Tempting the Beast

by Lora Leigh

  ives as they were overtaken. Babies cried, their mewling sounds both human and animal, adult members of the experiments snatched their children in the commotion and ran for cover. Fighting their way through smoke and ash to avoid the agents attempting to round them up, the soldiers attempting to kill them. Hard gray eyes surveyed the scene as half a dozen men and women, and four children escaped the mass destruction. He followed them quickly, his Pack could hide for as long as needed. He would be damned if he would let them be rounded up like animals.

  * * * * *

  General Morris Goveny stood over the still form of his security officer. Agents covered him, guns trained on him, the hard eyes of Mexican and American officials condemning him. He was the pride of the Genetics Council, his lab supposedly the most secret, the wolf hybrids they had bred the most exceptional specimens yet. And it was all falling down around his ears.

  His security officer had been shot by the bastards storming the labs, his head doctor had deserted the labs at the first round of gunfire. The General considered himself much smarter. He raised his hands above his shoulders, staring back at the condemning expressions of those who had come for him.

  “They’re animals. Tools and nothing more,” he muttered as the television droned behind him, the reporter listing the traits of what he called Human Genetic Hybrids. “They aren’t human. Not really.” Not humans, animals, created to serve, to obey dictates of their masters. His eyes narrowed on the bank of monitors by the television as he glimpsed the jeeps racing from the compound. Of course, they had escaped. His creations, his pets. For the moment he was defeated, but he swore the day would come when they would pay.

  “General Goveny, you are under arrest.” A tall American official stepped forward decisively.

  Goveny’s lips twisted as he sneered at the censure he glimpsed in the other man’s gaze.

  “You will learn, they are not society’s pets,” he bit out. “They are animals. Savage, inhuman. They must be trained, confined…”

  “You, Sir, will be the one confined.” Cuffs snapped over his wrists. “Due to your criminal disregard and insane orders, the Labs are destroyed, as well as everyone in them. Your breeds are dead, but I promise you, you’ll pay for the crime of their birth.”

  He hid his smile. He hid his plans. They weren’t dead. But he promised himself that they would soon wish they were.