Terre held on to his temper. “She won’t be able to keep up the pretense for long.”
Dayne shrugged. “I disagree. We have the perfect motivation for her with the children. Might I remind you, brother, that she considers them hers. If you mate her, they’ll be yours.”
Terre snorted. “Hardly. I’m sure we’ll have many sons for her to nurture. We don’t need human girls underfoot.”
Drake looked up. “She cares for those girls. I’d tread carefully. Karma seems sweet, but she has a side to her that looks quite dangerous.”
Terre narrowed his gaze. “Do you have a little crush, nephew?”
Drake returned to his game. “She reminds me of a feline. Maybe a cougar. They purr for you but can rip your throat out if displeased.” He expertly worked the controls. “Besides. My path is set, so I wouldn’t worry about it.”
Dayne looked over his shoulder at his son. “Speaking of your path, have you gained access to the Kyllwood girl’s dreams again?”
“Not yet.” Drake leaned forward as the game intensified. “Hope controls the dreams—for now, anyway. But I do feel a shift in the universe that I can’t explain. Something tells me I’ll be seeing her soon.” He spoke with a casualness far beyond his years.
Terre studied his nephew with new eyes. The kid’s loyalty was definitely to his father. If Terre ever took out his brother, he’d have to make sure to end Drake at the same time. His nephew’s fighting skills were already being noted by the battle-scarred soldiers around them.
The door opened, and Terre sighed. His other nephew strode inside. Terre had taken guardianship of the kid when his twin had died, but the experience had not turned out as he had hoped. Vero was a year younger, an inch shorter, and about a minute slower than Drake when it came to combat. Of course. “What?” Terre asked.
Vero halted and then hurried forward to hand over their newest model pistol. “We’ve tweaked the mechanism to eliminate three seconds from the internal reload sequence.” His black hair lacked red, and his eyes had a tinge of blue through the green. A Kurjan with blue in his eyes. It was unthinkable.
“Good.” Terre took the gun. His brother never should have mated that enhanced female years ago—she’d been a gypsy with blue eyes. Killing her had been a pleasure once Terre’s twin had died in a battle during the last war. “Shouldn’t you be training?”
Vero shuffled his feet. “Yes.”
The kid would rather work with guns than shoot one. Terre couldn’t believe he’d come from Talt’s loins. “I will be displeased if you don’t do better than you did yesterday.” While he had no idea how well the kid had done, it probably wasn’t well enough to discuss.
Drake beat the game and flipped off the console. “I’ll go with you.” He gracefully stood and loped toward his cousin.
Vero puffed out his chest. “I don’t need protection.”
“Didn’t say you did,” Drake said.
Terre grabbed Drake by the arm before he could pass. “Have other kids been picking on your cousin?” He’d beat Vero later for that, but now, family came first.
Instead of answering, Drake slowly looked down at the hand on his arm. The seconds ticked by.
Terre released him when Drake refused to speak. “I asked you a question.”
Drake looked up then, and his eyes were a soft purple. “Of course nobody has been picking on Vero. I made sure the last guy who tried limped home to his mama while bleeding from the eyes. Family is family, right?” Without another word, he turned and walked out the door with his cousin on his heels.
An unwelcome chill scattered down Terre’s spine.
* * * *
Benny led Karma along the river walk after showing her the lodge and the computer room Mercy had hastily set up the night before. It looked impressive and would actually be full of booby traps within a day. “This is probably our only weakness. I mean, the river.”
Karma walked along, her skirt against her ankles. “It’s lovely.”
Benny eyed the wandering water, the grassy banks on the other side, and the trees that surrounded everything. “I know. We wanted to create a better defensive position, but the females insisted on keeping it peaceful.” He shrugged his shoulders as if the whole situation was beyond him. “Nobody knows where we are, so it doesn’t much matter, right?”
She tripped on the trail.
He grasped her arm and helped her to stay upright. The sweet wildflower scent of her was killing him, and his balls had no doubt turned a lovely shade of bright blue. When she’d come apart in his arms earlier, it was all he could do not to take it further. Only the fact that she was lying to him and spying for the Kurjans had stopped him from kissing her again. Now he was pissed and aroused, which really was a terrible combination for an asshole like him. He kept her hand. “Let’s hold hands.”
She tried to pull away. “I don’t think—”
“Oh, don’t think.” He yanked her closer, and her hip bounced off his. “What’s it like living with the loser Kurjans?” How much would she admit?
She picked her way along the rocks and stopped trying to reclaim her hand. “It was fine.”
Fine? Even he knew when a woman used the word “fine,” she didn’t mean it. What was she supposed to say if interrogated? How much would she give away with them listening and watching? “Karma? I really need to ask you some serious questions. The others wanted to do this all together around a conference table, but I thought you and I should have some privacy. I’ll cover you.”
She swallowed. “I really do not know of anything useful to you.”
Right. He led her along the bank to a wooden swinging chair Mercy had made Logan install to make the place appear more permanent than it really was. “Let’s sit.”
She perched on the swing and turned to face him. “Are you angry with me?”
He sat and blanked his expression. “Of course not. Why would you ask that?”
She chewed on her pretty pink lip, her stunning eyes turned toward the river. “I don’t know. It’s just a different feeling from you, I guess.”
He took her chin and drew her face back toward him. A blush washed over her cheeks, and he watched, intrigued. “Do the Kurjans know we have Ulric?”
She gasped. “Excuse me?”
He kept her in place with just a finger and thumb on her delicate chin. While he was at this, he might as well really screw with the Kurjan nation. “You heard me. Ulric, the badass Cyst who killed a hundred enhanced females just to make himself stronger. The loser bastard with no soul. Do they know he’s no longer in the prison world we set up? Do they know he’s here and we have him in custody?”