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.She didn t make a sound, but he saw the discomfort the effort was costing her.Tanner s Scheme  Breeds 09 Page 165 of 403 Goddammit, Scheme, can t you even fucking ask me for help? He gripped her waistand lifted her in as he fought back emotions he had never known in his life.For the firsttime, he knew fear.Without her help, he couldn t save her. If I needed your help, I would ask for it. She lowered herself into the hot water with asmall, sighing gasp, the heated liquid washing to her hips as she pulled her hair out ofthe way and let it flow over the edge of the tub. Scheme. He hunched next to the tub and stared back at her imperatively. Give mesomething.Anything I can use to help you.Don t go down like this.For both our sakes.Her lips quirked. I m nothing to you, Tanner, she said softly. You aren t even part ofthe equation.Scheme watched as Tanner s face hardened, his eyes gleaming with an almostunearthly light as he straightened, staring down at her with a predatory intent that sheknew should have frightened her. I won t let you die like this. His voice was guttural, animalistic. No matter how willingyou are to die for that bastard who sired you.He turned and stalked from the room, snapping the curtain closed behind him as sheclosed her eyes against his rage.He was good, she thought, in regret, fighting back her tears.God, she was not going tocry over this.She had never cried for anything short of unbearable pain, until Tanner.She didn t cry because her emotions were ripping her apart inside.And they wereripping her apart.Tanner s Scheme  Breeds 09 Page 166 of 403For the first time since Chaz, she wanted to believe in a man.She wanted to believe sobad it was eating her alive inside, breaking her heart, destroying a part of her mind thatshe hadn t known existed.She could have sworn she had outgrown fairy tales.But shewanted the fantasy Tanner was offering so desperately that it cut like a knife inside her.She had lost her child because she had trusted a man.Believed in him with all herheart.Loved him until she had overlooked the tiny inconsistencies that warned her ofhis betrayal.And now she was on the very edge of doing it again.Placing her trust andthe lives of others in the hands of a man who could betray her.Her soul screamed out in denial.But she remembered that the moment she realizedthat Chaz had aided her father in destroying her child, her soul had screamed out thesame denial.Could she survive such betrayal again?If he was sincere, then once he learned the truth of what she had been doing, he wouldunderstand.That was love, she told herself.He would forgive her, wouldn t he? Hewould understand why she hid the fact that she was working for Jonas, that she couldn ttrust him until the information she had made it to the only man who knew what she hadbeen doing for the past eight years.Her lips quirked at the thought of that silver-eyed Lion Breed.Very, very few peopleknew his secrets.She was one of them.And because she knew them, she had trustedhim.He would have bled out in the most painful ways before betraying his own people.Or betraying someone attempting to help them.He was her only chance.All she had to do was get to Jonas.She couldn t trust Tanner,no matter the demand inside her that pushed her to do just that.No matter the pain thatholding her silence cost her.A part of her was certain that Tanner wasn t her father s spy.But there was that darkvoice within her soul, the one the had awakened the day she realized her lover hadTanner s Scheme  Breeds 09 Page 167 of 403helped destroy his own baby.The voice that whispered of Cyrus s manipulative,calculating evil.Breeds were deceptive; it was part of their training.And Tanner s training, even at ayoung age, had been extensive.And Cyrus had been part of his training.To date, hestill controlled more than half of the Breeds he had helped train himself.He had helpedtrain Tanner before the escapes from those New Mexico labs.He could still haveenough hold over Tanner to control him.So why did she need to trust him? Why was it such a battle to force herself to rememberwhat he was, and what he could be?Because she loved him.Because he had touched her inside when she was certain shecould never be touched there again [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]