Sitting up carefully, Kira took the gremlin and set him on the grass between them. “Chup-Chup, Jax is a friend. He won’t hurt you.” Gently, she stroked the fur between his batlike ears. “See? Friend.”

Chup wasn’t convinced. On his hind legs, he toddled closer to Jax, nose working, still not getting too close. The growling stopped, but neither did he make the content chupping noise Jax wanted to hear.

Letting go of Kira’s hand, Jax held his out to the creature, hoping he didn’t lose a chunk of flesh for his trouble. “Good boy,” he crooned. “Aren’t you cute? Remember me? I’m not so scary, honest. I only eat bad little gremlins who bite, and only when I’m really hungry. Friends?”

Chup looked back at Kira as though seeking reassurance, so she made encouraging noises, urging him forward without pushing too much. Emboldened, the small critter turned his attention back to Jax and closed the remaining distance, sniffing all over his hand. The stubby whiskers tickled but he didn’t dare jerk away.

Then, to his amazement, Chup began to rub his head against Jax’s fingers like a cat wanting a good scratch. He complied, lavishing attention on both ears, the broad face, under the chin. And there it was—the noise of happy contentment. Chup crawled right up into his lap and closed his big brown eyes in obvious ecstasy as Jax continued to scratch.

“Well! Looks like you’ve got a new friend,” Kira declared with a grin. “He won’t let you out of his sight now.”

“That might make it hard to leave for the op. Think I can use ‘I have to babysit the gremlin’ as an excuse not to go?” he joked.

“Hmm, somehow I doubt Nick will accept that.” Reaching out, she stroked Chup’s fur. “I’ll have to ask Mac if she’ll watch him while we’re gone. I hate the thought of putting him back in that cell.”

“Me, too. It could undermine the trust you’ve worked to gain, especially since he hates being locked in there.” He paused. “What about Belial? Have you made any headway with him?”

“I’m not sure,” she said thoughtfully. “He’s really hard to read, so full of bullshit I don’t know if even he is capable of separating the truth from the lies. It just seems to be his nature to deflect questions and kindness with blatant attempts at seduction, but things aren’t always what they appear.”

“True. So what’s your gut feeling as an Empath—can he be trusted? Will he be able to fit in here?”

She bit her lip, uncertainty clouding her blue eyes. “Eventually, yes, I believe he’ll get there. I sense a basic goodness in him that’s well hidden underneath the layers of self-hatred and anger, and I don’t buy his ‘Look at me—I’m such a manwhore’ act for a second.”

He nodded. “Okay. I trust your judgment. But whether it’s an act or not, I don’t pretend not to hate the hell out of knowing he puts the moves on you every time you get close. It makes me want to rip his heart out. Just so you know.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Eyes twinkling again, she leaned over and kissed him on the lips. “You’re so sexy when you’re jealous.”

“I’m not jealous! Well, I am, but you’ll have to admit I’m handling it. I’m here, for example, rather than busting down the snake’s cell door and chopping off his smarmy head.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Good thing, or you’d never even make it to first base with me, buddy. I don’t do homicidal lovers.”

“Duly noted.” He couldn’t resist the opening. “What kinds of lovers have you had in the past?”

“None who were violent! I did date one guy who was really pushy. Wanted me to do as he said, monitored how much time I spent with friends as opposed to him, had to comment on everything I bought for myself. Always found something wrong with what I cooked for dinner. Stuff like that.”

Jax snorted. “I’ll bet he didn’t last long.”

“Just about a New York minute. Honestly, I haven’t had too many boyfriends, or even second dates for that matter.” She had no idea how happy that made him as she studied him curiously. “What about you? I can’t imagine you’ve had too many dry spells in the female department.”

“You’d be surprised,” he murmured. “I don’t let people in easily, and the one time I did before you ended in disaster.”

There. Now he was committed. If she hated him afterward, so be it.

“What happened?”

“The ambush I told you about, the one six months ago?” She nodded and somehow he found the courage to reveal the truth. “It was my fault. I’d fallen head over heels for Beryl, or thought I had. Looking back I can see that I was blinded by lust, pretty much thinking only with my cock.”

Kira let the comment pass, expression serious, and guessed, “She betrayed you.”

“In the worst way possible.” God, he didn’t want to talk about this. “We’d been seeing each other a few weeks when she revealed that she knew what I was. She had some special abilities of her own, which is how she claimed to have figured me out. I didn’t question it. I was just relieved not to have to lie about myself.”

“Had she known about you all along, before you met?”

“Yes. I didn’t know she was a plant, and that her job was specifically to ensnare me, gain my trust.”

“What was her ability? Who was she working for?”

“She was a witch practicing the dark arts. As to her contact, we’ve never been able to find out who was behind the ambush. All we know is Beryl’s goal was to integrate herself here, gaining our trust and learning our secrets, like the fact that silver can kill us. She and her contact planted false information about a family being held by vampires, so we scheduled a rescue op. I trusted her. That night, the ugly bastard down in Block T and his murderous comrades were waiting for us. Taking us out was like shooting fish in a barrel,” he said hoarsely.

“How did she know about the existence of Alpha Pack in the first place?”

“That’s a question we’ve all asked. If one of us had been a traitor, then Beryl wouldn’t have needed to pass along information and set us up. So that theory is out.”

“But one of you might have let it slip by accident,” she speculated.

“Yeah, that’s possible.”

“I’m so sorry.” Laying a hand over his, she stared intently into his eyes. “Is there any chance at all she wasn’t involved? Do you know for sure she’s the one who sold you guys out?”

“Oh, there’s no question. She was there, in the aftermath, laughing as five of us lay dead—Terry, Micah, Jonas, Ari, and Nix. I can’t describe the horror of knowing what I’d done to my team.” The agony was almost unbearable. “The building was on fire and I used the last of my strength to throw her into the flames. I can still hear her screaming.”

His lover swallowed hard. “She’s dead?”

“Yeah.”

“I’d say good, except it might have been useful to keep her alive and force her to give up who was calling the shots.”

“Another idiot move,” he admitted. “I should’ve used my gift as a Timebender to go back and warn my team of the ambush. A few minutes were all we needed. But I was in shock, running on nothing but rage, and I reacted, using up what little strength I had left. Now we may never know.”

Unless they try again.

Shoving away the overwhelming guilt, he looked down at his lap, where Chup had curled up and fallen asleep. Sucking his thumb. There was proof that sometimes all a seemingly vicious creature needed was a little TLC. Too bad that wasn’t always the solution.

“So you can really bend time, go back and live something over again?”

“Yes.”

“Wow.” She thought about that. “Can you go back to when you were ten and beat up the school bully who kept tormenting you? Stuff like that?”

He laughed at the idea. “Wouldn’t that be nice? But no, I can’t jump around. I’m not a human time machine. I can bend it enough to gain back the previous few minutes, and that’s all.”

“Huh. Well, that’s still pretty cool. Sort of like that movie where the prince guy uses his knife filled with magic sand to go back in time. Only you don’t need anything but yourself.”