Chapter One
Fifteen Months Later
Shock held Roni immobile as she watched the news. Betrayal burned like acid inside her as it spilled through her already broken heart.
“If you’ll notice the small mark on her shoulder, you’ll see it appears to be a love bite.” The reporter pointed to a bruise-like shadow on the picture of Merinus Lyon’s shoulder, at the point where it met her neck. “We have no confirmations, but rumors are suggesting it’s a ‘mating’ mark. That there is an instinctive mating recognition between the Feline Breed, Callan Lyons, and his wife. It includes the mark, as well as a semen and saliva-based hormone that essentially acts as an aphrodisiac on the female. The Feline Breeds are denying this, but the reports that were slipped from the labs where the tests are being conducted are proving the theory . . . ”
Roni was in shock. She stood beneath her father’s regard, watching the report, feeling the blood drain from her face as her eyes centered on the mark revealed by the photo.
It would be easy to claim it was no more than a love bite, but several photos over the course of three months showed it never changed, never healed. The reports smuggled from the Breeds, the newscaster reported, said it never would.
Roni’s hand rose to her shoulder, covering the mark she knew marred her own flesh, just as it did Callan’s wife.
“What the hell possessed you to fuck that freak?” her father sneered as he paced the room, his breathing harsh, fury outlining every inch of his body.
Reginald Andrews was a big man, not as muscular and tall as Taber, but strong enough that his anger caused Roni to flinch at the thought of remembered beatings. She was an adult now. She wouldn’t tolerate physical violence from him anymore, but she had never gotten over her fear of him.
Her fear, or her hatred.
“Go back to wherever you came from,” she told him harshly as she continued to stare at the television screen. “They’re wrong.”
She had survived just fine without Taber, even after the way he marked her skin, destroyed her dreams. She had survived the endless threats and attempted attacks her father’s creditors had staged, and she had survived it alone. She could and she would get through this.
“You think you can lie to me?” he spat out as he came up beside her. He jerked her around until he could stare down at her, his washed-out brown eyes darkening in fury. “Do you look in the mirror often enough to see that disgusting place on your neck, Roni? Or does it sicken you too much to remember you spread your thighs for an animal?”
Roni watched him suspiciously. He didn’t care about her one way or the other and she had enough sense to know it. She highly doubted that he cared who she fucked, which meant there was more behind his anger than any parental concern or personal insult.
“Take your hands off me before I call your last employer and let him know exactly where the hell you are.” She kept her voice low, but there was no disguising the hatred that welled up inside her for her parent.
She hadn’t seen him more than half a dozen times in the past three years. None of those sightings had been pleasant. This one least of all.
“Roni, you’ve gone and ruined everything,” he yelled back at her furiously, but he did release her. “I nearly had you married, girl. Mr. Tearns would have paid for the use of you, while you let that cat have it for nothing.”
Ah, so now we get to the real story, she thought mockingly. How very typical of Reginald. Marriage to his boss, though, was a little bit extreme.
“Married? To your boss?” She laughed at him. “Is that why you showed up, Reggie? Do you think I’d so much as talk to the snakes you run with? I don’t think so. Fend for yourself. It’s what I do.”
What she had always done. She turned back to the television, nearly losing her breath at the recorded interview with the five Feline Breeds.
“The reports are farcical,” he stated. “The Genetics Council will do anything to frighten the world into destroying us. That’s their sole aim. Until our scientists say it’s true, then as far we’re concerned, it’s nothing but propaganda.”
Taber’s voice sent a surge of heat flowing through her body that she didn’t even attempt to fight.
She had learned over the years not to fight it. It only hurt worse when she did.
“Beats fucking an animal,” he sneered again. “You’ll be lucky to live if anyone sees that mark on your neck, Roni. I bet those Council bastards would love to get hold of you.”
Fear shot through her as she turned back to her father.
How desperate was he, she wondered? She wasn’t stupid enough to think that any parental bond would keep him from selling his information to the highest bidder. He would turn her over in a heartbeat, if he hadn’t already.
“Don’t look at me like that, girlie.” His mouth twisted in disgust. “I’m not about to tell anyone. Hell, like I want it known my kid is a dirty cat fucker.”
She almost flinched at the term. Almost. She hadn’t fucked him; hell, he hadn’t even kissed her. All he had done was mark her, ruining her forever for any other man, then left her in a way that made her father’s desertions pale in comparison.
“Leave, Reggie.” She turned off the television. “I don’t need you here now any more than I’ve needed you over the past years. I don’t have any money, and I don’t want to put up with your crap. Just go away.”
She had learned that it wouldn’t do her any good if she did need him. The minute he thought she might, he ran.
“You can use this, Roni,” he finally said, his nasal voice wheedling. “We could give ’em a story that could make us millions. We wouldn’t have to worry anymore.”
Horror rushed over her in a wave of sickening realization. She hadn’t seen him in months, and now he was here. Another scheme, another get-rich-quick idea, and once again he didn’t care how he used her to attain it.
It was time to leave. She silently admitted that there was no way in hell her father would ever keep this to himself. She might have a few days at the most to get her things together and run.
She stared around the small house she had lived in all her life. It wasn’t much, but it was all she had. The home her mother had dreamed of, but hadn’t lived long enough to enjoy. She would lose it now.
The small cabin was no longer the shack it had been. The job she had found in Morehead as an accountant had allowed her to fix it up; new curtains and appliances, a comfortable sofa in a dark forest-green with matching chairs, a small cherry coffee table and matching end tables, a delicate glass lamp. And she had a new bed rather than the mattress on the floor she had used for years. And now she was going to have to walk away from all of it.
“Go away,” she told him again. “And keep your mouth shut unless you want to die. Doesn’t sound like the Council is something you really want to tangle with, Reggie. They would kill you before they paid you a penny.”
There wasn’t a chance he would listen to her.
Fury flowed through her veins like acid, eating away the peace she had managed to find in her life in the past fifteen months. Just what she needed. To be drawn into something so dangerous that it made her father’s escapades look like tea parties.
“I’ll leave. But I’ll be back. You think about this, Roni. The bastard fucked you and left. What do you owe him? Make him pay, like he should have to begin with.”
He stomped to the door, casting her an angry, narrow-eyed look before he slammed from the house, leaving her alone once again. Roni shook her head wearily as she collapsed in the new chair. Leather, sinfully soft and supportive beneath her body.
“God, now what?” She raised her eyes to the ceiling as she fought back her tears and the reality of this new blow.
She didn’t want to leave her home. She had fought most of her life to stay, to hold together the fragile remnants of happier days and comfort herself with them. Now that was being taken as well.
She would have to fix the truck. It was more dependable than the car, and would get her further. Unfortunately, like the car, it wasn’t in the best of shape.
But it could be fixed. And she’d better fix it damned soon, because sure as hell her father wouldn’t wait long before trying to sell her to the highest bidder.
She shuddered in fear.
“Why did you do this, Taber?” she whispered with bleak sorrow into the empty living room, her empty heart.
She had been alone almost since the day Dayan had handed her the letter Taber had sent her. At first, she had tried to date, determined to get over the one man she had always dreamed of loving. But she had learned quickly that her body would never accept the touch of another man, and her heart ached for what she knew she couldn’t have.
But at times like this, when she desperately needed a shoulder to cry on, being alone really sucked.