experience and dexterous skill won out. Roark in lion form was far bigger than Jamal’s snow leopard, but he was also slower and had never needed to defend himself against vicious faction members who wanted him dead.
Not to mention lions were lazy as hell, for all the huffing and puffing they did. Snow leopards were used to taking down prey three times their own weight.
Jamal growl-smirked as he pinned Roark to the ground, feline teeth wrapping around the back of the lion’s neck. He nearly stumbled forward, then remembered at the last minute to pull his weight back and balance himself so that he didn’t collapse on his pawless leg.
His growl grew louder, demanding surrender.
Roark panted and tossed his mane, but was too exhausted to move. Finally he chuffed, sounding incredibly pissed off. The message was clear, though: he relinquished the fight.
Satisfied, Jamal released him. He leapt off before Roark could roll over, but couldn’t resist giving a nip to the lion’s rear end for good measure. Roark twisted up to his feet and snapped his jaws indignantly, but he didn’t charge forward. He glared, chest heaving within his massive rib cage.
Then, incredibly, he huffed a laugh. A feline equivalent of a laugh, true, but Jamal recognized it all the same. Jamal relaxed. Still, he watched to make sure Roark shifted back to human form first before he did the same.
“Good show,” Roark conceded, out of breath as he bent down to retrieve his clothes.
“Not too bad yourself,” Jamal returned politely. “Only had to pull my claws back seventy percent.”
“Jackass.”
“Naturally.”
Roark swiped at a cut above his eyebrow, then grimaced down at his blood-stained fingers. He was all cut up as a result of their fight. Jamal, on the other hand, had been protected by his thick fur from the brunt of Roark’s swipes. His right arm was the most scratched up due to a poor start when he’d still been getting used to being a three-and-a-half-legged animal. He’d finally figured out he had to keep that leg pulled up when facing off against Roark’s lion, but that was hard to remember during the heat of battle.
He’d won that battle, though. Jamal glowed with innate satisfaction as he dressed. He felt refreshed. Validated. It didn’t matter that he was a cripple with an anger management problem. When it came down to it, he could still take down his opponent. He just required a little adjustment and practice.
Surely he could get the Council to see it his way. His supervisors were obstinate and rigid in not allowing amputee agents in the field due to their belief that they wouldn’t stand a chance against their enemies, but wasn’t that simply stubborn, backward prejudice in all its glory?
Jamal might have to give in and amputate the rest of his arm to present less of a liability, but if that meant he’d be able to return to active duty that much sooner, it’d be worth it. He might not be able to join his fellow agents on certain mis
sions, but he wouldn’t care as long as they didn’t pull him out of the field entirely.
Yeah, he’d make the Council accept him. After all, it allowed rookie agents in the field, and Jamal bet he could trounce five rookies at once even on three legs.
Perhaps the Council would assign him to be a trainer. Jamal had no beef with that role, but he preferred to be an active agent. He wouldn’t just take what he could get. He’d take more. He’d long learned that one didn’t get anything in this world without fighting for it.
He was no leader, no trailblazer, no diplomatic liaison. He was merely the brawn. The muscle. But even the muscle knew a thing or two about quick thinking when it came to defeating his opponents. He’d fought and won against bigger odds before.
Jamal smiled to himself. He was looking forward to facing off with the Council officials. They wouldn’t know what hit them.
Roark nodded to the side. “Don’t look now, but I think we’re in trouble.”
Jamal looked. Terris waited several feet away, arms crossed tightly in front of her tense body. She looked relieved, distressed, and furious all at once.
Jamal’s smile widened. Terris’s frown deepened. She uncrossed her arms and headed their way.
“You mean it, then?” Roark said under his breath.
Jamal knew what he was asking. He released a slow exhale, an odd sort of gladness taking over his bones. He didn’t take his gaze off his mate. “She’s the one.”
“She means the world to me and my parents.”
“To me as well.”
Roark studied him, then nodded and slapped his back companionably. “Four of us protecting her against the world, then.”
“Terris is more than capable of protecting herself.” He met Roark’s eyes and grinned. “Doesn’t mean she has to do it alone, of course.”
Roark threw back his head and laughed. Jamal watched him, struggling with that strange, unfamiliar feeling swelling inside his chest. Maybe this was what having a brother was supposed to feel like. Maybe this was what family and belonging was.
Embarrassed, Jamal ducked his head to hide his expression. “Speaking of which,” he said after a pause, when he sounded a bit more like himself, “don’t suppose you possess more information about this … Rick, is it?”
