Nalini Singh - The Magical Christmas Cat

"A breach of privacy, wouldn't you say?" Kimberly raised an eyebrow.

Zach shrugged. "It's simply another sense. Ours just happens to be keener in that area—no different from an M-Psy being able to see inside the body, or you yourself being able to tell her condition because you know the subtle physical signs."

Annie bit the inside of her cheek to keep from interfering. Caro took the chance to whisper, "Oh, he's good. Wherever did you find Mr. Scrumptious?"

Annie threw her a quelling look. "Where's Araan?"

"My darling husband is driving back from a meeting in Tahoe. He'll probably make it in time for dessert." She smiled. "I know what you're having for dessert."

Annie felt Zach's hand move on her waist. It was obvious he'd heard Caro's outrageous prediction, and that he liked the idea. However, when she looked up, it was to find his attention not on her, but on someone else—a stranger her mother had just waved over.

"This is Professor Jeremy Markson," she was saying. "This is Annie's . . . friend, Zach Quinn."

Given that her own temper was close to igniting, Annie figured Zach would blow this time—he'd been blunt in saying he didn't share. But, to her surprise, he remained completely relaxed.

"Markson." Zach inclined his head in masculine acknowledg­ment. "What's your field, professor?"

"Molecular physics," Markson said. "It's a fascinating subject. Do you know anything about it?"

Arrogant twerp, Annie thought. "No, I don't, Professor," she said before Zach could respond. "Perhaps you'd care to en­lighten me."

The professor blinked, as if he hadn't expected her to speak. "Well, I—"

"Tell them about your latest project," her mother encouraged, shooting daggers at Annie.

Markson nodded, and off he went. Annie's eyes began to glaze over after the first few minutes. "That's so interesting," she said, when he paused for breath. "Do you work with my father?"

"Yes." He beamed.

"Where is Dad?" Annie asked, deliberately changing the focus of the conversation.

Her mother waved a hand. "You know your father. He's prob­ably lost in research." The words were light, but Annie heard the hurt Kimberly had never quite stopped feeling. "He promised he'd try to be here by the time dinner was served."

Which meant, Annie knew, that they'd be lucky if they saw him tonight. "What's on the menu?" she asked with a smile, hating that bruised pain in her mother's eyes.

Kimberly brightened. "I made your favorite vegetable dish fo an entree." Her words were sincere, her love open. "Don't start, Caro," she said, when Caroline opened her mouth. "I made your favorite pie, too."

"That's why you're my bestest aunt."

Thankfully, the conversation stayed light and easy from then on. They were about to move into the dining room when wonder of wonders, her father walked in. Erik Kildaire was dressed in the rumpled clothing of a man for whom looks mattered little, but he seemed to be with them today, rather than in his head.

Her mother's face lit up from within, and Annie smiled. "It's good to see you, Dad," she said, accepting her father's enthusiastic kiss on the cheek. Love swelled in her heart, but it was a love that had learned to be cautious. She'd never had the tangled relationship with her father that she had with her mother, but that was probably because he'd never been around to argue with her. A different kind of hurt altogether.

"And who's this?" he asked, looking Zach up and down while sliding one arm around her mother's waist.

Annie made the introductions, but her father's reaction was not what she'd expected.

"Zach Quinn," he muttered. "That's familiar. Zach Quinn. Zach—" The fog cleared. "The same Zachary Quinn who published a study on the wildcat population of Yosemite last year?"

Beside her, Zach nodded. "I'm surprised you recognized my name."

"Not my department," her father acknowledged, "but my good friend Ted—Professor Ingram, was very excited by it. Said it was the best doctoral thesis he'd seen his entire tenure."

Zach had a Ph.D.?

Annie could've kicked him for keeping that from her, especially when her mother shot her a look of accusation. Thankfully, her dad said something at that moment and drew her mom away, leaving Zach and Annie alone for the first time since their arrival. She raised an eyebrow. "Keeping secrets?"

He had the grace to look a little sheepish. "To be honest, I didn't think anyone would realize or even care. You told me they were math and physics people."

"My father knows everything about everyone. And a Ph.D. is a Ph.D.." She rapped a fist gently against his chest. "If you'd told me you had one, I wouldn't have worried so much about my mother's reaction—even she can't argue against a doctorate."

"Your mother's not the one whose opinion I care about. Does the Ph.D. matter to you, Annie?" The look in his eyes was guarded.

The hint of unfamiliar vulnerability caught her unawares. "Zach, if degrees mattered to me," she said honestly, "I'd have married the triple-Ph.D.'d physicist my mother picked out for me when I was twenty-two. Or the MD with more letters after his name than the alphabet. Or the multipublished grand pooh-bah who stared at nothing but my breasts for the entire meal."

His smile creased his cheeks. "The man had excellent taste."

"Stop making me blush." But she wasn't, not any longer—some­how, Zach Quinn had earned the trust of her vulnerable feminine heart.

It startled her, made her afraid.

But before the dark emotion could grow, Zach bent to brush his lips gently over hers, acting in the way of changelings, not caring that they had an audience. When he drew away, she leaned into him, fear—if not forgotten—then at least temporarily caged.

Two and a half hours later, Zach found himself on the balcony sipping coffee while Annie stood inside, chatting with her cousin. God, but she was beautiful to him—all he wanted was to take her home, hold her safe, and keep her just for himself.

It was an unalterable part of him, this possessiveness, coming from the cat and man both. But no matter his primitive instincts, he wouldn't do that to Annie, wouldn't contain her that way. Still, he needed to mark her—to take her until his scent was embedded so deep into her skin, no one would dare question his right to her. An animal desire. Yet often, the animal's heart was far more pure, far more honest, than the thinking man's. "Mr. Quinn."

He glanced at Kimberly Kildaire. "Please call me Zach."

"Zach." A regal nod. "Let me get straight to the point—from the instant Angelica told me about you, I was prepared to dislike you."

"I guessed."

"I've changed my mind."

Zach raised an eyebrow. "The Ph.D.?"

"No. In certain departments, any monkey can get a Ph.D." It was a gauntlet.

He picked it up. "Good thing I'm a leopard, then."

Her lips threatened to smile. "I've always pushed Annie toward men who are more cerebral than physical."

Zach waited with a predator's quiet patience.

"It was a conscious choice," Kimberly said without apology, "my way of ensuring she would never again be put in harm's way. I even rejected a brilliant engineer as a possible match because he frequently goes off to work on projects in remote locations. His humanity mat­tered less than the danger he might've exposed Annie to."

Her eyes met his. "To be quite blunt, changelings take that pos­sible danger to the nth degree. Your very nature is one filled with the violence of the wild."

He was floored by her candor. "You're very aware."

"I know others might say I'm intellectualizing away prejudice, but I'm no bigot." She held his gaze with a strength he suspected had been honed by surviving a lifetime of hurt. "I simply want my daughter safe. I saw her almost die once—it's not something I want to witness ever again."