Free Wild Thing by Doranna Durgin Page A

Nothing there to reach for, nothing there to set free.
    Here. Now. It happens.
    “Hey! No! What’re you— hey! ” A woman’s voice, high and startled and shifting quickly to fear.
    Mark jerked back his instant response. Sentinels, guardians of the earth—in the beginning, against the Atrum Core, and now against almost anything.
    But not tonight. Tonight, in spite of having trained since childhood, Mark merely watched. Watched as Tayla’s posture changed from sexy insouciance to taut huntress within. Wild thing. Still human, still very much in undercover mode. But oh, Tayla Garrett could run. Mark’s heart swelled with the beauty of it, the flashing legs and stunning grace, deceptively swift—crossing the patch of green between curving sidewalks and manicured trees before he could so much as blink, having spotted what Mark couldn’t yet see.
    He moved in slightly—she wouldn’t notice, not now. Not with her eye on her target, there, just the other side of the sandstone-brick public facilities: two struggling figures, and she was almost upon them. Mark drew closer, fists clenched on his need to plunge into the fray. Never mind orders—she’d be furious and embarrassed by his intervention.
    So he watched. Closer now, easily making out the plump, scantily dressed young woman who fought off a man twice her size. Close enough to see Tayla, moving so swiftly she had no chance to decelerate, and what was she thinking, and ah, there—she had it planned all along, that lightning grab at the attacker as his arm swung back to strike, using him as her brake—transferring all that speed into torque as she planted her feet and wrenched him back and around. His arm made a funny crunching noise as it broke; he cried out and gave way, slamming up against the sandstone brick while the young woman sobbed and scrabbled to put a few feeble feet between them. A few feet and then, face distorted with fear—of Tayla as much as her attacker—she gained her balance and fled.
    “No, dammit, let me help—“ But Tayla stayed on the man, anyway, following up to snatch the side of his head, fingers twined in his hair and steadying him as her other hand dove for his throat—no attempt to circle that beefy neck, but grabbing his windpipe in a precision claw grip.

    Whoa. That’s my girl.
    But in the next instant, the huntress fumbled.
    “You let her get away!” the man choked, gesturing vaguely after the fleeing woman.
    “So I did,” Tayla said, her voice a purr. “You won’t, though.”
    “My cousin—“ he said, and surrendered to her grip. “Been looking so long—“
    Doubt changed Tayla’s posture entirely, suddenly.
    No , Mark thought at her, inching closer. Y ou can’t buy that.
    “You hit her.” But the doubt crept through to her voice.
    His voice sounded stronger. “I was defending myself!”
    The doubt settled in. In spite of her instincts, in spite of what she’d seen, in spite of what she was and the training behind her…
    The man tore away from her faltering grip; he grabbed her shirt, bunching the fabric between her breasts and jerking her headfirst into the brick beside him.
    And then he, too, was gone.
    Watch her. Just watch her.
    Mark took a step forward, anyway. And another, and—
    No . Not yet. Not against orders. Hands bunched in painfully tight fists, he faded in behind a carefully tended tree, deciduous park luxury in the middle of the valley desert. Tayla sprang back to her feet, spitting mad, with every intent of following her quarry—but a car engine roared to life in the nearby parking lot, tires squealing…popping the car over the lot’s speed bumps and out the exit.
    Not even a cheetah could run that fast.
    She swore—and then she abruptly tested the wind, head lifted as she tasted for power trace and found it, looking directly toward his hiding place. Mark froze—but she shook her head slightly, dismissing him. Knowing there was a Sentinel somewhere in the area, just as she knew the park