The Psy-Changeling Series, Books 6-10 (113 page)

“You said it yourself, Faith.” A quiet reminder, the jaguar looking out of his eyes. “The future isn’t fixed. It wasn’t for Dorian.”

“Yes.” She’d seen the sentinel’s future blacked out, had thought it meant death, but he’d survived. “It’s different this time, Vaughn.”

“How?”

“I saw bits and pieces of reality—the fact that Sophia would need us for some reason tonight, other events that may or may not happen, but I
felt
this gathering wave. I can’t describe it, but I know something huge is about to happen, and it’s centered around Sophia Russo.”

“You’re talking about more than the life of one person . . . two people,” he added, and she knew he’d seen the way Max looked at Sophia. So had she.

Her foreseer’s heart hurt for them, for the future they didn’t have. “I’ve never felt anything like this, but from the research I’ve been doing”—using the records her father had managed to unearth then smuggle out to her—“F-Psy in the past noted the same kinds of sensations before major catastrophic events.”

Vaughn cupped her face, an areola of pure gold around his irises, the jaguar rising to the surface. “Are you talking earthquake, plague, political turmoil?”

“Any, all,” she whispered. “But whatever it is, Sophia Russo is the domino that will begin an unstoppable cascade.” The J was the leading edge of a perfect storm, one that might annihilate them all.

“Max?”

“It’s as if he simply doesn’t exist in Sophia’s future,” Faith said, tugging at the tie that held back her mate’s hair. It fell over her hands in a stroke of rough silk, a familiar anchor. “But I don’t get that same sense of blankness as I did with Dorian. Instead, it’s this feeling that he’s never been a part of her life. Which is impossible.”

Vaughn stilled. “Not if the Sophia you see is Sophia after rehabilitation.”

Faith shook her head in stunned horror, but he was right. Full rehabilitation wiped out the psyche, creating a slate so blank that nothing of the mind, the soul, remained.

Max argued with himself about whether or not to touch Sophia, knowing it had to have been their sexual play that had caused this, but driven by gut instinct, he got on the bed and cradled her in his lap. And the instant he did, it felt right. She was a soft, warm weight on him, her breathing easy, her heartbeat steady. Something wild and panicked inside him settled.

She hadn’t left him, this J who’d become the fulcrum of his universe.

A quiet sound, so quiet he hardly heard it. Shifting his hold, he pushed midnight strands of hair off her face, keeping his hand on her cheek. “Sophie?”

A hitched breath, eyes fluttering open. They remained drowned in black, endless and mysterious. “Wh—” A gasp, her hand flying up to close over his.

His soul went cold. Driven by primal need, had he made a fatal error? If he had, the shock would plunge her back into unconsciousness . . . or worse. But before he could break contact, she gripped his hand, tight, so tight. And as he watched, the liquid black began to recede from her eyes, until finally, only the violet of her iris, the normal black of her pupil was visible. “Max?”

He tried to catch her gaze, but it kept shifting. “Focus, Sophie. Focus.” Her disorientation worried him, could well be a signal of some kind of brain damage.

All at once her eyes locked to his. “Name’s not Sophie.”

“No? What is it?”

The most minute of pauses. “Sophia Russo.” It almost sounded like relief. “Sophia Russo,” she repeated, “Gradient 8.85 J-Psy, employed by the Justice Corps, temporarily attached to the office of Councilor Nikita Duncan.”

“Good.” Relief washed through him as well. “And who am I?”

“Max Shannon, Enforcement detective, highest clearance rate in New York, natural mental shield, and . . . and hands that touch me.” Her own hand spasmed around his, as if she’d only just become aware of how hard she’d been holding on.

“Shh.” Taking that hand in his, he pressed a kiss to her palm. “You’re okay.” His heart shuddered though he fought to keep his voice calm.

“Max, you can call me Sophie,” she said in a quickness of words, as if afraid he’d take her earlier statement the wrong way.

“I plan to do it for a long time.” He’d lost everything else and survived, but he couldn’t lose her, not his J. It would break him.

Intertwining her fingers with his, she turned her head a little. “Someone else is here. I can hear sounds.”

“Faith NightStar and her mate, Vaughn D’Angelo.”

“Faith, foreseer.” She dropped her gaze to their hands. “What happened?”

Faith and Vaughn walked back in at that moment, with four mugs of coffee in hand. “We were hoping you could tell us,” Faith said, placing two of the mugs on the bedside table.

Sophia looked up but didn’t move off Max’s lap, which told him more about her condition than anything else. Because his Sophie had a quiet reserve about her in public, or when they were around others, one that he’d come to realize was part of her nature, not a product of Silence. She’d never be comfortable with open displays of emotion—but that was fine with Max, because with him, she lowered her guard, gave him her trust.

Breaking their handclasp, he picked up one of the mugs and urged it into her hands. “Drink.”

She took an obedient sip, her eyes not on Faith, but on Vaughn. Max felt a sharp tug of irritation. He recalled hearing that Vaughn wasn’t a leopard, but the male was a cat of some kind. He had the same feline grace that Max had seen in Lucas, in Dorian. And Max had been in the world long enough to know that women were drawn to the cat changelings.

Sophia’s eyes didn’t move off Vaughn even when the cat stretched out his arm on the sofa behind Faith’s head, curving his hand around his mate’s nape in a blatant display—and statement—of his loyalty. It was Faith who broke the odd silence. “If you don’t stop looking at my mate that way, I might have to unsheathe my claws.” Her smile took any sting out of what was clearly a tease.

But Sophia didn’t laugh. Keeping her eyes on Vaughn, she spoke to Faith. “He’s not safe, you know. He could snap your neck with a single move. You should shift away from him.”

Delighted at the reason she’d been staring, Max fought not to laugh. But the look of affront on Vaughn’s face was priceless. Burying his own face in Sophia’s hair to muffle his laugh, he tugged her a little closer, just in case the changeling was annoyed enough to snarl at her. But Faith put a hand on her mate’s thigh, and cardinal eyes gleaming with laughter, nodded at Sophia. “I wouldn’t throw stones. Look where you’re sitting.”

Sophia belatedly seemed to realize her position. Color tinged her cheeks, but she didn’t move.
That’s my girl.
Running a hand over her hair, Max asked her if she knew the reason she’d fallen unconscious.

“Yes.” She cuddled impossibly closer to him. “An attempted hack into my brain.”

Max sucked in a breath, but it was Faith who next spoke. “That should be impossible. I know some F-designation men and women who see only the past, and they work for Justice—their shields are impenetrable. I assume Js are the same.”

“Yes, we are,” Sophia said, giving him the coffee so he could place it on the nightstand. “But the attempt was intense enough to cause near-unbearable pressure on my brain.” Her body trembled just a little, but Max felt it.

Placing her on the bed with all the tenderness he had in him, he swung his legs over the side and said, “We can discuss this more later. Right now, Sophia needs to get some rest.”

“Yes, of course.” Faith stood up at once. Vaughn followed a little more slowly.

Walking them to the door, Max was ready for the DarkRiver sentinel’s final words. “She’s still hooked into the Net, Max. Means she can’t be trusted.”

He felt his hand clench on the door. “So was Faith when you met her if I’m right.”

“Not the same situation, and you know it.” The changeling didn’t sound angry—if anything, there was a gut-deep understanding in his tone. “Faith was watched, but in an isolated setting. Sophia is in the middle of the Justice Corps. There are all kinds of eyes on her.”

And though the sentinel didn’t say it, Max knew the implications—Sophia might already have something in her head, something that
had
penetrated her shields without her knowledge.

 

Having changed into a loose T-shirt to sleep in, Sophia returned from the bathroom to find Max waiting by the bed. He looked strong and beautiful . . . and remote, the stunner he held loosely by his side a stark reminder of who he was, what he did.

“Stay with me.” It came out without thought, the heat of his body still imprinted on her skin. “I think I can handle the sensations now.” The invitation took all the courage she had. She bit her lip to quiet the plea that wanted to escape. She didn’t want him to pity her—but oh, how she needed him.

No words but he placed the stunner on the bedside table and ripped off his T-shirt. She clenched her hands on the bottom of her own. Angling his head, he tugged down the comforter and waited for her to get in. As he went to follow, his jeans still on, she had a thought. “Max, what if I’m compromised in some way? You shouldn’t leave a weapon that accessible to me.”

“Safety’s on, release programmed to my active thumbprint,” he said, pulling the comforter over them. “And no offense, Sophie, sweetheart, but you’d make a very bad assassin.”

“I could blow out your mind,” she reminded him.

“Not easily,” he answered. “According to what I’ve picked up over the years, a natural shield means I’d have enough of a warning to go for my weapon, or considering the fact that you’re a little bit of nothing—knock you out cold.” The words made him scowl.

“Good.” Relieved—in spite of the fact that she could see he hated the idea of hurting her—she let him slide an arm under her head, the other going around her waist. That much sensation, that much contact, still burned a hot, wild flame across her skin, but she was, she thought, becoming used to it. With Max it wasn’t an intrusion but a choice on her part. Turning, she placed her hands flat on his chest.

“But no voices in my head,” she whispered. “No memories, no thoughts, no yesterdays but my own.”

Max squeezed her gently, and she knew he understood. “Don’t push it,” he said. “Small bites, remember?”

She didn’t listen, lost in the storm of sensation, the world a kaleidoscope around her. “We never finished.”

Max’s hand stopped its soothing strokes over her back. “You’re not exactly in any shape—”

Tilting her head, she kissed the line of his neck, taking the taste of him into her lungs.
“Sophie.”
Then his hand was on her cheek and she was being turned onto her back and he was kissing the breath out of her. The kaleidoscope spun and spun until it exploded.

As the pieces rained around her, she found herself gripping Max’s shoulders in an attempt to hold on. His muscles shifted beneath her palms, liquid and powerful. Instead of trying to control the amount of sensory input, she gave in, drowning in the wild heat of him, the delicious pressure of his lips, the way his thumb pressed down on her jaw to open her mouth to him.

 

Max felt the instant Sophia let go. Her entire body melted for him, every inch of her open in invitation.

It was the most luscious of temptations.

But he wasn’t about to take advantage of her when she’d been disoriented and lost only minutes ago. Breaking the kiss, he looked into eyes that had gone pure black again—but he could distinguish a difference, though he’d have been hard-pressed to describe it. He just knew this time, it wasn’t a marker of danger. “Do all Psy eyes do that?” An intimate murmur against her lips, his legs tangled with hers, his hand in her hair.

Her fingers stroked over his shoulders with quick, hungry movements, and he was male enough to adore her for being so very delighted with him. “It’s more apparent at the higher end of the spectrum . . . but I think I may be even more susceptible to it, given the nature of my mind.” Calm words, but her eyes, her body, told a different story.

He could almost feel the vibrating tension in her, every tendon held taut. “I know who you are,” he said, holding her gaze. “I’m not going to be scared away because of your ‘imperfections.’ ”

A sheen of wet in her eyes, turning the midnight iridescent.

“We fit, you and I,” he whispered looking into that haunting gaze. “Two broken pieces making a whole.” It wasn’t the most romantic of statements, but it was torn from his soul. “I am not losing you.”

She tugged him down, kissing him until his body hummed for her, until her breath came in choppy gasps. He broke the kiss. “Is this much contact causing you pain?”

A pause. “No.”

Swearing, he rolled off to sit on the edge of the bed, looking back at her over his shoulder. “Why the hell did you—”

“I wasn’t lying, Max.” Curling onto her side, she watched him with an intense interest that told him he was the absolute and utter focus of her world. Some men would’ve been scared away. Max knew he watched her the same way.