Fractured Bond

Kira tried to pull away, but her traitorous body leaned into his heat. The Genesis Protocol had spliced her with Lynx DNA as a child—enhanced senses, a photographic memory, and a brutal heat cycle that no suppressant could fully tame. She was engineered to be a weapon, not a woman.

She hated how her body reacted—a flush of heat, a betraying quickness of breath. The Breeds’ primal pheromones were a weapon she’d been conditioned to resist. But Dane had always been different. Two years ago, he’d let her escape when his orders were to terminate her.

Kira’s heart slammed against her ribs. “We?”

“Don’t.” His voice was a gravel-laced rumble that vibrated in her chest. “I’m not here to kill you, Kira. If I were, you’d already be dead.”

He pulled the SUV into a dark tunnel, killing the engine. The only light was the faint glow of the chip between them.

He cupped her face with both hands, his claws carefully retracted. When he kissed her, it wasn’t soft. It was a claiming—a clash of teeth and tongue, of two broken things finding a perfect fit. Heat exploded behind her eyes, her Lynx DNA singing in response. Her mating heat had begun.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

She froze. That wasn’t her keyboard.

Dane grabbed her wrist—not hard, but with an unyielding possessiveness that made her knees weak. “From this moment, you don’t run alone. You don’t hide alone. You are mine to protect.”