Looking at his mate, he knew they had very little time. Her hands shook as she swallowed the icy drink her sister handed her.
“Sophia, what did you do?” Julia’s outward calm was not deceiving anyone. The tension in her face was evident in the way she held the glass in a white-knuckle grip. She waited expectantly for Sophia to reply.
“What do you mean? I haven’t done anything.”
Three sets of eyes watched as she gulped down the water like she’d been suffering from dehydration.
Julia dropped into her seat with a dramatic sigh. Even Julia had taken awhile to adjust when she’d first turned. Her body had fought the new physiology, not to mention the near-death experience from the rogue wolf that had attacked her. Those had been some very tense months, when no one was sure how the change would affect her.
Chase wasn’t sure what kind of effect this would have on Sophia’s body, but he was sure it wasn’t going to be good.
“Sophia, I know you’ve been doing something in that lab of yours, and you’re going to tell us what it is before you start the weird shit we just witnessed a moment ago.” Julia’s hysteria rose until she ended the sentence in a high-pitched squeak. Tears filled her eyes all over again.
Chase was unable to stop the wince that covered his face at her theatrics.
“What the hell is wrong with her?” Sophia asked, looking from Chase to River. “And what is really going on here? I mean, has everyone in this frigging town lost their mind today?”
Chase questioned her in a voice that was unbending steel, “What are you working on at your lab, Sophia?” He used the don’t-fuck-with-the-alpha attitude that ensured his pack members knew he meant business.
What he got from Sophia was a strong whiff of arousal at his tone.
So she liked a dominant male. His wolf rolled over in excitement, ready to burst his skin and do flips.
She blushed and tried to look away, but his eyes locked on hers as he waited for her to answer him. “I…I wanted to find a way to help Julia go back to being human or stop her from shifting.”
Her sister’s shocked gasp filled the humid afternoon air. “Why would you do that?” Julia demanded and jumped to her feet. Her tears had miraculously disappeared.
Chase ignored Julia’s question and proceeded with his own. “And did you find a way to do it? To stop her from shifting?” His voice whipped around the quiet yard, and his hard gaze never wavered from her face.
“Yes and no. I did find a way to suppress the change in a shifter, but I still haven’t gotten as far as removing the chromosomes from genes to…to make the person fully human again. All I need to do now is to create a serum and…and she’d be able to stop it if she wanted to. Of course, if I got a couple more weeks at the lab, I might be able to turn her into a full human again. Shit, give me a few months, and I can make her Batman.” The fire in her eyes revealed how proud she was of her work. She’d done what no one else ever had.
He knew they needed to keep her work under wraps. It would create chaos among shifters if they realized what she could do. She’d be hunted.
The thought didn’t sit well with his animal. It pushed at the skin cage once again and tried to get free. Chase bit back a snarl at the imaginary threat to his mate.
“How did you figure out how to do this?”
Her eyes flashed when questioned, and her usual patience was surpassed by the aggression contained inside. A shifter with two animals was unusual. It would create a problem with the dominant one, but from what Chase had scented Sophia appeared to have two alpha females inside that were presently getting along quite well. She exuded the dominance and power that reigned in alphas. His wolf howled in happiness, so much passion, aggression…and both animals were his.
“I singled out the shifter gene from a strand of DNA and created a pure sample of FB chromosome.”
Bingo. Chase knew he’d found the answer to her change. But wait… “What’s FB?”
“My tag for the chromosome that creates the animal inside all shifters. Furry Beast.” Her face turned tomato-red while she spoke.
He laughed. There was no holding it back. She had a silly sense of humor.
Eliminating the mirth from his voice, he continued with the questions. “What did you do with the pure samples?” He expected her to say she tested it on herself.
“What do you mean, what did I do? I locked them in my cold storage.” She furrowed her brow.
“Did you use the sample on yourself, Sophia?” His careful-worded queries were getting them nowhere.
“What? Of course not. That’s highly unethical, not to mention dangerous. I would never do that.” Outraged she jumped to her feet and glared at him, hands fisted at her sides. Her eyes turned a dark stormy gray, and his wolf pulled at his skin, wanting out of the human cage.