Allegiance of Honor (Psy-Changeling #15) - Nalini Singh Page 0,56
iron hands? As for physical intimacy . . .
She shuddered, banishing those thoughts far, far from her mind. “Quiet,” she ordered when her mate chuckled with a knowing glint in his eye. “Shall we go see Mercy tomorrow afternoon since you’ll be off-shift?”
Vaughn’s thigh bunched under the hand she’d placed on it. “No. She’ll just complain about exploding any day soon.” It was a bad-tempered growl. “I’ve never seen a woman be so bad at pregnancy.”
“It’s only been the last few weeks, when she can’t be as active as usual.” Even Mercy’s sentinel-fit body had said “Enough” at that point. “You know she’d like the company, and I know you miss her now that you don’t run into her on patrol.”
Vaughn growled again but muttered that he’d stop by a bakery and pick up Mercy’s favorite upside-down pineapple cake.
Faith smiled, wondering if they could steal Naya again and take her along on the visit. But her smile faded as she considered what had happened tonight. “You think Tanique’s reading will help?”
“Edward’s Pier doesn’t sound like an official name,” Vaughn said. “If it was put up on private land, it won’t be easy to find.” He shrugged, the movement quintessentially feline. “But it’s a whole lot more than BlackSea had before.” Golden eyes locked with hers for a primal heartbeat. “Now we see how well they hunt.”
Letters to Nina
From the private diaries of Father Xavier Perez
March 22, 2074
Nina,
I keep writing these letters knowing they’ll die with me, but I can’t stop. You’re the one to whom I always told my secrets. Now I have another one: I spoke to a man in the bar five minutes ago.
Not a man. A soldier. A Psy.
Like the ones who came to our village, came to annihilate because we refused to allow them to strangle all trade in the region, cutting us off from our livelihoods. The only difference is that this Psy looks even more dangerous. I drank tequila and I told him about the murderous evil of his people.
He thought I was drunk, that I didn’t know to whom I spoke.
He was wrong.
I can see him still from my new position in the very back of the bar. He’s waiting for whoever it is he’s come to see. Dressed in civilian clothing, he’s trying to blend in, is fooling most people, but I know the way Psy soldiers walk and I know the way their eyes scan a room.
I’m going to kill him.
I can hear you in my head, telling me not to commit this mortal sin, but the drink and the blood and the grief have washed away my faith. All I want is vengeance. If I can’t get the men and women who took you from me, took everyone I ever loved away from me, then I’ll take their brethren.
Xavier
Chapter 15
MERCY AND THE always-ravenous pupcubs were having a good couple of days. Not only had Vaughn and Faith brought cake and news and Naya yesterday, today Mercy and the football team inside her were getting all kinds of delicious. As for Naya and her pride in being able to shift, “adorable” didn’t begin to describe it.
Far more mobile in her leopard form, Mercy had shifted, too, and played gentle games with her alpha’s cub. Because, pregnant or not, she could still shift. Scientists had been trying to figure out the whys of that particular trick for centuries, but so far, all anyone could say was that because a changeling was meant to be both forms, a pregnant changeling who shifted also took control of the cells of her embryo or fetus and shifted that embryo or fetus with her.
Despite that, Mercy had worried about shifting the first time after she found out she was pregnant because it was possible the pupcubs weren’t built to shift into the same animal as her. But not only had Lara and Tamsyn both reassured her nothing would go wrong, she’d known that not shifting would cause far more harm to her, and thus to her pupcubs.
She’d shifted.
And the pupcubs had continued to grow, happy in either form.
Yesterday, she’d been certain she could feel their delight as Faith and Vaughn played with Naya alongside Mercy. Her jaguar packmate had taken his animal form, while a barefoot Faith had happily tumbled in the grass with Naya. Then Riley had returned from a run to get Mercy something she’d been craving; he joined in and the day had turned from almost perfect to perfect.