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The thought of Kade walking into harm's way made her breath come a little shorter, her heart beat a bit heavier. She couldn't bear it if something happened to him. Not after the time they'd shared, an incredibly short time, in which he was somehow becoming an inextricable part of her life. In just a couple of days, he had become her friend and her lover, her confidant. Somehow he was coming to mean something even more than all of that.
Could she possibly be falling in love with him?
Falling in love ... with a vampire.
No, he wasn't that.
Kade was Breed, and that was different. He was different. It was hard for her to reconcile that he was cut from the same fabric as the monsters that had attacked her family. Hard for her to believe that somewhere in his DNA, he carried the genes of something completely inhuman, unfathomably lethal. Something not of this Earth. It was hard for her to reconcile that the strong, proud, devastatingly sexy man prowling her modest little house was actually not a man at all, but something different. Something so much more.
Alex watched him in fascination, all the more so for what she'd seen him do outside the mining company grounds with the wolf. In an instant, he'd become part of the beautiful animal, connecting on some unspoken level that had left Alex gaping at him in awe. Even now, she marveled, feeling the current of wildness, of dark, commanding power, lingering in him still. He was intense and mysterious, strong and seductive. And yes, hot as hell.
Everything about Kade captivated her.
She merely had to look at him and she burned.
And he knew it, too. She saw the spark of awareness light the silver of his eyes as he wrapped up his call and set the phone down on the end table next to the sofa.
"How are you holding up?" he asked, seating himself beside her. "You must be exhausted. I know this is a lot to handle."
She gave a vague shrug. "My head's still spinning, but at least I have answers now. The things that never made sense to me before are clearer. Not exactly reason to jump up and cheer, but it's good to finally have the truth, however terrifying it might be. So, thank you for that, Kade." He took her hand in his, their palms pressed together lightly as he ran his thumb over the thin skin of her wrist. His touch was warm, soothing. Achingly tender. "God, I hate that you've been dragged into this. There are places that you can go where you'll be safe, Alex. The Breed has numerous Darkhavens that would take you in--secure communities where you would be welcomed and protected. Better than what I can do for you now. After seeing what we did out at the mine, this has all gotten too real. Too dangerous--"
"I'm not going anywhere," she said, curling her fingers around his and holding his grave gaze. "I'm not going to run. Don't ask me to, Kade."
His jaw went tight as he stared at her. His dark brows lowered over his eyes, mouth going flat as he grimly shook his head. "This is my battle. The Order's battle. Tomorrow some of the warriors will arrive from Boston. I'll be meeting up with them when they get in, and from there we'll launch an offensive strike on Dragos's operations at the mine. We don't know what we're going to find. I just know that I want you as far away from this mission--and any possible fallout--as you can get." He reached up and smoothed his fingers lightly over her cheek. "That also means getting you as far away from me as possible, before I put you any further at risk."
"No." Alex turned her face, pressing her mouth to the warm heat of his palm where it rested against her. She kissed the heart of his large hand. "I can't hide anymore, Kade. I don't want to live like that, always looking over my shoulder, afraid of the things I don't understand. You can't ask me to, not when meeting you has given me the strength to believe that I can face my fears. Meeting you has given me the strength to understand that I must face them."
He cursed harshly, but his caress was soft, his gaze penetrating, the pale silver color that ringed his pupils dark with desire. "You give me too much credit. You were stronger than you realized, to have gone through what you did as a child and not let it destroy you. Not many could. That's courage, Alex. You didn't need me for that. You still don't."
She smiled, reaching out to hold his face in her hands as she kissed him. "I do need you," she whispered against his mouth. "What's more, I want you, Kade."
His breath rasped out of him on a sigh as she slanted her lips over his again and moved closer to him on the sofa. His arms went around her, holding her in a loose cage as she climbed up onto his lap and pushed her tongue into his mouth.
He groaned, caught her tongue with his teeth ... then abruptly broke contact and turned his head away from her.
"What's wrong? Why did you stop?" She panted the words, her lips and tongue stinging with a delicious heat. She tasted blood, only the smallest trace, but instinct brought her hand up to her mouth and the tip of her finger came away wet with a scarlet stain.
She glanced at Kade's downcast face and felt his torment in the way his big body vibrated with barely leashed control, as though he were waging a private war inside himself.
leashed control, as though he were waging a private war inside himself.
"Look at me," she whispered. When he didn't immediately comply, she lifted his stubborn chin and physically brought his gaze back to hers. "Look at me ... let me see you."
"Trust me, you will not want to," he muttered, glancing away quickly. But not before she noticed the change that had come over his eyes. He hadn't been able to turn quite fast enough to hide the fact that their normally pale gray color was now shot with fiery amber. And his pupils ... something was different about them, too.
"Kade, please," she said gently. "Let me see you as you really are." Slowly, he lifted his face. His dark lashes flicked up, and Alex was stunned by a blast of ember-bright color that glowed like lit coals. And in the center of all that fire, his pupils had narrowed to catlike slits. It startled her, the strangeness of his gaze, the way it transformed his face, sharpening the angles of his high cheekbones and squared jaw. She stared, robbed of words. All but robbed of breath.
"I don't want you to be afraid of me, Alex." His deep voice rasped, sounding oddly thick to her, and then she realized why. She saw the gleam of sharp white teeth behind his lip as he spoke. His fangs. Not quite hidden, despite his obvious effort to conceal them from her view. When he looked at her now, there was a desperation in his amber eyes. Desperation and longing like she'd never seen before. "I don't want you to hate me, but this is who I am, Alex. This is who I truly am."
Despite the tiny shiver of wariness that kicked her heart into a more frantic beat, Alex leaned forward and cupped his face in her hands. She held his tormented gaze, then let her eyes travel downward, to his parted lips and the bright points of his fangs, which seemed to have grown even larger now, sharper.
"I'm not feeling anything close to hate," she whispered, tilting her head up and wetting her suddenly dry lips. "If you'd just kiss me again, you'd know that."
Sparks flashed like lightning in his eyes in the moment before he descended on her. Alex felt the leashed power in him, and she sensed the control he exerted to keep that power in check as he took her mouth in a hot, hungered, claiming kiss.
Alex gave herself over to him, reveling in the warm, wet brush of his lips on her mouth, her chin, her throat. She slipped her hands under the black cotton of his long-sleeved T-shirt, running her palms up the firm, satin-smooth muscle of his back. She could feel the vague outlines of his tattoos under her fingertips, a complicated pattern of swirls and arcs that she traced with her nails but really wanted to follow with her tongue.
"Let me see your body. I want to see all of you," she murmured, tugging at his shirt. She pulled it over his head and could only stare in wonder once she'd unveiled him. "My God," she gasped. "Those are not tattoos, are they?"
