The Breed (2 page)

“I think you’re right. I can afford one or
two new shirts.” I tried to smile but my mouth didn’t want to work
that way.

“Hey.” Sylvia leaned over and put a hand on
my arm. “You’re really worried about this, aren’t you?”

“Of
course
I am! I’m just…this is
wrong
. And nobody can tell me what’s causing it.” There was
a lump in my throat and my eyes burned—it took me a moment to
realize I felt like crying. The ridiculous, girly emotion was
completely unlike me. I hadn’t even cried my mother’s funeral a
year before and I wasn’t about to start now.

Sylvia must have seen the tears in my eyes
because she patted my arm again. Another woman might have pulled me
into an embrace but that wasn’t the kind of friendship she and I
had. We were both touch-me-not kind of people which was one reason
we’d always gotten along so well.

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do,”
she said at last, removing her hand.

I shook my head. “There’s nothing. I’ve just
got to…get through this somehow.”

“And you
will
,” she said with such
confidence that I felt a little better. “Lexie Conley doesn’t let
anything get in her way or get her down. Not the Lexie I know,
anyway.”

“Right.” I tried to smile at her, grateful
for the encouragement. And just at that moment, it had seemed that
everything would be okay.

But now, standing in front of my mirror in
the middle of the night I had to acknowledge that things were
not
okay. Something was happening to me. Something strange
and wrong that I didn’t understand. Worse, no one seemed to have
any idea what it was or where it was leading.

Or where it would all end.

“Knock-knock.”

I looked up from keying my sequence into the
penthouse’s security pad and was annoyed to see my older brother,
Lukas standing there. Well, not exactly
standing
. He was
lounging indolently against the wall with his hands in his pockets
and his head cocked to one side, watching me.

“Lukas,” I said, frowning at him. “How very
unusual
to see you. I thought you’d be at the other end of
the galaxy this time of year. Isn’t it spring break
somewhere
in the Milky Way?”

“Very funny, Sis.” Lukas had eyes as black as
mine but his matched his thick, coal black hair which he wore
neatly trimmed above his ears. He was wearing an expertly tailored
charcoal suit which probably cost as much as the average family’s
car and his deep red silk tie emphasized his tan skin. He strolled
forward and leaned down to give me a lingering kiss on the cheek.
His expensive cologne—something masculine and spicy—enveloped me
and his lips were warm against my skin. “Aren’t you going to invite
me in?” he murmured in my ear.

Actually, I really didn’t feel like dealing
with him right then. After my bad dream the night before, I’d
hardly gotten a wink of sleep. Work had been stressful and I’d been
leaking all day. All I wanted to do was go inside and take a long
hot shower which sometimes relieved the ache in my breasts. And now
I had Lukas to deal with.

“I haven’t seen you since Mom’s funeral,” I
said, stepping back and crossing my arms over my aching breasts. To
be honest, I’d
barely
seen him then. He had only showed up
at the very end of the service and then he’d given me a kiss on the
cheek and whispered something cryptic about seeing me in a year.
That was the last I’d heard of him until now which, while
irritating, was hardly surprising.

Lukas and I had been inseparable when we were
younger but once my parents sent him away to military school on
Mars when I was twelve and he was fourteen, we’d hardly seen each
other. Then he and my father had a falling out and my father had
disinherited him.

Lukas had promptly gone out and built his own
company from the ground up. He was a multi-billionaire in his own
right now and he spent his time doing whatever he wanted which was
mostly drinking, gambling, and womanizing—if you believed the
interplanetary press.

As far as I knew he and my father had never
reconciled before Dad died and he hadn’t come to see Mom when she
was sick either. In fact, in the fifteen years since he’d first
been sent away to school, my once-dear brother had become little
more to me than a handsome stranger. So why was he bothering me
now?

“What do you want, Lukas?” I said, blocking
the doorway to the penthouse.

“Just to see you, Sis.” He stroked a strand
of hair that had gotten loose from my bun out of my eyes and looked
at me seriously. “I told you I’d come visit you in a year—so here I
am.”

“Here you are,” I said, still not moving.
When I thought about it, it had been
exactly
a year since my
mom’s funeral. Something I’d been trying not to remember all day.
And now here Lukas was, reminding me.
Thanks a lot, big
brother.
“Why a year?” I asked.

“Because it’s just enough time.” His black
eyes were suddenly pleading. “Come on, Lexie—let me in.
Please?”

It was the ‘please’ that got me. Lukas never
asked anybody for anything—he preferred to just take what he
wanted.

“All right.” I stepped to one side grudgingly
and gestured for him to precede me into the penthouse. “But you
can’t stay long—I’m really tired tonight.”

“Long day at the office?” He strolled in,
hands still stuffed in his pockets, and looked around. “Looks like
you did some redecorating.”

“Mom did it the year before she died,” I said
shortly. “If you’d come around more often you might have
noticed.”

“I couldn’t.” He turned to face me, his
handsome face twisted in a look of regret. “I wanted to,
Lexie—believe me I did. But I couldn’t come see you while Mom and
Dad were still alive. Not after…” He shook his head. “I just
couldn’t.”

“Why not?” For some reason his words seemed
to tap into a deep well of hurt inside me—a reservoir of anguish I
hadn’t known existed until now. “Why, Lukas? I know Dad died
suddenly and you two still weren’t talking when he went. But that
last year with Mom was really
hard
. She had a stroke and she
could barely talk…” I had to turn my back for a moment to compose
myself. God, what was wrong with me? I was never this
emotional!

“Lexie?” he asked hesitantly.

“She asked for you, you know.” My voice came
out sounding muffled and weak but when I turned around I tried to
keep my expression calm.

“She did?” Lukas’ face was hard. “What did
she say?”

I frowned. “It was difficult to understand
but mostly…mostly I think she was trying to say she was sorry for
something. I…I told her I would tell you if I ever saw you again.”
I looked down at my feet, encased in shiny black leather Prada
pumps that hurt but made just the right statement with the slim
black pencil skirt and severely cut black suit jacket I was
wearing. I had the sudden urge to kick the painful shoes off and
just go barefoot but I looked up at Lukas instead.

He was watching me with real pain on his
face—a genuine emotion that surprised and moved me. “I’m sorry,” he
said softly. “I know you don’t understand. But I came here to
explain. I hope after tonight we’ll know where we stand.”

That sounded vaguely ominous but before I
could say anything else he came forward and hugged me—surrounded
me, really, since he was so big.

If I was startled by his embrace, my reaction
to it surprised me even more. I actually hugged him back. I put my
arms around his waist and buried my face in his broad chest, not
caring that my red lipstick might be staining his collar. Even
though I was wearing heels Lukas still stood a head taller than me
and the feel of his arms, like warm iron bands holding me close,
seemed somehow completely perfect and right. I breathed him in,
filling my lungs with his spicy scent and for the first time in I
don’t know how long, I let myself relax.

“Lexie…Lexie,” he murmured in my ear, his
deep voice soothing. He was rocking me gently, swaying to some
music only he could hear. For a moment I felt like we were dancing.
“I’ve missed you so much. So very, very much.”

“You have a funny way of showing it,” I said,
nuzzling closer to press my face against the warmth of his throat.
I liked the rough scratch of his whiskers against my skin. No
matter how often he shaved, Lukas always had a five o’clock shadow.
“Never calling,” I continued. “Never coming around…”

I had a vague idea that I should have let go
of him by now—our hug had gone on much longer than was really
proper between a brother and sister. But somehow I just couldn’t
bear to stop holding him. Being near him made me feel better…about
work, about the strange changes I’d been going through, about
everything
.

It was exactly the way I’d felt when we were
kids and I would run to him with a scraped knee. Lukas would always
gather me close in his arms and kiss the hurt spot and tell me a
silly story or sing me a song until I was laughing instead of
crying. I hadn’t had that feeling of comfort and safety from my
older brother in a long time. A very,
very
long time. And I
was surprised at how much I still enjoyed it.

“Mmm,” he held me tighter, his voice rumbling
through me. “You smell good.”

“Thanks, but I don’t know why. I haven’t put
on any perfume today.” I’d been in a hurry that morning and had
somehow skipped my usual spray of
j’latique.

“You don’t need perfume.” He inhaled deeply,
rubbing his hands up and down my spine in a way that was both
soothing and pleasurable.

I was beginning to get a little uncomfortable
with how comfortable I felt. I know that doesn’t make any sense but
it’s the best way I can describe it. It seemed wrong to let myself
melt against him this way, wrong to feel so good in his arms. I
tried to think of the last time I’d hugged him—of the last time I’d
touched
him in anything more than a very formal way and drew
a blank. Could it be that we hadn’t hugged each other since we were
kids? Was that normal? Was what I was feeling
now
normal?
What
exactly
was I feeling?

“What are you thinking?” he murmured. His
warm breath tickled my ear and sent a shiver down my spine. “What’s
wrong, Lexie?”

“Nothing,” I said a little too fast.
“Just…wondering when the last time I hugged you was.”

“Right before they sent me away to that damn
military school,” he said, surprising me. “Remember? The car was
waiting to take me to the port and you came running out to hug me.
You were supposed to be in school but you skipped that day, just so
you could see me off.”

“Of course,” I said as the memory came
flooding back. “I got in
so
much trouble. They had to pull
us apart because I didn’t want to let you go. We were both crying
but you were pretending not to. How could I forget that?”

“I couldn’t.” Lukas held me even tighter.
“I’ve carried the memory of it with me for years.”

“You have?” I drew back a little to look at
his face but there was none of the sharp cynicism or sarcasm I’d
come to expect from him. Only complete sincerity.

“Of course.” He looked back at me, his eyes
holding mine, making it impossible for me to look away. And then I
shifted my weight and felt something hot and hard brush my thigh.
What the hell?
Was our hug turning him on? Was it turning
me
on? I jumped away from him, ending the overlong embrace
abruptly.

“What’s the matter, Lexie?” He arched one
black eyebrow at me and just like that, the sarcasm was back.
“Something bothering you?”

“No. No, of course not.” My cheeks were hot
but there was no way I was going to admit what had really caused me
to stop hugging him. I’d probably imagined it anyway.

Lukas gave me a knowing smile. “You’ve
grown,” he said, his eyes flicking over my breasts which were
straining the buttons of my jacket. “Have some work done?”

“Of course not.” I crossed my arms over my
chest protectively. “I’ve just been…having some problems
lately.”

“Problems? What kind of
problems?”

“Nothing you’d understand.”

He frowned. “You might be surprised.”

“By you? I doubt it,” I snapped, moving past
him. Fond childhood memories not withstanding, our moment was
officially over. “Was there something else you wanted, Lukas?” I
asked. “I’m tired. I want to get a shower and go to bed.”

“Just wanted to see you. And talk to you.” He
frowned. “But if tonight isn’t good…”

“It’s not,” I said. I poured myself a scotch
from a crystal bottle on the rosewood bar and knocked it back. Fire
bloomed in my stomach and I looked up at him, my eyes watering from
the stinging alcohol. “It’s
really
not.”

He shrugged. “All right then—another time.
You go on to bed, I can let myself out.”

I felt suddenly guilty. “It really is nice to
see you again,” I said grudgingly. “And about what I said—I know
you didn’t get along with Mom and Dad. I just could have used some
support.”

“I know.” Lukas’ voice had gone soft and deep
again. “And I’ll never forgive myself for not being there for you,
Lexie.”

I sighed. “It’s too late for apologies
now—just forget about it. And now I am
dying
for a shower.
So if you’ll excuse me…”

“I’ll go.” He started for the front door.
“I’ll talk to you later.”

Sure you will. I probably won’t see you
again for another whole year.
But aloud I only said, “Sure. We
should do lunch.”

“It’s a date.” He flashed me a blindingly
white smile and I found myself smiling back. It was easy to forget
how charming Lukas could be when he put his mind to it. Especially
since I saw him so rarely.

Giving him a little wave, I headed for the
bathroom. But as I heard the front door
thunk
softly shut, I
couldn’t help feeling a little sad. Who knew when I would ever see
my big brother again?