Chapter Six
Monday evening, Gideon still waited for Alex to wake. The poor guy had gone down the day before and had slept for hours. Elijah and Carter were fighting mad, though. The guys paced around the house. Gideon had ignored Doc’s advice to leave Carter drugged and unable to do harm.
“You’re giving me a headache with all that pacing,” he said in a low voice, losing patience.
“Give it a rest, Gideon,” Elijah snapped. Unlike Carter, Elijah had a hair-trigger temper.
“You know, if we’d finished that fight, I’d have ripped you a new asshole.” Gideon waited for the snarky response no doubt coming.
Elijah’s lip curled, and Gideon felt himself smile. They’d spent the morning beating the shit out of one another, with Gideon coming out the victor each and every time. Neither Elijah’s deftness nor Carter’s brash strength had been able to put him down, which didn’t sit well with Elijah. Carter didn’t seem to mind.
“Please. I’m a straight up kick-boxing master. I’d have taken you to the mat in under five.”
Now, for some reason, Elijah no longer bothered him. The man’s persistent need to get under Gideon’s skin amused him. “Hours, maybe. That’s if you talked me to death.”
Carter snickered. “Come on, Eli. That’s funny.”
Elijah and Carter had known each other prior to the bout in Philadelphia. Friendly if not friends, the pair often fought on the same circuit.
“Shut up, Carter.” Elijah continued to pace. “What’s taking Palmer so long? And when can we go? I gave your Doc Dennis a freakin’ gallon of blood.”
Gideon raised a brow.
“Okay, a pint. Whatever. Point is, I did what I was asked. Now I want out of here. The others make me itch to get gone.”
Carter nodded. “I don’t like it here either. The guys are hot, but they give me the creeps.”
“Really?” Gideon wondered. “All of them? Or just McKinley and Hale?”
“Hale’s okay. McKinley’s super freaky. But all of them have that way of staring at you. Like they think we’re about to rape and pillage and burn down their houses.” Carter rolled his eyes. “As if. I can’t explain it, but we’re intruding on their territory.”
“Exactly. Let’s go.” Elijah stopped pacing.
“No. We stay and find out what they did to us.”
“Who died and made you boss?” Elijah asked.
And that. Right there. Despite being amused, Gideon’s beast rose up to accept the challenge. He’d been feeling a need to dominate since Ortiz and Freeman had been wakened and dumped in the house. His responsibility, according to Roane. Recollections of mating heats and a pack made sense, at least to his beast they did. Because the thing inside Gideon knew it needed to set precedent. And no time like the present.
Gideon rose from the couch and stared at Elijah and Carter. The sensual awareness had been building all day long. Fighting, brushing up against one another, touching, scratching, biting. It would all come together, finally.
The three of them were close to the same height. Before the lab, Gideon had been six-two. Now he stood a good six-four. Carter edged an inch or two over him, but they all had muscle mass that hadn’t been there previously.
A battle might seem as if it should end in a draw. But Gideon knew he could beat both of them at the same time. He had to, to cement their ties.
The man inside him tried to retreat, to return to normalcy. But the beast refused to back down, demanding he take charge.
“What?” Elijah took a step back, then frowned and held his ground.
Carter crossed his arms and watched, a smirk on his handsome face.
Handsome? Stupid face, more like.
“It’s time we settled a few things.” Gideon tried to reassert control. Sadly, the beast within grew in power. “I’m in charge. Time you two realized it.”
“Yeah?” Elijah just had to rock the boat. “Prove it.”
“Prove it,” Carter agreed, still smirking.
“You think I won’t?” Gideon fought the sentience inside himself. “Not sure, but I think I’m gonna jump both of you. Might want to…take… a break.”
Elijah frowned. “Huh?”
Carter grinned. “Hot damn. Let’s do it.”
Gideon pounced. He knocked Elijah to the floor and pressed his forearm to the smartass’s throat. “Give. You obey whenever and wherever I say to.” He bared his teeth, now fangs, and dragged them down Elijah’s face. A subtle scent marker, not to draw blood.
Elijah didn’t care for that and shoved at his arm. But Gideon remained in place. Even when Elijah raked poison-tipped claws into his side and spat, “Fuck you.”
Gideon felt Elijah’s erection through the sweatpants they both wore. And that need, the scent of masculine rage and desire, drugged him better than any opiate. He drew in the smell of Elijah, committing it to memory, and plastered their mouths together. The stubborn bastard remained closemouthed, so Gideon dragged his lips across the man’s cheek to his throat.
“Open for me,” he rumbled and nipped Elijah’s ear. Then he removed his forearm and ran a hand between them to grip Eli through his pants.
Elijah bucked against him. “Fuck. Cut it out.” But the words sounded weak, especially when Eli continued to grind up against him. “Pull me out and blow me. Then we’ll see who’s in charge.”
Gideon whispered in his ear, “I think you’ll blow me first. You want it, want to swallow me down, don’t you?”
Elijah groaned. “I don’t do guys. But fuck, I’m horny. I do you, you do me. Fair?”
Gideon lifted himself off Elijah and stripped down. The venom in his system burned, but not as much as the need to tie these men to him. Right now.
“Strip,” he ordered Carter. After he removed his clothes, he dragged Eli close and peeled them off the hardheaded Circ, encountering no resistance. “Now bend over, Eli.” He pulled Eli close and kissed him again, shoving his tongue through the tight valley of Eli’s lips.
The man sucked his tongue, and Gideon knew a fierce desire, to have everyone with him. Pack. One group, one loyalty.
“Carter, get Alex.”
Carter, now naked and sporting a huge erection, lost his cocky grin and nodded. He returned moments later with a cranky but awake Alex.
“Get the hell off me, Carter.” Alex froze when he entered the living area and faced Elijah bent over the couch, Gideon standing behind him, between his feet.
“What the hell?”
“Look at me.” Gideon stepped back and held himself out. “I’m wet. Hard and hurting. It’s time you all know where you stand.”
So saying, he stared at Carter and Alex as he shoved inside Eli, not caring what the man wanted. Because the Circ inside Eli spoke to Gideon. The creature wanted to be mastered, put in his place. Gideon could hear him on another level. Eli only mouthed off because he was afraid of caring, afraid of letting down his guard and getting trampled on, like he had so many times in his life.
But not anymore. Now Gideon would protect. But Eli had to know where he belonged.
Elijah, the man, would have roared in pain. But the beast inside him roared in pleasure, his body adapting to the hard, deep intrusion of Gideon’s cock. Digging into his passage, Gideon moaned as he sawed in and out, his strokes growing more aggressive, especially with the weight of Carter’s and Alex’s stares.
He came quickly, needing to continue with the others. Carter seemed eager to bond. But Alex would be a problem.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Alex’s voice sounded high, but his arousal couldn’t be missed.
Carter took note. “You’re hard, Alex. Wanting what the big man has to give, huh?” He gripped himself, then started jerking off while they watched Gideon finish inside Eli.
Gideon withdrew and pulled Eli up. Then he ordered Carter to his knees. “Suck him off, Carter. Don’t get off just yet, though.”
The scent of lust rolled over the group, and Gideon enhanced it without knowing how he did it. The need of the pack outweighed any one desire. So though he was hard again, he let Carter blow Eli, watching as the sexy men found pleasure while he and Alex stood by.
“See? Carter obeys, knows his place,” he whispered to Alex while he grabbed a towel and soaped it, cleaning himself off. But once clean and dry, moisture filmed over his erection. He once again grew wet, watching while Eli came down Carter’s throat.
A click of belonging settled between the pair, the same as the one now between Gideon and Eli. Gideon’s claws and fangs throbbed, needing blood to stain the bonding. He moved behind a shell-shocked Alex and started removing Alex’s clothing.
“S-stop.”
“No.” Gideon moved Alex’s hands away and stripped him down to nothing, noting Alex’s protests ceased as he watched Carter get to his feet, his dick slick with need. Eli remained at half mast, having come but still aroused.
“We’re Circ,” Carter said. “Always hungry. Needing a good fuck.”
“Or a good fight.” So saying, Eli slugged him. The pair punched, kicked, and bit, rolling over each other and crushing furniture.
Alex tried to break them up, but Gideon held him back. He hugged a naked Alex to his front, not sure why the feel of Alex against him was so damn erotic. He’d never done a guy before Alex, and coming inside Eli had been electric. But he wanted Alex again, and he wanted Carter. All of them touching, taking, giving…
Come here, he broadcast through scent and sound. The pair immediately stopped fighting and joined him and Alex. They cleared a space on the floor and lay down, following Gideon to the floor. He lay next to Carter, touching side by side. Then he motioned for Eli and Alex to join them.
Eli mounted Carter, and Alex mounted Gideon. A fucking orgy, yet the physical paled next to the emotional bonding taking place on another level. Watching Eli settle over Carter’s prick, Gideon could feel the heat surrounding Carter as if it surrounded him.
Alex had yet to take him inside, so he knew that sensation came from Carter.
“Fill him up,” he commanded Carter, harder than he’d ever been. “Alex, now.”
Alex hesitated, and Gideon yanked him by the hips, seating himself deep inside Alex’s ass. The position allowed him real penetration, and Alex’s gasp and groan nearly undid him.
“Fuck. Can’t last. Feeling…all of it.” Carter groaned and jetted into Eli, who released all over Carter’s belly.
Gideon, though, continued to push Alex up and down, letting the other man ride him, setting the pace. He felt Alex’s grief and need, and the ties holding them close allowed him to siphon some of that pain, enough to allow Alex to feel pleasure again.
Alex moaned, and then more hands helped him find his climax. Gideon pumped into him, his strength growing at an impossible rate. Carter jerked Alex off while Eli kissed his shoulders, neck, and mouth.
When Alex seized around him and spattered his belly with seed, Gideon roared and came hard. Filling Alex with his scent, covering the group with his dominance, Gideon spent until Alex pulled away. He continued to come while Carter and Eli jerked him into ecstasy.
When he came down from his high, it was to see his packmates staring down at him, confusion and hesitant acceptance on their faces.
“What did you do to us?” Eli asked.
“That was fuckin’ weird. Hot, but weird,” Carter rubbed the back of his neck, his cock stiffening once more.
“God. What the hell?” Alex blushed like a man on fire. “I came all over you.”
“Once. Now we switch.” Gideon had a hard time rising to his feet, replete and at peace for the first time in forever. But once again standing, the hunger to firm his ties among his pack grew. “Carter, clean me up. Then I want you on your knees.”
Carter frowned. “I don’t know…”
Gideon grabbed the big man by the back of his neck and easily brought him to his knees. “I didn’t ask you to think. Obey, damn it.”
Carter moaned and cupped Gideon’s balls. “Yes, okay.” Once Gideon released his hold, Carter hustled to get a clean towel while Alex and Eli stared at each other.
“I don’t give a shit what you want,” Gideon lied, knowing right now he did this for them, not him. “It’s what I want that matters. Yes?”
Eli licked his lips. Alex glanced down at his thick cock bobbing over taut balls. “Sure, boss.” Eli grinned. “So I’m gay now.”
Alex sighed. “You don’t turn gay, Eli. You either are or you aren’t.”
“You’re not gay. You’re not straight. You’re Circ,” Gideon corrected, knowing that to be the only answer that mattered. “Now stop talking and fuck. We’re getting this mating heat out of the way.”
Alex looked at him, his grief pushed aside, now fired up and needing the connection sex provided. “Mating heat?”
“I’ll explain when we’re done.” Though he’d already come twice, Gideon needed more. He had to see Carter’s firm lips around his shaft, to watch that mouth drag down his dusky rod and drink the seed that readied to release.
“Carter, come on.”
Carter returned, stiff as a board, holding two soapy rags. He tossed one to Eli, who used it before cleaning Alex.
Gideon grunted his assent, then cleaned himself while Carter watched, getting even thicker. “Get on your back, Carter.” Carter didn’t need to be told twice. “You two might want to try it this way,” he said to the others, then positioned his face at Carter’s dick while straddling Carter’s mouth. A beautiful sixty-nine Carter immediately embraced.
With a groan, Gideon followed. And then all that could be heard were the moans of men in lust, the bonds of togetherness firming into a web that simple talk would never undo.
***
Bailey woke in her hotel bed, her hand down her panties. She felt pleasantly used, wet, and full of desire for the men around her.
Men around her?
She removed her hand and darted to a sitting position but didn’t see any men. Just her, fully clothed, her bag, and a familiar looking ball cap tinged with red.
At the sight, she blanched. “Oh my God.” That cap belonged to the cowboy who’d attacked her. She ran her tongue over sore gums and knew what had happened was no figment of her imagination. She’d torn into her would-be attackers, leaving them both alive, but just barely.
Knowing she needed to get a move on before something worse happened, she hurried to grab her things, prayed she’d already paid because she had no idea where she was, then found her car parked outside and left.
Checking her phone showed she’d only lost a few hours, not the days she’d feared. No longer willing to trust that she’d arrive at Dr. Evan Dennis’s address in her full faculties, she drove as long as she could without falling asleep, then pulled over in a deserted lot in a field in Illinois and wrote herself a note.
When she woke, she was relieved to find herself in the same place she’d parked. Next to her words to behave herself, she found the words, “Hurry, need mates.”
Not sure what that meant, she hit a few fast food places to replenish her crazy appetite, tossed the bloody cap to get rid of the evidence, and drove as if her life depended on it. But as she drove, she remembered hazy images of an orgy she couldn’t for the life of her forget. Four gorgeous, muscular men had been going at it like stars in a porn movie.
Granted, Bailey liked sex, but she’d never been one for gay sex. Not with men or women. A little on the unadventurous side, she knew, but she preferred one man, one woman. At least, for her.
Yet recalling those four men sucking and licking, grabbing and fucking, she was panting, her body on fire for something to fill her. No, not something. Someone. A man worthy of her affection. Strong seed to make young, mates who could protect their female.
She sped up, needing to find this rowdy group. A bunch of men who didn’t even exist. Man, she was losing it.
Her trip to find herself was turning into an excursion from hell. She wondered if she’d find the answers she needed in New Jersey, or if she’d only find more questions.
What the hell is happening to me, Katie?
***
Amelia Norton sat by her computer and watched Duane Smith and Dr. Edwin Lang quietly discussing the arrangements she’d made. This particular laboratory sat underground in the Pearl District in Portland, a few miles from the site of the old lab. What made the location perfect, in her opinion, was that it had been an easy transition to move the people and specialized equipment without tipping her hand to the authorities.
She watched as Smith bowed to Lang with a flushed face, his hero worship annoying in the extreme. She didn’t like this side of him, the one that did whatever Lang needed, though he always remembered who signed his paychecks. Smith worked like a demon on her pet projects, using that EL13 serum, along with the psychic project, to enhance cell growth.
Amelia pulled a compact from her desk drawer and studied her ravishing good looks, aware her wrinkles had faded gradually, her youthful enhancements supplemented by keen science and a unique approach to fixing the aging problem.
That Circ serum developed years ago by the government had side effects no one had considered. But Amelia had been interested ever since joining her father in business. He’d been one of the initial contributors to Project Dawn back in the day, and he’d kept detailed copies of all recorded findings.
She’d already made a mint off the enhanced mercenaries they supplied around the globe. But this newest batch promised even better results, especially since the formula enhanced her beauty, with lasting effects.
“Duane, come to my office, would you?” She said into the intercom on her desk.
He glanced up at the camera on the wall and nodded.
She looked away from the monitor and studied her office, knowing it suited. The million dollar fashion warehouse covered up the underground lab below. Women and men flittered around the warehouse coming up with new designs and lines, overseen by her trusted creative team, while she seemingly lounged in her frilly pink office on the top floor.
Her furniture was top of the line. Expensive, comfortable, and suited to show off her sense of style and taste. Amelia had a bob of black hair, cut to expertly frame her slender jaw, high cheekbones, and perfect little nose. Her bright blue eyes mesmerized the press, so much that they’d taken to calling her The Norton Princess.
She’d never had a thing tucked or sucked from her body. Everything about her came from her amazing, perfectly selected genetics. A pity her mother had been hit by a drunk driver shortly after Amelia’s birth, but in a way that had only increased attention paid to her by the media. She could go nowhere, swamped by photographers and tabloids. They’d never known the real her, never had time for a shy little girl who only wanted her father’s attention. Instead, she’d been groomed to be a glory hound. Anything to please the people around her and make daddy look like the world’s best father.
She’d done that…for a time, at least.
Senator Timothy Norton, her father, had given her the best money could buy. In the past few years, he’d seen fit to include her in his vast network of intelligence and government initiatives. She had more power than he ever had at her age. Now retired, he spent all his time keeping their secrets and eliminating threats.
She stared onscreen as Dr. Lang conferred with his team of scientists. Time would tell if Lang could be trusted to enter her inner sanctum, as Duane Smith had. She’d been fortunate enough that he’d stepped into her path at the right time and place. As if fate had thrown them together for a specific purpose. She trusted Duane, though common sense said she shouldn’t.
He did whatever she wanted without question. Even better, beneath that average façade dwelled a byzantine mind and hardcore sadist, one who knew how to keep his mouth shut.
A knock on her office door. She’d sent her personal staff to Paris for a few days, hoping for a creative burst. The lack of people breathing down her throat gave her the opportunity to deal with Lang’s recent failure. “Come in.”
Duane entered. Neither tall nor short, fat nor slender, he had average features and an even temperament. On the surface. Now, as he approached, she saw the fire behind those pale brown eyes.
She suppressed a shiver and raised a brow. “Tell me exactly what happened.”
Duane glowered.
With her in private, he became another man. No longer the meek science nerd who swallowed every word Dr. Lang spoke as gospel, no longer the scared little boy who’d been abused unmercifully by his father, ignored by his mother, and treated as no more than a case number by social services, Duane drew on all the black stuff in his past and turned into the hardened man she’d seen buried under so much placidness.
Like Duane, Amelia had lived to type, doing exactly what others wanted of her for too long. And like Duane, she’d broken, then put herself back together. Daddy hadn’t realized she had a will of her own. Not until it had been too late to stop her.
“Lang fucked up.” Duane didn’t bother with niceties. “He trusted Alex Palmer, despite my concerns. Now Palmer, Spencer, Ortiz and Freeman are gone.”
She frowned. “Our successful Circs, no longer under our control?” A Series, no longer theirs?
“Correct. But we still have some of the B Series left. They’re not psychic, but they pass for normal and they’re strong.” He rattled off a bunch of names, ending with, “Myers, Yates, Sheer and Caldane. Oh, and we still have a few of our stronger psychics with us. They’ve been moved to this location and are currently in the white wing, under guard.”
“Good.” The psychics were as valuable as the Circs. It grated that the ones she’d planned to reap after breeding had gone missing, but she’d make do with what she had. “Work the females through Myers and his friends.”
“They’re a pack. That’s how they refer to themselves.”
“Fascinating.” She couldn’t care less. “I need fetal tissue. You know that.”
He nodded. “We’ve already harvested what we had from those still viable.” He scowled. “Sheer is getting out of hand. He keeps killing our subjects.”
She smiled. “After fucking them to death. Yes, I know. He intrigues me.” Almost as much as that wonderfully monstrous Caldane. She rose from behind her desk and walked to Duane, pleased when he stiffened and stared at her.
She wore a gossamer negligee, having expected him. Behind her back she held a crop. “I’ve missed you, dear.”
“Need to bleed, do you?” He licked his lips and focused on her breasts, still bouncy and firm thanks to a regimen of yoga and personal training, as well as access to EL13 and embryonic cell magic.
“Yes.” She pulled her dress aside, baring her left breast. “Bite me.”
The veneer of civilized male fell away as Duane embraced his true self. He bit her nipple hard, drew blood, and licked it away. He pulled back, and they watched as she healed. He smiled. “Very nice.” He bit her other breast, right through the filmy material, then grabbed the crop from behind her.
He twisted her arm behind her back, then spun her and bent her over her desk, wiping everything onto the floor in one giant crash.
The destruction added to his lust, because he unzipped and grunted as he shoved into her.
“You’re too wet.” He smacked her lower back with the crop and left a welt. “Too excited to see me.” He couldn’t hurt her by fucking too hard. She’d been excited the moment he’d stepped in the room.
But when he withdrew and pushed into the tender flesh of her ass, she gasped.
“Ah, there we go.” He laughed as he took her, and she reveled in the pain, in the sensation of being alive.
Duane beat her with the crop, striking until the burn faded and a bright glow lit her from the inside out. She tensed around him with one particularly hard hit, and she soaked him with her pleasure.
He didn’t like that she hadn’t asked permission to climax, and he beat her even more, stimulating another, more intense orgasm as one of her ribs cracked.
She clamped around him, stirring him to his own end, and he finished inside her, then withdrew and wiped himself over her open wounds, increasing the burn.
Once he finished and moved away, she straightened and waited.
“So sad. You’re all healed.” He sighed, wiped the blood from her back with the damp towel she kept on hand for such occasions, then helped her dress in a divine royal blue sheath that cost more than he earned in a month.
She looked at Duane, saw his common features and loved him all the more. She kissed his forehead while he finished righting his clothing. Peasant to her queen, and always at her disposal.
“We do have two pieces of good news for you,” he said, as if he hadn’t just taken her like an animal.
“Oh?”
“Well, this one’s not exactly good. We know where A Series are. With Circe’s Recruits in New Jersey.”
The government watched over those Circs with a keen eye. She might have to write them off.
“The second piece of good news?”
He smiled, and in his joy she saw true beauty. “We found Bailey Duncan. It turns out she’s successfully transitioned. She left a trail of bodies for us to find. We just need to get to her before Circe’s Recruits do.”
“Outstanding. You have full access to whatever you need. And keep Lang on track, would you, Duane? He’s easily distracted by his own importance.”
Duane grinned. He kissed her on the cheek, then slapped her so hard her head whipped back. “Watch your tone, bitch.”
Her eyes shone. Only Duane understood how to deal with her. “Yes, sir.”
“I’ll see you soon, sweet.”
She watched him leave, sighed, then stuffed her bloodied and ruined clothing into a bag into her desk. She’d dispose of them later.
Now back to managing her millions and dealing with that new regime in Thailand needing muscle to move their opium. Supermercenaries. A niche market, but one that paid exceedingly well.
She glanced at a secure email message and smiled. The dictator had the powder blue silks she wanted, finely crafted by the tiny fingers of orphans, a fortunate casualty of their ongoing drug war. Lovely. A win-win for everyone, she thought and lovingly stroked her throbbing cheek.