that the serum did something to you. It changed you.”
“This isn’t possible. I mean, I know Gray is a shifter. I all but shit my pants when he showed me his animal. And he definitely…changed since he…well, since he changed. I never thought it was possible. The science behind this is dizzying. How can a simple serum take my musculature and physiology and morph it into something else? The laws of nature and genetics are being mocked.”
The air took another sharp nosedive. The smell was bitter, and it made his heart ache. He faced Dakota, sniffing at the air around her.
“You smell bad,” he mumbled to himself.
Dakota took a step back as if he had burned her with his words. “Oh,” she whispered. “I’m sorry. I’ll go get the docs. They can help you figure this out.”
She went to leave, but with speed and agility he didn’t know he had, Bennett chased after her, his arm reaching for her wrist.
“No. Don’t go. I didn’t mean that you smell bad. It’s the air. It went from being all you, all chamomile and flowers to…something sharp and unpleasant.”
“Yeah. That’s going to take some getting used to. You can smell emotions. Or something like that.”
He nodded as if he understood, as if that made any sort of sense at all. It didn’t. Especially not then when he seemed to be so very far from Dakota.
“Please don’t go. Not yet. I would like to go back to bed.” Bennett was surprised that those words had even left his mouth. Had he just asked Dakota to get into bed with him? Judging by the high color of her cheeks, that’s precisely what he had done. He didn’t even have it in him to be embarrassed.
He took her hand in his, and he led her to the bed where he laid them down. Dakota went willingly. She nestled into his side, laying her head on his chest and with her palm over his heart.
“I really thought you were going to die,” she whispered. “That’s why I gave you the serum. I was trying to save your life. I had no idea this would happen.”
“I could have told you it would. This happened to Gray. It’s why he has the serum. He’s experimenting on it, and he wants me to help him with his research to see if there are elements from shifter DNA that we could extrapolate from the serum to combat cancer.”
“Well, that sounds crazy smart. Is that why the bad guys came to get it? Because there are things in the serum that can help?”
“I’d guess that it’s more along the lines of how the serum can be weaponized. Gray had his own issues with that.”
There was a long pause during which Bennett knew he should be assessing the situation. Before the attack, he and Dakota had just about been ready to call Nick and Gray to try and understand why Dakota had been followed.
This was a whole new ballgame. She hadn’t just been stalked home like a prey. She had been attacked. He had nearly died. This made the fight personal. It wasn’t even about the injuries that had been inflicted on him.
It was that they had put Dakota in danger. He would have none of that.
“Did you get hurt?” he asked as he rubbed her back softly. The fabric of her tee felt abrasive on his fingers. What he wanted to touch was her skin.
He felt her shrug beside him. “Not really. I was shot a couple of times, but shifters heal fast. I don’t even have the scars to prove that I am a badass tigress who took down three armed men.”
“You don’t need scars for that. That was very impressive.”
“Thanks,” she whispered. “Doesn’t quite feel like that. There are dead bodies in the house. The docs have rolled them into the freezer in the garage. That doesn’t exactly scream I’m-a-successful-protection-agent.”
He didn’t mean to chuckle, but he did. “Don’t you see you did exactly what you were paid to do? The house was under siege, and you defended it. I was injured, and you found a way to get me help.”
“I guess. I just didn’t think I was going to be dealing with quite so many dead bodies in this job, you know? I thought that I’d have a few easy gigs before Nick really eased me into the hardcore shit.”
“He must trust you,” he insisted.
“Or he had no fucking clue what was going to happen.”
Bennett thought about this for a