sideways to the gurney behind me. “You’re getting very close to a full heat, you know. Your lover’s pheromones have been playing havoc with your reproductive system. Already, there’s been a considerable change to vaginal blood flow and elasticity.”
“What?”
If you’d dipped me in ice cold water and then tossed me out in the snow, you wouldn’t have gotten close to the chill I felt run through me. My fingers plucked limply at the white cotton fabric.
“Not especially pretty,” the sneering prick said, “but much more efficient for what’s coming. Things are changing, you are changing, little animage, and soon the feel of anything other than my test subjects against your skin will be abhorrent. No need to fit you out in your drab little jeans and T-shirt ensemble when they’re just going to rip it off.”
There was so much happening and being said, it was almost impossible to know what to look at next. Stuart… I wanted to rake my eyes across him, stab my gaze into his unsettled eyes, stop them from flicking around like a beaten dog, and make him fucking face what he’d done to me. Vaginal samples… My hand was shaking when it slid down my thigh, not willing to go any closer. I couldn’t…
A slamming of fists on the glass walls further down yanked my attention away, a huge, tall black man standing there in just a flimsy pair of scrubs pants, his massive fists pummelling the barrier over and over, like the beating of a bass drum. The measure was picked up by others down the line, man after man.
“Must be somewhat heady,” Hollingsworth said, “having all that testosterone directed at you. Something that will only grow as you go into your first heat.” His eyes slid to the other cages. “Don’t worry, I’ll be introducing you to each of my studs, to see who you’re compatible with. It's a symbol of the barbarism of the two-skinned, that females must achieve orgasm to become pregnant, but that is no impediment. I had intended to bring you here, introduce you to the subjects, then wait until you showed signs of coming into season before extracting you, but right when I thought you’d slipped from my fingers, you were doing my dirty work for me.”
His grin broadened as his eyes shifted up, the hand landing on my shoulder telling me what caught his attention. He nodded to Jai, that shit-eating smirk still plastered on his face, before turning on his heel and stalking out.
“Come, Wilson,” he said.
“You’re gonna do this? Seriously?” I asked, hating the thread of panic in my voice, the pleading hope. But my former boss just avoided my gaze, keeping it trained on the floor.
“You’re not human, Shannon. I’ve seen that with my own eyes in the clinic. I need to find out what the hell you are, see what it means, for humanity, for the world. Shifters, animages…” He shook his head. “Like an apex predator, you’re getting crowded out. This is my last chance to study you. To save you.”
“By caging me?” My voice cracked on the words. I hadn’t, couldn’t deal with what had happened. My eyes saw the cages and the shifter men, but my brain wasn’t processing it. “Stuart, we used to go to the pub on Friday nights and sing karaoke. I always brought you an espresso on the mornings we worked late. I—”
“Controlled animals with your mind, changed them, melded them to your will. There's a point-one percent difference in the genetic makeup of humans and chimpanzees. Who’s to know when that 'twist’ of yours jumps across to sentient creatures? Don’t do this, ask me for your freedom. It won’t be me that gives it to you.”
“Shannon,” Jai said, his voice rusty and rough. He drew me back so my body leaned against his, but for all his warm strength, I could feel the shift and wobble in his limbs. “It’ll be OK.”
I heard the words and felt the push of emotion inside them, coming from a much-weakened version of his alpha whip, but I couldn’t believe them, not for a second. I looked down the line of cages, and eyes all along met mine. Jai’s hand clamped down when he felt me shiver.
Chapter 22
“It’ll be OK,” Jai said, rubbing his hands up and down my arms. The fact that he’d said that more than once was a worry. Well, that and the fact that we were locked up in a glass box along with a