She jolted and immediately slapped one hand to the back of her neck where they’d found the first chip.
“It won’t be there,” he said, moving across the room to her with long, purposeful strides.
“Then where?” She swept her own hands up and down her body as if just by looking for the damn thing she would find it.
“Rune says that Terri’s second tracker was discovered under her left breast.”
Shea’s arms instinctively came up over her breasts in a protective gesture that was as futile as it was understandable. “But they didn’t give me an injection there. I would have known . . .”
He hated seeing that look on her face. The expression that was both furious and filled with sorrow. If he could have, Torin would have returned to that prison where Shea had been held and torn it down brick by brick until there wasn’t a single stone left standing.
“They could have knocked you out for the procedure.”
“But I’d remember—”
“Not necessarily. If it’s there, Shea, we have to find it.”
Slowly, she lowered her arms, took a breath and bit down on her bottom lip. “I know. It’s just—never mind.”
He watched as different emotions raced across her face, each one appearing and disappearing so fast he could hardly identify them. But he felt her distress. Felt the tangle of fear and anger and grief knotting inside her. Torin didn’t want to admit that he might be the cause of her misery. “Don’t dismiss it. What’s bothering you? The fact that I killed those men who attacked you?”
She looked up at him and shook her head. “No. No, Torin. I know why you did it. I just . . . hate all of this. I hate being hunted. I hate that I can’t remember what I need to. I hate feeling so out of control.”
Torin smiled. “I didn’t hear you say you hate me. I think we’re making progress.”
Shea laughed a little. “I never hated you, Torin. You scared the crap out of me, but I never hated you. And now . . .”
“Now?”
“I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“You’ll never have to find out,” he vowed. “I promise you. I will be with you through all of this. You can depend on me.”
“I know,” she said, forcing a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.
“Shea, I have to find that tracker.”
She nodded, waved one hand in front of herself and instantly her clothes disappeared.
Hunger roared through him at the sight of her and he was pleased she had finally dispensed with her sense of modesty before him. Then he smiled, both at the view of her luscious naked body and at the display of her burgeoning control of her powers. “You’re getting better. Stronger.”
“Practice makes perfect,” she said on a choked-off laugh. “God, Torin, just find it.”
He moved in close, his gaze dropping to her left breast, where the mating tattoo was inexorably growing. The tiny red flames now formed a circle around her areola and were sweeping down in a delicate curve, following the swell of her breast and snaking toward her back, where they would eventually curve up and over her shoulder.
Pride filled him. This was his mark. The mark they had made together. And the shadow of her brand now stained his skin in the same pattern, proclaiming them a unit. Two halves of the same whole. His cock stirred, ready to claim her again. To coax more of those burning flames into life on her skin. To feel the heat of her pulling at him.
His fingertips traced the flames and he lifted his gaze to hers. He read a matching passion stirring in her emerald eyes and in response, his cock went to stone.
She reached up and held his hand to her breast, pushing herself into his touch and sighing at the cool glide of skin against skin.
“Touch me first, Torin,” she said, near breathless. “Then find the tracker. I need you. I need to feel you inside me. Wipe away the screams and the fire and the crazy people chasing us.”
His thumb and forefinger squeezed her nipple until she groaned. “I want you,” he whispered. “I always want you. I wake in a fever to touch you and sleep dreaming of you. You are the witch who holds my heart.”
She snapped her fingers and he was naked, his aching body on proud display for her. Shea smiled and reached for him, folding her fingers around his heavy thickness. Torin hissed in a