"You want love." He nodded slowly, as though he could possibly understand that. "A commitment."
"And what's wrong with that?" She opened her own beer and took a quick drink. She needed something to settle her nerves.
"There's nothing wrong with it, Ria," he answered softly. "But what makes you automatically think I'm not capable of caring for you? Not that I'm saying I do." He suddenly frowned. "But I'm not incapable of it just because I'm a Breed."
"No, because you've already mated. I've read your file, Mercury. Any other woman will always be second best," Ria answered, keeping her voice soft, quiet. "I don't do second best real well."
As she met his gaze, his eyes darkened and narrowed, chilling in their appraisal.
"Mating is a chemical reaction," he snapped. "It doesn't mean I'm dead or that my emotions were lobotomized."
"No, it means sex will always be just that, sex."
"And there's something wrong with that?" he growled. He really growled. It wasn't just a deeper tone as it was with some men, it was an actual rumble of sound, a rough, graveled scraping of his voice.
"It's all according to your point of view." She sipped at the beer again, using it to distract herself from the fierce frown on his face. "For me, sex has to mean more. I have to feel more than just arousal." And she had been feeling more than just that, for this Breed, for far too many weeks now.
"You've never had a one-night stand?"
"Not by choice," she retorted. "Look, this isn't a debate. It's my choice. I choose not to have sex with you. See why I didn't want you here? Why I preferred a woman to stay with me rather than you? I knew you would harass me over this."
"Harass you?" He came out of his seat, the relaxed facade dropping in the blink of an eye. "I have yet to harass you. I simply want answers."
"Tell it to someone who will believe you." She rolled her eyes at the declaration. "Come on, Merc. You want sex. And you don't care what you have to do to get me in bed, you'll do it. Forget how it might hurt me, or how it will affect how I do my job." She stopped then, her eyes narrowing. "Or is that the point? Are you trying to influence my decision where the Breed funding is concerned?"
Anger snapped in his eyes and it wasn't a comfortable sight. But neither was the heartache awaiting her. She needed to belong. She could never belong to this man because he had already lost that part of himself that could belong to a woman.
"Do I look like Jonas's f**king gigolo?" he snarled.
Ria propped her hand on her hip as she set the beer down with a thump and faced him.
"Oh, just go ahead and pretend he's not above it," she charged. "It wouldn't be the first time one of his enforcers has seduced a mark to get what Jonas wanted. He's cold, calculating and manipulative. And he lets nothing and no one stand in the way of what he wants. Go ahead and deny it."
Jonas is his father's son, Dane liked to drawl in amusement. Jonas Wyatt was created from sperm collected from Leo before his escape from the labs a century before. From the reports she had read on the director of Breed affairs, he possibly had all of Leo's worst traits. He was damned scary.
"I am not a goddamned puppet for Jonas Wyatt," Mercury snarled. And damn if he didn't do a good snarl.
He was pissed.
"Then why the sudden pressure to sleep with you? I've been here a month and you're just now getting to the hot looks and the flirty little comments?"
"You wanted me to jump you the first day? Damn, wish I had known that, because all I could think about was bending you over that desk, shoving that damned shapeless skirt over your ass and watching my c**k sink balls-deep into your hot little pu**y." His lips lifted in a snarl as he flashed his incisors at her. "Sorry, baby, thought you might need a small amount of time there to get to know me."
The image was flashing through her head. Oh God, she would never be able to sit at that desk comfortably again.
"Pervert," she said accusingly, fighting for a defense against him. Against the fact that he had been, what was the antiquated term for it? Courting her?
"Pervert?" he growled. "That's not perverted, sweetheart, but I can work on it if that's what you want."
Her teeth snapped together, her lips pressing into a thin line as she restrained the angry, passionate words rising to her mouth. She wanted to berate him. Wanted to assure him she wanted nothing to do with his mangy Breed hide. Unfortunately, it wasn't the truth. And he could probably smell a lie anyway. God, she hated Breeds.
"Don't put yourself out," she finally forced out. "Better yet, try not to think about me at all. This is insane."
"Insane is being so damned hard I'm about to bust through my uniform." He swiped his hand through his hair before jerking his beer from the table and taking a healthy drink. "Insane is smelling that hot pu**y wanting me and trying to ignore it. If you want me to back off, then maybe you better see what you can do about not getting aroused around me."
She was mortified.
"I hate Breeds," she muttered. "Do you know that? You and your sharp, damned noses. Just because I want to doesn't mean I should. Hell, I want cheesecake but I know better. It goes right to my hips. Does that mean I have to eat it anyway?"