Allegiance of Honor (Psy-Changeling #15) - Nalini Singh Page 0,73

in a lot of pain starting today.”

His phone buzzed with an incoming message from Cooper confirming that SnowDancer now owned a ten percent share in a company Ming relied on for supplies for one of his other corporations. Give me six more months, Cooper had written, and we’ll have a fifty-one percent share. The best part is that SnowDancer will make a profit long term even as we freeze out LeBon.

Hawke’s wolf threw back its head inside him and howled in triumph.

Letters to Nina

From the private diaries of Father Xavier Perez

March 28, 2074

Nina,

I haven’t written for many days. The Psy assassin and I have been in the mountains, laying a trail to disguise the path that leads to the hiding place of the villagers the other assassins are coming to murder.

I thought we’d fight, spill blood, but this Psy, he tells me to be intelligent, to stop thinking with an alcohol-soaked brain and to remember that we are only two against an entire death squad.

“We can’t win one on one,” he says. “We can win only by stealth and cunning and being smarter than the enemy.”

I’ve never fought this way, in the shadows. Even when I ran with the human rebels in the first months after our village was sacked, we aimed to do violence against those who’d harm our people. Any rebels who died in the course of our campaign were held up as heroes.

The Psy assassin doesn’t know about the rebel cells. I’ll never betray those men and women to a man who might turn on me without warning. But he said something to me that was eerily apt: “Don’t try to be a hero, Xavier. A dead hero can’t help anyone.”

Xavier

Chapter 21

NIGHT HAD FALLEN by the time Hawke and Judd drove up the final track to the den.

Impatience clawed at Hawke. Searching for something to take his mind off the hunger to see his mate, he said, “What time are you and Brenna heading to Cooper’s territory?” He knew the two had plans to visit friends in the satellite den. “Driving, right?”

Judd shook his head. “We decided to catch a quick flight at eight tomorrow, since our visit’s only going to be a couple of days anyway. It’ll give us more time on the ground.” He brought the vehicle into the underground garage under the den. “Good luck with Sienna.” Unsaid were the words that he’d need it.

Leaving the lieutenant to deal with the vehicle, Hawke jogged from the garage to his and Sienna’s quarters. He was halfway there when he realized the mating bond was tugging him in the opposite direction. Reversing course, he ran out into the night darkness and through the trees for nearly twenty minutes until he saw her standing on a rise, looking out over the fields below.

The moon was full tonight, her body outlined against a sky dotted with stars.

It hit him again, that she was his. His mate. Extraordinary and strong and . . . furious.

Wincing at the look she shot him out of cardinal eyes gone a dangerous black, he braced himself. “Miss me?”

She growled before hauling him close for a kiss, her hands buried in his hair. It was a kiss of claiming, of branding, of angry welcome. Groaning, he had his hands on her hips, his body having turned rock hard in a single pulse, when she pushed him away. “If you ever do that to me again, I won’t forgive you.”

He’d expected anger but not this brittle edge to her voice. “Walker was supposed to talk to you, make sure you knew what was going on.”

“My mate should’ve talked to me.” The obsidian of her gaze flickered with a translucent flame, her tone flat.

Hawke’s gut twisted; this wasn’t anger. It was deeper, harder. “You would’ve wanted to come and there was no way in hell I was taking you.” Even the idea of her anywhere near Ming made his wolf threaten to turn into a primal killing machine.

“Look at this!” Sienna held out a hand, on which danced a red and amber flame. “I’m not helpless! I’m the least helpless person in the world!”

Hawke thrust his hands into her hair, gripped. “But you’re mine to protect!” His heart pounded like a bass drum. “If anything happened to you—”

He couldn’t say it, couldn’t even think it. “I’ve lost too many people, baby. I can’t lose you.”

When Sienna cupped his face, her hands were fierce and gentle both. “You won’t. We’re in this together.” Her nails dug a