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wound.
    The first drop hit his tongue and a soundless shriek echoed
in his head. More fire, more pain consumed him, only this time the taste of
chocolate accompanied the suffering. Finally, the endless flow stopped, but
relief never came. The flames inside him flared up and ate him alive.
    She stood and peered down at him with a smile on her face. Seeing
her pleasure in response to his torment chilled him. Not wanting to look at her
anymore, he curled into a ball. A fresh wave of agony rolled through him. He
moaned, except no sound came out. Black dots spread over his vision. His mind
grew fuzzy.
    Dammit, he really was dying. If he had to go, he didn’t want
his last memory to be of this woman. He conjured Mira’s image and shoved the
one of his torturer away. Her golden light faded and blackness took its place.
It stretched out as far as he could see. In the center of the inky mist
surrounding him, Mira’s kaleidoscope eyes shone. He focused on them as his
heart took its last beat and let them lead him to heaven.
    * * * * *
    Mira paced from one end of the room to the other. She ignored
the sympathetic look Lena wore along with the muffled voices drifting from outside
and focused on the path her feet took. As with most pride issues, she didn’t
get included in the discussions. This time, she should’ve been. Kade and Devin’s
heated argument involved her. The message left on Kade’s voicemail spun another
complication in the mess that had become her life.
    If she’d wanted, she could’ve allowed her cats close to the
surface so she could use their enhanced senses to hear the debate. She didn’t
bother. No amount of arguing would change anything. The Council had dropped the
gauntlet in a thirty-second message informing Kade that if she refused to pick
a mate in the allotted time, they’d pick one for her. Like hell. She wouldn’t
allow it to come down to that. So she simply had to decide which of her friends
she hated enough to mate.
    For three hundred years, she’d avoided taking another mate.
Once was enough. Not that she’d had a choice in the matter then either. Edmund
had made it. As a single-shifter, he’d had no right to claim a royal, but he’d
paid her human nanny to make sure nobody could stop him.
    Pity for him, he hadn’t counted on the child he’d decided to
rape stopping him. Mira had killed him. Not before he bit her, though. The scar
left on her shoulder had ruined not only her life but those of her loved ones.
She swore she’d never take another mate unless she found a male she could love.
Without the emotion, all she had to offer her breeding partner was her body. And
an eternity of regrets and resentment.
    She pushed thoughts of her pathetic future aside and focused
on those involving the male she wanted but couldn’t have. Why did Josh have to
be so stubborn? Or so damn sexy? He’d captured her attention with a lopsided
smile and no amount of avoidance had dimmed her fascination.
    Every thought led back to Josh. She woke in the morning
thinking about him and fell asleep with his name on her lips. The only thing
she didn’t understand was why. She hadn’t even kissed him. Tonight’s little
encounter was the closest they’d gotten.
    For months, they’d danced around their mutual attraction.
They’d been ordered to stay away from each other. For their own good, of
course. Better not to know what it was like to be with him. The rational side
of her understood, but her heart…
    “For the love of god, Mira. Go back to him and tell him you’re
sorry.”
    Mira stopped her restless steps and glanced at her new
sister. It still amazed her the tiny female had been able to heal her brother’s
broken mind. For three centuries Mira had lived with the guilt of her actions.
She’d never once regretted killing her mate. The remorse she carried was for
allowing Devin to take her punishment.
    She should’ve stopped him before he left their familial home
to go to the torture chambers, but her