Lawe's Justice - Lora Leigh [59]
Luck.
Luck had been on his side for a minute.
The young woman centered in the scope arched her brow curiously as though questioning his inattention to her. His delay in pulling the trigger.
Daring him.
When she dared her mate in the same way, she would learn the consequences of such impulsive foolishness, he thought with an edge of regret. A shame, really, that she had already been marked by the Breed’s scent.
If times were different, if he were the Breed he had been at nineteen, or hell, even twenty-seven when he had been recaptured by the soldiers from the Brandenmore labs. Even then, he’d had hope; he’d remembered what it was like to laugh, to lust, to dream of freedom.
If he were still that Breed, then he would see if a mate could be charmed from her mate.
Once, he could have accomplished that goal, he thought. Or he would have at least had a chance. He would have given it a hell of a try, and had a considerable amount of fun in the attempt.
The woman in the view yawned as though bored and tired of waiting. She gave a little shake of her head and a chiding smile, as though she were berating him for merely watching her rather than confronting her.
What made her believe he would ever confront her?
What made her imagine he would pull the trigger?
He caressed it. His finger stroking over it as he would a lovers flesh as her lips quirked just a bit at the corner as though in a grin.
“Live by the sword and you’ll die by the sword, my uncle always said,” she had commented with a laugh as she had walked with her men days before from the airport in D.C. The Swede who walked with her had shaken his head at her response to his advice that she should proceed with care once they met with Director Wyatt.
She hadn’t heeded his advice. Instead, she had sworn to him that she would find the three they had been sent to collect and she would regret her actions later. This job, she had claimed, was too important. Her niece was too important for her to fail.
She would find all of them once she found Ms. Roberts. They would be with her, Gideon knew, and this woman would attempt to take them back to the Breeds to perform more tests. More brutal treatments.
A knife slicing through flesh just to see what hurt the most.
Gideon knew what they would see, though. He wouldn’t allow it. He hated the woman he was after more than he hated any scientists he had encountered. But even for her crimes, admittedly, a crime a child had committed. As terrible as it had been though, he wouldn’t allow that brutality to happen to her.
Ms. Broen was moving into the area where his prey was suspected to be located. Moving in to take from him the vengeance he’d lived and breathed for far too many years.
He couldn’t allow it.
He wouldn’t allow it.
He’d waited too long, fought for too long. And he wouldn’t be cheated of it now that the end was so near.
His sanity depended on keeping the vow he had made to himself so long ago.
He knew the general area where they were, and he’d given this woman the location. She would get there before he did, but, he would be close, and he would be watching. And once she found the prey, he would be there to steal it from her. If he remembered Judd, and he did, then he knew that the girls would be very well hidden. Very well protected.
Perhaps even sharing his bed.
He had to force back a roar of rage as he focused on the woman once again. Focused on what he knew rather than what he suspected.
He knew once Commander Justice arrived, Justice would be distracted by the past that would haunt him there in the form of the family his birth mother had been taken from.
The same family that had aided Judd and Fawn after Gideon had disappeared into the darkness on the night of their escape.
Terran Martinez had arrived, just as Judd had said he would. An arrangement Scott Connelly appeared to have been a part of. Because Fawn was his daughter.
His teeth clenched as a growl escaped before he could bite it back. He wouldn