She stared back at him thoughtfully. "I don't know, unless the hormone and his own instincts are attempting to overcome the contraceptive. In the previous human mates the genetic differences in them after conception have led to advanced immunity and healing abilities. It could be a primal compensation of some sort. A way of ensuring either conception or the hormonal balance that would allow that healing and higher immunity. I suspect the latter. She's already showing advanced sensory sensitivity. Hearing, eyesight. I suspect it's one of nature's little tricks to ensure that his mate has every advantage to fight beside him. "
And wouldn't others be very interested to know this.
Elyiana was very aware of the danger this could place Braden's mate in. The mated pairs so far stayed within Sanctuary for their own protection and to allow the vast array of tests needed to research the Mating phenomenon.
Braden and Megan would never stay within Sanctuary.
Braden was as wild as the wind, he always had been. And it seemed his mate was no different.
"We need her at Sanctuary. No matter the cost," Jonas informed her coldly, his anger obviously directed at Braden rather than her.
"She won't come. " Elyiana was certain of that.
Some Breeds were like that. Confinement only made them more dangerous, more volatile. It was one of the reasons that some of their best fighters had died in the Labs.
The Council had been unable to control them.
Elyiana considered herself an able fighter, an intelligent, strong woman. But Jonas terrified the shit out of her.
"I want those test results quickly," he told her softly, his voice cold, demanding as he stared at her out of those eerie, silver eyes. "Very quickly, Elyiana. Is that understood?"
''Yes. " She fought to keep her mind blank, her emotions under control. She had been doing it for years, for so long that no one had been able to rattle her until Jonas. "I understand. "
"Very good. "
She watched as he rose to his feet, a strong flow of movement, graceful and dangerous all at once as he moved back to the cockpit. As the thin
panel between the two areas slid shut, she took a deep, steadying breath. He wanted results, but no more than she did. It could mean the difference between her freedom and her own destruction.
The Mating Heat wouldn't be able to stay hidden much longer, which she knew was causing the Breed Ruling Cabinet to become concerned. Once information leaked of the advanced immunity and sensory abilities within the non-Breed mate. and the suspected aging delay, world opinion could turn against them with a violence Sanctuary might not survive.
As long as the Breeds portrayed themselves as weak, unable to fight the evil Council and the Purist societies, then the
world would look favorably upon them. They weren't a risk, or a threat. But once the truth emerged, only God knew what would happen.
They were fighting a losing battle though. Already suspicion was gaining among journalists. In nearly ten years neither Callan Lyons nor his mate, Merinus, seemed to have aged a day. The Mating marks on the shoulders of the mates had been glimpsed several times, and various scientists were commenting on it. Several Council scientists, captured during the rescues of the Breeds when word first emerged, had revealed their suspicions of the Mating, though none knew the full extent of it.
At the moment, Sanctuary was their only secure base. The old genteel Southern mansion was surrounded by several hundred acres of forested
land and provided the Breeds there a stable, safe haven. They stayed within their own borders and, other than military or law enforcement assignments they were sought for, they rarely ventured among the populace. Though Elyiana knew this wouldn't last for much longer.
Once the Breeds there had adapted to freedom, and their bodies and minds had healed from the cruelties inflicted upon them within the Labs, then they would begin to roam. It was the nature of the beast. The need to further their horizons, to bond, to mate, to begin their own prides.
It would be then that the true battles would begin. And it was those battles Elyiana feared. The fight for survival would seem like child's play compared to what she feared was coming.
Chapter Seventeen
Braden had always considered himself more man than animal. Better able to think before reacting. Clear-headed. Calm. Concise. Until he met Megan. Instinct had ruled since the moment he had laid eyes on her. His body's awareness of her had been instantaneous. The hard-on that filled his jeans in that second had been alarming. The instincts rising inside
him now were primitive. And like the bite he had delivered to her neck after the wreck, uncontrollable. He had no desire to control them. When it came to Megan and his hunger for her, he found he had no will to resist.
He faced her across the living room, seeing the exhaustion, the weariness that dragged at her body. She needed to curl up in her bed beneath all those fluffy blankets and sleep for as long as he could allow her to. But he knew that sleep would have to come later.
"You should be resting. " He growled. "You're pushing yourself too hard. "
"Isn't that rather like the pot calling the kettle black?" she asked with false sweetness. "You could give a mule lessons in stubbornness, Braden. "
Tonight he would be giving her lessons, but not in stubbornness. In submission. In learning the price to be paid in rousing the animal that lurked just beneath the thin veneer of humanity. In obeying him.