Becca wrenched her gaze from Nero to the lid of her coffee cup, but the lack of eye contact did nothing to ease the attraction sizzling through her veins, the weight of his ancient masculine presence, or his fear whispering in her head. Somehow, insignificant little her terrified him. But his thoughts weren’t clear, muddled with the other voices, and she couldn’t figure out what someone so powerful could fear, especially about her.

“So, ah…” He drew his coffee cup to his lips, his hand trembling. Shit, he hissed in her head, and captured the cup in both hands. The muscles in his jaw flexed, and he visibly steadied himself. “You take your coffee black, hunh?”

Guess he wasn’t going to talk about it. Not that she’d expected he would. Even if he seemed determined to help her — and that was clearly for Raven’s sake, not hers — she and Nero weren’t friends. They barely knew each other, and they certainly didn’t talk to each other about things that bothered them. “I found it easier to drink it black than needing cream and sugar and stuff when I was in the army.”

“The army?”

“You know I’m a captain. You were in my head.” The heat of embarrassment seeped up her neck. “You heard it all, didn’t you?” All her thoughts and determination to hold onto herself. It had been all she’d had.

“I heard enough.”

“Do you know about Afghanistan?”

He gave a tight nod, his expression dark.

“And you know what they did in the cave.” Her pulse stuttered and a shiver swept through her, jostling her hand and making her coffee spill out the opening in the lid. She set the cup on the table and pressed her palms on either side of it, as if that could somehow steady the panic whirling through her. “You know—”

“Just take a breath.”

She swallowed at the lump in her throat. Just breathe. Think of Raven’s warmth. But it was so hard to focus, and the whispers turned to hisses. She’s strange. Look at her. What’s wrong with her? Everyone was staring at her. They could see her falling apart, they knew pieces of her soul and mind were snapping away, and she was going to go crazy.

Nero laid his hand over hers. Please, Mother, just breathe.

The hisses vanished, as if someone had flicked a switch. All of them but Nero.

This was a mistake. I pushed too fast. The puzur will still be in danger, my kids will be in danger, and I’ll lose her, too, way too soon. An overwhelming fear and yearning rushed over her, and she jerked her hand away.

Nero’s voice in her head disappeared, but the whispers returned. His eyes flashed wide for a second as if he hadn’t realized he’d grabbed her hand, then his gaze hardened as he leaned back and cupped his paper coffee cup between both palms. “Tell me where this second location is, and I’ll get you back to Raven, then look for Werner myself. You can tell me about the facility when I get back.”

That sounded like the best idea ever.

And yet if she wanted to help Werner — and help herself — she needed to pull her shit together and deal with this. If Stanbury still had him, there was no telling how long she’d keep him imprisoned, and without a doubt when she was done with him, she’d lock him in some sub-basement cell or kill him. There was also Nero. If Stanbury didn’t know who or what Nero was, she would soon. Becca didn’t doubt the hospital had security cameras, which meant Stanbury had a picture of Nero’s face. If Stanbury was after humans with magic — and it was looking like she was — those kids Nero ferociously wanted to protect were in danger.

“Tell me about your kids.” Maybe she could use that to anchor herself. When she’d returned to Afghanistan, she’d known who she was fighting for, and it had given her a strength she hadn’t known she possessed. It had helped her drag two of her men from their burning light tactical transport vehicles and a dozen feet away to cover while she’d been injured — although at the time, adrenaline had disguised how injured she’d been. Werner was a good reason to hold herself together, but he was still capable of defending himself. Nero’s kids, however, were innocents in danger. Maybe knowing about them would help her to hold it together long enough to see this through.

“You need to return to the transition suites.”

“I need to do this.” Seeing it through would mean she’d managed to hold onto a part of herself. It would mean she wasn’t lost or crazy or helpless. God, she couldn’t be helpless while knowing she’d put people in danger.

The hardness in his eyes softened, and his hand slipped from his cup and started to ease across the tabletop toward her fingers again, before he stiffened and stopped himself.

Ah, crap. “You heard that, about being helpless, didn’t you?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well, now you know what drives me.” She had a feeling protecting those around him drove Nero, as well. “Please, tell me about your kids.”

He pursed his lips, his gaze holding her captive and sizzling through her nerves. What would it be like to feel all that power, that strength, focused on her, wrapped around her… inside her?

Jeez. What was wrong with her? Please don’t let him have heard that.

But his gaze remained steady, intense, and didn’t indicate he’d heard that embarrassing thought at all.

He took a sip of coffee, his attention still locked on her. “There’ve been a lot of kids over a lot of years.”

“Raven said you started saving them instead of killing them.” Concentrate on that. Not him. But her pulse still beat too fast for just sitting in a café drinking coffee.

“Yeah. That was a long time ago. Right now, there are just over a dozen in my house who I discovered in almost every corner of the world, and there are three dozen more, adults now, who are happily living their lives on whatever continent they want. Some nearing the end of their lives, some newly adults.” He took another sip and somehow, even though he never looked away, his posture and expression softened, as if talking about his unorthodox family changed him. He no longer seemed as powerful, ancient, and intimidating. His power had turned ferociously protective, and, if she looked closely, he also seemed fearful and fragile. “Naturals — a human who naturally develops a magical ability — are rare, so given the size of the human population, my family is small.”

Although it’s gotten bigger with Grey, Anaea, Capri, and the others.

“When you’re ready, you might want to talk with Anaea,” he said. “Her circumstances were different, but she’s not a Natural, either.” But not too soon. Not until Raven thinks it’s safe. Mother, anything could break her and— Stay on topic. Give her purpose. Keep her together, achieve her goal, get her information, then get the hell away from her.

Her throat tightened at his thoughts. The reaction was stupid. They weren’t friends. They weren’t anything. She had to remember that. She’d just thought, when he’d touched her hand, that something was changing between them. She yearned for something to have changed between them. But clearly, he wanted nothing to do with her.

“Mia is one of our youngest. She’s fourteen. A few years ago, she started having strange dreams. Some good, most bad. Those dreams started coming true. When she tried to warn her parents and anyone else who would listen about a terrible car accident, they started sending her to psychologists. When her parents were killed in that car crash, the rest of her family feared she’d been involved and, even though they had no proof, they put her in a strict disciplinary boarding school for troubled youths.” No one wanted the girl who’d murdered her parents.

“That’s terrible.”

“Almost all of my kids are like that. Their families don’t understand and are afraid of them. They may not know why they fear the kids, but they do. These kids end up in fights, or disciplinary facilities, or mental institutions, or on the streets. They think no one loves them, that they’re so damaged no one could love them.”

“But you do.” She could feel it radiating from him, and now all she wanted was to be a part of his ferocious protection, for her and with her. To be a part of a family, even if it was an unusual one, again.

Every single one. “I try to give them a fighting chance.” I need you to fight for your chance.

“Well, if you want me to fight for my chance, why the hell do you want to get away from me?” The words blurted out before she could stop them.

His eyes widened and his aura flared.

“I know, it’s rude. But you keep giving me mixed messages.”

“If you didn’t listen to my thoughts, you wouldn’t get mixed messages.” He sat back, his body tense, and his thoughts snapped to a barely there whisper, while the other whispers grew louder.

“You want to help me, but you want nothing to do with me?” She strained to hear what he was thinking, his thoughts not even a whisper within her anymore.

“It has nothing to do with you.”

“Yeah, right, because you wanting to get away from me has nothing to do with me?” The people in the café were starting to stare at her again. A shiver shuddered through her, and she fought the urge to hug herself.

His eyes narrowed, as if he could sense her strain. Maybe he could. He’d been in her head before. Just because she couldn’t hear his thoughts didn’t mean he couldn’t hear hers.

“Oh, my God,” she said, “are you eavesdropping on my thoughts?”

“Only when you yell them in my head,” he growled. His left arm twitched, and he hissed. “If I can put some distance between us, perhaps I can sever our connection.”

Someone in her head screamed, then another and another. She shoved at the voices, desperate to put them back on low volume, but only managed to turn them down to a roar. She clenched teeth and concentrated, wrenching them back to a normal conversational level. Pain sliced through her skull, and Nero gasped as the pain cut into her.

“You felt that?” she asked.

His expression tightened. “I was hoping we were done with that. We’re going to this other location and then I’m getting you back to Raven.”

“But you felt that?”

He stood and glared at her.

Well, that would explain why he wanted to get away from her.

“I don’t know much about telepathy, but maybe think about being in a soundproof room or turning the volume down or something. See if that helps.”

“Just tried the volume thing. That’s what made you wince.”

“Lovely.” Mother, if I could just take her pain. “Here’s the short of it. I’m worried that whatever connects us will get worse.” Except if I’m inamorated, it’s already as bad as it gets. “Things are happening in my world that have raised the danger level for my kids, and it was pretty dangerous for them before.” But I’m not inamorated because it isn’t possible. “If there’s a drake out there who knows you’re connected to the dugga and is after me, and that drake discovers my kids—”

“They’ll be killed. Yeah, Raven said that.” The thought made her pulse race, and the memory of the kids screaming in the school tent flooded her. She couldn’t let more children die. Even if stopping whatever was happening was impossible, she had to try.

Nero dropped his coffee cup into the nearby garbage can and headed to the door. Becca followed.

“I can’t afford to be distracted.” He held the door for her, and she stepped onto the cold dark street. “And I can’t afford to be incapacitated.”

She shivered but couldn’t tell if it was from the voices in her head or the winter wind… or how close she stood to Nero. “You think the connection is that strong?”

“I know it is.” And it terrifies me. “If I just felt the pain in your head, imagine what I’d feel if you were shot or killed. If that happened when I needed to protect my kids—” Mother, don’t let that happen.

Another shiver swept through her, and the voices grew louder again.

“So what do we do?” she asked, struggling to ignore the voices, but afraid if she pushed at them again she’d hurt Nero.

“First I fulfill the terms of our deal and look for your friend,” he said as they headed back to the alley where they’d first arrived.

“I appreciate that.” Although she was surprised, given what she now knew, that he’d carry on with their agreement. She wouldn’t have, not until she’d figured out how to separate their minds. “We can make it fast, then get back to your place.”

“Thank you.”

They walked to the middle of the alley, and he placed his hand against the concrete high rise wall.

“I’m sure it’ll be a relief to get me out of your head.” He didn’t sound as if it would be for him, and a mix of confused emotions swelled through her. Just get some distance. That’s all I need. “Where are we going?”

“There’s an abandoned warehouse on Battle Ridge Road. You’re aware of it. You sent the dev— Sorry. You sent Diablo there a few days…? No, closer to a week ago.”

“I remember it. Would your friend really return there?” With a whoosh of wind, a churning void of darkness formed around his hand and grew until it was large enough to engulf them.

She clenched her arms tight around herself and fought another shiver. “We had hoped you wouldn’t think we’d double back. At least long enough for us to regroup and move on. But that plan wouldn’t have worked, would it? You aren’t looking for us in any traditional way.”

He held his free hand out to her, an invitation to take it and step through his gate. Not anything more. Not the surety and comfort she irrationally wanted from him, a stranger. Yet a part of her knew he wasn’t a stranger. She recognized a fellow soldier who strove to protect innocent lives, a kindred spirit, a match she hadn’t realized she’d been looking for.

“No, I have… an ability that lets me hone in on a… person—”

“Jeez, you can say it.” She squared her shoulders and took his hand. “Magic. You have magic that lets you find humans with magic.” A shiver threatened to shake her, but she managed to keep steady. “See, I’m holding my shit together even while looking at that black hole.”

“Oh, yeah, you’re not affected at all,” he said, his tone sarcastic. “I’m stuck in your head, remember?”

But please, not hearing everything. Oh, man. That would be embarrassing.

He didn’t respond to that, so perhaps — thank God — her confused emotions weren’t bleeding through the connection.

“Fine,” she forced out. She’d carry on as if he didn’t know. When she got herself fully together, she’d consider her emotions. Until then, not feeling anything and moving forward was the only way to get through this. “Given the circumstances, I’m holding enough of my shit together to function.”

“I’ll give you that.” He pulled her into the gate, and the stomach-churning, mind-burning darkness enveloped her.

The tremor she’d been fighting rushed through her, and with a gust of wind, the world returned. She staggered forward, her legs wobbly, her pulse racing, and the people yelling and hissing in her head grew louder than before.

Nero’s grip on her hand tightened, and he tugged her to his chest, giving her something to steady herself against. Warmth flooded her body and the voices vanished. For a moment — a few seconds that she yearned would last longer — she felt safe and steady, as if just being in contact with Nero anchored her. There was a surety in his presence. One she craved and wasn’t going to think about, for fear she’d break down and take him with her. So much fear and determination radiated from him. And so much certainty from the depths of his being. He had a purpose, just like she’d had in Afghanistan, to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves. Except, as much as she feared and hoped she was part of his purpose, his family, a part of her was disappointed she was lumped into the same category as his children.