Conception Read online

  “Yes,” she agreed, sucking in a breath. Dusan Knight was a very handsome man. “Like now.”

  The baby woke. Her little arms flailed and her mouth pursed into a Cheerio of displeasure. Bohdan first looked shocked, then awkward, but when a wave of her fist connected with his chin, totally captivated. “The little one is hungry.”

  As one, the men looked to her to fix the problem. She folded her arms across her chest and stared right back at them. “Then feed her.”

  Both gazes dropped to her crossed arms, but it was Dusan who responded. “We are not so equipped.”

  She snorted in disbelief and raised her voice to be heard over the baby’s cries. “If you can change into a giant bird then I think you can grow a pair of breasts.”

  “That was illusion, this is reality.”

  The baby’s cries increased in volume. “I can’t feed her.”

  The shots the lab techs had given her had taken care of that. They weren’t interested in the baby’s emotional well-being, just her genetic makeup.

  Bohdan stepped closer. “She has no milk.”

  “Is this true?” Dusan asked.

  Eden didn’t answer, and she didn’t reach for the child Bohdan held out to her.

  “A woman’s milk lets down when her child cries. Hers has not.”

  Deuce’s nostrils flared as he took a breath, as if trying to catch a whiff of her…milk? That was just disgusting.

  “Will you two stop sniffing me?” She dug her fingers into her arms and leaned back into the chair.

  Bohdan glanced at Deuce before tilting his head to the side and saying in that aggravating, soothing tone, “It is not a problem. Other arrangements can be made.”

  “Did it ever occur to you two bloodhounds that I may not be her mother?” It was a possibility that nipped at her certainty, and one they should have at least considered.

  The look Dusan gave her was pitying. “You are her mother as I am her father. Her scent and thought patterns are of both of us.”

  “You’re sure?” She had assumed the child was hers, but there had been no way to know for sure. Her grandfather’s house was huge, a labyrinth of rooms that could hide hundreds of secrets, dozens of victims. God, she hoped she was the only victim, and her child the only experiment.

  Deuce paused as the question hung in the air between them, the quiver of uncertainty in the two syllables more telling than words. Eden had not known if this was her child. Their child. Yet she’d risked everything to bring her here.

  Dusan placed his hand on her arm. The coat blocked his access to her flesh. He pressed until he could feel the resistance of substance beneath the material, very aware that all he’d need to do to feel the pleasure of her flesh was to extend one talon and slice through the material. He focused instead on matching his mind to hers, to calm the fears that had put that look in her eyes, but all he encountered was that frustrating wall of silence. This could not continue. “I am sure, but I do not understand how this came to be.”

  Eden sat tall in the chair. Her throat muscles worked. She took a breath and stared somewhere off to his right. “They had the…samples from when you were captured. From there it was just a matter of technology.”

  “You will explain.”

  She pulled her jacket tight around her and turned away, shaking her head. The ridiculous pom-pom bounced in his face. He snatched the hat from her head and froze. Eden gasped and covered her head with her hands, her big blue eyes filling with hurt and humiliation as she grabbed for the hat. Anger, an emotion Deuce was fast becoming familiar with, set a muscle in his cheek to ticcing. Her head was shorn as smooth as a newborn babe’s.

  He stood, unable to believe what he saw. “Who did this to you?” He would kill them. The hat crumpled in his hand, the pom-pom offering no substantial outlet for his rage. Slowly and surely, he would kill them.

  Her hands dropped from her head. Her chin came up and those shoulders—those slight shoulders—squared with that indomitable pride that comprised so much of her personality. She held out her hand. “Give me my hat.”

  He looked at her hand and then at the ugly hat. He tossed it across the room and stood, straining to hold on to his control. “You are beautiful to me in all ways, Edie, but I would know who dared do this to you.”

  Her chin wobbled as her gaze trailed the flight path of the hat like a lifeline, then firmed. “That was unnecessary.”

  He hated the hat and all it represented—his failure to protect her, her suffering, his grief at the thought of her loss. “It was very necessary.”

  A trickle of power filled the room. He glanced at Bohdan as a soft feminine scarf appeared in Eden’s hands. Eden gasped and dropped it as if it stung her, looking first at him, then at Bohdan before slowly reaching for it.

  “You will tell me their names,” Deuce ordered as she picked up the scarf and whipped in into a triangle. He could not believe anyone would dare to be so cruel as to cut off her hair. Those beautiful, wild go-where-they-would curls he’d loved to slide his fingers through.

  “It doesn’t matter,” she whispered, tying the scarf quickly.

  Dusan touched a dangling corner with his fingers, unable to express the regret and guilt he felt. She had needed him and he had not been there. “It matters.” And he would take great pleasure in handling it. “Forgive me for not protecting you.”

  She jerked out of his reach. Her elbow hit the arm of the chair with a dull thunk. She grabbed it and rubbed it, but did not look at him. “I was there, remember? You were in no condition to do anything.”

  That still stung his pride. That he, one of the Chosen, had been so easily tricked. He took a breath before releasing it on a sigh. “I would still ask your forgiveness for leaving you unprotected.”

  “You’re kidding me, right?”

  “No.”

  “You’re forgiven.”

  The words came too quickly. Too easily. “If that is so, you will allow my brother to heal you.”

  Every muscle in her body pulled taut at the suggestion, until it felt like she’d shatter if he pressed too hard. “I said you were forgiven, not trusted.”

  “Nonetheless, I must insist.”

  She flicked her fingers at him in a parody of the humor he remembered. “Insist away.”

  He did not mistake her words for consent any more than he missed the flare of pain that radiated from her when she lifted her arm. She suffered. The time for humoring her had passed. Because he thought it would scare her less, he used his hands rather than his thoughts to open her jacket. Her response was beyond reason.

  She turned on him like a wildcat—teeth bared, hands doubled into fists, her emotions leaping past that wall of silence in an equally wild bid for freedom. Her blows were nothing against his strength, but the impressions that flooded his mind as she vented her fury almost dropped him to his knees.

  He caught her arm as her fingers went for his eyes. With a simple spin, he turned her around, arms folded across her chest, hands anchored at her side. He could not let her harm herself. He nodded to his brother.

  Bohdan whispered to the baby, sending her to sleep. He placed her on the bed. Even from across the room, Deuce could feel the waves of soothing comfort in with which Bohdan surrounded the baby. He was taking no chances on the little one waking up before they were ready.

  “Let me go,” she hissed, kicking out at Bohdan who easily sidestepped the blow.

  “No.” Deuce sat in the chair and pulled Eden down onto his lap. He was never letting her go again. She tried to butt him with her head, but she was so small she only rapped his collarbone. Neither her lack of size nor the odds against her swayed her determination. Her breath came in ragged gasps. Her heartbeat thundered in his ears and still she fought. The scent of blood intensified. Dusan tightened his grip, sheltering her with his body, trying to find a path through her panic. “You need care.”

  Bohdan approached again, hands at his side, weight balanced on his toes. “You will explain why you fear
the healing.”

  The calmness of his order did not override the battle stance he’d adopted. Bohdan was ready to force the issue. It was pointless to hope Eden didn’t know that. She cast one desperate glance over her shoulder, the agony in her blue eyes raising his beast before she wrenched so hard against his hold, he feared she would pull a muscle. Sweat poured down her face as she arched against his restraint. “If he touches me, they’ll find me.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know how.” The admission strained out between her gritted teeth as she pitted her strength against his. “But if they find me, they find the baby.”

  Deuce held her until she accepted the futility of her effort. She slumped against him after one last valiant bid for freedom, either accepting the pointlessness of further struggle or simply being too weak to try again. Deuce suspected the latter. The Edie he knew did not understand the concept of surrender. He turned her in his arms. Her head dropped back against his shoulder. Her eyes were huge and drowning in tears as they met his.

  “You can’t let that happen.”

  Chapter Four

  He would never let the Coalition have his daughter. “You and our daughter will be safe here.”

  The distress in her expression puzzled him at his proclamation as much as her “I can’t stay” offended him.

  He pulled the coat sleeve over her arm. “Nevertheless, you will.”

  The odors of female sweat and desperation swirled around him, mixing with, but not masking the scent of her injuries. Her lids dropped to over her eyes as she whispered, “I won’t.”

  “You have no option.” Deuce tugged the other sleeve. He would simply make the barrier go away, but he feared it might send her into hysteria. At last the coat fell from her body. He reached for her shirt front.

  “It’s too dangerous.” Her voice reflected the tension in her body. She was terrified.

  Her hand hovered over his as if she knew she could not stop him from undressing her, yet she was driven to try. She was right to think she could not. He was desperate to see the extent of her wounds. Her gaze bounced off his to check the window, the door, as if she feared discovery. Or attack. It was the behavior of a person who’d learned there was no such thing as safe.

  Bohdan put his suspicion into words. “You have escaped before?”

  “Yes.”

  Deuce worked the collar button free of its hole as Eden sank back into his lap. If she were Chosen, she would have disappeared. But she wasn’t Chosen, she was human and her only defense was her determination and her wits. It never failed to amaze him how she could do so much with so little. He opened the buttons over her chest. She jerked, her lip catching between her teeth, her breath filling her lungs and staying there. “You were not successful.”

  With his hands so close to her skin, Deuce could not miss her shudder or how the memories intensified the stench of her fear. Her memories were not pleasant.

  “No.”

  Such a little word to contain so much emotion. It was his right to know her thoughts and emotions. His privilege to protect her from her enemy and the memories that would hurt her. It was not right that he stand on the outside looking in, watching her suffer. “How did you escape this time?”

  Edie did not look at him. She kept her gaze locked on her hands, her lashes dark against her cheeks, the pale tips blending with her skin. “I had help.”

  Deuce nodded to Bohdan who turned away before he pulled the shirt off. “Who?”

  “I don’t know.”

  She wore no bra. A flush spread up over her chest, surging over the prominence of her breastbone as he glanced at her breasts. Her embarrassment tainted the air around them along with her stress. She was afraid of, or feared for, whoever had helped her.

  “They will not find you again,” Deuce said quietly, draping her shirt across her full breasts, preserving the modesty she valued. “And if you give me the name or the image of the one who helped you, they will not harm him either.”

  She shook her head. Her fingers locked together and clenched until the knuckles glowed white. “I can’t.”

  He would have pressed, but he had fears of his own. One of them being that she was holding onto her sanity by a thread. When she was healed, he would know his enemies and know his debts. He pulled the bottom of the shirt up, exposing the white bandage steeped red with blood that rose above the waistband of her jeans. He reached for the snap.

  She jerked back as far as she could. She would have fallen to the floor if he hadn’t caught her. “I can’t allow you to touch me.”

  He kept his hands where they were, absorbing the tangle of emotions spilling from her—terror, pain, need and determination. The last was the most disturbing. Now that she had found him, she should be relaxing, not building her resistance. “You will be healed.”

  She tugged her shirt tight around her middle. The physical gesture seemed to bolster her composure. Her voice was almost normal as she said, “Not if you can’t do it without touching.”

  “Touching is required.”

  “Then no.”

  “You like that word too much.”

  Her glance was wry, with the faintest hint of amusement, giving him another glimpse of the woman he remembered. “Men always say that.”

  “Men are always right.”

  “Says the male wanting to get his way.” She scooted to the right.

  Deuce rested his hands on her hips, keeping her there, blending their shadows into one. “Says the male who will get his way. In the matter of your healing, I will suffer no argument.”

  Another shadow flowed into theirs. Bohdan. “Your fears are unfounded.”

  Eden straightened to the last fraction of her height, her shoulders squaring as she challenged his brother. “You don’t know what I’m afraid of.”

  “You fear the ones you ran from. You fear for the baby. And you fear us.”

  This close, Deuce could not miss her start.

  “You’re reading my mind!”

  “It is not necessary to read your mind when logic makes it so simple,” Bohdan murmured, coming closer, healing energy radiating from him in soothing waves.

  “But you do read my mind.”

  “We can, yes.”

  She turned to Deuce. “Promise me you’ll stay out of my head.”

  “I cannot block the thoughts you project when upset.”

  Her blues eyes widened. She wrapped her fingers in the shirt and twisted. She had not known she projected. Adrenaline raced through her system again. “Fair enough, but I want your promise you’ll stay out of my head.”

  Her fear was greater than his arguments. He stemmed the flow of adrenaline. It would not hurt to give her this promise now. Soon enough nature would make it obsolete anyway. “This promise is given.”

  She looked at him askance, whether because of the formal Chosen wording or because she was still worried about the ramifications of her projecting, he did not know. Deuce tugged the shirt free of her fingers, smoothing the material across her hips. He could at least address one of her fears. He sent his own soothing energy into the waves with which Bohdan had surrounded her. “I can and will protect you, Edie.”

  With the hard bulge of Deuce’s biceps under her hand and the force of his personality around her, it was hard for Eden to believe anything could defeat him or his brother. But her grandfather had. She’d seen it with her own eyes. And he’d used her to do it. She couldn’t go through that again. Be responsible for that again. Risk failure again. Not with the stakes as high as they were. She couldn’t take that chance with the baby’s life. “What makes you think you’re strong enough?”

  The smile Deuce gave her was gentle, but the energy that radiated from him shifted, deepened, took on a darker resonance, twisting her resolution into a mixed message she couldn’t untangle. “I am Chosen. You are my mate. I will not lose.”

  Oh God, could anything get more complicated? She didn’t need him staking a claim on her. “I don’t want to be y
our mate.”

  “A mate is determined by birth, not choice.”

  The certainty with which he said that made argument futile. She couldn’t do anything about his delusion that she was his mate, but she could focus on what was important. His ability to protect her child. Was he strong enough?

  She looked to Bohdan. The same lethal aura that surrounded Deuce surrounded him. His eyes, as dark as Deuce’s, never wavered from hers. “It is true.”

  She glanced at her daughter, still asleep on the bed. So little and defenseless. So reliant upon her to do the right thing. What if she was wrong? If they were wrong? It wouldn’t be the first time someone had overestimated their abilities. “I can’t chance it.”

  “There isn’t any chance.”

  Something hard pressed against the top of her head. Deuce’s chin? The sensation of being surrounded intensified, giving birth again to that false sense of security. She squashed it immediately. The scarf slid across her forehead as she twisted until she could see Dusan’s face. “They got you before.”

  The flicker of his eyelashes told her he didn’t like to be reminded of that. “The circumstances were unique.”

  Pain lanced up from her abdomen, grinding through her chest, making it difficult to breathe, let alone speak. “Circumstances are always unique.”

  The pain was too much to hold the position. She turned back around to find Bohdan shaking his head, his brows lowered in a frown. He was a damn scary man when he frowned. She instinctively leaned back into Deuce. His hand opened over her midriff, pulling her into his chest. The unquestioning way he offered her his support made her want to cry in relief and run in terror. She had no defense against him. Never had, and apparently the last year hadn’t changed that. She sat as still as she could, taking breaths to not only control her pain but her instincts. She had to stop thinking of Deuce as her personal miracle and start thinking of him as a man she was about to put in a horrible position.

  “You hurt.” Bohdan’s frown deepened with the observation.