Page 2 of Pride
Shaking himself from the memory, Parker checked on the electrodes and then turned up the dial on the tens machine. Electricity surged into his body.
Standard regeneration for the Deadly Seven took two years, or so his maker’s notes had claimed. It had only been two months since the amputation. He’d regenerated less than half an inch, but he’d read studies and papers on how to trigger the healing process. Electricity helped. Next up was small doses of UV light. It was unlikely he’d see fast results, but he couldn’t afford to wait two years. He needed his arm now. He would try anything and everything.
Daisy was missing and the only way to find her was to repair AIMI and salvage what he could from Daisy’s tracking code.
Parker turned up the dial on the tens machine again. This time, the rush of electricity triggered his new instincts. Claws shot out of his right fingertips and The Beast surged to the surface. An almighty snarl rumbled in his throat and rattled parts on the table. Without checking a mirror, he knew his golden eyes looked more feline. His teeth had elongated to fangs, and his long auburn hair was more like a lion’s mane than a man’s. His ears picked up every sound within a one-mile radius. From the scurry of cockroaches down the drain pipes, to the man pissing in the alley behind the nightclub, Hell. Even at this ungodly hour, traffic blared. And the elevator outside in the hallway clanked as it moved.
He shut his eyes and concentrated on filtering the sound until he could focus on what was in this room, but the effort came at a drain on his system. Phantom pain lashed his missing left arm, and he had to remind himself the limb was gone. There were no claws breaking his skin on that hand. It wasn’t only the ghostly pain, it was the other urges, the ones yearning for him to hunt down his mate and claim her as his own.
Parker had deciphered his biological mother’s encrypted research years ago but told no one. He’d hid the fact because he was ashamed to admit what he’d eventually turn into. But a bigger reason was that he knew the mate myth Mary peddled years ago was true. He’d assumed because he was the eldest, he’d find his mate first. But he was the last, and it chaffed, especially because his mate had been within his reach. And he’d let go.
At the thought of his mate, his body reacted with a ferocity he blamed on the animal within. His pulse spiked. His pheromones triggered. His cock hardened.
Breathing through the changes, he forced his urges down with disgust.
I am not an animal.With a hasty swipe over the table, he spilled useless parts onto the floor until he found the one he needed. AIMI’s memory, the hard drive. He plugged it into his laptop and set to work salvaging fragments of data from the virus riddled device, a virus his older sister Daisy had inserted, betraying them. But she hadn’t known what she was doing, or rather, she didn’t understand that the asshole who called himself their father was a psychopath who’d used her. Julius Allcott was the king of sinful pride and before the year was out, Parker vowed to end him and the Syndicate.
He already had a plan ticking away in the back of his mind.
The elevator dinged, loud and annoying. Apart from supernatural hearing, he could also jump higher, see further, and punch harder. According to the original research, his genome was a DNA cocktail of anything from lion to amphibian to moth. He was surprised he still looked human. He touched a long, sharp fang. Human was debatable.
The gift he’d received was nothing like his siblings. Where they had class or flash, he had unsophisticated animal urges. Wrapping a lion in Armani didn’t change the fact it was still a beast.
The sound of two women bickering made his stomach clench. He reined in his auditory perception, shutting them out. Maybe if he ignored them, they’d go away. A knock came at the door. And another. He resumed picking through the corrupted code on his laptop for remnants of AIMI’s old programming.
A sudden haze of sleep dragged his eyelids down. The laptop screen blurred, and his claws and fangs slipped back into his body. When the haze just as suddenly lifted, he realized someone was playing with him.
“Open the door, dickhead!” Liza shouted, her voice filtering through the penthouse.
So uncouth.
“Or I’ll put you to sleep!”
Sloan this time. Even more lacking in sophistication. How he was related to them, he had no idea. But then again, he failed to see how he was related to Wyatt’s temper, Griffin’s neurotic tendencies, Evan’s wild streak and Tony’s vanity… well, maybe that last one wasn’t a far stretch. But they were family. Even Daisy. Family stuck together, and they had his back just like he had theirs. He trusted them with his life. And maybe he loved them. Just a tad.
Better see what they want.
He yanked the electrodes from his stump and pushed back from the table with a wince. If it wasn’t the phantom pain, it was the healing and growing pains. It might ache the entire two years he regenerated. He considered putting on the prosthetic, but decided he wouldn’t let them in, anyway. He didn’t even bother putting on a shirt. Out of anyone, he trusted them enough to relax around.
Silk pajama pants billowed as he strode barefoot to the front door and opened it to the length of the deadbolt chain he’d installed upon AIMI’s demise. Without his trusted computer management interface monitoring security, Parker let no one in his penthouse anymore. Not even the cleaner. He did a better job.
Sloan’s dark brows arched beneath her messy, long black hair. Her crinkled shirt and sloppy sweats suggested she’d been interrupted from respite, just as he had. Liza’s brown leather jacket almost matched the tone of her long hair. A CCPD detective’s badge dangled from her jeans hip pocket, and a metal cybernetic arm plated in chipped gold hung from her hand.
He’d seen stranger things.
“It’s late,” he grumbled.
Liza scoffed at his expression. “Don’t try that prideful shit on us.”
Sloan folded her arms, her face a mirror of her sister’s incredulity. He almost smiled at them. Almost.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“You’ve hardly been out in two months,” Liza accused. “If you’re not coming out, at least let us in.”
“I’m busy.” If he let them in, then they’d see his projects. They might even catch a glimpse of The Beast, and then they’d know he’d lied when he said he hadn’t found his mate. He’d been lying from the start.
Blue eyes blinking in the night, the rain casting a halo around her head.
