Christine Feehan - Predatory Game

Saber caught at the doorknob to yank open the door. It was torn from her hands and slammed shut, power swelling the room. The window slammed closed. She hadn’t known he could do that, move objects without touching them. What did she really know about him? She glanced over her shoulder and saw him coming. And then it registered. Jesse was on his feet.

He was big. Bigger than she’d realized. And strong. She knew his strength. He worked out daily and lifted his body weight over and over with his arms. She never thought she’d see him on his feet, and he was catching up fast, his longer strides eating up the distance between them. His gaze locked on her, fire in his eyes, a fury she’d never seen before, and there was ruthless determination on his face.

The shock of seeing him on his feet stole her breath. She opened her mouth but nothing came out.

You can walk. You miserable son of a bitch, you’ve been sitting in that chair the entire time making a fool of me and you could walk.

She could barely think with the betrayal. Sheer rage burst through her veins, spread through her like a wildfire. “You rotten bastard. You’re a worthless, miserable, manipulating liar, no better than Whitney.”

Before she could say anything else, Saber’s feet were swept out from under her, dropping her ruthlessly to the thick mat. Jess caught her before she landed and rolled so he took the brunt of the landing himself. She found herself on top of him, her body against his, her face inches from his. His arms closed tightly around her, holding her in place.

“Stop struggling, damn it. You’re angry and hurt and you feel betrayed. Maybe you even have a right to what you’re feeling.”

“Maybe?!”

“Yes, maybe, damn it. Put yourself in my shoes. What would you have done differently?”

“Well…” She broke off then tried again. “I wouldn’t have betrayed you.” She pushed at him again. “And you’re holding me against my will. Get off and let me out of here.”

“Listen to me, Saber. If, after we talk, you still want to leave, then I’ll abide by your decision, but not like this, Saber. At least give me a chance to explain.”

“Aren’t you afraid?” she hissed, furious that she couldn’t break his grip.

“Of what? You? You’d never hurt me, Saber, not in a million years.”

“Don’t be so certain.”

“I’m absolutely certain. Do I look afraid?”

“You look like a liar. You pretended to be in that chair when all this time you could walk. And you pretended to care about me when all this time you were betraying me, selling me out to your friends.”

“You know better than that.” His thigh hooked over both her legs, effectively stilling her struggles. “Stop. You aren’t going anywhere until we talk.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.”

He rolled, pinning her beneath his much larger body, and then caught her wrists together so he could use his other hand to force her to look at him. “Well, you have to talk to me, Saber.”

For a few moments her gaze warred with his, her body tense.

“Winter,” he tried out her real name.

Her head snapped up, eyes smoldering. “What did you call me?”

He took a firmer grip on her. His chair was in the other room and if she got away, she was gone and he’d never see her again, because after that one burst of strength, he had no more feeling-none at all-in his legs. They lay heavy and useless on the floor. “I thought you might like to be called by your given name.”

“Don’t call me that. I hate that name. He gave it to me and I despise everything it stands for.”

“Good. Because I like Saber much better. It suits you.” He would always think of her as Saber.

“I’m never going back there, Jesse. Never. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep out of his hands.”

“No way are you going back.” He locked his gaze with hers. “I’ll protect you, I swear I will, Saber.”

“You can’t stop him, Jesse, no one can.”

“Maybe not as individuals, but as a group, the GhostWalkers are pretty good at defending their own. And you’re one of us.”

She gave a small snort of utter derision. “Who in the hell is ever going to accept me? You know that’s not true.”

He went very still as the realization hit him. All the anger, all the fury, as rational as it had been, covered the one thing that she feared most. Saber thought of herself as an unlovable monster. Someone beyond redemption. He wanted to pull her into his arms and hold her tight, but he didn’t dare-not yet.

He leaned close to her. “Baby, listen to me. If you don’t believe anything else, believe this is the place and I’m the man who can accept you-who wants you.”

“Let me up, Jesse,” she said, trying to hold on to her anger when she felt it slipping away. She was tired of fighting, tired of running, tired of being scared. Most of all, she was tired of loathing herself. “Although this is a waste of time on so many levels.”

The warmth of his body was beginning to creep into the arctic cold of hers, melting the ice around her heart. The caress in his voice, the look of love in his eyes, sent heat curling in the pit of her stomach. She didn’t want to think about how much she loved him, or how cute his smile was. Or how hot his body was. She wanted to hate him. No, she didn’t want to feel anything at all. “Do you really think anyone is going to accept me into their lives? Your team? Your family? They won’t know what I am.”

He couldn’t help leaning in to inhale the scent of her, to nuzzle briefly the warmth of her neck. “You’re the one who can’t accept yourself, Saber. I’m used to the different psychic gifts the GhostWalkers have, and make no mistake, you’re a GhostWalker.”

Tears clung to her lashes and her gaze shifted away from his, even though he held her chin firmly to keep her looking at him. “I’m an aberration. A monster. A child killer. For God’s sake, Jesse, you read the file. I made my first human kill when I was nine years old. I’m not like you or the others. I’m a human killing machine. If Whitney could manage to get me an invitation to the White House to a dinner, I could get close enough to the president to kill him right under the nose of the Secret Service and no one would be the wiser. As he was having a heart attack, I could even look as though I were trying to help him, and neither he nor his bodyguards would ever know I was killing him. You tell me how that makes me one of you.”

He let go of her wrists and framed her face with both hands. “That makes you exactly like the rest of us- exactly. Do you think none of us ever made an accidental kill? We have powers we weren’t meant to have and we have to learn how to control them. Every single one of us knows what it feels like to be afraid of what we are and what we can do.”

Saber opened her mouth to reply, but then his words really penetrated. She hadn’t thought too much about the others and what they could or couldn’t do. She didn’t know. Jess had just made the door slam shut and he’d been across the room. What else could he do? What could Mari and Ken do? Or Logan? She’d been kept separated from others like her because assassins weren’t members of a team. They were loners. They worked in secrecy to carry out their mission. She had never even had a real friend-with the exception of Thorn-and even then, they hadn’t seen each other often.

“Let me up, Jesse.” She couldn’t reason with his body so close to hers and she had to keep her mind on her goal. Survival.

She squirmed, her body rubbing in temptation over his, and he closed his eyes and absorbed the feel and shape of her.

“If I let you up, I lose any advantage I had. In any case, I think you knocked the wind out of me when you threw that elbow. I can’t move.” His body was as hard as a rock and he made no attempt to hide it from her, moving seductively, pressing her closer into the cradle of his hips.