He thrust his hands into it and tipped up her head, looking down into the crystal clarity of her eyes. "Don't I?" he said again and this time it was a demand. "Answer me." The cat was possessive by nature. So was the man. And both had marked Ashaya.

"What answer do you want to hear?" It was a dare to his feline soul.

He growled low in his throat and the sound translated through his human vocal cords. "The truth."

She stared at him for several more seconds. "You're something I've never experienced. I'm fascinated by you and I know that's a weakness you'll exploit."

"That much honesty can be dangerous." He dipped his head while tugging hers farther back, the electric wildness of her hair moving over his hands like fire. That stuff, God, he knew he was going to be having all sorts of erotic dreams about Ashaya's hair.

"But," he whispered against her mouth, "it can also reap rewards." Knowing he'd never be able to stop if he started kissing her, he brushed his lips over the taut cords of her neck. She sucked in a breath. Unable to resist, he grazed her with his teeth. Her start was slight but he felt it. He nuzzled at her. "I won't hurt you."

Her hand crept up to his shoulder. "You yelled at me. You said I had a hard-on for sociopaths."

He didn't want to think about that right now, didn't want to consider the irrevocable lines he was crossing... the betrayals he was committing. Against Kylie's memory, against his own vows - to annihilate the Psy, to keep his distance from this woman who might yet prove to be an enemy.

For this one instant, he was just a man and she was a beautiful woman who was his own personal aphrodisiac. "Doesn't mean I can't take a bite out of you." He closed his teeth playfully over her pulse for a second.

She shuddered. "I don't understand you."

"Your body does." He tasted the ragged beat beneath his lips. "Does it feel bad?"

The unambiguous question seemed to be what she needed. "No. The sensations are... pleasurable. But it's dangerous - I'm in the PsyNet."

Frowning, he raised his head. "And no one's unmasked you?" There was something very wrong about that.

Before she could answer, a noise intruded.

The leopard went hunting quiet.

Chapter 23

I've met him - the sniper... Dorian. He confuses me on the most fundamental level. I have the irrational fear that if I'm not careful, he'll take me over. Yet part of me wants to take the chance. Part of me hungers to tangle with this leopard barely clothed in human skin.

-  From the encrypted personal files of Ashaya Aleine

Dorian relaxed as he recognized the approaching tread. "Kit's coming."

"Let go." Ashaya tried to pull away the hands still fisted in her hair.

He liked the feel of her touching him, soft feminine heat and frustration. "Kit," he called out, not releasing her, "we'll be down in a sec."

The juvenile stopped, his hearing good enough to have caught Dorian's words despite the distance and the closed door. "Oooookay."

Ashaya tugged at his wrists again. "I need to go check on Keenan."

He freed her - the terror she'd felt for Keenan continued to echo in her eyes. "What did he do?" he asked as he got off the bed. "What freaked you out so badly?"

She stood up and began to twist her hair into a single braid. "Keenan is highly intelligent. His IQ has been tested in the genius range." Finishing her braid, she turned back to the bedspread to search for the hair ties.

He leaned against the door and watched her. It was a nice view. "And?"

"And" - she found the hair ties and secured her braid before turning to face him - "it means he likes playing inside his mind. That's fine, but because of his telepathic gifts, he possesses the ability to go so deep that his brain 'forgets' about his physical body. Things stop working - I'm afraid one day, he'll compromise a critical organ."

Dorian scowled. "No fail-safes?" Most living organisms had some natural fight reaction.

"No," she said and glanced away. "No, he wasn't born with those."

He tasted the lie, but couldn't figure out what she could possibly have to hide on the point. "His stay with the Council had to have exacerbated the tendency." Violence stirred within him at the memory of how he'd found Keenan - the blindfold, the earplugs.

"Yes." A flat statement that may as well have been a blade, it held such deadly intent. "But we practised building a manual fail-safe each time he came to visit - doing it until it was almost instinctive - and he kept his promise."

Stubborn kid, Dorian thought, pleased. "Can we trust him to keep his word after this lapse?"

"I think so." A pause. "I believe he only broke it today because he was scared of being in an unfamiliar environment."

Dorian gave a short nod, and pulled open the door. Ashaya's face was perfect in its expressionlessness as she walked through, but he wasn't going to be fooled again. He could scent the confusion in her - and, hidden in that confusion - a distinct thread of feminine arousal. His leopard clawed at him, desperate to get to her. It felt like knives gouging at him from the inside out. "Let's get downstairs," he said, knowing his tone was on the wrong side of feral.

Ashaya began to follow him down. "You're prone to mood swings."

Mood swings? He stopped halfway down the steps. "Women have mood swings. Not men." It was a growl.

"That's untrue." She kept walking, completely unaware of the danger of having a pissed-off leopard at her back. "But it's a misapprehension many people share," she threw back over her shoulder as she reached the ground floor. "Men are as prone to the chemical imbalances that cause shifts in mood."

Dorian caught up to her in seconds, but didn't have time to correct her own "misapprehension" before they reached the kitchen. Tammy and Kit were both sipping coffee inside, and he could hear the sound of cartoons from the living room off to the right. "Twins still at your folks'?"

"Yes." Putting down her coffee, Tammy shot Ashaya a considering glance. "I apologize if this offends you but we weren't sure about Keenan. I sent my children to stay with my parents until we could figure out if he was safe to have around the cubs."

Ashaya didn't look away from Tammy's direct gaze. "He's only dangerous to himself. His telepathy is strong, but nowhere near strong enough to break changeling shields."

Tammy nodded. "Fine. But I'm going to wait for someone I trust to confirm that. Right now, he hasn't interacted enough with Sascha for her to make the call."

"Of course." Ashaya sounded so cool and collected that if Dorian hadn't seen her curled around Keenan today, he'd have believed she didn't care a whit. And he wouldn't have heard the fury buried beneath the politeness.

Ashaya did not like her son being treated as if he might be a danger to others. Dorian couldn't blame her. Neither, he knew, would Tammy. Protectiveness in a mother was expected. They'd just never thought to see it in one of the Psy. Not after the way Sascha's mother, Councilor Nikita Duncan, had cut her off.

"Kit" - Dorian jerked his head toward the lounge - "go make sure Keenan's okay."

"He's fine." Kit watched Ashaya with barely hidden fascination - he'd clearly picked up too much in that short visit upstairs. Dorian wasn't surprised. Not only did Kit carry the scent of a future alpha, he was very close to having his rank shift officially from juvenile to adult. "I checked on him a minute ago."

Dorian didn't say a word.

"Shit," the tall, auburn-haired male said and walked out, mumbling "I never get to hear anything interesting" under his breath.

Tammy's lips curved slightly after he was gone. "He's turning into a wonderful young man, but sometimes the child shows through."

"At least he has the excuse of being in his teens," Ashaya said so primly that it took Dorian a few seconds to realize she was referring to him and his "mood swings."

His eyes narrowed, but the cat was delighted at what it considered "play." "Tammy needs to know what you told me about Keenan."

For a moment, it looked as if she'd refuse. But then she nodded and complied. "If this ever happens again, and I'm out of contact, get one of the Psy in your pack to do a telepathic blast. It's a very loud noise on the psychic plane. Or" - she paused, glanced at Dorian - "you could shake him awake via whatever network it is that he's linked into."

Dorian shrugged. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Keenan is no longer in the PsyNet," she said. "Psy need biofeedback to survive. Which means - since he's alive and well - that you've found an alternate way to feed his mind, just as your pack feeds Sascha's and Faith's minds." Her words were staccato, perfectly enunciated. "You're lying to me."

Dorian stepped closer, until they were toe to toe. "So?"

She blinked, as if caught by surprise. "So don't treat me like an imbecile."

"Then don't ask questions to which you haven't earned an answer." Ashaya might love her son, but too many questions remained. It was one thing for him to kiss her, quite another to trust her with information that could be used to hurt the pack. Especially when she kept her secrets. "You haven't exactly been forthcoming, Ms. Aleine."

"Why would I want to share anything with a man who yells at me twenty-three hours of every day, then kisses me?"

A pointed cough had him snapping his head toward Tamsyn. The DarkRiver healer's face held open interest. He felt his jaw set. "Leave it," he said, turning on his heel and pulling out his cell phone at the same time. "I'll call and reschedule Ashaya's meeting." He pushed through the back door, heading out into the yard.