Visions of Heat

CHAPTER 6

Vaughn's beast scratched at the walls of his mind, wanting a closer sniff of Faith, as she walked past him and into the cabin. He leashed the cat this time. Faith was hanging on by the thinnest of threads. He had no desire to push her over the edge and snap that thread completely.

Because the truth was, he wasn't certain he could kill her without hesitation. And that made him wary. Psy weren't all gentle and empathic like Sascha. Some of them were coldblooded killers. DarkRiver knew that too well—they'd lost a young female named Kylie to a Psy serial killer less than a year ago and their blood allies, the SnowDancer wolves, had almost lost a female of their own.

Brenna, the SnowDancer who'd been kidnapped and tortured, remained deeply damaged despite everything Sascha and the healers had done to help her. Vaughn could guess why—as one of the hunters who had tracked down and executed the killer, he'd seen the face of the evil that had touched her, knew exactly what kind of atrocities the Psy were capable of committing.

Faith could turn out to be nothing like she seemed. Until they knew for sure, Vaughn had to distrust his reactions around her. While it was true that Psy generally had difficulty manipulating changeling minds, Sascha was proof that nothing was impossible. And notwithstanding the training he'd received from his alpha's mate, he wasn't Psy, while Faith was a cardinal.

Following his quarry into the house, he watched her and Sascha meet in the middle of the living room. His hand rose to rub over the tattoo on his arm—his loyalty to DarkRiver stemmed from an act of the most cruel betrayal and was set in stone.

It was the leopards who'd come to his aid at a time when he'd lost everyone and everything that mattered. And it was Lucas who'd extended the hand of friendship that had brought him back from the savage edge of an all-consuming rage. He'd lay his life down for his alpha and until this moment, nothing and no one had ever threatened to shift the intensity of that focus. That Faith was doing so after only a few hours made him more than suspicious of the reality of his response.

Faith fell asleep seconds after her head hit the pillow, body and mind both worn out. But that didn't stop the visions. Nothing ever stopped them when they were determined to find her.

Darkness brushed her consciousness. Her heartbeat accelerated. She recognized this darkness. It wasn't friendly, wasn't something she wanted to see. But it wanted her to watch. There was a twisted pleasure in it, pleasure she understood because it wasn't her own but generated by the darkness. During these visions, she was the darkness and if she'd felt fear, that fact would've terrified her. But of course she wasn't scared—she was a product of Silence.

It wasn't crushing yet, the darkness. It felt... satisfied. Its needs had been fulfilled for the time being and it was relishing the bloody rush. But then it showed her a glimpse of the future. A future she could no more not see than she could stop breathing.

Suffocation.

Torture.

Death.

Unable to bear the ugliness, she tried to draw back. It refused to let her. Her heart beat in a dangerous, jagged rhythm. This was impossible, her practical Psy mind tried to point out. But it was drowned out by the primitive core of her psyche. It screamed because it knew that this was possible.

Sometimes, visions didn't let go. Ever. The end result was insanity so deep and true that no more than twisted fragments of the mind remained. Faith clawed at the darkness, but there was nothing to hold on to, nothing to fight her way out of. It was everywhere and nowhere, an enclosing prison she couldn't break. Her racing heart began to go sluggish as her mind concentrated every ounce of energy on finding a way out. Only to slam up against a blank wall.

Touch intruded, a sensory alarm so shocking that it snapped the twining threads of the vision. She woke with a gasp, her eyes clashing with a pair that were not quite human. A ragged breath later, she became aware of hands holding on to her upper arms. Skin to skin. Her tank top was soaked with perspiration and, by rights, she should've begun to cascade because of the sensory overload, but she said, "Don't let go." Her voice was a rasp. "Don't let go or I'll fall back in."

Vaughn tightened his hold, worried by the look in Faith's eyes. There was something unfocused about them, as if she wasn't fully awake. "Talk to me, Faith."

She kept breathing those jerky ragged breaths and then, to his surprise, reached out to put her hands flat against his bare chest. Her touch was pure heat when he'd expected coolness. It burned and the jaguar wanted more. "Don't let me fall back in. Please, Vaughn. Please.”

He didn't understand what she was so afraid of, but he was a sentinel—he knew how to protect. His senses had lit up in warning minutes ago, though Faith hadn't made a sound. He'd walked into her room on silent feet, expecting her to wake and tell him to get the hell out. Instead, he'd found her barely breathing, her skin sheened in sweat, her hands curled into fists so tight she'd been bleeding from tiny cuts made by her nails.

Now those same instincts had him locking his arms tight around her. Touch unsettled Faith; maybe it would unsettle her enough to bring her back from wherever it was that she'd gone.

Pure black.

He finally realized what it was about her eyes that had worried him—the complete lack of stars. He'd seen Sascha's eyes do that before, but there had been something different about Faith tonight, as if there were a deeper darkness behind the one he could see. He ran a hand up her back and under her hair to close over her nape. The woman he'd met hours earlier would've been shoving him away and threatening to go into seizures. This one was too still, too passive.

"Shall I kiss you, Red?" It was a dare. "Never kissed a Psy before. Might be fun."

Her breath hitched and she shook her head against him like a kitten shaking off wet. Then she shoved at his chest. The devil might've made him keep her with him for a second longer, but he was all too aware that her body had had an unexpected effect on his. He was used to his sexuality; what he wasn't used to was it reacting so completely against his wishes. Letting Faith pull free, he watched as she scrambled backward until her back pressed against the headboard. The eyes staring into his were wide and full of stars.

He made his smile a slow tease. "So, you back?"

She nodded, continuing to stare at him as if he were some large wild animal who might see her as dessert. She wasn't far wrong. The cat definitely liked the smell of this Psy and the man found her disturbingly fascinating.

"I've never scared anyone by threatening to kiss them before," he commented, checking her face for any lingering signs of whatever it was that had frightened her badly enough that he'd become safe.

"I don't feel fear."

He tugged at her tank top. "Lost control of your physiological responses again, huh?"

She pulled the damp fabric from his grasp. "Even Psy can't control sweat in sleep."

"You going to be okay?"

Faith didn't want him to go, an illogical reaction. Vaughn couldn't stop the visions if they were determined to come, but some irrational part of her was convinced that if he left, the darkness would return and this time, nothing would make it let go. "Of course."

"You don't look it." He scowled and reached to push her hair off her face. "Do you want to shower?"

His touch made every nerve ending ignite but she held strong. She could handle this. It was what had brought her back from the vision and she'd learn to deal with anything that helped keep the darkness at bay. "Yes. Will I wake Sascha and Lucas?"

"They're not here."

"We're alone?" She suddenly felt vulnerable in a way that was so viscerally female, it was an utterly new sensation.

"You didn't think I'd let our alpha and his mate remain in a spot that a cardinal Psy knew about?" He snorted. "We might've blindfolded you, but Psy have other ways of knowing."

"You thought I'd lead others here."

"It was a possibility."

She didn't know what to say, hadn't expected Sascha to abandon her like this. Though of course, once she thought about it, her supposition had no basis in fact.

"She didn't want to go," Vaughn said, and almost startled her into an overt physical response. "But we weren't going to let her heart put her in danger."

"Her heart?"

"She's an E-Psy."

Faith flicked through a mental file. "There's no such thing as an E designation."

"Have your shower and I'll tell you something else your Council's been hiding from you. It's almost five—you want coffee?"

"Okay." Faith was aware there were peculiar gaps in her knowledge and the taste of coffee was one of them. She knew of it, of course. No one who read as much as she did could miss knowing about it, but she'd never actually drunk it.

Vaughn got up from the bed and her eyes followed the shift of lean muscle and male strength. He was built perfectly in proportion, beautifully constructed. His musculature was well defined and his skin shimmered with a healthy glow that her mind found... interesting, she thought desperately, when that same mind tried to insert another word.

"Do I pass inspection?"

Her eyes met ones that glowed slightly in the dark and she saw something in them that she now recognized as laughter. Her answer came from a part of her she hadn't known existed. "You appear healthy, but I'd have to dissect you to make an accurate judgment."

To her surprise, his lips curved. "So you can play after all."

She wanted to argue, but he was already walking out. "Wait!" It came out without thought.

He turned. "What's the matter?"

Now that he'd stopped, she couldn't say it. What if he left and the darkness found her again? "The shower—where can I get a towel?"

"Hold on." He stepped out.

By the time he returned, she'd started to breathe faster. He paused the second he got inside the doorway. "I smell fear, Red."

She got off the bed and went to grab the towel. What she couldn't even allow herself to think was that she was going to him because he made her feel safe. "You're imagining things." She tugged at the towel.

He held on to it. "I'm a cat. I don't make mistakes like that. Come on."

Knowing she should argue, but not having the will to do so, she followed as he led her from the bedroom. When he didn't switch on a single light, she realized it was because he could see perfectly well in the dark. Since she couldn't, she reached out with her mind and flicked on the kitchen light as they headed into that room.

He froze. "Telekinesis?"

"A touch." In reality her Tk strength was close to negligible, but she didn't think it smart to admit that.

"Any other 'touches' I should know about?" He gave her a piercing look.

She shrugged. "What are you doing?"

"Starting the coffee before I babysit you." He opened a canister sitting on the counter that ran along the back wall.

It felt like he'd slapped her. "Give me the towel. I don't need babysitting."

Ignoring her, he finished setting up the coffeemaker. "I was teasing, Red. Don't get your fur ruffled." He pointed down the hallway. "Go use that shower and I'll sit outside and wait for you."

She took the towel he held out. "I'm fine." She didn't know what had driven her to tell that complete untruth. She never lied—she had no reason to. "And I don't have fur." But for some bizarre reason, she found herself imagining what it would be like to stroke that black and gold fur she'd glimpsed when he'd first stalked her.

"Ask nice and I might let you."

He'd read her mind for the second time. "You're telepathic?"

He nudged her toward the shower. "No, you just can't lie worth a damn. Everything's in your eyes. Plus I know when a woman's thinking about stroking me."

"I wasn't thinking about stroking you." She preceded him down the hallway. "I was imagining your fur."

Heat at her back and a rough whisper against her ear. "You let me stroke you and I'll let you stroke me—I have a thing about your skin."

Faith had no idea how to deal with him. So she opened the bathroom door and stepped inside. "I won't be long."

His eyes lingered over her and she became aware that the tank top was plastered to her skin, outlining everything about her, from her full breasts to the curve of her hip. "Take your time."

Faith wondered why she felt like she'd been marked. He hadn't touched her and yet... he had.

Vaughn heard the shower come on as he leaned against the wall next to the bathroom. He'd said he'd stay there while she showered and he would. And it wasn't only because he'd smelled the acrid tang of bone-chilling fear. Something far more disquieting had been present in that nightmare-soaked room—a third entity that the cat had recognized as nothing natural, nothing good.

He hadn't been able to define the lingering miasma as either human, changeling, or Psy, but it had clung to Faith like a second skin, disappearing only in the light of the kitchen. It might be gone now, but Vaughn was far from convinced that he'd seen the last of it. Faith could very well be a psychic carrier of some kind, providing a conduit for the infiltration of DarkRiver.

However, his instincts said otherwise. There had been something malignant about that darkness, something violent and ugly. And while he wasn't sure about his redheaded Psy, his beast scented none of that ugliness in her. Faith smelled warm and female, tempting and inviting.

Whatever it was that was happening, he had the gut feeling that Faith herself was unaware of it. It was even possible that someone else was entering her consciousness through her connection to the hive mind of the PsyNet.

The shower shut off. That was when he realized he'd given Faith nothing with which to replace her sweat-soaked pajamas. He waited for her to figure out the same. She cracked open the door a minute later. "I need new clothing."

He turned and propped himself up with an arm against the wall. "I don't know. I think you'd look good without them."

Night-sky eyes stared at him without blinking. "You're not playing nice."

"You catch on quick, Red." From the gap in the door he could see her holding the towel closed over breasts that appeared surprisingly generous given her small frame. The beast prowled closer to the surface of his mind.

"My name is Faith."

"Hmm." He moved enough to slide a strand of wet silk through his fingers. Right now, her hair was a dark red that reminded him of heart's blood. "Do you have extra clothes in your bag?"

"A shirt and the pants I was wearing earlier." She didn't protest his touch and he wondered if she even realized how far she'd come in mere hours. Something in Faith craved sensation and it was driving her to buck her conditioning under Silence. He was pleased. And it was because he liked touching her. The cat saw no reason to lie about that.

"I'll get you a T-shirt—you can get into your day clothes later in case you decide to go back to sleep." There was spare women's clothing in the cupboards, but he wanted her covered in his scent. And he was animal enough not to care why he wanted that. He just did. "Wait here."

This time, she didn't ask him to stop, but he felt her eyes on him all the way down the hall. She hadn't moved so much as an inch by the time he came back. Whatever it was that she'd seen, it had spooked the hell out of her, spooked her enough to break down her normal shield of cool reserve.

"Here."

"Thank you." She closed the door, leaving him to imagine all sorts of things. He was getting to the part about replacing his T-shirt with him when she walked out.

"I left the towel on the drying rod." She tucked her hair behind her ears.

He saw that his old black T-shirt hit her a bare few inches above the knee, covering way more than he'd expected. "You're short."

"Did you only notice now?"

"What are you, five two?"

"One hundred and fifty-five centimeters to be exact."

That made her a lot shorter than him. Which would make things very interesting in bed. He pushed off the wall, not surprised at the direction of his thoughts, but disturbed by the strength of them. Cats liked sensuous play and Faith was a very enticing female, small but formed just right. And that skin—it made him want to lick her up.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Faith took a step back and tilted up her head.

No emotion in either her tone or her expression. No scent of desire. But the cat knew full well she found him intriguing.

"Yes, it'll make things very interesting." He could easily lift her up against a wall and pound into her. Hard. But maybe he'd save that for later—his Psy would probably appreciate a bit less enthusiasm the first few times.

"Vaughn, your eyes are going more jaguar than usual."

He shook his head in a sharp movement and strode down the hallway. "I think the coffee's ready." What the hell was this Psy doing to him? He was known in DarkRiver for being aloof to the point of icy remoteness. Most of the newly mature females gave him a wide berth while they flaunted themselves to every other male, because they knew he wasn't led by his balls. At least not until now.

Faith caught up to him. "Do you have any nutrition I could have?"

"Nutrition?" He scowled. "Do you mean food?"

"I have some nutrition bars in my bag if you don't."

"You're worse than Sascha was." He put his hand on her lower back and urged her toward the kitchen.

She jumped away like a scalded cat. "I told you not to touch me."

He growled very low in his throat. "Minutes ago you were begging me not to let go. Make up your mind, Red." He was aware his voice sounded a touch more jaguar than Faith could probably handle.

"I wasn't completely in control when I woke." She stared at him with wary caution but didn't back away. Then she surprised him even more and took a step closer. "And you know that."

The cat growled again, but it was pleased. This woman might look fragile but she had a spine of pure steel. "Are you sure I'm that logical?"

"No. But you're not an animal either."

He leaned in close until he had her boxed against the wall, his arms on either side of her body. One simple lift and he could have her at his sexual mercy. "That's where you're wrong, baby." He brushed his lips over her ear. "I'm as animal as they come." Before she could say anything, he pushed off and walked into the kitchen.

He heard the ragged gasp of her breath a few seconds later. "Are you really?"

He looked over his shoulder. "What do you think?"