“Don’t blame him.” Rachel shook her head. “He’s stayed quiet at my request, Callan. I wanted to wait. I didn’t want to cause strain at a time when I know other matters are far more important. But, Diane isn’t near so patient I’m afraid. She made me do it.”
Amusement at the almost childish proclamation drew a chuckle from Callan.
“I’ll thank her personally when next I see her,” he promised. “And thank you again.”
Rather than kissing her cheek, shaking her hand, or any other form of touching that could have caused her discomfort, Callan instead lowered his head to hers and rubbed against it briefly.
The acceptance, respect and affection inherent in the gesture wasn’t missed by Jonas or any other occupant in the room. From that day on, Rachel would always be considered a member of Callan’s personal Pride, and his inner circle of family.
“Gentlemen.” She nodded to the others gracefully as Callan stepped back. “I’ll let you return to your meeting now. And if I were all of you, I would prepare for the fallout when they return.”
She didn’t explain the fallout, but she didn’t need to. If they returned with the former Brandenmore victims, then it would be self-explanatory.
Without another word she walked gracefully from the room, nodding to the Breed guard who opened the doors and then closed them behind her.
Jonas turned back to the alphas who had deliberately found something else to watch.
All but Leo, the man biology named his father. Amber eyes watched him thoughtfully, his lips quirked with a hint of knowing amusement.
He’d watched each moment of the exchange and, Jonas suspected, heard far more than either he, Rachel or Callan wished. But his gaze had softened as his expression reflected a respect Jonas rarely saw in the other Breeds’ gaze.
It was then that Leo nodded back at him before stating, in a tone that reflected surprising fondness, “I think she scares me.”
Jonas sighed in resignation though his chest seemed to weaken with his love for her. “Yeah,” he drawled. “I think that makes two of us.”
*CHAPTER 8*
THREE DAYS LATER
ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO
Gideon watched the window of the hotel room carefully through the scope of the rifle. The gold jewelry that Scott had been kind enough to keep in the safe had purchased the sniper rifle and highly sensitive scope from the black market contact he’d made years before, during one of his brief escapes from Brandenmore’s labs.
It was an old-fashioned weapon, one powered by the ammunition loaded into it, rather than the kind that used a laser box for power before each shot.
The soft sizzle of the box powering up the laser rifles were easily detectable to most Breeds if they were within a certain distance. But even easier for them to discern were the two tiny pin lights at the side of the box. Those pin lights could be seen from miles away by a Breed’s sensitive eyes.
This weapon, though, with its dull steel and the shaded glass of the scope, was all but undetectable to Breeds or humans.
Until it was fired.
This weapon, unlike the laser-powered variety, was loud enough to alert even the densest of the human population that violence was being committed.
It couldn’t be powered back to wound rather than kill or to burn rather than pierce. It couldn’t be deflected by the reflector glass or comparable material. There were few things that could stand between a man and a bullet.
Or a woman and a bullet.
At the moment, the woman in question was sitting comfortably in the chair she had moved to the side of the bed, directly in front of the window. The curtains were open and gave him a clear line of fire as she propped slender, jean-clad legs on the low table in front of her. Scuffed boots looked worn and comfortable, as did the faded jeans and the sleeveless, snug camisole she wore.
And she was staring straight back at him, her gaze meeting his in the scope of the rifle, daring him to fire.
Gideon had to smile.
He was almost becoming fond of this woman after the past three months.
She had a backbone, a daring no other adversary he’d known possessed. She was bold, confrontational, and mysterious. And she was damned intelligent.
Intelligent enough to know she was being followed and cunning enough that she had almost lost him more than once. Gideon had never come so close to losing prey as he had this woman since he’d begun following her.
She was a damned fine adversary, and he had no doubt she would make some worthy man a damned fine lover.
If she survived the little game they were playing at the moment.
He almost envied the man that would share her bed. No doubt it would be the Breed whose scent he’d detected on her clothes when he slipped into her bedroom earlier.
That Breed would have a woman most men could only dream of having. A woman that would be his partner. She was one who would go into battle with him, soothe his soul, mend his wounds, and drive him crazy in bed once the danger was over.
She couldn’t cook worth a damn, he’d heard one of her men say, but she commanded four powerful, territorial, less-than-courteous bastards who lived for war. Three of them followed her willingly, loyally.
The one who wasn’t completely loyal still lived because Gideon had only managed to identify him in the past twenty-four hours. If he were still traveling with her, then Gideon would have already killed him. This woman deserved more than the traitor who had sold her to her uncle’s enemies, she deserved more than the supposedly careless accidents used as attempts to get rid of her. Someone wanted her out of the game. They wanted to keep her from aiding her sister’s mate in protecting her sister and her sister’s child. According to the rumors swirling, now that she was so firmly aligned with the Breeds, someone wanted to ensure that if Colt Broen ever resurfaced there would be no one he could reach out to for assistance.
Someone was very frightened of the combination Diane Broen and her uncle represented. So frightened that once they realized she either didn’t know where he or the Leo’s home base was located, or was strong enough to keep her secrets, decided they were better off with her dead.
Alive, she represented a threat. A threat someone wasn’t willing to take.
Gideon doubted she realized how often three of those men stood between her and laser fire. If any of them were there now, he had no doubt they would be standing between her and his rifle. As her uncle and her ex-lover had tried to stand between her and the enemies that followed. And they had paid for their efforts in blood.
She was alone now. She had left her men behind, just as he had suggested she do in the letter he had left for her in Argentina. At the time, Gideon hadn’t yet uncovered the identity of the traitor on her team.
Now, he knew. He knew who had been the cause of her lover’s death, who had betrayed her uncle, and who had betrayed her.
For what? For a secret her parents had taken to the grave with them. The secret of the location of the Lion’s Den, the home of the first Leo.
She had sent them all home, three of them wounded by Gideon’s bullets. At the time, there had been only one Gideon was certain she could trust. It was only in the past twenty-four hours that the traitor had shown his hand and Gideon had identified him. That one was a danger to her. The bullets Gideon had used to take the three he suspected out of the game had been a warning to each that they had struck, and it was one the bastard had best heed. Neither man nor Breed could serve two masters, and that one was making the possibly fatal mistake of attempting to do so.
Still, she intrigued him.