Connor (4 page)

"Keep your nose to yourself, boyo, or I'll cut it off. This here's my mate. Seems another of the lasses has come out of the woodwork for us. The timing couldn't be worse."

"Mate?" Allie sputtered, preparing to make a break for the door, which Cameron was closing behind them.

Connor grabbed her arm as the door was closed and locked. "Steady on there, lass. You're not the only one rattled by that notion."

"Is that why she smells so… delectable?" Cameron smirked, leaning in yet again to breathe Connor's woman in.

In a split second, he had the pretentious prick against the closed door, pinned by the throat. "I usually only warn people once. But because we need you, I'll make an exception in your case and make it twice. Don't push it. She's mine. Make another move in her direction and it's cat-on-cat. And I'll win because I've had years in a cage to learn how to fight dirty. The Queensbury Rules won't cut it if ever we go for it."

In a flash of movement, Cameron broke Connor's grip and had him on his knees, his right arm bent up at a debilitating and painful angle. Connor recognised the position, with the part of his brain that wasn't dealing with the excruciating pain, as a Korean Martial Arts hold.

Seething, Connor considered his next step. The idea that Alice was seeing him brought literally to his knees by the English wanker was galling. But it was what he deserved. He'd underestimated his competition. Lesson learned. He wouldn't let his guard down again.

"I find Korean Martial Arts so much more effective than boxing. Any time you want to test me out, I'm happy to oblige. But I can see that we have more pressing matters to contend with at the moment than determining the alpha cat. Like: is she Guild?" Cameron let him go and stepped back.

Climbing to his feet, he tried to shake out his arm to ease the pain. "She didn't seem to know what I was talking about when I mentioned them."

"Hello, I'm right here. Boy, I hate you macho types," Allie huffed.

Connor went to her and tipped her face up to him by the chin. "Did your surveillance turn up his martial arts skills?" He fought the urge to kiss her pouting lips. She was a smallish woman, maybe five-three, with a slim, light build, compared to his. And he loved that about her.

"No. I just saw his impressive bedroom skills," she threw back, almost daring him to get possessive again. Her dark eyes sparked fire as they stared into his.

Cameron laughed loudly. "You liked the little performance I set up especially for you, did you?"

"You knew I was watching?" Allie suddenly looked as humiliated by Cameron's revelation as Connor had been only moments ago.

"I knew someone was watching. We always do. It's the predator in us."

"Us?"

"Come, my staff don't usually arrive this early on a Sunday, but you never know when one might get overly conscientious. We'll take this into the sitting room. Or would you prefer the gym?" Cameron quirked an eyebrow at Allie.

"I assume it was Godzilla you were doing?" Connor said on a grunt, still not sure if he liked the idea of his mate watching the
impressive bedroom skills
of his newest brother.

"Unfortunately, yes. I have to close my eyes and think of England, as they say. But loathing makes me last longer, which Meredith seems to appreciate."

"Ah huh! I knew it. I knew you couldn't really be into that weird-looking chick. What is it, the money, power? Why do you put on such a show of affection if you're only marrying her for political reasons?"

"How about I'll answer your questions when you've told me why you're taking pictures of me and who you've told about what you've seen?"

They'd entered the elegant sitting room with its functional lines and subtle hues. Again, as a courtesy to Allie, Cameron turned on a light. It was a male room, and Connor felt comfortable in it, for all it was way classier than anything he was used to.

Allie seemed happy enough to answer Cameron's questions. "I'm a Private Investigator who transferred here from the States last year. I wanted a change of scenery. LA was getting me down. Never thought I'd miss the sunshine and heat, but after a winter here I'll be transferring back state-side as soon as I can. If I live that long."

Cameron sat across from her on a leather sofa the colour of dry grass. Connor sat down next to Allie and slid his arm over the back of the sofa, so she was within reach without actually touching her. He'd never felt this kind of need before. It was like he had to be close to her, had to touch her. For the first time, he was starting to understand Colt and Alyssa's intense connection.

"Go on," demanded Cameron, all business. He was still dressed in tee-shirt and track-pants, having obviously come straight from his gym. Yet he looked like he was sitting at the head of a boardroom table. Confidence and superiority oozed from every pretentious pore.

"So I was hired to observe and record your activities. I have no idea who my client is, although my boss will know. I just do the grunt work. I've kept records of your regular activities. I haven't mentioned the anomalies to my boss because I couldn't quite make sense of them. Yet."

"Anomalies?"

For a moment, she seemed to be considering censoring her next words. Then she thought better of it. Connor was grateful she was a pragmatist and didn't feel the need to throw herself onto her sword because she'd been captured.

"You look like an Eveready Bunny on the treadmill in the morning. You're engaged to Godzilla, and you do a great job of making it look like a love-match. You don't have friends, you don't go out on real dates, and you work too hard. You never deviate from your work schedule except on Sundays when you brunch at Covent Garden. There you never meet anyone, and yet always sit two tables away from a man who looks surprisingly like you. As much like you as Connor Patrick O'Brien here does. And then, last night, you had three mysterious visitors to your dark and empty house. Anomalies."

"How long have you been observing me?"

"Three weeks."

"And you have no idea why?"

"Nope. I assumed it was your future father-in-law checking to make sure there were no skeletons in your closet."

"Hmm. It likely is. So what do you think these anomalies mean?"

"That you're engaged in a rather elaborate espionage activity. One that allows for drugging unwanted observers with hallucinogens so they think they have cat-eyes and the bad guys have super-powers."

"Hallucinogens? You think you were given hallucinogens?" Cameron smiled for the first time.

"Well, that's my explanation. If I'm wrong, I'm willing to be enlightened."

Connor couldn't stop himself stroking her shoulder. The soft wool of her jumper was almost as pleasurable as the feel of her skin against his fingertips had been. He was instantly hard when he remembered closing his hand around her pert breast. Shifting to accommodate his growing interest, he smiled down at her.

"No hallucinogens, lass. I bit you and you were activated."

"Activated. And that means…?"

"I think this requires a brief history lesson," Cameron concluded. "If she's one of ours then she needs to know what she's in for."

"Go for it, your Lordship. Never was much of a teacher."

Cameron shrugged and nodded. It was so similar to Connor's own gesture that for a second he had
a moment
. How long would it take him to get used to seeing himself everywhere he looked? He'd been with the Sons for a year now, but it still caught him by surprise when he saw himself so clearly in the looks and gestures of the others of his kind.

"In the 1980s an organisation called the Guild undertook illegal human cloning experiments, which included cutting-edge genetic engineering using animal DNA. The scientist in charge of those experiments, a man called Regis, was a member of an opposing group called the Résistance."

"Like the French Résistance during World War Two?"

"Yes. But this Résistance has fought the hidden enemy for millennia."

"Why?"

Cameron sighed, clearly not used to being interrupted. "The Guild are descendants of alien invaders who colonised earth 12,000 years ago. Their species are like locusts that feed off planets, until all the resources are exhausted, and then move on. They have almost reached that point with Earth. Have you never wondered why, when humanity knows it's reaching the point of massive ecological disaster, it still doesn't try to pull back?"

For a moment, Allie looked confused. Then she seemed to consider the question seriously for the first time. "We humans are a self-destructive bunch. What can I say?"

"Humanity has that potential, but it's being helped along by a race of sociopaths who have no interest in a sustainable future. These beings have pulled our strings for thousands of years without humanity realising it. Except for the Résistance, of course, and they have to keep a low profile if they're to survive to keep fighting."

"Okaaay, let's assume I accept what you're saying. Why did these aliens make genetically engineered clones?"

"As their own private army. There were at least a hundred babies being gestated in tubes at the time the U.S government found out about what was happening. That was in 1988. The experiments were shut down and the babies were supposedly terminated. But there were others. Including embryos, female embryos, which were never gestated."

"So what happened to the test-tube clones?" Allie was sitting on the edge of the sofa now, watching Cameron with more interest than Connor liked.

"They were secretly distributed by the Résistance to adoptive families around the world. You are very observant Miss Wunderlund. The man in the bistro, and Connor here, do look a great deal like me. In fact, had we not devised disguises to hide the similarities, we would look almost exactly alike. We are as identical as identical twins. You are looking at two of those warrior babies and we go by the name of the Scorpio Sons. I'm a relatively new member. All my life I thought I was the only one. It came as quite a shock to discover I wasn't."

Allie looked, wide-eyed, from Cameron to Connor and back again. "But you don't look exactly alike."

"My hair is bleached. Connor has temporary implants in his cheeks and nose to change the shape of his face as well as green contact lenses to alter his eye colour. The man at the bistro has his hair darkened, keeps it long, and wears a beard. Just enough changes to fool the unobservant. People see what they expect to see. They don't expect to see clones, so they don't."

"Okaaay. So you said these clones had animal DNA."

"Yes, panther DNA, to be precise. That gives us speed, as you have seen on the treadmill and when Connor and I were setting boundaries, but we also have agility, strength, increased sensory awareness and longevity. But that part of us is very volatile. It's like living with a beast inside you that can come out whenever you let your guard down."

"So the cat eyes…the teeth. You're like Shifters, right? Like werewolves or something."

"What would we do without pop culture? Yes, Miss Wunderlund, we are like Shifters. But we don't turn fully into cats. Our eyes, our teeth, and a lengthening of our fingernails in moments of crisis are the only changes observable."

"So why did I have my eyes change? I'm not one of you warrior clones. I look nothing like you."

"No. You are one of the female embryos genetically manufactured as our mates so that we, as a species, could continue. They didn't clone you. Each female comes from a different gene pool for diversification purposes. But you all have panther DNA.

"Before today, we have only ever encountered one of your kind. That's Alyssa, the woman you saw visiting my house last night. She didn't know what she was either, until her mate bit her and she was activated.

"It will take some getting used to. But the one thing you need to remember in this whole bizarre situation is that we're fighting for our planet's survival. And as one of ours, we will protect you as surely as we will our planet. Especially Connor, here."

Allie turned those huge, dark eyes on him again as she rubbed at her short hair. He wouldn't have been surprised to see pointed ears peeping out from beneath those feathered ends. There was definitely something Elvin about her.

"See, I think you've got this wrong. I can accept the whole genetic cocktail story for you guys, but not for me. I'm really ordinary. I grew up in the Mid-West to parents who didn't have the sense to name their daughter something other than Alice. The only reason I know I was adopted is because I look nothing like my parents. They didn't tell me until I challenged them on it, when I was twelve. I've never been special. I just learned to blend into the background as a shy kid, and turned that aptitude into a strength when I was trying to think up a career for myself. I don't have real super-powers. And though you're cute, Connor Patrick O'Brien, you're not my ma –"

"Did you see your eyes and teeth when you looked in the mirror? Did you feel different then?" Connor challenged gently.

"You know I did, but that was the LSD."

"There was no LSD or any other hallucinogen, Allie. You saw what I saw. You're one of our mates. Maybe you don't feel anything special for me, but you will for one of us. I just hope I can keep my cat chained when you do."

Connor tried not to sound disappointed that she felt nothing for him. He didn't want the complication of a mate. Nor did he have it in him to love her the way she deserved to be loved. But it was one thing to say he didn't want it, it was another to accept the idea of her being with someone else. Just having Cameron sniffing around her had sent him into a rage. Knowing she was
with
someone else,
loved
someone else? That was the formula for
obsessive-stalker-boyfriend
if ever there was one.