Therian Promise(41)
He accepted the glass but didn’t take a drink. “I told you the backers recruited me, but that’s not exactly true. One of Milliner’s teams captured me eight years ago. I was treated like the others, examined, tested, experimented on.”
Shocked by the revelation, she couldn’t think of anything to say for a moment then questions bombarded her mind. “Then why in the world would you help them? Why subject others to the same mistreatment you’d endured?” What did they give you that was worth betraying your own people?
“You’re a scientist,” he snapped. “You understand the cost of medical advancement.”
She needed to be more careful. The last thing she wanted was to piss him off and have him clam up on her. He fiddled with his glass, but he still hadn’t raised it to his lips. “Were the other two backers involved back then? How long has this project been going on?”
“I’m not sure exactly. Milliner met Roberto in the eighties. Tias joined the club a few years later. The project was in full swing when they captured me.”
The project had been underway for perhaps forty years and they still didn’t understand what enabled Therians to shift? That wasn’t accurate. The backers had a basic understanding of the biological processes. They just couldn’t recreate the abilities in humans.
She took a sip of her wine, hoping Osric would do the same. He rested the base of his glass on his thigh and stared off into space. “How did you go from being a test subject to participating willingly in the program?”
He finally took a long drink of wine then set the glass aside. Damn. Would enough of the drugs reach his system with only one drink? “If you want more, lose the skirt.”
He’d seen her naked before and she wasn’t ashamed of her body. This could only be humiliating if she allowed it to be. She unzipped her skirt and stepped out of it, draping it across the chair back with her other garments.
“They learned what they could from me then turned me loose. It wasn’t until a few months later that I realized they’d tagged me.”
That wasn’t surprising. It was standard procedure to tag test subjects. Of course he wouldn’t have known their procedures back then. “That didn’t really answer the question. How did you end up helping them?”
“Take off the rest. I want you completely naked.”
She kicked off her shoes and rolled down one of her stockings. She started to roll down the other then stopped. “You’re not talking.”
His gaze traveled the length of her half-naked body as a fresh wave of lust formed his expression. “Therians mate for life. Once our bodies sync with our mate’s body, we are incapable of—”
“Wait.” She tossed her stockings over the chair and paused with her thumbs hooked under the waistband of her panties. “What does that mean? How does your body ‘sync’ with your mates?”
“We’re shapeshifters, Doctor Ides. Our bodies literally shift, becoming more attractive to and compatible with our mate’s physiology.”
“And your body retains that change for as long as your mate lives?”
“Yes. Once the mating bond is formed it’s permanent, but while a female is still searching for her mate, synchronization lasts three months with each potential partner.”
“Then it’s the female’s responsibility to find her mate?” That didn’t seem quite fair.
He chuckled and his gaze focused on her exposed breasts. “Females go into heat, which announces to every unbound male that she is physically ready to be claimed. It’s the male’s job to convince her that he is the strongest and most capable of satisfying her every need.”
“Being physically capable of reproduction doesn’t mean anyone is ready for a lifetime commitment.” Yet having strong, demanding males vying for her attention sounded like a sexual fantasy. Except she’d be expected to spend the rest of her life with whomever satisfied her best. Maybe being human wasn’t so bad after all.
“You’re human.” He made it sound like a disease, but she’d already decided she was thankful for her humanity. “You’ll never understand the intensity of mating fever.”
He said no more, so she dragged her panties down to mid-thigh then turned so all he could see was her bare hip. “What does this have to do with your joining the program?”
“My mate…” He picked up his wineglass and drained it with several deep gulps. “She was weak and selfish and terrified of her destiny.”
She let her panties slip down her legs then she kicked them aside. The pain in his eyes was even more disconcerting than his usual lechery. “You’re obviously not incapable of being with other women now, so what happened to her?”