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Tanner turned his gaze on her then. His oddly striped black hair fell over his brow, the gold strands that grew through it matched the amber color of his eyes. They were an odd, eerie amber, almost glowing in his darkly tanned face.
He had worn contacts and colored his hair while they were in hiding, so Sherra was used to seeing a much more toned-down version of her brother. Now, he did nothing to hide who he was, and did everything to make up for the years he had been forced to conceal his true nature.
“So when are you going to tell Kane you’re pregnant?” He shocked her with the question, keeping his voice low so that only she heard, but the laughter in his voice made her want to hit him. Sherra stiffened. She had only learned the truth herself an hour before, during the exam Kane had ordered after they had dragged the assassin off to a holding cell. Thankfully, her mate had been busy securing the estate and hadn’t been with her during the visit. Doc Martin was as confused by the pregnancy as Sherra was. According to him, somehow the hormone raging through her body had begun to repair the break in her fallopian tubes and heal the surgery he had performed years before in preparation for the fertilization of her womb. He had scratched his head and mumbled vague phrases that made little sense to her other than the fact that Breeds were enigmas and he needed more help.
“No answer?” Tanner smirked when she stayed silent.
“Shut up, Tanner,” she growled. “Give me a chance to get used to it myself. ”
She couldn’t believe it. It was more than she had ever prayed for. She winced as she watched the two women in the dining room fighting to breathe as the men fought around them, discussing their protection and ignoring their attempts to escape them. She prayed that wasn’t a glimpse of her own pregnancy in the coming months. They would make her crazy.
“Tell them. ” He nodded into the room with a chuckle. “They’ll help you get used to it. ”
She was starting to regret his return. His helicopter had landed just ahead of the Tylers’, carrying him, Merc and Simon Quatres. Cassie had been loaded quickly into the machine to rush her to her wounded mother’s side. Dash and Elizabeth had completed their mission, stilling the most dangerous threat to Cassie’s life. The small family would go into hiding after Elizabeth’s recovery though, Tanner had reported. Cassie, and now the child Elizabeth was carrying as well, would all be in danger until the world came to grips with the new species now inhabiting it. And it didn’t look like that was going to happen anytime soon.
“Tanner, go find someone else to torture and torment,” Sherra finally ordered him as her gaze caught Kane’s and she looked upstairs slowly.
She needed to share the news with him, to see his face when she told him he was going to be a father. To exorcise the ghosts of the past.
As Kane turned to his father, a sudden shrill whistle pierced the room. All eyes turned to Merinus, widening in surprise as she stared at them in fury.
“Enough, dammit!” she yelled out to the room of men as Roni jumped to her feet and pushed Taber’s hand aside so she could move to the other woman’s side. “We’re pregnant, not wounded and definitely not in any way incapacitated. Get over the he-man crap now. ”
A stunned silence filled the room as she punctuated her words with a hard smack to the back of her youngest brother Gray’s head when he started to argue. It wasn’t a small sisterly pat.
“Now. ” Merinus adjusted the shoulders of her maternity smock as she gave them all a narrow-eyed look. “I’m sick of all of you. I want a glass of milk, a pack of Oreos, and some peace. You can argue amongst yourselves all you want to, but Roni and I have had enough. We expect our milk and cookies in my room immediately. ”
The two women moved for the doorway when a set of twins rose to their feet as though to stop them.
“Sit back down, assholes,” Merinus snarled. “Before I make good on my threat to shoot you all. ”
They sat down, though indulgent smiles crossed their faces.
“Better escape yourself, Sherra,” Merinus muttered as Tanner stepped back to allow the women to pass. “You’ll be next. ”
Sherra grunted, her hand caressing the butt of the weapon still strapped to her thigh. “I won’t just threaten to shoot them,” she muttered. “I will. ” She gave Kane a look of warning. She received a wicked, daring smile in return. A smile that sent her pulse rate rocketing and her pussy creaming in anticipation.
Merinus and Roni moved quickly past her and headed to the elevator at the far end of the entryway. Merinus was evidently playing it safe for the time being. As she turned back to Kane, Sherra wondered how he would handle attempting to protect her. Surprisingly enough, the thought of Kane hovering over her and their child didn’t bother her so much. Those brothers of his would have to go, though.
“I say we adjourn this fight for the time being,” Kane announced as Sherra once again indicated her desire to return to their room. “Caleb,” he turned to one of the twins, “you and Seth get everyone together and get the plans for those houses started. Uncle Sam, you do something with that Breed Liaison in D. C. I want dependable satellite intel on those caves. Dad, you can get with Merinus later about the report she’s preparing, we want worldwide coverage on this. It has to stop. ”
His voice hardened on the last words, his gaze turning cold as his fury seeped to the surface. The assassin had come much too close to the sister they all treasured. They wouldn’t allow it to happen again. As Kane strode toward her, Sherra felt a warmth and security infuse her entire being. He was hers.
Finally. Completely. Her hand moved to her abdomen, her fingers spreading across it as the truth finally hit her. Their child rested there. Their baby. The joy that bloomed in her heart spread throughout her body as her lips curved into a smile she couldn’t contain.
Kane stopped several feet from her, seeing the joy, the utter complete happiness that suffused her face and seemed to light up the room around her. She seemed to glow, to give a heat and radiant light that took him aback. Her eyes seemed greener, her soft skin creamier, while at the same time she seemed more mysterious and in contradiction, more touchable than ever before. His gaze went over her. What was different?
Then his eyes paused at her abdomen, the way her hand lay over it, her fingers splayed as though in protection and amazement. He felt his heart race, his mouth go dry. The heat had been easing, he realized that now, where he hadn’t before. There had been moments that he hadn’t craved to be buried inside her. Not often, he admitted, but moments. And though the hunger was still there, it was more natural, softer.
He took another step toward her, distantly aware of the others behind him, the silence surrounding them. But all he could hear was his own heartbeat, all he could see was the knowledge glowing in Sherra’s eyes. And it brought him to his knees. Literally.
“Kane. ” Her shocked exclamation didn’t stop him as he clasped her hips and buried his face against her stomach.
He was overwhelmed. Emotion churned inside him, ripping through his chest, filling his heart. She was carrying his baby. He swore he could feel it beneath his cheek—life, a renewal to all the dreams they had once believed were lost to them.
“I love you. ” His arms wrapped around her as he laid a tender kiss on her abdomen. “God help me, Sherra, I love you. ”
“Kane, they’re watching you,” she whispered, but there was no shame in her voice, only laughter, only love.
“Let them. ” He moved back just enough to watch as he splayed his fingers over her flat stomach. His fingers were trembling—hell, his whole body was trembling as he stared up at her, weakened by the emotion he saw in her gaze and the knowledge of the child growing in her body.
“How?” He shook his head. He had resigned himself to never healing that part of the past for either of them.
She reached out, her fingertips touching his face.
“Doc’s not sure. ” She cleared her throat as she
glanced back at the room full of men behind them.
“Kane, if they start hovering over me, I’m going to shoot them. ”
“Ignore them. ” He shook his head as he came slowly to his feet. “You’re sure?”
He couldn’t stop touching her. Her hand rested on his shoulder now as his ran up her arm, caressing the
soft skin, marveling at the miracle she was to his life.
“Well, Doc says it’s so. ” She shrugged with a small grin. “What do you think?”
Kane glanced behind him then. His damned brothers were snickering, but that was okay, let them snicker, he had the world in his arms now.
He turned back to her with a grin and whispered, “I think we need to go check for ourselves, just to be certain. ”
Her laughter was a salve to his soul, a sound of joy and dreams and all the stubborn hopes he had carried with him for years.
“Definitely,” she answered, turning to lead the way up the stairs. Kane didn’t give her time to take the first step. He picked her up in his arms instead.
“Dammit, Kane, I’ll shoot you, too,” she threatened fiercely as he started up the steps. “Put me down before you drop me. ”
“Not a chance,” he promised, glancing down at her, loving that dark little frown on her face as he headed for their bedroom. “I’ll never drop you, baby, and I’ll never let you go. Never again, Sherra. ”
She touched his face and heat exploded inside him. A touch, given freely, a mate’s caress, as he had come to call it when he saw it between Callan and Merinus.
“Never again, Kane,” she agreed before she rested her head against his shoulder, her arms wrapping around his shoulders as she held onto him. “Never again. ”
Epilogue
Kane massaged his neck tiredly, the ache from the debilitating blow the day before still smarting. The blow to his pride was worse, though. When he had walked into the guesthouse, he just hadn’t been prepared. Which was no excuse.
The guards had been outside the guesthouse, relaxed and comfortable. The chauffeur had been cordial as he opened the door. There had been no warning of what awaited him inside. A second later, blinding pain had rendered him unconscious. As unconscious as Callan, Taber and Dawn were. The assassin hadn’t wasted any time. The house guards had been systematically tranquilized, then bound hand and foot before he began to make his way to his victims. He had found Roni first, taking her with him. Cassie had left her room by then, foiling his attempts to get to her. As he made his way to Merinus’
room he had heard something along the other hall that had sent him scurrying into that spare bedroom. Likely little Cassie’s knock at Sherra’s door.
The assassin had been hired by Aaron Lawrence to help kidnap his daughter. But he had been approached later by the Purist Society to kill her instead. He had used the elder Lawrence to gain his way into the compound and to carry out the plan the Society had laid out. A society backed by the remaining, secretive members of the Genetics Council. And he had almost succeeded.
“This has to stop. ” Callan stood at the window of the office, his shoulders thrown back, his long mane of hair held back by a leather strip at his nape. He looked just as wild as his nature. “One of these days, they’ll succeed. ”
Kane ran his hands over his closely cropped hair in frustration as he stared at his quiet sister. Merinus had said little since coming into the meeting. She had been crying, though. Her eyes were red and swollen from those tears. Dawn was still in the medical facility downstairs. She had taken the brunt of the injuries. She had been the first one the assassin had attacked. After taking out the other two guards he had tortured both her and Seth Lawrence as he repeatedly hit her, threatening to rape her as he demanded the locations of the rooms inside.
“We enact Breed Law,” Sherra snapped then. “We have it for a reason. ”