What the hell had happened?
She gathered her clothes together. Jeans and socks, a bulky sweater. Enough clothes that he wouldn't lose his mind, he had warned her.
She slipped into the bathroom, uncertain what to think, what to feel. Uncertain who or what the animal was that her lover had turned into.
* * *
"Fuck." Dane came around with a slow, slurred curse as Mercury dropped his hands from the wall and turned back to the room.
He stalked across the room, jerked a clean shirt from the dresser that had had its top cracked clean through, and tugged it on over his head.
It was tighter than normal. His jaw clenched. Feral displacement.
He pushed his fingers through his hair and fought it back. The need to kill was like a hunger burning inside him. He turned and focused on Ryan DeSalvo and Dane Vanderale, and his lips tugged into a primal, silent snarl.
"They slipped into the f**king room," he bit out. "Nothing but shadow and they thought I wouldn't attack?"
Ryan lifted his gaze from his boss, and Mercury saw the suspicion in his eyes. Just as he saw it in everyone else's.
"He's right." Ryan shook his head and breathed out roughly. "Dane slipped in. He likes to play games with Ria. Hell, he thought it would be funny to scare the hell out of her. We didn't know she had company until we were already in the room."
"Li'l witch never has company." Dane chose that moment to cough out the accusation. "She's so damned grouchy no one can put up with her long enough to stay in a bed all night beside her." He cracked his eyes opened and focused on Mercury. "Figures it's you."
Callan's growl was intimidating, furious. "You slipped past her guards, broke into her cabin and thought for one damned minute that you could sneak up on the Breed sleeping with her?" He jerked to his feet, his long tawny hair unrestrained and flowing around his shoulders. "Son of a bitch. Do you know what? Vanderale can shove its f**king money because I'm sick of your games." He jabbed his finger toward Dane. "Obviously genetics f**ked up with you, Dane, because anyone of the first Leo would have better sense."
"Hybrid," Ryan snorted. "Just wait, Lyons, you'll find out what fun raising a hybrid is."
"He tries to slip up on me again and he'll find out how a hybrid dies," Mercury snapped, barely in control, but hanging on to it as Dane sat up slowly.
"Get him out of here." Jonas rose to his feet, his gaze meeting Mercury's, his silver eyes flat and hard. "Out to the living room and patch his ass up before I finish it off for him."
He ran his hands over his short hair, and Mercury's jaw bunched as they helped the other Breed to his feet.
"Dane." That growl was still in his voice.
Dane turned his head painfully, wincing at the movement.
"Invade our bedroom again without warning, and I'll kill you."
"You're not killing anyone. If you were, you would have done it tonight." Ria stepped from the bathroom.
Mercury swung around, and something inside him stilled instantly.
She wasn't pale or crying. Her eyes glittered with irritation, and a flush of anger mounted her cheeks. She was dressed in jeans and a bulky sweater and there was nothing to threaten whatever primal rage had built inside him at the thought of her nakedness being revealed in front of the others.
But she wasn't happy with him either. He could hear it in her voice, seeing it in the look she shot him.
"Hell," Dane muttered. "Rye, did we bring the knapsack?"
Rye grimaced. "It's in the living room."
"Don't worry." Dane was limping as they helped him from the room. "I have your f**king bribe."
CHAPTER 13
Ria laid her bling on the cabinet. It was quite a nice haul: several nearly perfect diamonds, emeralds so brilliant they were nearly blinding and a tiger's-eye stone that swirled with magic and majesty.
She slid the stones into a velvet bag, tied it off and tucked it into the pocket of her jeans, then flipped her sat phone closed and erased the speed dial set to go straight to Leo's emergency number. Her threat to Dane. Had the bribe not pleased her, she would have called and tattled to hell and back.