Dillon hadn't memorized the lay of the land in the Impure Resistance compound yet, but one thing she had memorized was Gray Donohue's scent.
She was a Beast after all.
And he was sweating.
She'd followed her nose all the way to the basement, and after a sharp right and a stroll down the dark hallway, she hit the door that caged the Impure-the male.
Gray.
She turned the handle and pushed. Inside she found a stark-white room-except for the black and red targets affixed to the wall-and two nude-colored dummies hanging from the ceiling. One was taking a killer beating, slashed and penetrated by two fierce and shiny blades.
She knew those blades, knew the fire-ravaged hands that worked them.
She licked her lips. Terrorizing the poor, defenseless dummy was a six-foot-tall, profusely sweating, shirtless male with a six-pack for a belly and a killer wingspan for shoulders.
For a moment she forgot why she was there. Had to have a reason, right? Coming to stare at the Impure meat candy wasn't going to cut it when he asked. Which was about to happen any second now-
"Need something, D? Or did you just come to watch?"
She narrowed her eyes at him, wondering for a moment if he truly couldn't hear her thoughts as he claimed. "No," she said. "There was a reason."
He raised his brow.
What the hell was the reason?
He flipped both blades in his hands and plunged them into the dummy, one through the neck, one through the heart.
Dillon swallowed. Yum.
"Wanted to see how your meeting with Sara went." The words tumbled out of her mouth effortlessly. Ah, there it was. Thank you, brain.
"Pretty damn bad." He executed a sharp turn and slammed a hard kick into the dummy's abdomen.
She leaned back against the wall. "What happened?"
He glanced over his shoulder, gave her dark grin. "You're not going pretend you care about this shit, are you, D?"
"Excuse me?" she asked, attempting to look offended.
"Because, damn," he said, his eyes registering severe frustration even with the all the high-speed, sweaty deathblow action he was wielding. "I'm really needing a female to be totally honest with me right now. Even if it tears my ass up."
What the hell had gone on over there? Dillon thought, a little taken aback by his ferocity, and maybe a bit concerned too.
"Hand me the blades," she said, going up to him, putting her hands out. When he hesitated and had the nerve to look suspicious, she added, "Hand me the blades or I'll tear that ass up." She grinned. "You want honest? I got honest."
Instead of placing the blades in her hands, he tossed them past her shoulder without even looking, his gaze locked on hers. Dillon glanced back, saw that both had landed in the eye sockets of the dummy.
She turned to face him again. "Damn," she said, her nostrils flaring with heat.
He moved closer to her. "You said if I didn't hand them over, you'd tear my ass up." One sharp eyebrow arched. "Liar."
He was close now, so close she could watch each individual sweat bead travel down his pectoral, up and over each ridge of his impressive abdomen, down to catch in his navel, then south to paradise.
Inside her, the cat scratched to get out. A feeling that surprised her. Never had her shift-her animal life-cared for anything or anyone she bedded. Not that she'd bedded this male.
Yet.
Her gaze flipped up to his, saw the challenge, the demand. She grinned. She'd give him the fight he was looking for.
She was quick, veana quick-Beast quick. She whipped her body to the side, slashed her leg out and behind his, then shoved him back hard. He went down like a one-hundred-and-eighty-pound brick onto the massive gym mat, and she was right there on top of him when he landed.
"No one calls me a liar," she whispered, feeling the sweat on his chest soak through her shirt.
"Not unless they want you on top of them," he said.
Dillon's skin went hot, jumpy, and below her waist, the muscles inside her cunt tightened. She brought her hands to the sides of his face, tried to look fierce as he gazed up at her like there was nothing in the world he'd rather do at that moment than fuck the shit out of her.
And she wanted it too. Every damn inch of her screamed for it-for him. And yet she hesitated.
Goddamn it. Why was he different? Why was this any different than fucking anyone else? Yes, she liked him-but she'd liked many others. Why did this seem to mean more?
She felt his cock stir against her pelvis, felt the magnetic pull of his mouth, his neck, his blood.
She drew in a breath. She didn't want him to have this kind of power over her-it wasn't good. In the end-because there would be an end, had to be-no one was going to come out unscathed.
Her expression must've changed, because so did his. From hungry, hot male to all concern all the time.
"What's wrong?" he asked.
She shook her head, to clear it and to get herself back on track. "You," she said. "And Sara. Tell me what happened."
He heaved out a breath, let his head drop back to the mat. "Wasn't Sara."
She inched up his body, so they were face-to-face again. "What do you mean? Who was it, then? The Romans?"
"My mother."
Dillon felt him tense up. She said, "All the way from Minnesota? What's that about? A little vacation to see the family?"
Ice formed in his gaze. The tenseness of a moment ago turned into impenetrable steel. "She came to warn me."
"Warn you about what?"
He wrapped his arms around her and flipped her to her back. He loomed, his gaze warrior hard. "You." He snapped out the word almost like an accusation. "She said the Order knows I'm keeping you."
His eyes were pinned to hers, his tawny hair bracketing his sharply angled face, his now rock-hard cock pressed into the top of her pelvis and his thickly muscled thigh rooted between her legs.
A hum of anxiety moved through Dillon. She didn't like being trapped, feeling trapped. And yet this was Gray. Was she really desperate to get away from him, or was it that fierce accusatory glare he was throwing her way?
She lifted her chin. "She wanted you to turn me in."
He nodded, his expression blank now. She hated that-she needed to be able to read him.
"You going to do it?" she asked, despising herself for the thread of true fear that ran though her voice.
He glanced up, past her. "I would, but we have to leave soon."
It took her a moment to process his answer. And another to recognize the trace of humor behind it. She reached out and grabbed his ass, squeezed the rock-hard globes, then dug her fingers into his flesh. "I'll flash you anywhere you want to go if..."
He dropped his head and kissed her-kissed her almost covetously. Then pulled back a fragment and bit her lower lip. "If what?"
Dillon felt breathless, turned on, and for a moment-one brief moment-unconcerned with lying on her back, pinned by this male. She looked up at him. "If we leave Chef Blondie at home."
Gray laughed. "Someday you're going to have to follow through on that jealousy trip you keep riding. But for now, for the next few minutes anyway..." He dropped his head again and fed off her lips.
On the third floor of an abandoned warehouse blocks away, Celestine crouched beside a huge picture window and watched the building that housed Gray and the mutore. She may have been an emotional veana with secrets she didn't want to reveal-and reasons for them that were too complicated to sort through in the seconds her grown balas had given her-but she was also a spy. Trained in the art of tracking a subject without being followed.
And tonight her subject had been Gray.
She moved the high-powered lens to each window, hoping for a glimpse of him or the Beast. But the building was locked up pretty tight, shades drawn. It was a good site they'd chosen, right neighborhood too-lots of warehouses, both in use and up for lease.
She sighed. She wasn't looking to take down these Impure warriors or their fight; she just wanted to protect Gray.
She didn't trust mutore.
The one she'd known, the one she'd had the unfortunate luck to fall in love with once upon a time, had turned out to be nothing but a demon. Maybe worse than a demon. And his "children" couldn't be that far behind. She wasn't going to have one of his aberrations hurting her son. Even if it meant Gray would never forgive her.
Her mind traveled back to the tunnels below the Romans' house. With all Gray knew now, all that Samuel Kendrick had revealed, odds were Gray wasn't going to forgive her anyway.
She focused the lens on the front door and waited. All she needed was a picture or two, and if the Order was her last resort to put an end to this Beast, she would have what she needed.
"Your flash is different than the other Pureblood we've been with," Uma remarked the moment they touched down in the back parking lot of what used to be a Trenton nightclub. "Smoother."
Dillon rolled her eyes and released the pair. She was way too jacked up from the mutual heat thing she and Gray had been working earlier. And with the quick get-up-and-go combined with the zero-release, she was cranky in the extreme. And it was this chick's fault. Dillon was pretty sure she could've convinced Gray to stay on top of her and play a round of strip and lick, but they had a commitment to meet Blondie here.
"Thank you for flying Pureblood Veana Airlines," she muttered. "Please don't come again."
Uma laughed. "You're funny." She glanced at Gray. "She's funny."
"Sidesplitting. Literally," Gray said drily. "Let's go." He nodded to Dillon. "You lead the way, Chuckles."
The parking lot was deader than Dillon, and they crossed over it quickly and headed for the back door. Dillon didn't even check to see if it was locked, just kicked the thing in and walked inside. With a quick heartbeat check, she knew they were alone. Except for the roaches and a few spiders as big as her palm hanging from lines of thin, silky rope in the corners of the room.
"How do you know about this entryway?" Gray asked as they bypassed the bar, a few upended tables, and headed toward the back of the building.
"I heard about it somewhere," she said, ducking down the short hallway and into what must have been the manager's office. "You know, Purebloods talk."
"They talk about where Impures are kept to be castrated?" Uma said, the disgust in her tone unmasked.
"It's not a Pureblood's main concern," Dillon said, shoving a massive desk back toward the wall. "Impures serve the Pureblood communities. They don't need their sex drive to do that."
"Christ, D," Gray uttered blackly.
She hated that tone on him, hated it directed straight at her. "I'm not saying it's right or that I agree with it," she returned defensively. "In fact, I think it's total bullshit and another tool by the Order to control anything and anyone." She pulled back the rug that had lain beneath the desk, and a massive dust cloud shot into the air. "Come on; help me with the trapdoor."
"But you don't push to stop it," Uma said, crouching down, ready.
Dillon glanced up and snarled at the female who thought it was in any way okay to lecture her. "Hey-I'm here tonight, aren't I? That's doing something to stop it."
Gray yanked up the thick trapdoor. "Let's go. We're wasting time." He shot her a fierce look. "We don't have all night to listen to you defend the indefensible."
"I don't need to defend anything, Gray," Dillon said caustically, jumping onto the ladder and beginning her decent. "Now, you on the other hand..."
"Christ," he hissed, helping Uma onto the ladder, then jumping on it himself. "This is going to be a long goddamn night."
Uma snorted softly. "You two are like an old mated couple."
"One that continually wants to off each other," Dillon said.
"How much farther?" Gray asked as they jumped down to the dirt floor beneath.
"Just a few floors," Dillon said, flicking on her flashlight and leading them to an elevator. The thing was old, metal, and had strange purple markings on the doors. She pressed the button marked "down."
When the doors opened and they were all inside, Gray said, "How long has this secret passage been here? It's so calculated."
"I have no idea," Dillon returned. Irritation snaked through her veins. How was what the breed and the Order did for kicks suddenly all her fault? If they kept this up, she was going to give them exactly what they seemed to expect from her. Zero help and a whole lot of not-my-problem.
When they hit bottom and the doors opened, all three took their positions. Gray went first. On the alert, his blades out, he searched the long corridor for any sign of life.
"I hear heartbeats, and they're not yours," Dillon said, coming up beside him, Glock in hand. "Maybe a few yards up."
"Remember," Gray reminded them. "Goal is to get as many out as we can without endangering their lives."
"Or ours," Dillon added.
Gray ignored her. "This tunnel seems to drag out farther than we had anticipated," he said, moving quickly down the dark corridor.
"You still think this tunnel comes out between two cages, right?" Uma asked, taking up the rear with two small pistols.
Jogging beside them both, Dillon said, "That's what I remember hearing, but like I told you-it was at a club a hundred years ago, and I haven't made this trip myself. At some point, we'll just have to man up and take it as it comes."
"I see a door up ahead," Gray whispered, and they quickened their pace. "Weapons ready, eyes vigilant."
"There's something," Dillon whispered, her nostrils flaring as she tried to figure out what she was sensing, hearing. Gray had to hear it too. What the hell? "Massive heartbeats...Something's wrong-"
But if Gray heard something, he didn't hesitate, his need to rescue driving him to open the door. The sounds of a full-blown riot met their ears, while the intense metallic scent of blood flooded their nostrils.
Gray pulled back, grabbed Uma, motioned for Dillon, and they all moved into the shadows away from the arena. They'd come out between two massive cells just like Dillon's memory had recalled, cells that housed at least fifty Impures each. Hiding behind a stone pylon, they assessed the situation.
"This is out of control," Dillon whispered loudly over the din. "We've got to go back."
"No," Gray said, his gaze watchful.
"Gray, there's no order here-and I'm not talking about the nine idiots who try to rule us all." She nodded to the cells surrounding the Paleo, where males and females were screaming and banging things on the bars caging them.
"Oh God," Uma cried, her eyes wide and horror filled.
Dillon followed her gaze. In the center of the arena, all eight stone tables were occupied with bound and writhing Impures.
"Look at the ground," Uma said.
Like puzzle pieces, ten or so Impures lay at different angles on the ground surrounding the stone tables. They were moaning, crying as though they'd already felt the fangs of the Order.
"What's happened?" Uma said, shaking her head, the noise nearly deafening now. "I've never seen it like this. It's chaos."
"They're speeding up castrations," Gray shouted over the madness with blatant bitterness. "Fucking Order. We need to get to the ones on the table before the Order members return."
Dillon grabbed his arm. "You've lost your mind. You'll be a dead male the moment you step foot in there. You think they're not watching, not waiting for you?"
He turned, his eyes blazing. "I don't care."
She saw the passion burning there, the blind determination. Christ, he wasn't kidding. He would die for this cause. How could he think that was how this war would be won? She had to reach him. "That's not strategy, Gray-that's suicide. You need to think."
Uma laid her hand on his other arm. "I'll go with you."
Dillon fought down her jaguar's growl and held on to her veana common sense-because truly, she appeared to be the only one with a functioning brain here. "I'm not watching you die."
He jerked his arm from her, his eyes flashing with a fire Dillon wondered if she'd ever understand. Or ever want to. "Then go and wait for us near the exit."
He turned away from her and took off, down the rest of the corridor, then out of sight, Uma after him. Dillon left the shadows of the pylon and stalked back to the door. Goddamn stupid, motherfucking Impures. This wasn't bravery-this was just plain stupid.
She paced by the door, not ready to walk through it, every second ticking off in her head.
Goddamn it! She couldn't just stand here doing nothing while Gray was being captured or killed. Not happy about it, but her decision made, she whipped around and headed back in the direction of the pylon, but she got only five steps when the pair came running at her with two Impures.
"Go!" Gray called out harshly.
No one spoke as they broke through the door and hauled ass down the tunnel. No one looked at one another as they piled in the elevator and shot upward. It was only when they were out of the metal box and hustling down the second tunnel heading for the club that Gray let loose.
"You just don't get it," he said with deep menace as they crawled up through the trapdoor. "What we're doing here."
"I was just supposed to be your ride," Dillon returned sharply.
"Bullshit." He slammed the trapdoor shut and kicked the rug into place. "You wanted in on this job and you choked."
Dillon glared at him. "Because I didn't want to embark on a suicide mission?"
"We're still alive."
"Then you're damn lucky."
His nostrils flared, Gray glanced down at his hands, then back up at her with eyes frozen over with ire. "Yeah, D. Luck and me? We're tight."
"No pity parties, all right?" Dillon snarled. "Everyone's got one to go to. This was stupid and fruitless. What did you manage? A couple bodies. You could've put together something that would've removed a dozen or more."
"With what army?" he yelled back. "We're just lowly Impures, remember? And if we can out one or two, we've done something." Gray turned away from her and led the terrified Impures out of the office and through the nightclub. He burst out of the back door and into the cold night air. "You and me." He shook his head at her. "We're from two different sides of the street."
"Try two different worlds," she bit back.
Barely noticing that there were others present, Gray descended on her, his fangs dropping. "You don't care about anyone but yourself."
"Not true and you know it."
"Right. You care about me."
She stuck a finger in his chest. "That's something."
"That's not enough."
Dillon froze, his words moving like ice water through her veins.
"All right," Uma said behind them. "Easy now. Both of you."
Ignoring her, Gray shook his head, his eyes blazing into Dillon's. "I'm such a fucking fool. Thinking there was something there."
"Like what?" Dillon shot back. "A relationship? Do you not know me at all?" She threw up her hands. "I'm the witch in those fairy tales, Gray-not the princess. There's no happily ever after, no Prince Charming, no true mate lover for life coming for me."
"Well, she's right about that."
Both Gray and Dillon whirled to face Uma. The female stood beside both Impures, who looked confused and exhausted and ready to get the hell out of there. She took a step forward, grabbed Gray's hand and rubbed her thumb over the top.
He hissed.
Dillon snarled. "Touch him again and die."
Uma dropped Gray's hand but didn't step back. Her gaze found Dillon's, and she said with complete calm, "Your true mate's not coming for you, Veana. Because he's already here." She clicked on her flashlight and positioned it over the top of Gray's hand. "I wondered about this, thought I had seen something within your scars. But tonight I saw it flicker under the lights of the Paleo when you were cutting one of the Impures free."
Both Dillon and Gray looked up, confused.
"You're both such idiots," Uma said, shaking her head. "Look!"
Dillon narrowed her eyes on the skin of his hand. "Oh, shit. The mark."
Gray looked up. "It looks like a jaguar."
Uma snorted. "It looks like Dillon. Now can we get the hell out of here?"