Free LyonsPrice by Mina Carter Page B

to regain.
The thought that she’d callously denied any chance of conception added to the
flames of anger swirling through him.
    “I-I…h-h-had it done last w-week,” she stammered, lying
pliant under him. Her eyes were wide and fixed on the knife he held in his
hand. “Please, it’s j-just an implant.”
    Boss, back off with the blade. She’s terrified.
    Cael’s soft warning filtered through his anger. He snapped
his gaze up to Samara’s face. Cael was right. Samara’s face was pale and
bloodless and her pupils dilated. Her heart pounded as tremors shook her delicate
frame. He moved his hand, putting the knife out of sight. Her gaze followed it,
and then stayed fixed at the area where it had disappeared from view.
    She was in shock. Deep inside something twisted as he
realized he was scaring her. He let his anger sweep the feeling away. How
pathetic was that? If she wanted to play games with the big boys, then she had
to be prepared to get hurt.
    He let go of her wrist, expecting her to start fighting him
again. Instead she let her arm drop to the bed and just lay there. Frowning, he
hooked a finger under her chin and pulled it around so she had to look at him.
She didn’t offer any resistance, her eyes blank and unfocused, like she didn’t
see him.
    It’s just shock. She’ll be fine.
    Pushing the sheet out of the way, he focused on her thigh
where the implant was embedded. How had he missed it? He knew every inch of her
body, had been over it with hands and lips, but he hadn’t spotted this.
Contra-implants should be sub-dermal, just under the upper layers of the skin,
not this deep. For it to be this deep meant that someone didn’t want it found.
    Cael, what’s the medical procedure for contraceptive
implants?
    Her reply was a stream of information on how to insert and
remove implants. He looked at Samara’s thigh again, but didn’t see the satin
skin nor the enticing curve as it flowed into her hip. Instead he used his
onboard comp to display an anatomical diagram over the limb. He needed to cut
into her flesh to remove the thing. The longer it remained active, the longer
they were all in danger.
    He moved to rest the tip of his knife against her skin. The
soft whimper from her lips twisted his heartstrings. What if she didn’t know?
Her leg would have been numbed when they replaced her implant. She may not have
noticed the difference between the placement of the old and the new. He hadn’t
noticed and there was no way his exploration of her body had been casual.
    He started to press down, but stopped. His hand was shaking.
A frown creased his brow as he stared at it. A quick check of his subroutines
and hardware confirmed the limb was within operational standards. He pressed
down again. The blade parted the skin and a bead of blood rolled down her skin.
    His hand still shook.
    Boss, let me. Go take a breather, okay?
    Cael was at his elbow, holding her hand out for the blade. A
sigh rumbled through his chest and escaped over his lips. He couldn’t do it.
For the first time in his life, he couldn’t achieve the mission objective. He
looked at Samara spread out over the bed. As furious as he was with her, he
still couldn’t hurt her. She was the enemy and all he wanted to do was pull her
close and protect her. How pathetic was that?
    He handed the blade over and stood to let Cael take his
place. Grabbing a med-kit from the wall, she knelt by the bed and rifled
through it. Withdrawing an anesthetic, she administered it with quick,
efficient movements and picked the knife up again. Lyon hovered, his hands
clenched into fists at his side. He couldn’t watch, but he couldn’t walk away
either.
    In the end, Cael made the decision for him. She looked over
her shoulder and fixed him with a cool, gray stare.
    “Boss, breathing down my neck isn’t going to help. You
wouldn’t want me to slip with this—” She wagged the knife, which suddenly
resembled a butcher’s meat cleaver, at him. “Now would