“There hasn’t been a minion or a Master around here in eight years. This is the safest place for her to be, especially since we’ll have to increase security for the babies.” He gestured to Madison, who was thankfully still calm. Chris really wasn’t sure he’d survive another pregnancy with the woman. Best friend or not, if she woke him up again at three in the morning to talk about how sore her br**sts were, he was making a run for it.

“I’d like you and Ephraim to question her since I haven’t managed to get anything from her. I’m hoping she can give us something to work with. It will also be your job to train her, quickly,” Eric stressed the last part.

“What do we know about her?” he asked, deciding that the best plan was to get this shit over with and get her trained. As much as it pleased him to finally have his mate, his partner, he had a job to do, one that he took very seriously, especially when his family’s safety was on the line.

Eric opened his mouth to answer when Joshua came skidding into the room. “She’s locked herself in the bathroom downstairs and she’s on the internet!”

Chapter 4

She stared intently at the small screen, waiting for her program to do its thing. There was absolutely no warning, not even a little scraping sound. The door to the bathroom was there one second and completely gone the next.

Her grip tightened around her candy bar as she slowly looked up, too frightened to look up quickly and yet unable to look away. Her eyes ran over loose blue jeans, unbuttoned blue jeans, that hung low around a lean tan waist and up over a very well defined set of abs with a thin light pink line that intersected a small circular scar almost hidden completely by a dusting of black hair and up to where two large muscular arms folded over yet another impressive area of the body. A large Celtic tattoo marked half the left peck and just below two very angry looking scars. Her eyes moved over his arms and she inwardly whimpered at the combination of scars, muscle, and tattoos running up and down both arms. Forcing her eyes to continue north she noted the rather angry patch of pale skin on the right side of the man’s neck and then further up to a rather handsome face with seriously angry green eyes.

Isabella swallowed nervously even as her body began to tingle.

Wait a minute her body only reacted this way once and that was to…..

A small whimper escaped her. This couldn’t be. She narrowed her eyes on the man before her. Gone were the wet underwear, Grizzly Adams’ beard, and messy hair. The man before her was clean, shaved and too damn good looking for her peace of mind.

She whimpered again.

The man reached out and she automatically scooted back on the lace covered chair, hugging her candy bar to her chest while leaving her little computer balancing precariously on the edge of her knees. Even in her drug hazed mind she had priorities.

Chocolate came first.

The man’s sinfully wicked mouth kicked up into a lazy lopsided smile as he reached forward and snatched the computer away. Never taking her eyes off him, she stole a quick bite of chocolate. Chocolate at this moment was very necessary. Her mind understood that. It was the only way she was going to survive this moment with this man.

What in the hell was wrong with her?

God, she needed more chocolate. The three king size bars she had stored away in her bag were not going to be enough if she had to spend any real time in this man’s company.

She took a fortifying bite of her lifesaving chocolate as she watched the man pass the computer back to Eric, who was glaring at her. The man in front of her looked somewhat amused as he studied her.

“Cuff her, Chris,” Eric said, not sounding very happy at all.

The god…er, man named Chris sighed unhappily. With a wave of his hand he gestured for her to stand up and come to him. Taking another bite of chocolate for strength, she shook her head.

“Come on, sweetheart, make it easy on everyone,” he said in a deep timber voice that she could have happily listened to all day. “The faster you come out of there the faster I can get some beauty sleep.” Did the man not own a mirror? Not that he was beautiful, but he was handsome in a very sexy bad boy kind of way. If he got any hotter she was afraid she’d be limited to monosyllable words and grunts.

Again she shook her head and this time when she tried scooting back her chair banged against the tiled wall.

There really was nowhere to go, but that didn’t mean she had to make this easy on them. She was a prisoner and it was a prisoner’s job to escape or make their captors’ lives a living hell so they had no choice but to release them, at least she thought she heard that somewhere. Right now it sounded like good advice so she was going with it.

His smile deepened as he eyed her. “Oh, I bet I can find a way to get you out of there,” he murmured. Before Isabella could ask what he had planed he reached over and snatched the candy bar right out of her hand.

Seriously the man took her chocolate! His hand touched hers as it retreated and she was mentally promising herself kickboxing lessons so she could stop the next bastard that did that when something stung her.

She was vaguely aware of his curse when she looked down and raised her shirt yanking the waist of her cargo pants down to look at the area that hurt. She expected to find a bee or a spider or something, but there was nothing.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Her once light brown birthmark was now bright red. She ran the pad of her forefinger over it and moved to do it again when a large tan hand pushed her hand aside.

She was a bit surprised to find Chris kneeling in front of her, staring intently at her little crescent moon and cross birthmark. Well, at least they looked like a crescent moon and cross to her. The easy going smile he gave her a minute ago was completely gone and replaced by a look of deep concentration as he ran the tip of his finger over her mark.

A startled gasp escaped her as intense green eyes met hers. His hand dropped away from her and he stood abruptly, never taking his eyes off her. It was almost as if he was afraid she would disappear if he looked away for even a second. A little odd, but nothing compared to the oddities of the last twentyfour hours.

He gestured with the candy bar, her candy bar, for her to stand up. Again she shook her head. He glared at her as he took a huge bite out of her candy bar. Oh, when she got those kickboxing lessons she was so coming after him!

“Look, we can do this the easy way or the hard-“

“Thanks,” a very beautiful woman with gorgeous silky black hair and a golden tan to die for said as she snaked a hand around Chris and stole the candy bar out of his hand. Isabella’s jaw dropped as the woman took a bite of the candy bar and closed her eyes in utter rapture, but that’s not what shocked her. No, not even close. The woman was only wearing a sheet.

Her eyes darted from the woman who looked like she just came from a marathon of sex to Chris, who was only wearing jeans, unbuttoned jeans at that. The first time she saw him he was only wearing boxers, probably just something he threw on after doing the mattress mambo with this woman. The way the woman took her candy bar from him indicated they had a close personal connection.

Yeah, they were definitely lovers.

She thought over her reaction to this man, one she’d never had for another man and she had her answer, finally. They drugged her food with some kind of hallucinogen laced with an aphrodisiac. They were probably hoping to use sex to get her program out of her.