“You’re all a bunch of idiots when it comes to women.” She snorted, her voice rougher.
“Roane didn’t have the balls to tell Caitlyn he loved her. You two,” she said to her mates, “danced around each other and me for years. And now, Derrick’s afraid of a female he could break in half.”
Derrick opened his mouth to snap at her but quickly closed it when Ace shook his head violently behind her.
“You males are so incredibly dense,” Kelly continued, inciting Caitlyn to join the conversation.
“That’s the truth. Derrick, you have to trust a woman someday. And don’t start. I know you trust Kelly and me, but that’s because we’re safe. You aren’t really invested in us the way you’re going to be with your mate.”
“Christ.” Derrick passed his hand over his head, wondering why the hell these women were ganging up on him.
His mother, his cheating ex-fiancée, all the women he’d met since becoming a Circ who he could barely stand for more than fucking, had all let him down. Except for Caitlyn and Kelly, he at times wondered if he even liked women for anything other than sex. They were too emotional. They liked to talk things to death. And they turned simple into complicated with a look.
“Yes, well, you make some excellent points, Kelly,” Doc said gently, leading her away from the group toward the door. He motioned for her mates to accompany her. “I think you three need some alone time,” Derrick heard him say under his breath to Zack as they passed.
“She feels hot to me.”
Unfortunately, the rest of them heard it…before feeling it as well.
“Shit, another heat,” Hale groaned.
Before he could say another word, Caitlyn pounced on Roane. Her eyes were huge in her face, her sexual hunger apparent as she gave him one hell of a kiss and then eyed Hale like a slice of dessert.
“Come on, Hale,” Roane said with a sigh. “When she gets like this, there’s no talking to her.”
Derrick felt the same urge to fuck, but he couldn’t leave Sabrina. More than anything, he wanted to spread her thighs and take her again and again until she couldn’t walk. But seeing her lying there, so still and vulnerable, hardened his resolve. He’d force the damned woman to accept Doc’s help, no matter what he had to do to make her.
“I’m staying here,” he said to no one in particular.
“Good idea,” Roane answered, sparing him little attention, his focus on his mate and his second in command. Lust turned his eyes from brown to black, and Derrick caught the glint of fangs when Roane smiled. “She’s all yours, D. Your responsibility, bro. Don’t fuck up.” Hearing Roane, their leader, acknowledge Derrick’s claim on the woman -- not claim, responsibility for, he reminded his beast -- filled him with satisfaction. “No problem.” Hale complained, “Why does he get to sit with the pretty girl while I’m manhandled by the mean one?”
Caitlyn laughed, a rough sound signaling she was close to changing. “You think I’m mean? That woman nearly snapped my neck in two.” Roane growled, but Caitlyn pushed him and Hale ahead of her toward the door. “Believe it or not, my beast likes her. That’s not to say I wouldn’t mind some payback, but she might just fit here. We need to work on her subordination in the grand scheme of things, but I have a good feeling about her.”
“Bullshit,” Roane argued and tried to stop moving toward the exit, despite the erection clearly visible between his legs, but Caitlyn wouldn’t let him.
She shoved him and Hale out the door and winked at Derrick over her shoulder, leaving him alone with Sabrina and Doc.
“Finally. I thought they’d never leave.” Doc wiped his forehead with his sleeve. “The mating heat in those females packs a wallop, even to us mere mortals.” He gave Derrick a knowing look. “Interesting you’re able to resist its lure.” Derrick ignored the jab even as he realized his need to procreate had faded with the departure of both women. The scent of Sabrina calmed him in a way he found both relaxing and worrisome. Pulling up a stool, he sat next to Sabrina while Doc maneuvered around the lab. The older man returned to Sabrina’s side in no time.
“I’m only going to take a bit more of her blood so I have something to work with. But I’m not going to force her to undergo experimental treatments.” Doc grimaced. “I saw too much of that with Elliot.”
As Doc worked on Sabrina, Derrick chatted with him, the familiarity of Doc’s soothing voice further putting him at ease. Doc talked about the weather, Kelly’s baby, Roane’s growing strength, his brother Elliot…
“What?” Derrick stared in horror at a man he considered to be beyond reproach.
“It’s true. Elliot Pearl is my half brother.” The room remained silent for the minute it took Derrick to process Doc’s words.
He swore. “We’ve been with you for eight years, Doc. You think you might have mentioned this before.”
“I know.” Doc continued to avert his gaze.
“The others know?”
Doc nodded. “I told Hale, Roane, and Caitlyn earlier. I’m sure they’ve told the others by now.”
Derrick was shell-shocked. He trusted his squad and Doc in particular. It was as if a cornerstone of his very foundation were crumbling. Sabrina, Doc, what the hell other surprises were in store tonight? “Wait a goddamned minute,” he growled, pointing at Doc.
“You’re telling me you and Elliot worked together to create unstable Circs? That you knew they would go insane and --”
“No,” Doc interrupted, his voice firm, and finally met Derrick’s gaze. “I never knew about the problems we’d face. Everything you’ve known about me is true, except for my ‘relationship’ with Elliot. I can’t help the nature of my birth. He and I were never very close.
We shared the same mother. She divorced his father a few years before she met mine. He and I were never friendly, but we shared an aptitude and interest in science. And that’s all there was to it.”
“You two just happened to work together on Project Dawn.” Derrick’s sarcasm wasn’t lost on Doc, who flushed a bright red. Dammit. He liked the man. And as much as he didn’t want to, he liked Sabrina. The story of my fucking life. I’m drawn to assholes who want to leave me or kill me.
“Derrick, I’m sorry to tell you like this. Trust me. I’ve wanted to tell everyone for a very long time, but with all you’d gone through, I knew you’d never trust me if I confessed the truth. At first, I told myself it was because I wanted to help you all, and I wanted you to trust me. But the more I lied, the more I found I liked not facing a link to Elliot.
“He’s my brother, a man I neither like nor respect. He’s a genius in his field, but a man with no moral compass. I’ve tried to appeal to his sense of fairness, but he has none.” Doc’s blue eyes clouded with what looked like remorse. “He’s a very sad man, as much as he’s a monster. Do you know he e-mails me with advice about you five?”
“And what do you tell him?” Derrick couldn’t help his suspicions, and he hated himself for it. If Doc had really wanted to screw them, he could have done it ten times over by now.
Still, Derrick hated lies. Coming from Doc, they were a perversion. Doc was his mentor, his friend, hell, a pseudofather.
“Derrick, do you really think I’d tell Elliot anything? Really?” Derrick had to look away from Doc’s piercing gaze. “No. But I don’t like this.”
“How do you think I feel? I hate that I’m related to a man who does what Elliot does.
Derrick, he experiments on people. If you knew half of what I read in that file… Which is why I can’t, and won’t, do anything to Sabrina without her consent. And if you think about it, I’ve never done anything to you and the others against your will, either.”
“I guess.”
“I admit,” he said with a faint flush, “that I misled Kelly about the shots she was receiving. But that was a decision her mother made, one I didn’t agree with, but respected all the same.”
“I know, Doc,” Derrick said with a gentleness to put the man’s mind at ease. Kelly had told them all how she’d come to be a Circ. She’d been infected at a young age, but her mother hadn’t wanted her exposed to Pearl. So she’d convinced Doc to block her daughter’s change. Doc had, until Kelly’s body refused to suppress her beast any longer.
“I’m sorry.” Doc sighed. “I shouldn’t have lied to you, to any of you. But I was afraid if I said anything, you’d leave.” Doc took an unsteady breath. “You’ve become my family. I don’t know what I’d do without you all.”
Derrick started to panic. Sensitive, controlled Doc looked on the verge of tears. Shit.
“Doc, man, it’s okay. I believe you.” He took Doc’s shoulders under his hands, acutely aware of how easy it would be to crush the smaller man. His beast reared its head, wanting to protect, further convincing Derrick that Doc was on their side. “Doc, it was just a shock, okay? With you and Sabrina, well, I’m confused enough as it is. You know?” Doc smiled, blinking away tears. “Actually, I understand. I’ve felt the same way myself, Derrick.”
Derrick knew he referred to his quiet relationship with Diego -- their cook -- Doc’s best friend and lover. Diego and Doc had been together for as long as Derrick had known the man. He wondered what that felt like, to have such a tight, loving bond.
“It’s not that I think of Sabrina like a mate,” he hurried to argue. He didn’t need another woman in his life. Hell, he didn’t trust Sabrina at all. At least with his other troubled relationships, he’d begun on a positive note. And look at how those had ended.
“Derrick, you don’t need to convince me.”
He wasn’t sure, but it looked like Doc tried to hide a smile. “Good.” Sabrina stirred, taking his attention.
“I gave her some of this to counteract the sedative.” Doc held up a syringe. He turned to Sabrina. “Sabrina? Can you hear me?”
Her eyelids fluttered and then opened, revealing light gray eyes that reminded Derrick of diamonds. “Doc?”
“Sabrina, give it a few moments. Your vision and faculties will start to clear.” He turned to Derrick. “Derrick, help her sit up.”
Derrick put his arm under her back, his energy pooling where their skin made contact.
Was it his imagination, or did she lean closer on purpose? He felt her sniff him, and then the woman curled into his chest. Shit. There went his heart again, racing like crazy.
“Derrick?” Doc asked, his mouth open. “Are you purring?” Derrick wanted to crawl through the floor. “Yes,” he hissed. “And you can’t tell the others, okay? I catch enough shit about her as it is.” He nodded toward Sabrina, resting in his arms like a contented kitten. He stroked her back, wanting to put her at ease while she regained her wits. But only to even the playing field. I hate weak women, and I can’t fairly defeat this enemy if she’s facedown and knocked out.
His beast cried bullshit, but he knew better than to give it its way. He’d already fucked the hell out of the woman for hours. Instead of pushing her out of his system, he’d damn well become addicted to her. Some help his beast turned out to be.
Sabrina muttered something against his chest, then leaned back to look up at him.
“What?” he asked.
“Why do you always smell like cinnamon?”
“Why do you smell like apples?” he countered.
Stymied, they stared at one another until Doc cleared his throat.
“Sabrina? I need your permission to run some tests --” Before he could finish, Sabrina was shaking her head. “No way.”
“Sabrina, you haven’t changed yet, and I’m worried. What Elliot did to you may not be reversible, but we can work on fixing the broken aspects of the mutation.”
“He hasn’t managed that in four years,” she scoffed.
“Princess, let him finish,” Derrick interrupted, annoyed she wasn’t giving Doc a chance. “You want to be a mindless monster that kills for fun?” When she blanched, he continued, “Then give Doc a shot. What do you have to lose?”
“My freakin’ mind?”
“What there is of it,” Derrick muttered and grinned at the curses she uttered. She was so damned cute when riled. Not cute, dangerous. Appealing, his beast countered, and he mentally counted to ten to control his unruly thoughts. Just because he wanted to help a fellow Circ didn’t mean he’d forgotten anything. She was still the enemy, still a woman he didn’t -- wouldn’t -- trust.
“Sabrina,” Doc tried again. “Without any help, you will lose control of yourself. Despite not wanting to, you’ll hurt people. You’ll be stronger and faster than many of our squad. Do you want to chance hurting Caitlyn or Kelly? After all you went through to save Kelly’s baby from Elliot, do you want to be the one who kills her child?” Sabrina scowled, and Derrick could smell the fear drifting from her pores. “Fine. You do what you have to, but don’t let me hurt Kelly or Caitlyn.” She gave Derrick a shuttered glance. “Or anyone else.” The stubborn woman sighed. “Maybe you should just do us all a favor and kill me.”
“Hell, no,” Derrick growled, purposefully ignoring his alarm at the notion of Sabrina’s death. “Not after all the hell you’ve put me through. You’re going to deal with this shit. Doc’s going to fix you, you’re going to answer our fucking questions, and then your ass is mine.” He grabbed hold of her hand, ignoring how hard she grabbed him back.
“Jackass,” she muttered, but she didn’t let go.
Dr. Elliot Pearl scowled and reread his missive again. “Now? They want to see me now?”
McKinley slowly moved from his position against the wall, startling Elliot, who’d forgotten the massive man’s presence. “Dr. Pearl?” The deep voice sounded more like a growl than a question. Elliot glanced at his bodyguard, refusing to be cowed. Regardless of his fall in status within Pearson Labs, Elliot maintained the title of head scientist. Without his tireless work, the drug that enabled them to control the newest batch of Circs wouldn’t exist. McKinley worked for him, and Elliot resolved to be more in command around the Circ.
He forced himself to meet McKinley’s changed eyes. Golden amber surrounded slitted pupils, a clear indication that McKinley was more than human. Unlike the other Circs Elliot had dealt with for the past twenty-plus years, McKinley never looked anything but the way he did now. He didn’t change, and he didn’t look completely human. Instead, he had the height and brawn of a super soldier in human skin, but with the eyes and senses of a fully transformed Circ. The man radiated danger by simply breathing.