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Liam moved closer. “Why? What do you see?”
“Toys. She’s purchased a lot of sex toys in the last month, no handcuffs or cock rings though, so I think its all for…personal use. As in solo. Or research. But man, that one personal massager is hu—”
“You said groceries? But she didn’t take them home?” The wolf shifter interrupted him, frazzled and flushed, and Saint knew he needed to stop torturing the poor dog before he lost all his control.
“Chill out. Give me a minute. She just linked her cell to someone else’s computer. Downloading pictures.” Saint snorted. “Why do people always think babies are cute? Nothing but baldheaded monsters without teeth that spit foul acid from every orifice. Not my idea of cuddly.” He tensed. “Wait a second. I can see them.”
“Them?”
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Them. Two women, their foreheads bumping together as they laughed and oohed and aahed over the images appearing on the laptop screen. Julie Wu was there, smiling easily, her mind pushing aside its usual turmoil and insecurity for this one special moment with family. Her family. Her cousin Ume.
Ume, the woman beside her with the big, dark, bottomless eyes and exquisite features. Her fingertips slid over the pad, moving the cursor, and Saint swore he could feel the touch to his cock.
“Fuck.”
Liam growled. “What? Who’s with her? Is someone hurting her? Tell me.”
Saint couldn’t speak. He had connected. This was her computer. Her life. And he was being inundated with information. Ume, who lived alone. Ume who was a half-breed, like him. Born to a Chinese father and Japanese mother.
In a flash he knew where she went to school, that her inheritance from her mother’s side ensured she would never have to work, but she always had anyway. She’d even started several charities and relief funds in her deceased mother’s name.
Before the accident. An accident followed by a slew of painful surgeries. Saint had a sudden, uncontrollable desire to kill everyone who’d caused her pain. The man who’d been driving drunk. The surgeon who had operated. Everyone. To torture them slowly until they screamed and begged for mercy. Begged for death.
Damn, he could feel her fingertips again. They soothed him. Aroused him. Made him crazy. He scrolled through pictures of her. She loved to dance. She climbed mountains. She surfed. She was taller than her cousins, her body lean and muscled, her skin golden. Her lips were full and always smiling. Or they had been.
There was something about her. In her eyes. Something…special.
A frenzied growl brought him back to himself, reminding him he wasn’t alone. He broke the connection, instantly feeling the loss. What the hell was going on?
Liam was shifting, changing into his beast. Shit. Saint held up his hand and sent a wave of seductive serenity, pulling the wolf back from the brink. “Julie isn’t hurt, big guy. And she’s not with a lover. She’s visiting her cousin. Relax.”
The larger man took deep breaths, reining his animal in once more, then met Saint’s gaze. “If nothing is wrong, why did your eyes turn red?”
They had? He knew it was true. Could feel the restlessness in him now focused, homing in on its prey. Poor little prey.
Saint smiled. “I’m going to help you, my shaggy friend. Help you control yourself. Be your Cyrano. The voice in your head that knows all the right words to say.”
Liam’s expression was a humorous mix of hopeful and wary. “Why? What do you want in return?”
He shrugged. “Can’t a demon do something selfless? Out of the goodness of his heart?”
“Not usually.”
“Do you care?” Saint stalked toward the shifter, his voice lowering hypnotically. “Does it matter what price is paid to win the heart of your mate? And she is your mate, Liam. You know it. I know it. What wouldn’t you do to make her yours?”
Saint knew the instant he’d won him over. Liam would do exactly what he said. Shifters were decidedly passionate about their mating habits. A trait that made him malleable to the whims of a hungry demon. He wasn’t sure who this Ume was, or why he was so drawn to her, but he would figure her out soon enough.
It was time to play.
“I can’t believe James and Cindy are pregnant again. Jinny is only one year old. Are they trying to start a baseball team?”
Ume heard Julie snort from the kitchen where she was making tea. “It does look like that doesn’t it? Still, if I’m going to be a spinster aunt, my brother and his wife have made sure I’ll have enough nieces and nephews to distract me in my old age.”
“Jules, all the children your brothers and sisters keep having aren’t a distraction. They’re an army.”
The Wu clan had always been known for having large families. Julie was one of seven children, and her father and Ume’s had been a set of twins, the oldest of nine children themselves. Ume was the only one her parents had had. Though since her father had moved back to China and remarried, he’d given her four half brothers.
