Nocturnal Part 4

That made Nick go really quite still in shock. Strange. He had seen just about everything from killer grannies to drug-pusher babies. Why would it so surprise him to realize the quiet woman in his lap was a murderer?

"Excuse me?" he said, figuring he'd heard her wrong in spite of his acutely improved hearing.

"I grew up on the streets of Dark Chicago, Nick. My mother was a junkie selling herself from fix to fix. I used dirty old syringes to play darts, learned to run fast and hide in small unreachable places, and stole everything I ate for years. The first person I killed was a gang boy when I was thirteen. He tried to steal from me."

She meant he had tried to rape her. Nick could see it from the way she turned her eyes down and away. Her clenched fists told him she didn't regret what she had done, that she would do it again in the same circ.u.mstances. But Nick couldn't hold that against her. She'd been all alone, fending for herself in the worst Dark City there was...tied only with Dark Manhattan. The so-called Dark Cities were the abandoned sections of the cities where gangs had overrun even the police forces. They'd been walled away, fenced up high, and ignored as best they could be by ignorant people who hoped they would stay put. The Dark Cities grew larger with every pa.s.sing year, though. Some of them, like Chicago and Manhattan, were completely infested. Los Angeles was third runner-up.

"You don't have to account to me for how you survived that kind of life," he told her quietly.

"But don't you see? I got out of it. As soon as I was able to work legitimately I left the city and worked my way into a workhouse. It was always cold and always dismal, but it was safe. I could sleep at night without being afraid. I could put away those b.e.s.t.i.a.l instincts I'd become grown with. I have no idea how I even knew how to be anything other than a savage. TV, I think. But..."

Nick watched with an ache in his breast as tears stung wetly into her tough copper eyes. She swallowed them back, though, clearly too proud or too stubborn to show the weakness of them.

"They've turned me back into one," she whispered. "Don't you see how easily I am adjusting to this? G.o.d, I think I am even enjoying it. Relis.h.i.+ng it!"

"Hey, no more or less than I am," he said sharply. "I had the good life compared to you, but it wasn't easy from my perspective. I was always angry. Always violent. My mother swore I had been born mad at the world. Thing is, I hate injustice, and this world is so full of it, it makes me choke. When I was young I was impotent. Our society doesn't give kids ways of helping make things better. When I was seventeen, my father bought me a low-level commission in the Corps. He knew if I wasn't tempered, I'd be in jail before I was twenty because my rage would have gotten me into trouble." He reached to brush gentle lips against her temple. "Thank G.o.d he did. I learned control there. I learned empowerment."

"You learned how to make a difference. I've never made a difference. I've just survived."

"That isn't anything to be ashamed of. Right now, that's all I want. I want us to survive. We have to figure out how to do that, and frankly I am glad you have all that killer survival instinct in you. When the time comes, it's going to be really handy."

"I never wanted to be like that again," she said sadly, resting her cheek on his shoulder.

"Let's just be glad we finally have a choice."

Chapter 8.

"Are you awake? I hear someone coming."

"Yeah, I'm up. Been listening to you bite your claws."

"I was not," Amara hissed. "Besides, they aren't bitable. They are like t.i.tanium."

"And how would you know that?" he teased her softly as he sat them up to face whoever was coming to the door.

Amara didn't dignify that with a response. Okay, so maybe she had been nervously nibbling a little. It had been two days since Dr. Paulson's visit and his ominous threats of releasing them into the general populace. Since then they had discovered they could, indeed, eat. They had not needed to drink blood, although it was tempting when they were having s.e.x to indulge in the act.

Which made for a lot of temptation, because closed up in such a small s.p.a.ce there was nothing else to really entertain them. Not that they wanted any other entertainment. Nick and Amara couldn't seem to get enough of each other.

Amara's worrying was doubled, however. Not only did she dread what would happen next, feeling the ponderous wait of the forward-ticking time as if it were set on an explosive device, but Nick had warned her of another danger she hadn't even considered.

"You're going to begin ovulating soon," he had said softly as they caught their breath from their latest sensual attacks on each other's bodies. She had jolted in surprise at that at first, and then realized that once she thought about it, she knew it was true. "I can smell the change on you. I can feel the imperative inside of me that's eager for it. I'm terrified to think that's exactly what they want. I'll be d.a.m.ned if I will breed my children for them."

"Me, too," she agreed with a little s.h.i.+ver.

Now Nick pulled on a fresh T-s.h.i.+rt and they both got to their feet as the door slid open. Amara knew he wanted to step in front of her, but she stubbornly kept to his side and ignored his dark frown. He might be feeling all kinds of butch and manly because of his alterations, but she wasn't in a very submissive s.p.a.ce herself any longer.

The orderly was armed.

It was the first thing she noticed. Granted, it was with tasers, obviously a little added security after what Nick had done the last time. Also, there was a significant change in uniforms. While they remained the same annoying white, they were now boasting armored vests, padded sleeves no doubt meant to protect from sharp claws, gloves, and helmets. They looked like a contingent of guards, which in actuality they had always been. They just had not looked so much the part before.

Taser guns and nightsticks at the ready, they made way for Nick and Amara to move out of the room. Their sharp gestures said there was to be no argument, and Amara couldn't see any point in doing so. They eased out of the cubicle room side by side, Nick's arm tight around her shoulders. As if everything were the same and it was just another normal day as involuntary lab rats, they were marched into the common area.

Only there had been significant changes.

The common room had all been caged in. Steel bars disrupted the perfection of white everywhere there was a section of gla.s.s or an opening leading out of the common area. The exterior access had been cut off and was now guarded heavily, but not from inside the room. The guards all remained outside the caging.

They came from four compa.s.s points, small groups of them being hustled and even shoved into the common rooms all at the same time. Nick and Amara were the last to step inside from their section and the steel gate rang with finality at their backs as it slammed shut.

For a moment, everyone was quite still. Hesitant. Amara gripped at Nick, feeling the tension in his muscular body. She automatically looked for the familiar faces of her friends, having been worried about them since this had started.

That was when she first noticed the smell.

Then came the sensation.

Her skin felt as though it were vibrating in a supersonic dance, the hairs at the back of her neck p.r.i.c.king up even as her nose began to sniff out all the signals it received.

"I can sense them," she breathed. "I can tell which are still human and which are Morphates."

"You're not the only one," Nick whispered grimly as he drew her back against a wall where no one could come up behind them. He nodded toward a human male who had approached someone else as if he recognized him, greeting him. He now suddenly found himself the focus of two and then three Morphate males who began to actively sniff him. "I have a feeling this isn't going to be pretty," he warned her softly.

Amara was in agreement with that. She watched as the three males started to shove at the human, batting him between them like cats toying with a ball. Claws appeared, and then fangs. The human male screeched in fear when he saw it alter them into feral-looking beasts. Amara sniffed, smelling how the keenness of his fear called like a sweetly baking treat in an oven beckoned one's hunger.

Then it was ending in a sudden flash of violence as the first Morphate male sank his fangs deep in the human's shoulder. The second chose the opposite bicep, and the third, heedless of how it nearly ripped him apart, grabbed up a leg and tore into his thigh.

Once the feed was on, the rest of the room erupted into a frenzy of reaction. Other hungry Morphates tried to find their way into the feast, only to be viciously rebuffed. Humans began to scream and clamor for release at the exits, terrified they would be the next meal for these inhuman beasts. Then there were other Morphates who seemed to have no appet.i.te or simply no care for the tableau that played out.

Amara felt Nick's awful tension and sensed how badly he wanted to do something. But there was an entire pack of feeding Morphates now, other humans being picked off to satiate those who either had not been fed properly or enjoyed satiating themselves on the bloodl.u.s.t and power of their new forms. They could clearly see a good deal of both.

There was blood and human death everywhere by the time the furor for feeding had died down and the worst of the pack had grown too full to continue to drink or they were just growing bored of the easy prey. The remaining humans were huddled and sobbing or simply sitting in traumatic shock.

Amara scented something familiar and turned her attention to the approach of a beautiful female Morphate. It was Mina, she realized with no little shock. Mina had always been a confident and s.e.xually attractive female, but now with her Morphate enhancements she positively reeked alluring femininity. Readiness. s.e.x. She was not marked by a male, not like Amara at all. It was obvious, though, that she had been with more than one male in the last block of hours.

And she was in search of another.

Mina practically slithered up to Nick, the slink in her spine and the sway in her hips so suggestive. Her nipples stood out under her tee attentively, and Amara could smell her ready excitement as she approached her desired target. She saw Nick's nose twitch as he took in her scent as well and felt the knee-jerk male response of interest. Mina was in a full-blown heat, and that was designed to attract any viable mate.

Even her her mate. mate.

Amara reached out and smacked away the hand Mina reached out toward Nick's chest hard enough to get her message across. She even backed it up with a growl of threat.

"Back off," she hissed, placing herself between Nick and the trashy little Morphate seeking to usurp her place at Nick's side.

"Come on, Amara," Mina scoffed at her. "There's no way you'll ever keep all that to yourself." Amara's friend sniffed at her in disdain. "Why he ever picked you is beyond me."

"Because I ride his c.o.c.k like it's an Olympic event," Amara retorted smartly. "Just the feel of my teeth in his skin makes him come as hard and fast as lightning. He knows a good thing when he finds it."

"Holy s.h.i.+t," Nick whispered just behind Amara. She was standing right in front of him, her back brus.h.i.+ng his front, so she was immediately aware of his bodily reaction to her words even before his hands clamped onto her waist to cuddle her backside back against his jutting erection.

"Mmm, perhaps. But maybe he wants a little changeup. Some variety." Mina's tongue appeared between her lips to lick them with appet.i.te as her eyes dropped to where Nick's hips were flush with Amara's rear. She could smell his arousal and it made her willing to risk the threat Amara might pose. Mina hardly even saw the other female as an obstacle. She'd been a weak, apathetic little thing for the entire time they'd known each other. So Mina doubted she'd put up much of a challenge when push and shove might come into the picture. "What do you say, stud? You seem more than a little ready to have some fun with an energetic woman. The girl is nice in a pinch, I'm sure, but you need something a little more hot-blooded."

Mina ignored Amara's presence and sidled up to Nick's side, rubbing her eager t.i.ts against his arm as she fondled the shape of his muscular shoulder.

Amara hardly knew what happened next. She could only recall the feel of her mate tensing in response against her back, and then a blinding wall of possessive fury. She literally saw red, that that was how hot her temper was as it bolted through her. She was all fangs and fearsome talons in a heartbeat and she tackled her compet.i.tion with a wild snarl of rage. She did not take their former friends.h.i.+p into consideration for even a second. On the most primitive level of instinct she had, she was realizing that Nick could be stolen away from her. All it would take was a woman who wanted her mate badly enough to be willing to kill her for him. They would all want him, of course. He was the most beautiful male specimen in the entire room. Biological imperative demanded they try to mate with the strongest and most powerful genetics available, and Nick was 100 percent prime DNA real estate. was how hot her temper was as it bolted through her. She was all fangs and fearsome talons in a heartbeat and she tackled her compet.i.tion with a wild snarl of rage. She did not take their former friends.h.i.+p into consideration for even a second. On the most primitive level of instinct she had, she was realizing that Nick could be stolen away from her. All it would take was a woman who wanted her mate badly enough to be willing to kill her for him. They would all want him, of course. He was the most beautiful male specimen in the entire room. Biological imperative demanded they try to mate with the strongest and most powerful genetics available, and Nick was 100 percent prime DNA real estate.

Unless she set an example, one that was brutal and definitive, she would find herself fighting challengers to her position all the time. They weren't playing by human rules any longer and she couldn't afford to be nice. She would end up dead, and Nick would belong to someone else, if she did.

It took only two rolls across the floor for her to gain the upper position. She hissed down at the other woman in warning, giving her the opportunity to put up her hands and slink away alive but smacked down in defeat. Mina was all about s.e.x and getting what she wanted. She had been that way even when she'd been human. She wasn't about to give up her target and she delivered that message with a swipe of deadly claws that raked Amara from her right ear to her jaw and throat.

It was just enough to really p.i.s.s Amara off. The blonde reached out and caught Mina's head between her hands just as she had seen Nick do to the orderly, and with all of her inhuman power, she wrenched it completely around.

Amara let go of Mina, her face dropping against the floor in grotesque opposition to the faceup position of her body. She ripped wild eyes completely around the room as she surged to her feet. The fight had drawn bloodthirsty attention and she could smell the s.e.xual interest from the women who could see Nick was the point of contention. But the moment Amara barked out a savage warning to all other females nearby, there was an immediate exodus of women stepping back so she wouldn't mistake their presence as a challenge. In a matter of seconds she had proven herself capable of defending her position as an Alpha mate.

She turned to look at Nick, furious with him for how he had reacted to the stimulus of another female. Logically, she realized he had little control over his urges and interests at the outset. She also knew that he would never take another woman so long as she was alive. Still, jealousy and hurt made her belly ache as though it were filled with weighty lead. He quickly crossed over to her and took her into his embrace. He held her tight and secure, drawing her up to the powerful body she had inspired to feel amazing pleasure just as she had claimed. With comforting strokes of his hands, he rea.s.sured her that there was no other for him. Nick hugged her warmly, her back to his chest, and drew her head aside so he could touch his tongue to the gashes Mina's claws had left behind. He licked away the blood until the wounds closed and she was relaxed and all but purring her forgiveness in his arms.

Chapter 9.

When Nick looked up from his maintenance of his mate's wounds, he met a half dozen aggressive gazes. The six males reeked of challenge and, most important, s.e.xual desire. A sweeping glance told him each and every one had a ma.s.sive erection and a yen for his woman. They had watched her dispatch her compet.i.tion in a matter of heartbeats, her viciousness and strength arousing their interest in her...as well as their c.o.c.ks. Nick felt the way their eyes fastened onto her ripe b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the rigid nipples he knew were so easily seen through her snug tee. They sniffed for her p.u.s.s.y, seeking her scent as they edged closer. The pack had no loyalty to one another, but they would use the others to weaken him so they might gain advantage and the victory prize.

They all could smell how close to season she was. She was almost ready to be bred and they all wanted to mate with a female who could fight with such dominance.

Nick realized then that the challenges weren't likely to ever stop. He could discourage them, but others would always want Amara. She was a worthy and breathtaking mate. He had known it from the very start. She would whelp amazing children of strength and equal beauty. She would fight for all that was hers to her very last breath. If she had ever been apathetic, it had been forever discarded. It was no longer in her makeup.

Nick gave her scratches one last lap, savoring the flavor of her blood. That, too, had attracted them. Her blood-scent. He knew because it attracted him him. He was rock-hard with need just from watching her defend her place and desperate to be inside of her now that her flavor washed against his tongue.

But first things first.

Nick ran a proprietary hand over Amara's breast, palming the full weight of her and even catching her nipple in teasing pinches between his fingers. She had borne his bite there, her o.r.g.a.s.ms and his own quite arousing. His touch certainly aroused her. He could smell the tangy change in her scent as her p.u.s.s.y went wet in antic.i.p.ation of him. Soft growls of challenge began to erupt from the other males as they began to crave her just as he did.

Good. Let them. Let them build themselves into a fever of need for what they would never have. The frustration would make them stupid and sloppy. His own need was empowering. It made him steady and quite clear on what was his to protect if he wanted to find himself back inside her sweet heat once again. He slid his hand down his b.i.t.c.h's belly, his fingers gathering up fabric until he touched the bare skin of her tummy. All the while, he remained alert, his eyes trained on the restless six watching what he was doing. His hand glided under the waistband of her sweats and his fingertips combed through tight curls he knew were the color of fine golden filament. He sought for and found her c.l.i.t quite easily. It was moist and a little swollen already, antic.i.p.ating the pleasures of the c.o.c.k pressed to the crease between her bottom cheeks.

Nick's fangs slid into place, his claws curving and p.r.i.c.king her until she gasped and moaned in response.

All h.e.l.l broke loose.

Nick spun Amara back behind him as the first two males lunged at him. Natural weaponry aside, before he'd been forced to become a Morphate, Nick had been a federal agent trained in the deadly art of hand-to-hand combat. Facing down such powerful odds simply didn't faze him. He never once worried about the fact that these were Morphates, not men; that any one of them could have the power to defeat him alone. He never believed it.

Luckily for Nick, he really was the most powerful male there. The others had been slack and lazy with defeat for months. Nick had still been powerful and fit with rebellion at the time of his transformation. His strength and skill combined to make him a deadly force of nature-even if that nature in and of itself had been forced.

He mimicked his mate's kill with his first, snapping the Morphate's neck like a twig and already attacking the next before the first hit the ground. This one he took out with a strike across the bridge of his nose. He went down howling, blood spraying everywhere. The third and fourth were the first to actually lay hands on him. Or rather, claws. They shredded through his s.h.i.+rt in front and back, flaying his skin in deep furrows he didn't even bother to feel. The idea that Amara would heal him with the stroke of her erotic little tongue was all he needed to swing him swiftly around, hooking the third male by the throat with his arm and ripping him off his feet with his momentum until he sent him slamming into the fourth. They landed in a tangled sprawl of arms and legs and at least one of them was still alive. Nick didn't much care.

Number five was smart. After seeing how quickly he had dispatched the others, he abruptly threw up his hands and backed off at a speedy pace. Number six...well, now, there had to be at least one real challenger. Number six was definitely it. He was a big, blond b.a.s.t.a.r.d, but in a ponderous way. He was like a tank.

"Keep that s.n.a.t.c.h warm, baby," he called crudely to Nick's Amara. "I'm going to want it just as soon as he's dead."

Nick saw Amara flip him off, and it was the only thing that kept him from going totally ape-s.h.i.+t on the guy for daring to speak to his mate in such a way. Just that single flash of humorous defiance helped him keep his head and probably his neck.

The two t.i.tanic males clashed and tables and chairs were crushed or sent flying in their wake. Morphates and humans alike plastered themselves to the walls to keep out of their way. Once Nick threw off the other man, his eyes sought Amara to make sure no others were coming near her. She was leaning back so casually against the wall she nearly looked bored. Then Nick realized it was because she had no doubts he would prevail and she was impatient for him to finish what his teasing touches had started. Her matter-of-fact att.i.tude inspired the same in him. Suddenly he saw exactly how to dive past those meaty, hammering fists and he took his shot, using his claws to rend through the cotton crotch of his opponent's sweats and the flesh of his s.c.r.o.t.u.m and p.e.n.i.s as he tore up and away.

Had Nick still been human, it would have been considered a low, dirty tactic. As a Morphate protecting his rights to his mate, it was poetic justice. The man fell in a screaming, writhing mess of blood and agony. Nick stood there catching his breath for a minute, his glare challenging the room to incite him further; warning that he could do much, much worse. All eyes turned away or down submissively, whether they were human or Morphate.

And, without ever meaning to, Nick and Amara became the Alpha Morphates of the room. They didn't realize it just then, but it would change everything for them all over again.

Nick flung the blood of his enemy off of his claws with a sharp snap of his hand, then he turned to look at his woman. He lifted his chin, his nose seeking her aroma through the heavy rusted stench of spilled blood. Still, he found it easily and in an instant. Sweet ambrosia and eagerly awaiting him, it called him back to her in rapid-fire strides. He grabbed hold of her as she crashed her chest against his, her arms wrapping around his neck and her legs climbing up around his waist as their mouths melded and dueled in hot, wild kisses of need and victory.

He couldn't wait.

The knowledge pounded through him with an animalistic roar. He had to reclaim her, right now, right there.

"I have to take you," he gasped into her mouth as her back hit the cold cinderblock wall. "Right now!" "Right now!"

"Yes. Yes, yes, yes!"

"Watch my back, babe," he said roughly. It was the only thought he gave to the rest of the room. He grabbed the waistband of her sweats and pulled them off her bottom. He bared her just far enough and then withdrew his aching c.o.c.k from his sweats. Nick was aiming and thrusting in the very same movement, his instincts for f.u.c.king her like second nature now. They both understood this was a reclaiming. It would be hard and fast and as crude as could be, but it would stain them with each other all over again and everyone would know she was his. He was hers.

He enjoyed the hard counterforce of the wall, the immovable object allowing him to thrust deepest, hardest, and fastest. She oozed juicy and slick around him, her walls burning hot as his aggressiveness and dominance excited her beyond reason. She stopped watching behind him when her head fell back so she could eject l.u.s.ty moans in cadence with his every thrust. He struck her pleasure spot with ease, his huge c.o.c.k and the erotic circ.u.mstances speeding her swiftly beyond her tolerances. She began to come, squeezing around him so tightly it was like plunging up through a clutching fist.

"Bite me," he hissed at her as his body burned violently for release. He wished he could lose himself in her, in the moment, but there was too much danger around them. Still, in spite of that threat, he could no more have resisted taking her than he could have talked reason into the Morphates who had wanted to take her from him. Like so many things now, it was a demand he couldn't ignore.

Amara didn't argue. She didn't even hesitate. She tore aside his shredded tee and latched onto his neck with a primal little growl of owners.h.i.+p. Nick felt his blood bursting into her mouth and his c.o.c.k simultaneously bursting inside her core. He roared out in pleasure, in warning, in ultimate domination. He came as hard and fast as lightning, just as she had claimed, the electric charge of it scrambling his brain until it was fried with ecstasy. Amara was struggling to drink even as o.r.g.a.s.m after o.r.g.a.s.m rolled through her writhing body. Nick shuddered with his sense of ultimate privilege, content in knowing that this time he had not just been given her at random. This time, he had earned her. He had fought for her, defended her, and earned his ent.i.tlement inside of her.

He was catching his breath and trying to coordinate the strength in his legs as she licked his wounds closed. She dropped off of him and he straightened their clothing.

Now that all Morphate urges had been satisfied, Nick turned around and was suddenly struck with the very human understanding of what he had just done. The entire room was staring at them, having watched his every thrust into her, heard every cry he'd wrenched out of her. The intimacy between them that had no privacy as it was, had just been displayed in public with the heedlessness of two dogs f.u.c.king without a care of who watched or who was embarra.s.sed by it. He had behaved utterly like an animal from the moment he'd first caught Mina's open and admittedly provocative scent. He wouldn't have touched her, but he'd still been stirred by her, the beast inside reacting purely by instinct. But it was also instinct that cleaved him to Amara alone. Mina would only have p.i.s.sed him off eventually if Amara hadn't intervened. When he had responded to the scent of an available female, it had been Amara's body that he'd craved to be his only solace. His only relief.

Now everyone in the room knew it.

Nick backed up against Amara's warm, lush body, pressing her between his back and the wall he'd so artfully used to wring deep pleasure from her.

"G.o.d, I can't believe I just did that to you," he said in a voice strangled with a confusion of human emotion and satisfied Morphate instinct. "In front of everyone. Like some kind of savage."

His heart was racing so hard and his chest hurt with shame for his behavior and anxiety for Amara's sensibilities. f.u.c.ked-up DNA or not, they had been raised with a lifetime of humanity. She had to care. She had to care that he had just taken her like a common street wh.o.r.e against the nearest convenient wall. Remembering the type of woman her mother had been and how hard she had struggled to avoid that fate, he felt lower than dirt.

Nick felt her hands slide around his waist, hugging him with possessive warmth. Her cheek pressed against his back as one palm crept up to lay flat over his thundering heart.

"It isn't the same world anymore," she reminded him with a whisper. "None of the old rules apply. I know you already understand that, but I want you to know I understand it, too. Nick...I'd f.u.c.k you like that in Times Square if you asked me to."