Nalini Singh

“There is a dark music in the screams of your enemies.” (Raphael)”

“He couldn’t say the words, had spent too long in Silence, but he’d learned other ways to speak. Taking the paperweight she’d knocked off her desk out of his pocket, he put it in her hands. “It’s fixed. As long as you don’t mind more than a few scars.”

“She blew out a breath between gritted teeth. “Sometimes I really want to”—a frustrated sound—“bite you!” He froze. “I might let you.” “I won’t do it if you’d enjoy it.”

“Holding Hawke’s gaze in a way that not many men could, Walker said, “You will be good to her.” Not a statement, but an order. Hawke’s wolf stirred. “Do you think I’d be otherwise?” “If I did, you’d be dead.”

“She watched as he settled down on the bed with Naya skin to skin on his chest. His hand all but covered her tiny body as he stroked her in that changeling way, bonding with her on the most elemental level. Then he purred, and Naya made a happy little sound of delight, very much a cat in her love of touch.”

“Damn, but I like making out with you Sienna. Let’s do it again tomorrow.” He left to the sound of a feminine snarl. It made his lips curve into a feral smile.”

“You’re in my every breath and every thought, intertwined so deep inside me that love’s not a strong enough word—you have my devotion, your name branded on my soul, my wolf yours to command. A hundred years? It’ll never be enough. I want eternity.”

“The only thing you can do to make me that angry is to lie with another man" ~ Raphael, Guild Hunter, Nalini Singh”

“What was that?" "Really excellent sex." "You were trying to sex me into submission." "Did it work?" A lazy grin as he turned to look at her. "I was just trying to be me.”

“Pack is built on the bonds of family, of mating, of love. You come first. You always will.”

“I shouldn’t ask you to,” he said, devotion in every word, “but I’m going to. Wait for me, Jess. I’ll come back to you.” Naked emotion turned the sea green into hidden emeralds. Pressing her fingers to his lips, she shook her head. “You never have to ask, Galen. Forever, that’s how long I’d wait for you.”

“Bluebell, you couldn’t take me if I was blindfolded and had both hands tied behind my back.” “Bluebell?” Illium narrowed his eyes. “That’s it, Barbarian.”

“You should sit,” Lucas said, and he wasn't talking to Mercy.Sascha stared at him. “I didn't realize pregnancy of four weeks' duration made me incapable of standing upright.” “It makes me incapable of reason.”

“You almost died.” “But you brought me back.” She cupped his face in her hands. “I always knew you were there. Death didn't have a chance against the Wall.”

“I have something for you.”“Yeah? What? Is it shiny?”They both waited until Indigo had jogged away before resuming their conversation. “So,” Riley asked, “what have you got for me?” Taking his hand, she placed it palm-down over her heart. It would hurt like a bitch, she thought, but he was hers to protect as much as she was his. “Me.” And she opened up her soul, laid herself bare.”

“You said I could pet you as long as I liked.” “Didn't say I wouldn't try to fuck you in the middle of the petting.” Her eyes snapped up to meet his. “That's feline logic. You're a wolf.” “I'm learning from the best.”

“Be gentle with him, Mercy. He's got a heart as big as Texas— he'll die for you without blinking. But he doesn't expect anyone to do the same for him.”

“Sentinel meeting tonight,” Ria told her. “At Lucas's place.” “Time?” ...“Seven. Sascha's doing dinner.” “God save us all.” Sascha had decided she liked cooking. Unfortunately, cooking didn't like her back.”

“You trying to make me crazy?” “Everyone needs a hobby.”

“Sometimes he hated that voice in his brain, the one that slapped him upside the head anytime he got too stupid. Funny, it happened a lot with Sienna.”

“I assume you have a reason for manhandling my mate?” Cool words but his amusement was apparent. “Riley likes Mercy,” she stage-whispered, trying to twist around to look at her mate. “But she told him that h—oomph.” Riley set her on her feet without warning. She swayed, but Judd's hands on her hips kept her upright. Pushing her hair off her face, she leaned into her sexy Psy mate and smirked at Riley. “Sooo...” “Judd.” Riley ignored her. “You're obviously not interesting enough for my sister—she's got way too much time to poke her nose into other people's business.” Judd wrapped his arms around her from behind, his chin on her hair. “I'm more interested in you and Mercy.”

“Don't pull any shit because you want to show off.” “Wait a second.” She looked down then back up. “Nope, I haven't grown a cock in the last few minutes. I have no need to prove whose is bigger.”

“Mercy laughed. “You have to excuse them—boys suffer from an incurable disability.”“What?”“Testosterone.”

“So, you tumbled that wolf you were with?” Mercy was too much a pack animal to take offense at the personal question. She grinned. “How did you know it was me?” “Do I look senile to you?”...“Yes,” Mercy said. “And I'm not doing it again.” If she kept telling herself that, maybe her traitorous body would actually notice and shut up with its demands. The older woman gave her a sour look. “Damn shame. What, you like them prettier?” A snort. “In my day, we liked men who looked like men.”

“One thing I've always wondered—why did you enter that bikini contest when you were a teenager?” Her face flushed with a mixture of anger and embarrassment. “How far back did you trace me?” “Far enough.” A pause. “You didn't answer my question.” “And you didn't turn into a puff of smoke and disappear. The world is full of disappointments.”

“Dorian’s going to love this.”She glared. “I swear to God, you tell him, and I’ll” — what the hell could you threaten an alpha with?—“I’ll tell Hawke you want to go on daily bonding runs with him.”

“Riley knelt down, clasping the fur at the back of her neck. “You’re fucking bruised all down your back. Why the hell didn’t you tell me it hurt?” Because it didn’t at the time, genius.”

“Once— and most of the night definitely counts as once—you can write off as a mistake. But you do this again and he's going to start thinking he has rights over you.” She knew predatory changeling men. They liked control. They particularly liked their women to submit. And Riley was one big giant hunk of testosterone-fueled Neanderthal wolf—he probably thought her submission was his right. She snorted. “Not in this lifetime.”

“Smiling, she went for his throat and almost had him, when—using a move that was all sorts of illegal—he flipped her again so her front pressed into the leaf-laden ground, her wrists still locked in his iron grip and pinned above her head. “Cheater.” “So says the woman who tried to kick my balls into my throat,” he pointed out, even as he licked the salt off the skin of her neck in a lazy and highly provocative move.”

“I don't need a mate,” she muttered, staring up at the bright circle of the early autumn moon. “But can't you send me a nice, sexy, strongmale to dance with? Pretty please?” She hadn't had a lover for close to eight months now, and it was starting to hurt on every level. “He doesn't even have to be smart, just good between the sheets.” Good enough to unsnap the tension in her body, allow her to function again. Because sex wasn't simply about pleasure for a cat like her—it was about affection, about trust, about everything good. “Though right this second, I'd take plain old hot sex.”That was when Riley walked out of the shadows. “Got an itch, kitty?” Snapping to her feet, she narrowed her eyes, knowing he had to have deliberately stayed downwind in order to sneak up on her. “Spying?” “When you're talking loud enough to wake the dead?” She swore she could feel steam coming out her ears.”

“A faint smile that made every tiny hair on her body rise in quivering attention. "How fast can you run?" A wolf's question.”

“While Dmitri, as the leader of Raphael’s Seven, could not accept such a weakness, the mortal he’d once been, the one who had loved a woman with a wide mouth and eyes of slanted brown . . . that man understood what it was to love so deeply it was a kind of beautiful madness.”

“You have the power to tear me to pieces, to wound me so deep and true that I‘ll never recover.”

“I think Illium can take care of himself.” “Not if he keeps flirting with you.” A fine, almost elegant tendril of heat, champagne and sunshine, decadence in the light. “Raphael’s not the sharing kind.”

“The scent of the sea, a wild turbulent storm, crashing into her mind. Elena, why is Dmitri naked?”

“llium snorted. “I look like a damned duck.” His words weren’t far off the mark. The feathers that had grown over the injured section were soft, white, and delicately … fluffy. “I hope to hell these baby feathers fall off and get replaced by real ones. They will, won’t they?” He sounded worried.”

“How’s Her Royal Bitchiness?” “Alive.” “Pity.”

“Are you?” “What?”“Venomous?” Another savage smile. He touched the tip of one fang with his tongue and when he drew it away, she saw a pearl of golden liquid. “Try me and see.” “Maybe later, after I’ve survived Michaela.”

“I’ve had reports of this one being in the city, but no close-up pictures till now. He’s some kind of pretty. I could just take a bite out of that firm—”

“Animals obviously ranked higher in Michaela's world view than humans. Having seen some of the things humans were capable of, Elena couldn't disagree.”

“Elena wondered if Michaela was waiting to be served. Snorting inwardly at the idea, she poured her own coffee—and, because she was feeling generous, and okay, maybe because she wanted to irritate Michaela—Raphael’s as well. Then she put down the carafe.”

“Do tell. It might be entertaining to see who gets to you first.” “Excuse me if entertaining you isn’t at the top of my agenda.”

“You’d make an enemy out of me over a human?” The word “human” might as well have been “rodent.”

“She crushed it, telling herself she was going to add Big in front of her Idiot tattoo.”

“Push me and I will. I’ll get punished, but you’ll still be dead.”

“You’re not useless. You’re a hunky bite of sex and I’m not sure if Dmitri swings both ways.”

“No,” he responded, reaching out to trace the shell of her ear. “They grew back even more beautiful. Blue edged with silver.” Elena laughed at the scowl in his voice.”

“Say what you would about the dietary requirements, vampirism sure did do great things for the skin and body.”

“He leaned a fraction closer. “My lovers have always been warrior women. Strength intrigues me.” She refused to let him play with her like this, even if her body disagreed. Vehemently. “Do knives intrigue you, too? Because touch me and I will cut you up. I don’t care if you throw me off the nearest balcony.”

“Surely you’re not going to practice discretion now?”