Claws scratched rock above her; she glanced up to find him comfortably ensconced on the outcrop, one massive paw outstretched, claws exposed to knead stone and a cat grin on his face.
She would have blushed, had she been in the human form—this, then, was the reason she could never work alone. Too vulnerable, when those moments of utter concentration blocked out all else.
The skin over her shoulder twitched—no doubt he’d said something to her. She scrambled lightly up those rocks to stand beside him; he withdrew his outstretched paw and tucked it beneath him, classic cat, eyes squeezing closed.
Good God, was that a purr she heard?
If so, it was brief and barely evident, but he remained settled. In his element. For the moment, not concerned about Lyn, or about what they might find here. Certainly not concerned about what she might expose of his activities here.
Another flash of uncertainty hit her. Either brevis had been wrong all along—she’d been wrong—or he’d simply led her so astray that he already had complete command of the situation.
She’d prove him wrong. And damn fast.
She settled herself on their perch and went deep again; she wouldn’t let it be said that she’d stinted the search. She filtered him out—harder this time, with his contentment now coloring his trace—and she hunted. The land gave her a trickle of something fresh and bright and near, and at the same time nudged her with the distant unrest of a developing storm cell. And there, at the edges…
Something bitter. Something corrupt. The faint traces of power ripped from its living vessel and stored away, as decayed as any corpse but still entrapped.
Amulets.
Her eyes popped open. She found Ryan watching her with such interest in those predator’s dusky hazel eyes that she felt a quick, ephemeral thrill of fear—it ran down her spine and just like that, puffed out the considerable length of her tail.
He blinked, drew back. Looked, if it was possible, embarrassed. He sat, turning away to look out over the land. For the first time she realized that on the other side of their approach, the rocks tumbled away in a V shape. They sat at the apex, and directly below them, from within the steep cleft of stone and moss, a seep of water eased out to fill the most modest of pools near the base of the structure.
Suddenly she was so very thirsty. And she thought, from the sly flick of his ear and the way he didn’t quite look at her, that he might be laughing again—that she’d been so caught up in the hunt she hadn’t yet realized that he’d brought them to water.
The birds alone should have alerted her, flitting so actively from twisted evergreen branch to lichencovered rock, or the light scent of the tiny white flowers so thickly scattered along the gentle slope below. She gave another inward blush, another acknowledgment of how very focused she became when on the trail of something. They should have sent me with a partner.
But they hadn’t wanted Ryan to feel threatened enough to act rashly. They’d wanted him just as he was—aware of Lyn but underestimating her. If that meant she needed to pay a little more attention…
Well, then, she’d do it. She’d had her warning.
And now she scrambled to catch up, because Ryan had moved ahead, descending careful step by step on the nearly vertical clifflet. Here, Lyn found herself at an advantage, light and swift; she reached the spring before him, lapping neatly from its fresh, cold water, then moving aside so Ryan could join her—noisier, not quite so tidy.
Men.
That the thought held humor surprised her, and she was still somewhat bemused as she padded out beside him, heading toward another, much lower rock formation. Except this time he gave her a little sideways glance, and it was but an instant later that the first wafting stench of it hit her.
She stopped short. Her eyes widened; she sneezed. Corruption filled her nose, her sinuses, her inner self. It brushed against her soul with Brillo-pad harshness; she slammed her defenses shut. Another sneeze and she dropped to rub her paws over her face, and that’s how the change caught her; she came to the human curled up over her knees with her hands over her face.
Dammit. Another weakness, and one of her worst. She hadn’t intended to change, but when the trace came on that strong…it didn’t matter whether she was human or ocelot, she found herself jarred into whatever she wasn’t.
But Joe changed right beside her, already crouching down to put a hand on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”
She sneezed, one more mortifying time, her face still buried in her hands. “I’m fine,” she said, her words muffled even to her own ears. Even now, the trace was strong—but she’d adjust. She’d push it back until she could filter out the details, just as she had pushed back the feel of Joe Ryan.
Except now, with the corruption so strong around them, she gave in to sudden impulse—she let his trace wash over her, as textured and deep as she remembered. She took it into herself, absorbing it like a decadent balm, and then took a breath, clearing her thoughts, finding her own inner note of centered calm…pulled that centered space around her as if it were a cloak.
Ryan made a strangled noise. His hand clenched down on her shoulder—until he snatched it back to himself, sucking in a quick breath. Lyn looked up from her centered, peaceful place to discover him staring at her, darkened eyes wide and alarmed and something she couldn’t read, his withdrawn hand clenched and…
Yes. Trembling.
Chapter 5
Joe took another deep breath. What the hell had she done? That centering thing of hers, but something else, too—something that had grabbed him and folded him in and damn well caressed him from the inside out, touching nerves he hadn’t even known he’d had.
And she clearly didn’t have a clue.
At least, not to judge from those big, brown eyes aimed his way, puzzled and a little concerned—but more suspicious than not. So Joe took one last deep breath and counted himself glad for clothes, and he turned himself brusque and matter-of-fact. He tightened all those feelings down into his clenched fist and allowed himself that small crutch while the rest of him went on. “We can’t stay this way long,” he said, certain the cold wind already bit into her as it did into him. He stood, held out a hand and pulled her to her feet.
She tucked a strand of wavy hair behind her ear and gestured at the area. “How did you know?”
He shrugged. “I guessed.” He pointed back at the little spring. “Believe it or not, that one’s not on any maps—none of the trails go anywhere near it. I call it the top of the world. It’s a place where…” He hesitated, narrowed his eyes slightly—and decided maybe not. Not when she’d already decided he had a thing for power. So instead he asked, “What’s it like? The traces? What do they feel like?”
She looked taken aback, as she well might. It was a personal question, in its way. Probably too personal, and probably she wouldn’t answer, but—
“It depends,” she said, wrapping her arms around herself—cold at that. Her eyes still watered slightly from her sneezing and she hadn’t quite recaptured all her hair; a wavy tendril from her temple fluttered in the breeze. Reluctantly, she added, “They come as smells, mainly, but also as…inner sensations. The sneezing…the amulets are particularly pungent, in all ways. Corrupt. Like sticking your nose into a liquefying corpse.”
He recoiled. “Tell me I don’t do that to you,” he said, the words out of his mouth before he thought them through.
She reacted much the same. “God, no,” she said. “You’re—” and then she caught herself. “No, not at all. Don’t worry about it.”
All right. Yeah. He changed directions again, back to where he’d been. “What I feel,” he said, “is too big to fit inside me. Like being inside a slow wind