Allegiance of Honor (Psy-Changeling #15) - Nalini Singh Page 0,75

that was almost Psy—except for the fury behind it, the rage Hawke could all but taste.

“Katya shot him in the head. The fucker survived.”

Running a hand down the sexy curve of his mate’s back as the memory of Dev’s angry words echoed through his mind, he said, “Arrows have to hate him, too.” That would’ve been easy enough to guess with the defection of the squad from under Ming’s leadership, even without Judd’s close connection to current active-duty Arrows.

“Hmm.” Sienna tapped her kiss-swollen lower lip with a finger. “SnowDancer can blindside Ming a few times, but eventually he’s going to figure out all our major business entities and start to avoid anything where we could have an impact.”

Hawke bared his teeth. “That’s satisfying on its own.” It would mean the pack was forcing Ming to make financial decisions that weren’t in his best interest.

“Yes, but if we get a few other people involved . . .”

Hawke wasn’t used to playing with people outside his pack—and okay, Lucas, since the cat had proven his loyalty to the blood bond between the two packs. But he could see the positives of Sienna’s idea. “Enough people in on this and it’ll become very difficult for Ming to predict who might have an interest in what—or who might develop an interest.”

Sienna nodded. “Dev has financial expertise but I’m not sure about the Arrows—I know Judd didn’t get any financial training as an Arrow. He learned what he did on his own. We don’t want to put anyone in a bad position.”

Hawke nipped at her lips just because, growled when she dug her nails into him in response. It wasn’t a complaint. “This is only fun if everyone but Ming comes out a winner,” he agreed. “I’ll ask Judd to check whether the Arrows have someone with financial smarts. We have people we can lend them if they don’t.” He ran one hand through the dark ruby fire of Sienna’s hair. Yes, his wolf thought, this is better. Working with my mate, coming up with ideas together.

Smiling at him, she ran a finger down his nose. “I feel your wolf prowling in there. You want to run? I have to do a sweep anyway.”

“Yes.” The wolf wanted her fingers in its fur, wanted to nip at her with its teeth, play with her under the moonlight.

Pushing off him, Sienna held out a hand. He took his time rising, enjoying the sight of her nude body kissed by the moonlight and clothed only in the beautiful hair he loved to play with in either form. Her smile, though, that was the most beautiful part of her. He kept that image in his mind as he shifted, the wrenching pain and stunning ecstasy of the shift rippling through him as his body exploded into millions of particles of light, then reformed in another shape.

It was still him. Always. In either form.

He shook his body to settle his fur into place, discovered his mate was pulling on her jeans. Picking up her T-shirt while her back was turned, he started to pad away.

“Hawke!” Her outraged cry came a second later. “Give that back!”

Huffing in laughter, he upped his pace.

An infuriated scream echoed on the air currents, but Sienna didn’t come after him. When he glanced back, he saw her pulling on his shirt—which happened to be torn down one side thanks to her angry, impatient hands earlier. Using the torn halves, she tied the shirt off at the side of her abdomen, then smirked at him and picked up his jeans.

“Guess you don’t need these?” she said before balling them up and throwing them over the side of the rise.

Dropping her T-shirt, he loped back to her and, without warning, nipped her butt. She yelped, clamped a hand over the part he’d bitten, turned to look at him with temper in her eyes. “You are in trouble.”

Fire arced a half centimeter from his nose.

Making a sound more common to a startled pup than a tough-as-nails alpha, he jumped back . . . to hear his mate laughing so hard she could barely take a breath. When he growled again, she just laughed harder. And then she was on her knees and her hands were in his fur and she was pressing her face to his while the jeweled dark red of her hair fell around him and life was perfect.

• • •

HAWKE kept Sienna company all night on her security shift. After their run through the area assigned