“Tanner, I’m dying.” She was panting.

“In a minute.”

He knew her need for release was escalating rapidly. Each slow thrust inside her and she was tightening further on him, her inner muscles caressing him, drawing him deeper into the vortex of need that threatened to consume him.

“Now.” She tightened again, flexed, rippled, and he had to grind his teeth to keep from coming for her then and there.

“Naughty Scheme,” he grated out, clenching his teeth to hold back.

But he couldn’t resist moving inside her harder, faster. The pleasure was like a whirlpool sucking him in. His eyes lifted from where he was pressing inside her to meet her gaze. Melting chocolate. That’s what her eyes reminded him of. Hot, rich, glittering with the hunger and need as her hand lifted to his face.

“All my life,” she gasped. “All my life, I’ve prayed for you.”

“All my life, I’ve loved you.” He bent to her, taking her lips with his, giving her the spicy, erotic taste of his kiss and sharing the burning need threatening to sear his nerve endings.

Nothing mattered now but stilling those flames. Taking the kiss deeper, letting it get wilder as he began to thrust powerfully between her thighs, taking her cries as his own and throwing them both into the tempest racing through them.

He felt her orgasm first. The steady tightening, the tension building until she bucked beneath him, screaming into his lips as her nails dug into his back. Then he gave in to his own, tearing his lips from hers to throw his head back, a primal snarl leaving his chest as his semen pulsed from his cock and the barb became painfully erect, locking him inside her, stealing his mind.

He felt reborn within her. Renewed. Locked inside her, spilling his seed into the heated depths as he spilled his soul into hers. His head lowered, a growl rumbling in his throat as he locked his incisors into the mating mark he had given her at the caves.

She cried out again, spasmed around his cock, and spilled more of the sweet release that he knew was his alone. Just his. His mate. His woman.

Moments later, he collapsed against her, sweating, panting, drawing her against him as his tongue lapped at the wound on her shoulder and his senses filled with the taste and scent of her.

This was what he lived for now. Not revenge or hatred, but this. For love. For Scheme.

CHAPTER 28

Scheme hadn’t expected that the Breeds would ever throw a party such as the one she prepared for the next night. Of course, the fact that there were several reporters there to report on the “engagement” of Tanner Reynolds and Scheme Tallant had nothing to do with it. The only thing missing inside the opulent mansion was the news crews parked outside the iron gates of Sanctuary’s main entrance.

She hadn’t expected this. When Tanner had said “party,” she had assumed he meant some sort of small event. Just the main families within the estate house, not the guests that had arrived in heli-jets for the past few hours.

Of course, she should have known better. This was what she would have done herself to counter General Tallant’s accusations. And they had grown in the past twenty-four hours.

Her father was frightened. She had seen it in his eyes in the last news interview. He was terrified of what she was going to say, what she was going to do. What proof she might have of his actions. And she had plenty. Proof that she knew Jonas was now downloading from the secured site she had been storing it on over the years. Her insurance, she had always called it, just in case she needed it.

As she swept her hair into a fashionable twist, she met her own gaze in the mirror and nearly flinched at the grief in her eyes. Why should she feel grief that the monster that had haunted her living nightmare would soon be falling? It wasn’t as though he had been a loving father.

In his eyes though, he had been, and she knew that. Her father was a psychopath of the worst sort. He believed in what he was doing with total conviction. He believed he had done the best by his daughter—the daughter betraying him in what he considered the most heinous matter.

He had killed her mother, and Scheme knew he would have killed her given the chance. He would have done it with love in his heart and belief in his soul that he was saving the world.

She shook her head at the thought before securing the last pin in her hair and surveying her image carefully. She was known for her scarlet dresses, and she wore one now. Scarlet silk with a daring slit cut to the thigh and black stockings peeking through. The silk swept over her curves and molded her breasts before the straps tightened at her shoulders and crisscrossed behind her back.

Having checked her makeup one last time, she slid her stocking feet into scarlet pumps, picked up the little evening bag that matched her stockings and left the bathroom.

“Ready?” Dressed in a tux and looking sexier than any man or Breed had a right to, Tanner rose from his seat at the bottom of the bed, his gaze moving over her with slow appreciation.

“You look good enough to eat.”

“I’m nervous as hell.” Her skin was sensitized, warning her that the mating heat was playing hell with the nerves, as Ely had warned her it would.

“Just remember to keep enough distance between you and others to keep them from accidentally touching you. You know the reporters. You’ve dealt with them before. You know how to work them. Everything’s going to be fine.”

Everything was going to be fine.

“Cabal will be keeping watch from outside,” he continued. “David is secure in Callan and Merinus’s suite. There are about two hundred guests; none are known associates of your fathers or the Council’s, but they’re influential in politics and financial affairs. The reporters are well respected and known for their impartiality where the Breeds are concerned.”

“I’ll be fine.” She was assuring them both.

She lifted her chin, reminding herself that she had done this countless times in other settings without so much as a twinge of nerves.

Tanner’s hand rode low on her back as they left the suite and moved to the wide, curving staircase that led to the crowded foyer and ballroom. Breed Enforcers were en masse, stationed with silent watchfulness every few feet up the stairs. Below, they had positioned themselves at the doors leading into the house and the ballroom, as well as the other rooms that led off the foyer. Only the ballroom was open. All other doors had been closed and carefully locked.

The ballroom doors were thrown open, and she knew the French doors leading into the gardens beyond would be open, allowing the guests to wander out for fresh air in the heavily secured and well-lit gardens.

No sooner had they stepped from the stairway into the foyer than the three reporters invited were striding toward them. Cassa Hawkins was a reporter and newcaster for INS, the International News Service; Joel Briggins from CNN was there, as well as Philippe Augustan of ENI, Euro-News International. Each reporter had his or her own cameraman following behind. The small recording devices normally uploaded their video feed live to the stations, but with the communications blackout at Sanctuary at the moment, they were on record only, to be uploaded after Jonas had previewed each disc.

“Scheme, you don’t look drugged to me.” Cassa Hawkins made a little moue of disappointment as she stepped past the Breed Enforcer that had stepped closer as they entered the foyer.

Cassa was in her thirties, cool and polished. A natural blonde with steady gray eyes and porcelain skin. She could be amusing but frighteningly sharp.

“Of course I am, Cassa.” Scheme smiled as Tanner tucked her hand into the curve of his arm and glared at the reporters. “Tanner can be quite addictive in certain areas.”

They had no clue how addictive.

Cassa’s agreeable laughter was soft, but her eyes missed nothing. Not Tanner’s good looks or the way he seemed to hover over Scheme protectively.

“He could be indeed,” she agreed. “Do you think he would allow us a few moments alone? He’s glaring at me, you know.”

And he was. Glaring at her and the camerman behind her.

“Tanner, I’ll be fine.” She slid her hand from his arm and glanced around. “There are enough enforcers here to fight a small war. And I could use a drink if you don’t mind.”

His amber eyes gleamed down at her, rich with amusement and a shade of disapproval.

“I won’t be far,” he promised her, warned the others.

“He’s very protective,” Cassa said softly as Tanner moved to Sherra, resplendent in a smoky gown as she stood beside her husband, Kane Tyler.

“He’s had reason to be.” Scheme let her gaze harden as she stared back at the reporter, then her cameraman, before moving back to Cassa. “Turn him off.”

Cassa sighed. “Go get a drink, Monty, and some nice shots of the party.”

Monty mumbled and moved away before Scheme turned to the other two reporters. “Sorry, guys.” She smiled. “Girl talk. Can we chat later?”

The promise to chat later had them smiling agreeably, if suspiciously, before moving away.

“General Tallant is frothing at the mouth,” Cassa said as Scheme led her to the far end of the foyer with a small indication to the enforcers to keep others at bay. “And word is that the pure blood societies are arming to attack any Breed they come across.”

“They do anyway.” Scheme sighed. “Now let me ask you something, Cassa. Whose side are you on?”

“The truth.” The answer was given without hesitation. And Scheme believed her. Cassa was a fanatic about the truth. It had nearly cost her her job and her life on more than one occasion.

“Excellent.” Scheme stared back at her in focused determination. “You and I have talked often in the past. Do you believe General Tallant, or what you see now?”

Cassa’s lips twitched. “Honey, I doubt the devil himself could brainwash you. So why don’t you tell me what’s going on and if the rumors are true that General Tallant is fighting to keep the skeletons in the closet, or just his little girl close to his side. And if it’s okay with you, let my cameraman back in here.”

The last was said with subtle mockery. Cassa wanted an exclusive, but she was willing to play nice with it.

Scheme nodded to the enforcer a few feet away, who waved the cameraman over.

With polished expertise, Cassa turned to the camera. “I’m talking to Scheme Tallant, General Cyrus Tallant’s daughter and rumored personal assistant. We’re at Sanctuary, the home of countless Feline Breeds and the main base of operations, where Miss Tallant and Mr. Tanner Reynolds are preparing to announce their engagement on the heels of her father’s accusations of brainwashing and coercion.” She turned back to Scheme. “Miss Tallant, I must say after knowing you for several years, you don’t look in the least brainwashed. Why is your father claiming you are?”

Scheme put on her “public” face and gave Cassa a practiced, charming smile.

“To hide the truth.”

“And the truth is, Miss Tallant?”

“That he would do anything to silence the truth that will be revealed in the coming weeks. The truth that he’s murdered countless Breeds, and had Tanner not moved quickly, he would have murdered me as well.”

Her heart ached, and she didn’t know why. He had never been a father. He had never cared for anything other than his fanatical dreams of controlling the Breeds.

“Why would your father want you dead?”

“Because I know the atrocities he’s committed. Because, Ms. Hawkins, for the past eight years I’ve been a double agent for the Bureau of Breed Affairs, working directly with Jonas Wyatt. I know my father’s secrets. And he would do anything to silence me.”

The interview with Cassa went smoothly, despite the constant interruptions the other reporters tried to make. The enforcers held them off dutifully though, and once she finished with Cassa, Scheme gave the others a few minutes with their questions. It wasn’t much, but they would have airtime. Tanner had also talked with them, and before they entered the ballroom, Tanner and Scheme were interviewed together.