Chapter 4

She was just entering the wide, sheltered portico of the mansion, her duffel slung over her shoulder, when she saw him.

The door jerked open and he stepped from the house, his expression livid, his gray eyes dark and firing with fury as he slammed the door closed.

Dawn smirked. It was completely unlike her; everything rolling through her senses and her emotions was completely un-Dawn-like since she had learned Seth had a lover.

She stopped, cocked her hip and stared back at him as he stalked over to her, gripped her arm above the hem of the long-sleeved light jacket she wore and steered her to another entrance.

Steered her nothing—he was dragging her. The heat of his palm raced through the thin material of the black jacket, fired against her flesh and sent erratic impulses rushing through her body.

Past arousal was nothing compared to what she felt now. It wasn’t arousal—it was an imperative, all-consuming hunger and a need that she couldn’t survive without fulfilling.

He was hers. He was a part of her soul. When had that happened? Other than those brief days ten years before, she hadn’t allowed herself to be alone with him, hadn’t allowed herself the hope that she could have more than the nightmares.

She didn’t want the pity. She didn’t want the knowledge in his eyes of what she had been, but she couldn’t bear to lose him either.

He pulled her into another door, slammed it closed, then swung her around to face him.

Dawn smiled mockingly as she looked around the huge, deserted laundry room.

“Isn’t this just a little too clichéd, Seth?” She drawled. “And here I’m not wearing my little French maid outfit. Should I change for you?”

My God. His eyes. For a second, the hunger, the lust that fired inside them wiped the thoughts from her head and the saliva from her mouth, and not in fear. She could smell the lust pouring from his body, his pores, filling the room with the subtle scent of male musk and heated flames. It was the most erotic scent she had ever known.

“Who the hell are you and what did you do with Dawn?” he snarled. “Better yet, why the fuck are you here?”

“What, didn’t want me to witness you going to your knees in surrender when you propose to your little bunny of the month?” she shot back, and watched as his nostrils flared, his head jerking back in surprise. “Didn’t think Callan would tell me, Seth?” She wrinkled her nose as she had watched Cassie do a dozen times when slapping down one of the Breeds for impertinence. “Didn’t think poor little Dawn could handle the sight of it?”

His lips thinned as she watched the anger build inside him. Well, that was fine with her. Let him get mad. Let him get as mad as she was and let him burn inside.

“You’re right.” She lifted to her tiptoes and almost, just almost managed to get right in his face as she dropped the duffel bag, placed her hands against his chest and pushed furiously. “You have a problem on your hands, stud. See how you can fix it.”

He fell back a step, his expression frankly incredulous as she felt, scented, knew, the hunger that began to whip through his system.

The power of it slapped around her, tore through her like lightning and left her struggling to breathe as they glared at each other like combatants.

“You don’t want to be here,” he snarled. “God damn you, Dawn. I won’t let you fuck me up again, and I won’t let you fuck my body up again. Get your ass back on that heli-jet and get out of here. I don’t want you here.”

“Liar,” she growled furiously. “I can feel how much you want me here. I can smell it. I can feel it like flames burning over me, so don’t even try to tell me you don’t want me here.”

His hands clenched at his sides; anger pulsed off his body in waves and fired her own, just as the arousal did. She could feel the familiar dampness growing between her thighs, feel her nipples hardening beneath her light summer-weight tank top and feel her hands and tongue itch.

They itched like a rash. Worse than a rash. Or what she had heard a rash felt like. She wanted to touch. Touch his skin. She had to touch his skin, had to rub her tongue against it and infect him with the same insanity crawling through her.

“I don’t want you here,” he bit out again, furious, sincerity ringing in his voice as it sliced across her soul. “I don’t want to look at you, day in and day out, and ache for something I can’t have, Dawn. You won’t rip through me like that again. I won’t allow it.”

He didn’t want her? Had he ever really wanted her or had it just been the mating heat?

Pride had her head lifting, her chin jutting in the air as she snarled back at him. “Then stay away from me, Mr. Lawrence. Keep your ass safe, and let me and my team find your irksome little assassin and I’ll just be on my way again.”

“Why?” Frustration, fury, lust—they all filled his voice.

“Why? Because it would look excellent on my résumé, of course.” She shrugged, the sarcasm in her voice thick enough to slice through. “Just think of all the nifty little government assignments I’ll get after this. Commanding my own team? In the thick of the danger?” She drew in a hard, sensual breath through clenched teeth. “Mr. Lawrence, I could command my own price. All because I managed to save your very tight, very sexy ass.” She flicked her eyes over his body slowly and smiled. “Oh, and maybe your little mistress while I’m at it. Tell me, Seth, does she scratch and beg for more, or does she lay there like the little ice princess she portrays herself to be?”

Oh yeah, she had checked up on Miss Caroline Carrington herself. She had a nice thick file residing in her PDA and more information due at any time.

“Do you care?” He was breathing hard, staring at her as though she were some alien creature he had never seen before. Well, let him stare, because she didn’t know herself anymore either. But she would figure it out before she left, and when she left she would make certain she had freed herself of Seth just as easily as he had managed to free himself of her.

“Do I care?” She flashed a canine at him furiously. “Not for much longer I won’t, if I ever did.”

It was killing her. It was breaking her soul in two, and she could feel the screams of agony ricocheting through the very core of her being.

She had dreamed of him, ached for him. She had watched him every time he had come to Sanctuary and inhaled his scent the moment he left a room. She had fought herself, and she had lost. Now she was losing here too, and something inside her was screaming out at the pain of it.

“If you ever did,” he growled, flashing a look of male disgust. “That’s the problem, Dawn. You never did, until now. Why now? Because someone else might have something you didn’t want to begin with?”

“And when did you bother to ask me if I wanted it?” She wanted to scream. She wanted to rage and pound her fists at him. Because he hadn’t. He had never come to her. He had flirted, he had teased, and she hadn’t known how to handle it, so she had run. And within months he had stopped doing even that. He stopped seeking her out, and he stopped caring. And she had continued to hide, because as God was her witness she had no idea how to tell him she needed him when all she could see was that flash of pity in his eyes.

“I followed you around like a lovesick puppy for months,” he bit out in self-disgust. “When I could find you.”

“Months.” She waved her hand mockingly. “Poor little Seth didn’t get instant gratification. Isn’t that just such a shame? Bad Dawn, being so mean to him.”

Seth stared at her incredulously. Who the hell was this woman? This was not the shadow he had watched slipping around Sanctuary for ten years. This was not the woman who, on the rare occasions they were in the same room, avoided him like the plague.

He clenched his hands again, fighting against the nearly overwhelming need to just touch her. To run his hands down her arms, to feel her hands against his chest again. To take her lips. He didn’t want a cool little brush of lips as they’d had before. He wanted to take her lips, he wanted to devour them, he wanted to lick against them and suck that pretty little tongue into his mouth.

Arousal, almost violent in its extremity, rushed through his system. He could feel the thickening of his cock, the blood pumping furiously to it.

Damn her to hell. He hadn’t been this aroused in his entire fucking life. So aroused he could feel the need in every cell of his body.

“Dawn, don’t push me.” He leaned forward just enough, just that extra bit that would have made the Dawn he knew run for cover.

This one didn’t run. She stuck her chin out further, braced her hands on her hips and smirked. Son of a bitch, she was smirking at him.

“You’re so hot you’re going to catch this room on fire,” she snarled. “Tell you what, Seth, don’t you push me and I won’t push you. And get the smell of your lust out of my face before I have to tell your little girlfriend just how hard you get for me.”

“Dawn, don’t do this.” He wiped his hand over his face, more to wipe the betraying sweat from his brow than for any other reason. “This has been hard enough. For both of us. Let’s just walk away from each other and thank God neither of us ended up too hurt in the process.”

But he saw the pain flash in her eyes, for just a second. It was there, then gone so fast that he couldn’t be certain it had even been there to begin with.

“Of course you didn’t get hurt, Seth,” she murmured, her voice cold, her lips twisting in amused contempt. “You would have had to invest something first, wouldn’t you? As I said, just stay out of my way so I can keep that tight ass of yours alive, and I’ll consider my job done. Now, can I get out of your laundry room? I’m tired of the scent of your dirty laundry.”

Anger and lust beat a tattoo inside his head and his balls. He fisted his hands, fought against the flames racing over his body and knew if he didn’t get out of that room, if he didn’t get away from her, he was going to take her. He would rip her pants from her body, bend her over the fucking folding bench and take her with all the pent-up fury of a lust he thought he had finally conquered years ago.

He would do that to her. Even knowing the hell she had endured as a child. Knowing the brutality those monsters had used, he would still do it and he knew it. He knew it and it sickened his gut.

“Stay out of my way,” he snapped.

She lifted a brow and flashed those pretty little canines in a smile that almost had him drooling with the need to take those lips.

“Stay out of my way,” she amended. “I’d hate infect you again. Wouldn’t that just suck, Seth?”

“More than you fucking know.” He gripped the handle to the door, gave it a vicious twist and slammed out of the laundry room before he ended up doing something that would scar his conscience forever.

“Here’s your room.” Caroline Carrington was icy, contemptuous and corrupt.

Dawn followed her into the room, her brows lifting at the size of it and the clear knowledge that it was a servant’s room. She knew for a fact the Breed Enforcers were being placed closer to Seth’s suite.

“This won’t work.” She turned on the other woman, flashed her canines and watched as Miss Carrington’s eyes flickered with disgust.

Aww, poor little Caro, she didn’t like Breeds.

Too fucking bad.

“I beg your pardon?” Arrogance and imperious demand filled every pore of the bitch.

“I think you heard me, Miss Carrington. Breed Enforcers are being placed on the upper floor, closer to Mr. Lawrence’s suite. You can escort me there now, or I can find it on my own.” She shrugged. “I really don’t give a damn which way it goes, but I’m heading there.”

Put her in the basement, would she? The basement? As though she were a dirty little secret that needed to be kept out of the public eye.

“Security members are employees, not guests,” the black-haired snake snapped.

Dawn ignored her, shifted her duffel on her back and took the stairs to the upper floor two at a time. She could smell her way; she didn’t need Miss Caroline Carrington to show her anything.

The wicked witch of the universe had spied Dawn the moment she stepped into the house and with an arch little voice had informed her that her room was waiting.

Dawn had snorted at that. She had followed her just to see what the hell she was up to, but Dawn knew she hadn’t been expected at all. And what was more, she knew this woman was the one Seth intended to announce his engagement to.

Not on a bet, Dawn thought. If he was sleeping with this black-haired snake in the grass then he wasn’t doing it often enough to leave more than the most subtle of scents on her. He hadn’t claimed her, and he hadn’t marked her. Not with the scent of his passion or of his emotions. But she could smell his lust on her, and that was enough to make Dawn see red.

Fine, she had known they were both in mating heat over the years and she hadn’t done anything about it. Well, where the hell had he been? What the hell had happened to the guy doing the chasing? Was it now a mortal sin? Somehow unmanly? Had the rules managed to change while she was learning how to survive?

“Agent Daniels, this is uncalled for,” Miss Carrington snapped behind her.

Dawn looked back to see the black-haired witch making rather good time up the stairs in those mile-high shoes and that too-short skirt. She wondered if the other woman would split the side of that skirt trying to rush after her.

“Sure it’s called for,” she retorted. “It’s called my job. Check with Seth, he’ll okay it.”

A gasp sounded behind her. “That is Mr. Lawrence to you.”

Dawn snorted. Mr. Lawrence, her ass.

She turned as she reached the landing, followed her nose and, within minutes and, along two different hallways, she found the rooms she was looking for. And if she wasn’t very much mistaken, there was an empty room right beside Seth’s suite. Oh my, how lucky could one little Breed female get? Let him hump and roll while she was sitting right next to his room snarling in fury. It wasn’t going to happen.

“You will not.” Miss Carrington’s voice went from angry to pure fury.

A second later talons gripped Dawn’s arm and the flash of fiery distaste had her jerking back and turning with a feral, enraged snarl, her hand slashing out, gripping Miss Carrington’s throat and, in a second, pulling her to her knees in front of her.

Dawn hadn’t had time to think. There had been no thought. There had only been instinct.

“What the hell is going on here!” Seth’s voice, enraged, furious and incredulous, sliced through the room as Dawn snapped her hand back and glared at him.

“Seth.” The bitch. Carrington whimpered, her face pale, her hand gripping her throat as she stumbled to her feet, pretending shock. “Oh my God, Seth. She tried to kill me.”

“Oh, get real,” Dawn muttered and stared back at Seth as that black-haired weasel ran to his arms.

Ran to his arms. She stared at them, seeing his powerful arms surround another woman, hold her close. As though it were happening in slow motion, as though the world had shifted and ended right there in front of her eyes.

Dawn stepped back, and she stared. Just at his arms. Just at the powerful, corded muscles flexing beneath the tanned flesh, tightening, holding the woman to him. Arms that should have been around her earlier. That should have been holding her.

What was she supposed to do now? She lifted her gaze to Seth’s, seeing the chill in his expression as she swallowed tightly.

“She caught me unaware,” she whispered, dazed. She felt as though she had taken a blow to the head that she couldn’t recover from. “Behind me. She grabbed my arm.” She lifted a hand, then dropped it as she shook her head.

“Caroline, what the hell happened?” Seth was coldly furious and, Dawn realized, he couldn’t believe her explanation.

She ran her hand down her arm and watched, no longer furious, no longer enraged. He was holding the other woman as she cried, as she babbled…something. Something about being confused, she hadn’t done anything, blah blah blah.

Dawn stared at his hands now. The way they curved over the other woman’s shoulders. So gently. He was holding her gently and the animal inside Dawn was screaming, howling, fighting to break free as agony seared it like a red hot whip.

“Dawn!” The crack of Dash’s voice had her jerking to attention, her gaze swinging to where he and Elizabeth were standing in the doorway. “Is that true?”

“True?” She blinked back at him.

“Did you attack Miss Carrington? Unprovoked?” Dash’s amber-brown eyes were flat and hard, commanding.

“I didn’t.” She shook her head slowly, concentrating on Dash’s eyes. “She grabbed me, from behind.” She turned her gaze back to Seth.

“Dawn!” Dash’s voice jerked her back. “Why would Miss Carrington grab you from behind?”

She swallowed and fought to get a grip on herself, but, God, it was hard. Rage was twisting inside her, instinct screaming, clawing in pain.

“I’m second command,” she told Dash, breathing in roughly. “I need to be upstairs. She tried to place me in the servant’s quarters and I ignored her direction. I followed the scent of my unit.” She indicated the room. “This will be my room.”

She was unaware of her voice strengthening, but Dash wasn’t. He stared at her, terrified he was going to lose her to the instinctual rage of the animal he could see firing in her eyes at the sight of another woman in her mate’s arms.

They were so close. If they lost Dawn, everything she had fought for in the past ten years would be lost.

“Dawn!” He jerked her attention back to him as she turned to stare at Seth again.

“Seth, you have to get Miss Carrington out of here,” Elizabeth whispered at his side. “Now.”

“No!” Dawn snapped, now more tense than ever before, her eyes snapping back to Seth and Caroline Carrington with so much naked agony that Dash wondered how such a slight body could contain it all. “I apologize, Mr. Lawrence. Miss Carrington.” She seemed to sway as the words passed her lips. “I’ll…” She stared around the room. “I’ll change rooms with one of the others.”

She was moving toward the door when Caroline gave a little shriek of dismay and threw herself back into Seth’s arms. Dawn froze. Dash watched the transformation, saw the enforcer’s lips curl, watched as the Feline mate fought for freedom, fought to destroy the woman stealing her place in life.

“Now,” Dash snarled, aware of Seth pushing Caroline toward Elizabeth with a hard, cold voice order to “Go.” But Seth didn’t go with her. He stared at Dawn, watched her carefully, his expression brooding, angry.

“I’ll switch rooms with Lawe.” Dawn inhaled deeply, shaking her head as though trying to shake off a drug. She moved for the door again.

“Stay here.” Seth’s voice was rough, as agonized as the pain tearing through Dawn’s eyes. “Just fucking stay here.”

He turned then and moved from the room, obviously ignoring a distraught Caroline as she rushed after him. Dash turned back to Dawn, his heart aching for the little Cougar Breed that fought so valiantly for the control that meant so much to her.

Her expression flinched and her lashes drifted over her eyes as she turned to him.

“I’m fine,” she whispered. “I’ll be fine.”

And he had to believe it, because he couldn’t order her back to Sanctuary, no more than Callan or Jonas could. Breed Law forbade interfering with mates. And despite the reversal of the hormone, Seth and Dawn were still mates. Though it was Dash’s guess that that reversal was making a sudden turn to renew itself. He had smelled the scent of the hormone on Seth’s flesh, and he had seen the flinch Seth couldn’t control as Caroline threw herself against him.

“Dawn’s awakening,” he heard his daughter whisper behind him, and he turned to her quickly, his eyes narrowing suspiciously as a single tear slipped down Cassie’s pale face. “She’ll wish she had continued to sleep.”