More than Truth (Arcane Crossbreeds) Read online

  Katya sighed but nodded as she walked away to her own terminal. Brit watched her with a frown. Break it down, prioritize, and focus. Taking in a deep breath that was filled with the warm scent she associated with Tag, Brit for once didn’t fight the arousal. Instead she accepted it, letting it move through her, bringing with it a sense of reassurance that she wasn’t alone. She had to trust that Tag would find Meghann so she could focus on finding a cure for Katya before it was too late. But it was hard.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “You boys have that girl walking a very fine and dangerous line, Vincent,” Kahn said pointedly.

  Vin tossed his napkin onto his tray and leaned back from the cafeteria table with a sigh. He knew it was coming. His father was never one to remain silent when he had something to say. In fact, Vin was surprised the man had lasted this long. Their reunion had consisted of a hardy slap on the shoulder and a nod. Twenty years and he’d gotten a slap and a nod. Of course it wasn’t as if there hadn’t been any contact between them at all. The initial reason he’d left his people was to infiltrate the Triumvirate, and even after he’d traded himself to save Brit, he’d still found a way to get medical intel to his father through Brim Fallon.

  “Father,” Vin started carefully and rubbed at his temples. While Brit was speaking with Tag, Vin had sat through a meeting with Forestor and the Drakes where his time with the Triumvirate had been discussed at length. Then Raife Merrick had arrived, and they’d discussed the possibility of interspecies mating. Now Vin was eating with his father, and it had been hours since he’d been near his mate. The heat was making his skin too tight for his body and threatening his notorious control. He really didn’t want to debate the intricacies of his relationship with his complicated mate, especially not within hearing distance of at least twenty other Drachon.

  Kahn frowned and pulled his napkin from his lap. “I’ll walk you back to the lab. I can feel your need to be near your mate.”

  They were silent until they reached the elevator.

  “Father, you need to understand that this is not a typical mating heat, and Brit is not a Drachon female.”

  “Now there’s where you’re wrong,” Kahn said and walked through the open doors of the elevator. He waited until they closed behind them before he continued, “That woman is without a doubt a Drachon female in spirit. She’s fierce and loyal. A perfect mate. What is in doubt here is whether you are male enough.”

  Vin clenched his fists as his dragon rippled beneath his flesh in response to the challenge. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  Kahn’s lips thinned, and Vin sensed his father’s struggle with his own dragon. “Vincent. For the past twenty years, you have been on your own, away from your people…your brother. I can tell it has taken its toll on you. Taggart as well. There is a chasm between you, between your daemos, that was not there years ago. You are fated, destined to form a sacred triad, but without that connection between the two of you”—Kahn shook his head—“your mate will not submit.”

  “She will,” Vin snarled, his dragon rumbling menacingly in his chest before he could control the reaction. “She belongs to me. My daemos acknowledged her.”

  Kahn shook his head again, his eyes glittering with sympathy. “You are only one half of a whole; you know this. She will only submit to the both of you.”

  Vin rolled his shoulders and inhaled. He needed to calm himself. The last thing he needed was to incite a fight between him and his father. “I understand that. We approach her together.” And still she refused to submit. “She’s just very stubborn.”

  Kahn grunted when the elevator doors opened. “Just because you attempt her at the same time doesn’t mean you are together.”

  When he’d come here, he hadn’t expected that his brother would just accept him, that things would be as they once were between them. Tag was understandably angry and distrustful, but Vin had hoped that would settle over time. He and his brother would share a mate and the responsibility of a child. Tag had acknowledged that much when he’d agreed to mate Brit. Yet, Vin hadn’t considered the tension between them would affect their ability to actually get that done. And it left him in a tough spot.

  “Maybe it’s time to explain the truth of what happened twenty years ago,” Kahn said, drawing Vin from his musing. Vin frowned and stepped out of the elevator.

  “It’s not that simple.” No, it was damn complicated. Quite evident by the cold detachment he picked up off them, most of his people believed he’d joined up with the Triumvirate after the death of their older brother. While Tag had resigned himself to finding some contentment in what was left of his life, Vin had sworn to do anything to save his people—to go to any lengths to find a way for them to survive. He’d spent years infiltrating the Triumvirate labs; he just hadn’t expected what he’d find or how far he would go to protect Brit. If he explained that to Tag, he risked everything. Brit would know he’d been responsible for resurrecting the ARSA project—she was too intelligent not to make the connection.

  “You know”—Kahn paused just outside the sealed door to the lab and turned to face him—“your mother and I have been together for nearly a hundred and fifty years. We’ve watched two of our sons fall beneath the burn of an unmated heat. We’ve lost two homes to the attacks of the Triumvirate’s Guardians, seen countless friends die in the wars throughout the years. We survived it together because of the strength of the bond we created, and I’m not only referring to the mating.” Kahn met Vin’s gaze with an uncanny knowledge glittering in his eyes. “That bond did not get created with half-truths and careful evasion. The three of you will be together, the gods willing, for two centuries or more. Do you really want to start it like this?”

  “You don’t understand,” Vin began and then lost whatever he was going to say when the faint scent of Brit reached him, that electric awareness of her nearness crackling over his skin. The door to the lab hissed and slid open.

  Kahn put a hand on Vin’s shoulder and squeezed. “I think I understand just fine, son. In time so will you. I just hope it’s not too late.”

  Vin watched his father walk away before he stepped into the lab. This was her territory, and her essence filled up every corner, saturated the very air. How could he have thought he could just give this up so cavalierly? She seemed distracted as he approached the counter. She looked exhausted, dark circles making her pale eyes look sunken. As she passed, stirring the air around him, the minute change in her pheromones from being around Tag had his cock rising fast and hard.

  Vin bit off a groan and gripped the counter so hard his knuckles turned white. The heat was getting stronger. Soon he wouldn’t be able to resist the need to dominate her, mate her. Thinking of his father’s warning, he tentatively reached out to his brother. “I don’t think I can hold off much longer.”

  Tag’s response was immediate. “You don’t think I fucking know that? She was all up in my space for more than an hour. I don’t know why my cock even bothers getting soft.”

  “We need to attempt her again soon.” Vin watched her lean over the counter to peer into a microscope.

  There was a long silence, then, “Tonight. Katya and I are trying to narrow down what the hell happened to the doc’s sister. She’s…depending on me, bro.” Vulnerability and determination crackled through their connection. “It’s important to her. I can’t let her down.”

  “I know.” Vin swallowed hard as the emotion choked him. “Tag…we need to talk before tonight. I need to explain—”

  “Save it, Vin. I agreed to share the doc, nothing else. Keep your damn explanations to yourself. I’m not interested.”

  And Tag was gone. Vin could penetrate the telepathic block his brother put up, but it would be a wasted effort when Tag was so determined to keep him at a distance. He pinched the bridge of his nose and focused on Brit. If she was all Tag was willing to share with him, then he would just have to reach his brother through her. If his father was right, they wouldn’t even have her between
them if something didn’t change. Was it worth baring his soul to her in an attempt to keep her when the truth might end up causing him to lose her anyway?

  Hell.

  Vin instinctively brushed his mind over hers simply for the comfort of the contact and scowled. She was exhausted and weak, her mind struggling for each thought. “When was the last time you slept? Have you even since yesterday?”

  Brit blinked, a look of concentration contorting her face as she drew her lab coat closed. She looked across the room at the clock on the wall, and he could easily see had a hard time remembering. She came up empty and merely shrugged before returning her attention to the lab books. “I will in just a bit. I’m expecting Ms. Schaffer to stop by shortly for some blood work.”

  “Brit,” Vin began reasonably, her abject disregard for her own well-being making him long to roar at her. Did she always push herself to this extent? Why the hell didn’t Tag intervene? “I know you are aware that a malnourished, sleep-deprived body loses the ability to think rationally.”

  “I’m fine.” She didn’t even look at him. “I may appear human, but my stamina exceeds that of a simple human body, and I resent the implication that I am not thinking rationally.”

  Already riled by the conversation with his father, Vin’s dragon rippled beneath his skin. He slid deeper into her thoughts. She was not fine. She felt sluggish to him. Her emotions, usually neatly managed in that sharp mind of hers, were swirling and chaotic. Fear. Worry. Confusion.

  “Brit,” Vin started again.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You are not fine,” Vin snapped. He moved to her side in a smooth flow of muscle and ripped one of those damn lab books easily from her hands. She was willful and stubborn, and her refusal to submit to them had him treading the very edge of his control.

  Brit spun to face him, the pale blue of her eyes electric with her irritation, yet all he could see were the dark shadows and new hollows of her face. It…riled him, had feelings of inadequacy and righteous anger expanding in him. She was his mate—his to protect, his to care for—and she was drawn and weak. It couldn’t be borne. He was done with this. Brit was going to be theirs, fully and completely. He would tell her the truth, and Tag would damn well accept his explanation for the past twenty years; then they would finally take her.

  “You can’t even focus enough on your anger at me to formulate a response.”

  Brit narrowed her gaze on him. “Stay out of my head, Vincent. Despite you and your demon twin using it as a public commons, I actually value my privacy and resent the intrusion.”

  “And I value the health of my mate,” Vin snarled, lifting the remainder of the lab books out of reach when she made a grab for them.

  “Give me the bloody books.” Brit stepped closer and thumped his chest with one palm. “I’m not your mate yet, and the likelihood decreases with each minute you continue to piss me off.”

  Vin glared down at her, absently noting how small she was, the wayward strands of her dark red hair brushing his chin. And her scent, stronger from her anger… Vin drew it in. He closed his eyes and relished the hard throb of his reaction, the tightening in his groin that made his balls draw up against the base of his cock. God, the effect she had on him! He wanted to slam her against the wall, slide into the wet heat of her body, and bury his face into the crook of her neck. With an intensity that was painful, Vin craved both the wicked bite of lust and the ease of solace her scent promised him.

  The books slid from his fingers, and he snapped his eyes open to see her stomping away, books in hand as she called over her shoulder, “Now who is having difficulty focusing?”

  Vin growled, the deep ache for her still resonating through him. “Damn it, woman.”

  “I will not dignify that with a response,” Brit said as she rounded the counter, putting the expanse of the lab between them. “I accept such dialogue from Taggart, but I expected more from you.”

  Brit was explicitly ignoring him, and he dragged a hand down his face in frustration, lingering over the rough growth of hair on his jaw. He looked down. Hell, his clothes were wrinkled, the tails of his shirt hanging out. His mate was making chaos out of the extreme order and control he’d always prided himself on. Compliments of the hassle from his mate and his brother, Vin was unraveling faster than he know how to counteract.

  “Listen, Brit,” Vin said on a resigned sigh. “There is a lot you don’t understand…about us, about this.” He motioned around them. “Hell, about me.”

  “And you believe now is the appropriate time to discuss it?” She pulled her lab coat closed and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “You need to understand what is going on here. We are in full mating heat. I know you’ve been analyzing your responses. You’ve seen the proof.” Vin swung an arm out to encompass the lab at large. “You can’t refuse it or resist it. You may think you have it under control, but once Tag and I get you alone, you’ll be begging for it.”

  Brit rolled her eyes with a snort. “Do you even know just how egotistical that sounds?”

  Vin purposely used the preternatural speed of his kind to round the table before she could react and aligned his body against hers. With a hand against the small of her back, he pulled her tight enough to feel the steel of his erection against her belly. Her startled squeak blew against his chin.

  “Don’t fool yourself, love,” Vin whispered against her cheek, his lips moving to her ear. “Once we have you between us—and we will very soon—you will be begging to stay there. And when that time comes, there will be nothing but skin to separate us.” Vin dragged his mouth back across her cheek to breathe against her lips. “So yes, now is the only time we are likely to get to discuss it.”

  She trembled against him, and his dragon writhed beneath his flesh as though wishing to touch her. He dropped his hand and allowed her to step back, gaze drawn to the wild flicker of her pulse at the base of her neck. Soon he would taste that frantic pulse with his lips, feel it in her wrists held tight in his palms as he lost himself in the depths of her body.

  “Fine,” she said breathlessly, eyes wide, pupils dilated until the pale blue was a fragile ring. In her mind he could clearly see the image he’d drawn in his, her body rising to meet his every thrust, arms restrained above her head.

  Brit spun back to the counter, knocking books to the floor. She muttered in Gaelic and bent down to retrieve them. Vin smiled. It appeared he might have found a way to even the odds when she was being obstinate.

  “You’ve adequately made your point.” Brit slammed the books to the counter and faced him, hands buried in the pockets of her lab coat. “What is it I need to understand?”

  “The truth,” Vin said before he lost his good intentions. He paced away from her, needing both the distance and the activity. “Twenty years ago, my older brother died from the unmated heat. We were close.” He closed his eyes, the loss and helplessness roiling over him. If he’d had half the promise his people believed he did, he should have been able to save Bryce. Vin shook his head and turned back to meet her gaze. “After that, I swore I would find a way to save my species. We had been hearing rumors that the Triumvirate was making strides in genetic manipulation. I made the decision to infiltrate the Dublin labs.”

  Brit frowned. He knew the Triumvirate’s Dublin labs were where she’d been held for most of her adolescent years. Vin held his hand up to stop the questions he could feel rising in her.

  “I spent ten years gaining the trust of the Triumvirate.” He hadn’t gotten there on his own; others were still in the Triumvirate’s inner circle. But he wouldn’t acknowledge their existence and put them at risk after all the sacrifices they’d made to get there. Not even to his mate. “Then I saw you.”

  “Wait! I don’t remember…” She was shaking her head, searching her memory.

  “You wouldn’t. The Triumvirate kept you fairly insulated from the rest of us, and you were too young and intent on your work to notice the men around you. But I recognized
right away what you were despite the impossibility of it. I arranged to get you out, but somehow Triumvirate guards found out.” And everything had gone to hell from there. Shards of memory flickered through her mind. He could see them, feel her trying to assemble them. She’d struck her head when her father had pushed her and her sister out of the fight. She’d been conscious but only barely.

  “My parents. My sister…Meghann tried to protect me.” Tears welled in her eyes, making the blue crystalline.

  Her spitfire of a sister had launched directly over Brit’s prone body, eyes black, claws drawn. The teenager had killed two guards and wounded another before she was killed. Or so he’d thought. Back then his only interest had been Brit and getting her out alive.

  “We left them there to die. It was my fault they were there in the first place. If I hadn’t wanted to learn—”

  “No,” Vin said and clenched his fists against the need to touch her, to pull her into his embrace, but he’d never finish this if he touched her now. And the hardest part was still unsaid. “They were not your victims, love. They knew the risks. It was your mother who screamed for me to save you.” The woman, stunning with her fire-red hair and flashing green eyes, had stood between him and Brit and the oncoming guards, her daughter and husband dead at her feet.

  Brit drew herself up, and Vin could see much of that woman in the one who stood before him. More composed, she nodded. “So you were there that night. You carried me out. Then what?”

  Vin inhaled and met her gaze. She was so beautiful and brilliant and strong. He was humbled by her—his mate. His father was right. He couldn’t start their lives without honoring her with the truth. “I had to go back, to buy you time. Arrangements were being made to get you out of the country, but you were too young, too vulnerable. I didn’t want you to live hunted, so I made a deal with the Triumvirate.”