Damn! Creed stared at the man, hiding his shock as he assessed how many decades the age regression had taken from Phillip Brandenmore. He looked as fit, as formidable as he had in his early forties, his face once again dark and roughly handsome, his brown eyes free of the dimness age had brought.
His dark brown hair was once again thick and sporting only a bit of gray at the temples, while his shoulders were broad, his chest muscular. As though his body hadn’t forgotten its former shape, strength, and power, and had easily returned to it.
Kita moved to slip to his side before Creed tightened his fingers on her wrist in warning.
She stilled just that fast.
He could smell her fear, though, as well as her uncertainty.
Phillip Brandenmore smiled. Perfect, straight white teeth had replaced the aged, darkened ones Creed remembered from his last visit to Sanctuary, just after Brandenmore had been captured.
The shock Kita was feeling scented the air as Creed kept a careful eye on the men flanking Brandenmore and the weapons trained on Kita and himself. He paid especially close attention to the woman on his far right, knowing when he killed her, there would be hell to pay.
“Creed Raines, lion Breed enforcer,” Brandenmore drawled as he moved in line with the mercenaries that had obviously broken him out of Sanctuary’s cells. “Breed, you have balls to think you can kidnap my niece, fuck her, and not pay for it. She’s too damned good for the likes of a fucking animal.” His gaze flicked to Kita, and for a second, the smallest second, Creed could have sworn something painful, something filled with regret flickered in Brandenmore’s eyes.
Could he get to his weapon in time? Could he throw Kita to the side and actually do any damage before they managed to hurt her?
His gaze went over the men once more. He shouldn’t have felt disbelief at seeing them there, but damn if he had expected this. When he stared back at the woman, the commander these men followed, he was almost brought up short again by the small pendant she wore outside her T-shirt.
His attention returned to Brandenmore.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he growled, his fingers tightening once more on Kita’s wrist to hold her in place.
“I came for my niece,” he snapped. “Wyatt thinks he’s so damned smart. So damned careful,” he sneered. “I heard him, just as I heard his plans to turn Kita Claire into a fucking breeder for one of his Breeds. A Breed that had managed to gain her trust.”
Kita stiffened, her harshly indrawn breath attesting to her shock, and he feared, her belief in what Brandenmore was saying or what she was seeing.
An uncle from the past, not the present. A man who now stared at her with reptilian eyes, a sneer on his lips when his attention turned to Creed.
A man whose hired guns were pointed in her direction.
KITA COULDN’T BELIEVE what she was seeing, what was happening around her. He looked like her uncle before she had even been born. This was the man who had stood so proudly in his sister’s wedding pictures, the man who had held his newborn niece, his expression gentle and filled with love.
Her uncle wasn’t this young, and it wasn’t possible to turn back time, to return to youth no matter how much one might want to.
“Who are you?” she finally whispered. “You can’t be Uncle Phillip. It’s simply not possible.”
But it was possible. She stared back at him as an odd smile tugged at his lips.
There was no warmth or compassion in this man. There was no love, no gentleness as she had always seen in his face when her mother had been alive. There was none of the grief she had seen in his face when his beloved sister had died.
“Of course it can be,” he said. “I must say, Kita Claire, I never expected this of you.” He waved his hand to Creed as a look of distaste crossed his face. “Sleeping with the enemy, child? And one of a different species? I’m very disappointed.”
Kita was terrified.
She shook her head. “I don’t know you.”
Desperation laced her voice, a plea that someone explain, rationalize, that they assure her this really wasn’t the uncle she once loved so dearly.
He clicked his tongue, a mocking sound that raked across her senses and sent fear racing through her.
“Of course you do, child.” He smiled back at her. “You just don’t want to accept it. I’ve discovered the fountain of youth. The elixir of cures.” Excitement lit his eyes. “I’ve searched for it all my life, Kita. I dreamed of finding it before your mother died. Before the cancer killed her. I could have saved her.” For a moment, fanatical rage lit his eyes. “She could be alive today, young and whole, if I had found it sooner.”
“It’s destroyed his mind, Kita,” Creed whispered softly.
“Shut up!” Phillip’s furious scream made her flinch as her breath hitched painfully, fearfully. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. My mind isn’t destroyed. Those Breed doctors are crazy themselves. I’ve tested it before!” Spittle gathered at his lips as Kita forced back her tears. “I know what I’m doing.”
His attention turned back to Kita. “You would have thanked me later if this bastard hadn’t mated you.” He flung his hand toward Creed in a gesture of fury. “Son of a bitch had to go ruin it. You could have kept your youth, Kita, without having to fuck this animal.”
Kita shook her head, terrified now.
“You haven’t told her?” Phillip suddenly became amused, calm. “Haven’t you told her, Breed, how that hormone you’ve infected her with will stop her aging? How she’ll remain young and beautiful, and you’ll remain in your prime, strong and fully able to fuck her?” he sneered the last.
“Creed?” she whispered his name.
“Later, baby, I promise.” It was only a breath of sound.
“Unfortunately, not later.” Phillip gave a happy, satisfied little sigh as Kita watched him warily.
This was a monster standing in her uncle’s skin.
“Let Kita go, Brandenmore,” Creed stated, his voice dark, held tightly in control. “We’ll deal with this, just between the two of us.”
Phillip shook his head. “Sorry, Breed, I can’t do that,” he snapped. “She chose to mate an animal, now she can choose to submit to the tests I’ll need.” He glared back at them. “I may have found the fountain of youth, but it does need a few adjustments. As mates, you can help me make those adjustments.” His gaze became harder as Kita slowly gripped Creed’s arm in terror. “Unfortunately, you won’t live past many of the experiments. But they should prove to be very helpful.”
She knew the news reports had vilified her uncle and her father for using the Breeds as research subjects. For their cruelty, the deaths they had supposedly caused, the inhuman experiments and the drugs that had nearly killed several top-level members of the Breed community.
She held on to Creed, barely able to breathe, feeling the horrible sense of unreality become reality as she realized this truly wasn’t the uncle who had spoiled her as a child, who had promised her he and her father would always protect her when they learned her mother had cancer.
Her uncle’s head tilted as he saw the understanding dawn on her face. A frown marred his brow, and for just a second she thought, maybe, she glimpsed the beloved uncle he had once been.
“Mother loved you.” Her breathing hitched, the accusation in her voice now filled with tears. “You lied to her.”
His frown deepened as anger lit his gaze. “Never once did I lie to your mother,” he gritted out. “She was like my own child. I raised her.” He thumped his chest possessively. “I protected her.”
“You swore to her you and my father would protect me,” she cried furiously. “Look at you. What would she do if she saw you right now, Uncle Phillip? She would cry.”