“I can’t,” she said. “Father, I won’t. I don’t want Elliott.”
Her father’s mouth flattened, but his tone was tender with concern. “He’s a good man. Can’t you understand, I only want what’s best for you. Someone worthy. Someone decent.”
“Someone of your choosing?” she asked gently.
His gaze sharpened a bit, intense with purpose. “Someone I trust implicitly to have your best interests in mind, yes.”
“What about my happiness? What about love?” She stared up at him. “What about the things I need?”
Clearly taken aback, he went silent for a long moment, regret creeping into his features. “Have you ever felt unloved or unhappy as my daughter?”
“No,” she assured him. “I’ve never wanted for anything, Father. You’ve given me more than I ever could’ve hoped for.” She smiled sadly. “Except the freedom to become an adult woman with my own mind, my own dreams … my own plans for my future.”
He said nothing, not for several endless seconds. “Please come home, Jordana. Let me fix this … before it’s too late.”
She shook her head. “I don’t love Elliott. I never did, no matter how much you seemed to wish it were so. And now there’s someone else—”
The words seized up in her throat as her senses prickled to attention. A shiver of awareness traveled through her bloodstream, making her veins sizzle and her palms tingle with the dancing of a thousand needles.
He was here.
Nathan.
Jordana felt him even before she turned around to confirm it with her eyes. The entire room seemed aware of his powerful presence too. She watched as a clearing began to form down the center of the exhibit hall.
Bit by bit, a path opened between Jordana’s place in the room and Nathan, standing just inside the doors.
He came after all.
And, God, he looked good.
Tall and dark and dangerously handsome in a basic black suit that looked anything but basic on him. He wore an ebony silk shirt, unbuttoned below his throat, exposing just the sexiest hint of the Gen One dermaglyphs beneath his clothing.
Glyphs Jordana was now intimately familiar with and couldn’t wait to see in their full, naked glory once again. Along with the gorgeous Breed male they belonged to.
Her mouth watered just thinking about it, and her heart rate kicked into a faster, heavier tempo.
Without a word of excuse to her father or anyone else who had stopped to gape, Jordana waded into the parting crowd and headed straight toward Nathan. She could hardly keep from running to him, and there was no curbing the smile that spread across her face as she came to a halt in front of him.
“I didn’t think you’d be here.”
His stormy eyes took a long, slow trip from her face to her toes. When he met her gaze again, amber sparks glowed in his irises. “How could I refuse such an enticing invitation?”
She felt warmth flood her cheeks. It had nothing to do with shyness, but an eager reaction to the hunger she saw written so plainly on Nathan’s face. It was written on his skin too. The tawny-hued glyphs at his throat surged with deeper saturation, and she knew the rest of his Breed markings would be livid with wild, waking colors underneath the urbane dark suit.
She smiled, barely resisting the urge to touch him. To kiss him and press herself against him, even in front of hundreds of observing eyes.
“I’m glad you came,” she murmured. “I realize you probably can’t stay long. Your patrols—”
“My patrols will wait. For tonight, anyway.”
Hope flared in her belly. “You have the night off?”
“More or less,” he replied, his sensual lips flattening slightly. “I was instructed to take the night off.”
“Because of me?” She frowned, reading the meaning in what he didn’t say. “Because you stayed with me last night. Oh, God … not because of the messages I sent you today? I never should’ve done that. I overstepped—”
“You did nothing wrong.”