by Lara Adrian
“You don’t have to prove a damn thing to anyone, Sia. You are all of those things already.”
She gave him a humorless laugh. “Flattery from you?”
He shook his head. “The truth. I’m just telling you what I see.”
Her eyes softened as she looked at him. Before he realized it, her fingers came to light gently on his face, tracing his hideous scar and clamped jaw. “Do you want to know what I see? You are everything I didn’t expect. A brave warrior. A man of deep honor and conviction. I see someone who’s been hurt very badly and not only survived, but emerged stronger.” She stroked his ruined cheek, tender light shining in her eyes. “What did you survive, Trygg? I know your early life was hard. I’ve heard something about the program you were in—a Hunter, isn’t that what you were called?”
“Yes, that’s what we were called.” He exhaled sharply, but allowed her touch to linger on him for a moment before moving away from her warmth. “What we were was killers. Held like prisoners, treated like animals. Worse than animals. We had one purpose from the time we were born, and that was to deliver death on our master’s command.”
Sia listened, unflinching. But when she spoke it was with a soft, careful voice. “Why did you stay?”
That answer was as simple as it was final. “I didn’t know any other life. None of us did. Even if we had, there was no chance for us to seek it out. If we tried to run, we died. If we disobeyed or showed the slightest defiance or regret during our training, we died.”
“But even as children, you and the others must have been strong. Was there no way to overtake this madman and save yourselves?”
“Dragos planned for that possibility. Every boy in the program was fitted with an unbreakable ultraviolet collar that would detonate if tampered with…or whenever Dragos ordered our termination.” Trygg’s hand came up to his neck in reflex. “Sometimes I swear I can still feel the cold black polymer against my skin.”
Sia’s gaze lowered, her breath escaping on a shallow sigh. “He sounds like the worst kind of monster.”
“He was,” Trygg agreed, recalling too many of the faces of his brothers in the program, many of whom had served as horrific lessons to Trygg and the other boys that there was no escaping Dragos or the UV noose he’d fitted them with as soon as they could walk. “Dragos trained us to be monsters too. He trained us well.”
Sia said nothing for a long moment. “And it was the Order who finally freed you?”
He nodded. “I owe them my life. I’d lay it down for any one of my warrior brethren.”
“That kind of loyalty is a rare gift,” she murmured, her expression distant and regretful, as if she hadn’t ever seen that kind of faith in anyone herself. “How did they save you, Trygg?”
“When they defeated Dragos, an Order warrior named Gideon found a way to remotely disable the lock codes on the Hunters still in the lab. Like me, most of them were young boys. I was fourteen.”
“So, did you join the Order immediately?”
“No. I made my own way in the States for a while. It wasn’t until I arrived in Italy that I sought out the Order and offered my life in service to them.”
He chose to stop there, telling his history with an utter lack of inflection, precisely how the program had taught him to be. No emotions. No need for care or affection. Just cold, machine-like efficiency. No Hunter came out of the program without a heart as cold and sharp as a blade.
If he didn’t watch himself, a woman like Tamisia could smooth those sharp edges.
Make him weak.
Hell, she already was. How else could he explain the fact that he had let her hijack his mission tonight? Now he was sitting on her bed with an envelope of evidence spread out before him and questions badly in need of answers, yet all he could think about was the pleasure of Sia’s touch. Her expressive, sky-blue eyes filled with tender emotion…and desire.
“What happened to the Hunters who were freed?”
He shrugged his shoulder. “I’m only aware of a handful. One of them, named Scythe, lives with his mate Chiara here in Italy.”
“Is he as big and grumbly as you?” Sia asked, her pretty mouth curving.
Trygg chuckled. “He was. Chiara has gentled him somewhat, but I’m sure my half-brother is still a pain in her ass.”
Sia laughed. She gazed at him, tilting her head in amusement. “And is Scythe as handsome as you?”
Trygg felt his face harden into a stony mask. “Don’t play me, Tamisia.” His low voice came out like a lash. “I’m well aware of the way I look, and I’m not as easily fooled as the men fawning at your feet back at the JUSTIS station.”
“I’m not playing you.” She sounded utterly sincere, even stung. “Do you think the scar makes you ugly? It doesn’t. Not to me. Only someone’s actions can make them ugly, Trygg.”
He took no comfort in that opinion. “Then if you knew everything I’ve done in my life, you’d think I was hideous.”
“So tell me, Trygg. Why not let me decide for myself?”
He turned his head on a curse. “I didn’t come up here to talk about me.”
“Then why did you come?” Her fingers were at his chin, drawing his gaze back to her. “You could’ve just as easily taken that envelope out of my hands. You could have walked away tonight like you threatened to do, but you didn’t. Why not?”
It took more control than he thought possible not to yank away from her light grasp and head for the door. But that would only confirm his worst fear—that this woman was getting under his skin. That she was getting perilously close to his heart.
“Don’t push me, Sia.”
She shook her head. “I think a push is exactly what you need.”
Without warning, she took his mouth in a hard, hot kiss.
Chapter 7
He moaned sharply as their mouths came together. His hands were at her shoulders, his fingers like iron, so immensely strong. For a moment Sia thought for certain he was going to shove her away.
She had overstepped her bounds by kissing him. She knew that. She might have even lost her mind, pushing a dangerous Breed male like Trygg. A Hunter. A cold, emotionless assassin.
But he felt anything but cold.
He didn’t feel emotionless, either.
He was hot and wild against her lips, as powerful as a storm. His hands came up to cage her face as he took their kiss deeper. She opened to his tongue, eager for the invasion.
She was on fire too. For this killer with the haunted, dark eyes. This Breed male who was like nothing she’d ever known before.
As he kissed her, all she felt was need for the man who made her crave his darkness the way she needed light—for strength and nourishment, for survival at its most elemental.
She was immortal, as formidable as any Breed, but she had never felt more delicate and small than she did now with him. And she marveled at the feeling, savored it.
Liquid fire shot through her and she groaned as her nipples tightened into stiff peaks. Primal, unadulterated power flowed from him, his strength and vitality drawing her in, making her ache with a desire so consuming it astonished her.
He drew back then, his eyes blazing with fiery amber, his fangs enormous between his parted lips as his breath rushed out of him, scraping and raw. “It’s been too long for me, Sia. And the way you look…so fucking beautiful. Christ, the way you feel.”
He broke off on a groan, bringing his hands to her shoulder and the ripped sleeve of her blouse. He toyed with the frayed edge for a second, then rent it loose, tearing the garment away from her body and pushing her down onto the mattress. Sia gasped at the sudden rush of cool air as her heated skin was exposed to him. But his heat filled the space soon enough, and then his mouth was on her shoulder, her clavicle, the swell of her breast still encased in the lace of her bra.
“You’ve consumed me since I first saw you,” he murmured, his tongue hot and wet on her sensitive skin. He closed his lips over the clasp at the front of her bra, then he cau
ght it between his teeth and bit it open. His moan as he swept the thin fabric away from her was pure male, utterly possessive. “You’ve been a torment, Sia, but tonight? Fuck. The way I felt when you came into that station looking like someone’d had their hands all over you—”
He bent his head to kiss her breast, taking her tight nipple into his mouth while he reached between her legs to cup her sex through the denim of her jeans.
She writhed at the spike of need that arrowed through her as he suckled hard and caressed her ruthlessly, punishing her with his tongue and teeth and hands. When he finally drew his mouth away and glanced up at her, his pupils were narrow slits, his irises like an inferno of need and something deeper that she could not name.
“Was I worried that something had happened to you?” he snarled thickly. “Hell, yes. Was I pissed when I realized your game? I swear, I wanted to kill you at that moment, Sia. I could’ve throttled you with my bare hands.” He bared his fangs in a threat that made her shiver, though not with anything close to fear. And with every harsh word he growled at her, his hands continued their tender assault on her aching body. “I wasn’t prepared for what seeing you like that did to me. Ever since, I can’t decide if I want to drive my fist through a wall or my cock into you.”
She couldn’t curb her desire-drenched smile. “If you’re asking me to choose, I’d much prefer the latter.”
To prove her point, she reached down to cup his huge erection over the zipper of his pants. The shaft more than filled her grasp, surging even bigger as she stroked him. He uttered her name in a low, otherworldly snarl, then claimed her mouth in a deep, urgent kiss.
Sia reached for the back of his black shirt and dragged it up and over his shoulders, his mouth only leaving hers long enough for her to free him from the clothing. They lay back and kissed some more, his thick thighs straddling her and his hands sliding into her hair, anchoring her in place while he traced the tender skin on the inside of her bottom lip before nipping hard.
She gasped as a bolt of need shot through her, pooling in her core. He tore his mouth away as he reared back to stare at her, his pupils barely visible in the center of so much hot amber light. Breed dermaglyphs tracked all over his body and onto his neck. The multi-hued skin markings were like a painting now, his desire for her making the swirls and arcs and tangled vines of patterns surge with motion and pulsating colors.
Sia had never seen anything as magnificent. Every inch of him was dense muscle and firm skin swirling with the strange, alien markings, these living, moving testaments of his need for her. Nothing at all like the sun-kissed, golden skin of her past lovers in the colony, including Elyon, whose fine-hewn physical perfection could have made the angels weep.
No, with his massive build and bulging muscles, Trygg looked more demon than angel. And her hungry eyes couldn’t get their fill of him.
“You’re glorious, Trygg.” She smoothed her fingers over his warm muscles and the stunning glyphs that were uniquely his own. “The most incredible man I’ve ever seen.”
His sensual mouth twisted at her praise, but this time he didn’t reject it. His breath sawed out of him, his fangs like pearly daggers as he gazed hungrily at her beneath him.
“Beautiful Sia,” he said, his hands roaming from her waist to the swell of her hip. Gripping her there, he dragged her against his groin, using his hold to crush their bodies more tightly together. “Have you ever been with a Breed before?”
Although phrased as a question, he meant it also as a warning. One that made her veins throb and the heat gathering in the center of her turn even more molten.
She shook her head. “I’ve never wanted to be. Now I can’t think of anything I’ve ever wanted more. Just you.”
With the press of his hard, thick arousal jutting against her, she moaned, suddenly desperate to get even closer. He leaned over her, tugging hard on her hair as he took her mouth again, his hold tilting her head back on her shoulders, baring her throat to him.
She could feel her pulse pounding there and froze, wondering if he wanted to sink his teeth into her flesh. Some wild, reckless part of her wanted him to. Dared him to. Anything to make this dark, needy pull inside her subside. But no, he only skimmed his lips over her skin, leaving a trail of flames in their wake as he moved lower.
“So damn soft,” he muttered on a groan as he scraped along her jawline with the very edge of his fangs. For a second, he pulled back to drink her in with the heat of his molten gaze.
Then he was on her again, this time his hands at her waistband, deftly unbuttoning her jeans, slowly working her zipper down. She helped, wriggling her hips as he slid the material down over her thighs and onto the floor. It was only when he straightened that she realized he’d gotten her panties as well. And now she lay before him naked.
The pulse in his neck hammered like a drum as his gaze traveled over her. He pushed her legs apart roughly and dropped his head down between her spread thighs. A moment later, he was on her, his molten mouth covering her sex as his tongue flicked against the part of her that ached most.
She closed her hands over his stubbled head and held tight, reveling in the feel of his mouth on her. He mastered her pleasure, combining long, sensual strokes with quick, brutal lashes of his tongue over her clit and deep into the cleft of her sex. Then he dipped a finger inside the wet heat of her channel and stars exploded behind her closed eyelids.
Her body erupted into climax, the world going out of focus as wave after wave of ecstasy crashed over her. So quickly, he’d sent her over the edge and now she wanted nothing more than for him to join her.
She reached for him, not caring if she showed him how badly she needed him.
Desperate. That was the only word for how she felt.
She was desperate to feel his length inside her. Filling the space that felt so empty. Making her forget how lonely she had truly been since arriving in this mortal world. How lonely she had been even back home in the colony.
She scrabbled for his belt, her movements unusually clumsy. When she released a frustrated sound, he covered her hands with his, speeding things along. In moments, he was naked. And if Sia had thought him impressive before, the sight of him fully unclothed and unabashedly aroused robbed all of the air from her lungs.
His answering grin held no shame. And why should it? He was magnificent.
And, at least for right now, he was hers.
“Touch me,” he commanded her, as if she needed the direction.
Her hands were already reaching for him, greedy to feel his power in her palms…and in her body.
He groaned, dropping his head back as she stroked him. But he didn’t allow her to explore for long. On a snarl, he prowled back into place above her. His glowing amber eyes held her gaze as he lowered himself and pushed inside, filling her in a long, heavy thrust.
And then they were moving together, giving and taking, bodies slick and urgent and driven with a combined need neither of them could deny. It was as if she’d been waiting for this all her long life. Waiting for this man to awaken her and make her feel truly alive.
Sia cried out as wave after wave of release poured over her.
But the pleasure she felt was only the beginning of something larger yet to come. Trygg took her there before she’d barely caught her breath from the first orgasm. She’d never felt such intense desire, and she was no delicate virgin getting a taste of her first lover.
No, this passion she felt with Trygg was unexpected. If she had known it would be this good, she might have leashed the urge to kiss him. Because now, as she looked into his blazing eyes while he chased his own release, all she craved was more.
More from a Breed male who had already pledged himself to another: the Order.
Of all the ways he should be able to terrify her, that thought worried her the most.
Pushing Trygg to kiss her tonight had been an impulse she couldn’t control. Now she feared it was a mistake she couldn’t undo even if she wanted to. Not that sh
e actually had the will to try. Not when his body was still moving inside her, coaxing her to forget everything except how good they felt together.
Sia groaned, unsure if it was pleasure or misery that pulled the anguished sound from her breast.
Maybe she truly had lost her mind tonight.
All she knew was that if she wasn’t careful around him, she might also lose her heart.
Chapter 8
Trygg could have stayed buried inside Sia’s soft, wet warmth all night.
He’d lost count of how many times he made her come. His own performance had been one for the records. Hours later, somewhere between midnight and daybreak, she had fallen asleep in his arms. His eyes remained open. Sleep was the last of his concerns. He had a handful of evidence lying on the dresser just out of his reach—evidence that might lead him to Santino—yet he’d just shirked his duty in order to steal a few hours of pleasure with Sia.
No doubt about it, making love to her was worth every second and then some.
Yet when he considered what he’d just done, guilt raked him.
Anger, too—directed only at himself.
He knew better than to let anything distract him from a goal.
Santino might already be regrouping after the bungling of his men’s handling of Rosa. If he had moles inside JUSTIS, he might already be aware that the evidence collected from the dead woman’s room had gone missing sometime during the night.
And all the while, Trygg had been lost in a blinding, unquenchable need for the woman still dozing at his side.
Damn it.
This could not happen again. He couldn’t allow it. Not until he saw this mission through to the end. Then, maybe he could think about Tamisia the Atlantean.
Right now, she was a distraction he could not afford.
Rolling away from her, he moved carefully out of the narrow bed and got dressed.
Rosa’s phone and the other items he had retrieved went silently into the pocket of his leather jacket.
