Closer to the water's edge, to his left and near the lowest wall of granite, the water ringed, and something silvery gold appeared to break the surface for a moment. Kadan unconsciously held his breath. An otter? Were there otters up here? Were otters silver and gold?
She rose up out of the water, long wet hair streaming, gleaming, and shimmering like skeins of wet silk. The droplets of water ran off the curves of her breasts, down her narrow rib cage, dipped in at her small waist to stream down her flat belly to the triangle of blond curls at the junction of her legs. She was naked, skin glowing in the sunlight, her tan so deep it emphasized the white gold of her hair. She tilted her head to one side and brought her long hair over one shoulder in an unconsciously provocative gesture.
The wind shifted and carried her scent to him. Kadan's body tightened savagely in response. His body knew her instantly. She looked like some wild, pagan offering. Untamed, seductive. For him. He went very still, his breath catching in his lungs. Instant awareness shook him. He'd certainly had his share of women, but he never reacted like this--a vicious, brutal response of his body and mind, everything in him reaching toward her.
"Whitney, you bastard," he whispered aloud. Not for one moment would he ever believe his reaction to be natural. It was too strong, too obsessive. Too unlike him.
He crouched down for a moment, feeling sucker punched. He'd joined the military, gone through Special Forces training, continued with water, arctic, desert, and even urban training, and then he'd read the call for testing of psychic ability and he had gone immediately, tested high, as he'd known he would, and been accepted into the military GhostWalker program. He'd agreed to be psychically enhanced. He hadn't agreed to be genetically altered, nor had he ever been told that they would match him chemically to a female.
As the extent of what had been done to the volunteers became apparent, Kadan had hoped he'd been one of the ones who escaped this particular hell. But he knew. His body knew. He tried to breathe away the monstrous hard-on that came out of nowhere. He pushed down the aggression as testosterone flooded his body with burning lust and a savage desire to possess. He'd never thought to ask any of the others what it was like, or even if all of their symptoms were the same, but he felt aggressive, dangerous, almost brutal, a primitive response preprogrammed into him.
Breathing deeply, he grabbed a handful of dirt, closing his fingers around it hard, as if squeezing the life from someone's throat. And where was the cat? He had to make certain the animal wasn't about to leap on her.
Once more he lifted the binoculars, breath catching in his lungs as she came back into focus. Even the way she wrung out her hair was sensuous, tipping her head to one side, the long, golden strands rippling like silk as her hands squeezed the thick skein. Water beaded and ran from full breasts to belly and down to the vee at the junction of her legs. Her legs were slender, her butt firm as she waded toward the edge of the pool, the water lapping at her thighs. His tongue moistened his suddenly dry lips. He would have given anything to lick the droplets of water from her skin.
Reluctantly he moved the binoculars from his fantasy vision to scan the surrounding forest and mountains. Nothing. He shifted his direction, quartering the area, looking high, from branches to boulders. The mountain lion had to be there somewhere, invisible to his sight, maybe, but not to his gut.
There was no camp close by that he could see, but it had to be there. He turned his attention back to the woman. This must be Tansy Meadows. She looked almost as if swimming in the pool and napping and sunning were a daily ritual, and if so, she wouldn't be hiking too far from her home ground.
There was no doubt in his mind that she owned his body, and that meant she had to be one of the lost girls Whitney had experimented on. The demented doctor had taken infants from orphanages from all over the world and performed experiments on them. A few lucky ones had been adopted out. Kadan had her background information memorized. Her parents had adopted her when she was five years old. She had severe problems in school and other social settings. She'd worked with the police from the age of thirteen, tracking killers and kidnap victims with amazing accuracy. He should have known she was too accurate. He should have known her psychic abilities were enhanced.
Kadan took another long look around in an effort to spot the mountain lion. If it was there, the animal was well camouflaged. Every area he thought would be the perfect place from which to ambush her seemed serene and peaceful. He swung the glasses back to the natural basin.
She stepped from the shimmering emerald water, moving with grace and something else, something so seductive and innocent at the same time that his body screamed at him with urgent demand. His breath caught in his throat as she lifted her slender arms toward the sun, the action thrusting her breasts upward, the darker nipples erect from the cold. Kadan could feel the taste of her in his mouth. He took a slow, deep breath to calm the surging excitement, the exultation. His body, his mind, his very soul said she was the one. He was looking at his mate.
God help him, he didn't want to think that way--not now--not in the middle of such a huge crisis. He needed to be sane, to keep his mind and body under control. And he needed to use this woman, be ruthless if necessary. He swore softly under his breath and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand as he kept the glasses trained on her.
She lathered her body with lotion, every stroke of her hand making his body throb and jerk in need, and then she stretched out, facedown, on the flat surface of the rock, her body an offering in the afternoon sun. Her bottom was curved, well muscled, joining the long expanse of her shapely legs. It was impossible, even with the field glasses, to see her facial features; she was turned away from him, her face in the shadows. His imagination could not provide a face to go with her sensual body or the erotic way she moved. He watched her for a long while, until her breathing became slow and even and he knew she slept.
She was sound asleep and a mountain lion had stalked her all the way down the trail to the basin. It was hidden somewhere above her, maybe watching. Again he scanned the surrounding area, appalled that she lay naked and exposed, where any hunter or wild animal might come across her. Fury burned in his belly, low and mean, and for a moment, the ground around him trembled. He clamped down on his temper and forced air through his lungs as he sifted through every possible place the cougar could hide. He'd trained at the elite sniper school, taken the test of finding fifty objects hidden at multiple distances, and he'd spotted every one, but the cat remained hidden.
He lowered the glasses. He'd been too long without sleep. He'd traveled to ten foreign countries in two weeks, working on forming a collective pool of multinational antiterrorist information for an elite assassination squad. The team would live in the shadows, travel to the kill zone, destroy all targets, and fade away before anyone ever knew they were in the area. Each member would be totally anonymous so there could be no retaliation against families. Each member would be a GhostWalker, able to get in and out of a target zone like a shadow.
Kadan had been assigned the task and was pulling his team together when he was abruptly called home and given another mission--and this one was too important to mess up. He was known for his coolness under fire, his absolute calm in any crisis, his ability to lead his team and undertake any mission, find a way to carry it out and get his team home again, no matter the odds. He sighed. He didn't feel cool or calm now, he felt edgy and mean. He was grateful his fellow GhostWalkers weren't around to witness his struggle.
Deliberately slowing his breathing, he took another drink from his camel pack. He was going to have to climb down to the rocks below and find a way to convince her to join him, because in the end, she didn't really have any more of a choice than he did. He had a feeling it wasn't going to be easy or pleasant, but completing the mission was necessary. And he had the feeling that if this woman had been given up for adoption years earlier by Whitney, she probably hadn't been chemically matched with him, which, quite frankly, was going to make thin
gs one hell of a mess. Whitney had kept her DNA and had programmed him, but not her.
He'd thought the task was going to be heartbreaking and difficult enough just convincing and perhaps forcing Tansy to partner with him in his investigation, but now, with the added threat of the physical pull between them, the mission had become daunting. She had suffered a breakdown, and by all accounts, it had been real. He'd read the report carefully, as well as all her medical records. She'd spent weeks in a hospital and months in seclusion with her parents. She'd been fractured, shattered by her last case, her mind splintering and refusing to relinquish the evil voices of the killers she'd tracked, or the screams of their victims. He was going to have to ask her to let other, more powerful and vicious voices in. On top of that, he was going to have to somehow explain that he was paired with her.
Kadan found himself unable to tear his eyes from her. The longer he watched her, the tighter and more urgently his body made demands. He had never experienced such sexual hunger. It seemed to fill every cell of his body, invade his brain, squeeze his body in a vise until jackhammers were ripping through him, driving out every civilized thought. He had to get some kind of handle on the link between them or he would destroy any chance he had with her.
He sat down, folded his legs tailor fashion, and closed his eyes, searching inwardly to center himself. He needed balance. The discomfort of the rocks, of his boots, of his body swarmed into his brain and he allowed it to wash over him, to form rings on the pool he focused on and disappear in the ripples of the water. He breathed long, deep breaths, searching inside himself for the truth of his strong emotions.
Fear for her safety. Both from animal predators and from human ones. This area was so isolated, it frightened him to think what would happen if she were found by some drunk hunter, or a man without scruples or principles. Any animal could stalk her while she lay defenseless in the sun; the cat already had. Anger. He examined the turbulent emotion from all angles. It was one he was not completely familiar with. Most of his life he had been cold and dispassionate in his dealings with people. That was what made him so good at his job. He had mastered his every emotion. Anger. It ripped through him. Boiled. Surged and pounded. Insisted on release like a heated volcano. Completely over-the-top, and he refused to let it to the surface. He had a mission, and nothing--no one--got in the way of a mission.
He took another deep, calming breath and stayed in the pool of sanity while insane emotions swirled and clamored and finally abated, leaving him whole again. He opened his eyes and smiled. The smile of a predator. He came to his feet, unexpectedly fluid for such a large man. His eyes found her once again. The shadows were just beginning to reach for the soft curves of her body.
He moved with sudden decision, finding the easiest way down the mountainside. It was steep and rocky and, as always in the mountains, deceptively longer than it seemed from a distance. It took some hunting to find the steep, narrow staircase that actually led to the secluded basin. He made his way down as quietly as he was able. He wanted to study her while she slept, just take his time and let the image of her burn into his memory for all eternity. He wouldn't mind throwing one hell of a scare into her either.
CHAPTER 2
Kadan was careful not to allow his shadow to fall across Tansy Meadows's body. The granite was smooth under his boots and made no sound to give him away. He stayed out of the wind just in case she possessed an enhanced sense of smell, and made certain he didn't interrupt, even briefly, the flow of air moving around her body. GhostWalkers were all sensitive to the smallest change in the energy flowing around them. Meadows may not have been trained as a GhostWalker, but if she was enhanced, as he suspected, she would be a force to be reckoned with.
He scanned the surrounding area, searching for any weapon, anything she might use to defend herself. He frowned when he realized her clothes were neatly stacked some distance from where she was stretched out sleeping. A small dart gun was beside her clothes, up against a rock. Kadan eased his way, placing each foot carefully so as not to disturb loose rock, his body moving slow to keep the air still, and reached for the dart gun. For both of their safety, he slid the weapon into his belt. She should have held the gun under her palm where she could easily defend herself against a wild animal or a hunter. If she was a GhostWalker, her self-preservation instincts weren't as good as they should be.
After satisfying himself there was nothing she could grab to cause either of them harm, he crouched down beside her. More than anything, he wanted to see her face. Up close she was breathtaking. Her skin looked so soft and warm, it took every ounce of his self-control to keep from touching her. Her hair was a mixture of true platinum and skeins of gold that spilled down her back and across the rock. Long lashes lay like crescents, feathery and thick. Her face was a small oval, her mouth full and inviting. He stifled the urge to bend down and wake her with a kiss. She was much smaller than he'd expected, but her legs were long, her bottom curved, and his body told him she would fit him like a glove.
His face was a few inches from hers when she opened her eyes to stare directly into his. Fear leapt, turned the deep blue of her eyes nearly violet with alarm. Her eyes glittered with a kind of reflective shine, and then she squinted, as if the light hurt them. She blinked once and her eyes were clear, cool, and assessing. She reached for her sunglasses and slid them onto the bridge of her nose with a casual haughtiness that told him she was a princess and he was a mere peasant.
Tansy opened her eyes from a peaceful dream and found herself staring into perfect cat's eyes. Cold, unblinking, so dark blue they were almost black. Focused. She was looking into the eyes of a man who had killed often. Shaggy dark hair spilled across his forehead, touching a thin white scar that ran the length of a rough face that was all angles and planes. He looked weathered and all too dangerous. There was a shadow along his jaw as if he couldn't be bothered to be civilized enough to shave. He wore no expression on his face at all, just that sweeping fixed stare, cool as a cat's.
She lifted her chin a few inches, her lashes sweeping down to veil her expression before she put on her dark glasses. She made no attempt to cover her nudity because there was nothing she could do about it and she didn't want to give him any more of an advantage by letting him see she felt vulnerable.
Rising with as much grace and dignity as she could manage, Tansy crossed to her neatly folded clothing. She had to brush past him, and he didn't budge, his frame solid and muscular, his skin rubbing against hers and causing a brief frisson of awareness. Electricity zinged along her nerve endings and tiny wings took flight along her stomach. She could feel those blue-black eyes tracking her every step of the way. Tansy was eternally grateful she'd never cut her hair. The long length of it covered her bare bottom, giving her a false sense of security. She had no idea that the silky platinum and gold mass against her dark skin was provocative, and only served to give her an erotic, seductive appearance, emphasizing her curves.
Keeping her back to him, she pulled on her shirt and stepped into her jeans, taking several deep breaths to maintain control. Out of habit, Tansy wrapped the length of her hair several times and secured it at the back of her head with a large barrette. Surreptitiously, she looked around for her tranquilizer gun. It was not in the usual place by the jutting rock, which meant he probably had it. Squaring her shoulders, she turned to face the stranger.
He was a large, heavily muscled man. The sheer brute strength of him set her heart pounding. If she had to be caught naked, alone, in the middle of nowhere, why couldn't that person have been some ninety-pound weakling? She feared more than the actual size of him. He exuded power from every pore. He looked dangerous in some way she couldn't define. She might dismiss the impression of power by saying it was his looks, but she knew better. His features looked as if they could have been carved from stone, every bit as rugged as the granite surroundings. He wasn't handsome--he was far too rough-cut for that. But he was striking in a scary way.
"I'm sorry I sta
rtled you."
His voice was smooth black velvet, the devil's tool and sarcastic as hell. Intense anger simmered below that smooth exterior. She touched her tongue to her lips, her only concession to nerves.
"It was time to wake up anyway." She made herself shrug. "This is a private preserve and you aren't allowed here." He was military, not a hunter. His eyes were flat and hard and watchful--too watchful, as if he expected her to make a run for freedom. She shifted to the balls of her feet and turned slightly to angle her body toward his, presenting fewer targets should he attack.
"I came looking for you."
Because she'd been so startled to wake up to him, she hadn't registered until now that being in close proximity to him didn't cause the headaches she'd suffered around other human beings--including her parents. The ravenous psychic energy that normally surrounded her when she was close to people wasn't present. She felt the slight breeze, heard the continual call of birds, the buzzing of bees, but no whispers in her mind.
"You came looking for me?" she echoed, feeling a little lost. Her gaze flicked over him, taking everything in the way she did, her mind cataloguing the picture, referencing the scars along with his gear--especially the knife at his side.
He smiled as if to ease her fear. He looked like a mountain lion right before mealtime. "Let's start again. I'm Kadan Montague." Deliberately, his smile almost wolfish now, he held out his hand.
Automatic reflex was nearly her undoing. Right before his hand could envelop hers, Tansy stepped backward, both hands behind her back. She didn't dare chance physical contact with him. Nor did she wish to get close enough if his intentions were to assault her.