Page 55 (1/2)
PROLOGUE
BUFFALO GAP, VIRGINIA BREED COMPOUND, SANCTUARY
He was a beast, an ani of ed within hi The ability to run, to hunt, to scent the enemy on the wind and taste it in the breeze was chained in the dimmest part of the man’s subconscious
Hoas it fair that it was locked away? it roared The iven leave to walk the land, and yet the beast was forced to hide It stared out of the man’s eyes, it pumped the blood in the man’s body, and forever it was leashed, restrained
But it was growing stronger The drugs that had kept it leashed had worn off; the years of freedom that the man had known, the false sense of security that theinside him
The beast waited It prowled It roared out in nightmares as it bided its tis the scientists had given him in those labs, and his own control, had killed the aniht with such ferocity to survive
But it wasn’t dead It had never left For a tier growing inside it, and noake It ake and clawing to be free
But it was patient, or so the aniht It could hold on until the man let it free It was part of the man, part of who he hat he was The man would release the anih It was tired The atte so deep within the man’s primal unconsciousness that even the ed to survive
But when it slipped back, the drugs had built an unbreakable fortress of bars around it They pressed into the anih its soul and filled it with pain And weakened it Weakened it as surely as a fatal wound would have killed the man
And the ive rein to his heart, or to open his soul For the man believed his soul lost Only the animal knew better And the animal waitedWaited for the man to find his soul
“Have you finished the tests?” Jonas stepped into the small lab, as Jackal trailed behind hiiven the order that with Jonas’s own force of lorified clerk, Jonas had to have a bodyguard A hu he could at least get along with the other man
He stared at Elyiana Morrey’s back as she tensed, her hand lifting to rub the back of her neck The muscles stiffened beneath her white lab coat as the scent of her irritation began to bloom around her
She was doing that a lot lately As soon as he found the time, he would ree in power plays with her