Marie Harte: Julian's Jeopardy

But instead of releasing his anger, the emotion boiled, increasing Tersch's anguish. Buried under his beast, he knew he was fast losing control. Not good, not good at all, and not what any of them needed right now. But he couldn't stop himself.

“You're not going anywhere.” Fallon huffed out a breath and telepathically sent him support. “Tersch, come on. Rein it in. You can do it.”

“Let me go!” Tersch tried to shrug out of Fallon's grip, but the tenacious Circ clung like a burr.

Anger pushed through Tersch's beast, calling forth the berserker that nothing could stop. He grew muscles on top of muscles and increased in mass. On top of that, he felt a burning fury to decimate everything in his path and intended to make good on his desire. His eyesight changed, seeing in heat patterns as the scent of his prey—Fallon—grew stronger.

He shoved Fallon back so hard into the wall that Fallon broke through the drywall and dented the reinforced steel behind it. Fallon stumbled groggily to his feet. Seeing his adversary weakened, Tersch took another step closer and drew back his arm.

Hands caught him, and he turned to attack.

Only Fallon's quick shove pushed Tersch away and saved Ava from taking a fist in the face.

Her eyes wide, she stared at him in shock, and the fury Tersch had been feeling faded under a blinding wave of shame. Fists striking, screaming. A frail female falling, moaning his name before she hit the ground, hard. Then the scent of death, all too close…

“Gunnar?” Ava took a step closer.

Horrified he'd nearly struck her, Tersch scrambled back. He turned to leave when he suddenly stumbled. Confused and heartsick he'd nearly hurt the woman who meant the world to him, he wanted nothing but to disappear. Instead, he fell to the ground.

“Easy, Gunnar. You just need to sleep this off,” Mrs. Sharpe said, her voice soft, soothing.

He glanced up to see her holding a dart gun, her expression concerned. He wanted to crawl into a hole and die. His worst fear had come true. He was nothing more than a monster, an abusive asshole like his father. Now Jules would suffer even longer because they'd never let Tersch help find him.

“Should have used real bullets,” he mumbled before he blacked out.

Sheridan tugged on the spaghetti strap of her thin camisole and stared without seeing at the large bed in her room. She had a feeling tonight would prove as frustrating as the past few nights had been. She couldn't sleep, and she didn't need to wonder why.

In the past two weeks, Sheridan had only managed to visit Jules twice more.

He never seemed quite aware of her, questioning her existence as if he thought himself dreaming. She thought that might be a good thing, considering his poor state of health. Better he be nearly unconscious than to be fully awake and suffering so much. Damn Ricardo!

Both times she'd seen Jules, he'd been beaten so severely, she'd cried as she healed him. Since she'd learned of his existence, she'd spent her time planning and plotting. With Pedro's help, she'd managed to copy, encrypt, and send her research to her family for later study. She'd thoroughly deleted her project from the compound's computers, pretending to continue her work on basic botanical studies any third-year student might access from a public university. Luckily, no one seemed overly interested in her research.

Sheridan couldn't wait to leave. And thanks to Pedro, she soon would.

He'd been a font of information concerning the compound, once she'd found the nerve to question the truth about the place. It wasn't the professional lab she'd envisioned when she'd first started working here. The scientists, if she could call them that, experimented on people . Or so it was rumored. She only wished she knew more. But avoiding Ricardo remained her top priority lately, especially concerning the information she'd recently overheard.

Apparently, Ricardo wanted her . Sheridan Keyes, quiet, unassuming, overweight botanist, had somehow managed to outshine Elena Dominguez, a supermodel and Latina hotbod. Who would have guessed?

She swallowed hard, trying not to imagine Ricardo's cold, calculating stare or the way he sometimes focused on her mouth or breasts, as if envisioning her naked.

She trembled, but as usual since meeting Jules, the very word “naked” immediately conjured up images of the sexy but bruised prisoner. Her tremble of disgust quickly turned to one of arousal. No matter how much she told herself not to think about the poor man that way, she couldn't help it. Jules could look at her lips or breasts any way he liked. And how messed up am I that I’m turned on by a guy who doesn’t even believe I’m a real person? Not only is he out-of-my-league hot, but he’s in pain and doped to the gills, and I’m lusting after him. Pitiful, Sheridan. Just pitiful.

Fixing him, despite the drugs he'd been given, took a lot of energy.

Fortunately, she had cured him without experiencing that odd, out-of-control desire for him while doing so. Seeing him bloody and beaten cured most of her arousal.

And the drain on her power, mingled with the ever-present threat of Ricardo so near, took the zing right out of her while she healed him.

Jules had promised her that he continued to remain mute about her participation in his recuperation. But he still wouldn't tell her why Ricardo was holding him, and he'd cautioned her not to trust anyone else with what she'd done.

To her surprise, she trusted him. She'd never told Pedro that she'd seen him more than that first time.

Sheridan worried about her safety. She still planned to escape, and with Pedro's help, she would. But she couldn't leave Jules behind. She wouldn't. She glanced again at the bed sitting in her spacious bedroom. While she would try to sleep on a thick mattress, poor Jules dangled from iron chains welded to a stone wall. In a freakin' cave.

“Sheridan, dear, how are you?”

She started, then cringed as she slowly turned around. Ricardo had entered her quarters unannounced. He'd never done that before. She hadn't been expecting anything but to crawl into bed, and she wore minimal clothing: a thin camisole, a pair of boxer-style shorts, and her grandfather's ring around her neck on a chain—a precious family heirloom that meant the world to her. She normally kept the ring in her jewelry box, but at night she liked it close. A piece of her past in a place she hoped wouldn't be her future for much longer.

He stared at her with hunger in his eyes, and she crossed her arms over her chest, unnerved. She hated that look on his face—the one that told her he clearly envisioned her sans clothes.

“Oh, um, hi, Ricardo.”

He drew closer, his gaze roaming her face and settling on her lips.

She refrained from doing anything that might provoke him, instinctively sensing that to show fear or unease would only spur his interest. “I was just getting ready for bed.”

“Hmm, that's too bad. You see, you and I, we need to talk.” He pounced, slamming her backward and down onto the bed and settling the full force of his much larger frame on her, surprising her with the speed of his action. To her disgust, he ground an erection against her belly.

Dumb, dumb, dumb . She should have been prepared for this. The years of gifts, the subtle yet increasing sexual interest in his glances, the avid interest she always wished didn't exist, Pedro's warning that Ricardo wanted her, not Elena.

She'd thought she'd have more time before confronting him. Hell, she'd hoped that she might escape before that came to pass. Now she had to deal with him and pray she could survive the fallout.

“You've been a naughty girl, Sheridan. Seeing Julian in secret, hmm?” He leaned closer, his eyes black with lust. “I bet the sight of you threw him into an uproar. That fine ass, those round tits. You're a tasty little treat, aren't you, cara ?”