Page 4 of The Scent of Seduction

“Well, what is it?” he said, exasperated.

“You told us to monitor any transactions occurring on Ms. Holland’s accounts.

She just withdrew a substantial amount of money from her savings.”

He quickly stood, circled the desk, grabbed Kenneth’s shirt and yanked him inches away from his face. “Where is she?” he growled.

“We’re working on it, sir. Jasper is trying to hack into the banking system to find the branch location of her withdrawal. However, the new firewall program is one he hasn’t encountered before. It’s going to take time.”

He pushed Kenneth away, and the small body hit the door of his office with a hard thud.

“You go tell Jasper I want that information five minutes ago. If he doesn't have it by the end of today, I will punish him in front of the others tomorrow. Let him know he is to report to me personally when he has her exact location.”

“Yes, sir.” Kenneth clutched the handle of the door and left the office as quickly as possible.

Adam paced in circles for a minute. The vein in his neck pounded in time with each step. They were so close to finding the faithless whore and she still slithered away. He would know where she was by the end of the day or there would be hell to pay. He picked up the lead crystal glass and slammed back the remaining seventy-year-old scotch. The fiery liquid seared his throat and churned his stomach. The conflagration burned his senses, and he launched the glass towards the wood panel wall, watching dispassionately as it shattered. Lead crystal rained down, catching the sunlight filtering through the large window, and tiny prisms littered the oriental carpet.

He stalked to the door, wrenched it open, and took several steps into the foyer. “Lenora!” he shouted. His voice echoed off the marble and stone filling the expanse of the house.

A few seconds later, a small woman ran into the hall from the back of the house that led to the kitchen. She dropped to her knees before him.

“Yes, Alpha?”

“Clean up the glass in my office. And don’t you dare get any blood on my carpet if you cut yourself.”

“Yes, sir. Right away.”

Adam watched as she scampered into his office and his sensitive ears picked up the sounds of glass pieces hitting each other as she gathered them off the floor. He threw open the back door, walked across the stone patio, then out onto the grass. He needed to be in the labs for the latest round of trials in an hour, but he knew that if he didn't blow off some steam first, there was a good chance he would cause irreparable damage to the subjects. Punishment was one thing, but there was no sense in damaging the goods to where they would be useless when the time came to implement the final stages of his master plan.

Nicole pushed against the arms, imprisoning her. “That’s impossible!”

“No it’s truth,” Jaryn corrected.

“I’m not one of you! I’ll never be one of you! I won’t have it!” She took several steps back and held out her arms to halt Jaryn from gathering her back into his arms.

“Easy. I won’t hurt you. I could never hurt you. We are mates. My wolf recognizes you. Close your eyes, and open your senses. You’ll see it for the fact it is.”

“Are you crazy! I’m not going to close my eyes while standing in a parking lot with a stranger who says he’s about to claim me.”

She was breathing rapidly, her fists clenched—a hair’s breadth away from bolting back into the bank for safety—but she knew she could never outrun him. If he pursued her, he would have her in his powerful arms within seconds.

“Okay, that’s sensible. Look, before we continue this debate, will you please tell me your name? I’d like to know who I’m arguing with.” He smiled.

“It’s Nicole Holland,” she answered quickly.

“Nice to meet you, Nicole. I know you have no reason to trust me, but you obviously know what I am—what being my mate means. So tell me why it’s impossible, other than stubbornness.”

She pushed back the hair that had blown in her face again. “First, I’m not a werewolf, so telling me to open my senses won’t achieve a thing. There’s no reason for me to recognize one of you as a mate. Second, I'm pretty sure I'm already marked. And third, I have no interest in being some chauvinistic Alpha asshole’s chattel. Why do you think I ran in the first place?”

A low growl rumbled in Jaryn’s chest. “First, there is no mating mark on you. I would detect it. Second, I’m a shifter, not a werewolf. It’s an entirely different concept. Third, I believe somewhere in your family history there is a shifter because we can identify each other—call it a sixth sense, if you will. And you did recognize our connection, so don’t think you can lie to me. You can’t lie to a shifter, and you especially can’t lie to your mate and expect to get away with it. Once you stopped fighting, you clung to me like I was a piece of driftwood on the open sea. And fourth, I don’t know where you got your ideas of what it means to be an Alpha’s mate, but I have no intention of treating you like a chattel. In our pack, we honor, protect, and treasure our mates.”

He slowly stepped forward, and taking Nicole’s hand, he placed it on his chest. “The concept of a mate is that we find the one individual who is a perfect match for us out of the entire world's population. We treat any mating like the miracle that it is because the odds are astronomical. Being your mate also means that I can sense your emotions, especially when they are running hot. Earlier, I detected fear. And I suspect it had to do with more than dealing with the shock of all the new feelings coursing through you. Tell me. Let me help you.”

Nicole’s fingers dug into the hard, warm chest. Her breathing had instantly calmed with Jaryn’s touch. This was the complete antithesis of how Adam made her feel. He was right—she wanted to cling to him, but fear made her skittish as she imagined an abused animal might feel. She’d been through too much in the past year and a half to accept anything on blind faith.

Faith no longer existed, not in her.

Since the revelation and integration of shifter communities some twenty years ago, humans clamored to learn more about their culture. The discovery of the mating bond a decade ago meant that the world learned a secret that the shifter community had kept secret for centuries. It was said that when a shifter met his or her mate, the two individuals experienced a biological response that linked their psyches together. Wolves, along with several other shifter species, mated for life and those fortunate enough to be part of a pair experienced a love greater than any previously known in their existence. There were entire dating services dedicated to searching out shifter mates for humans. Those masses didn’t care that the odds of it happening were few and far between.

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