Exclusive Extra: Advanced Excerpt From Primal Mirror
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Advanced excerpt from PRIMAL MIRROR
by Nalini Singh
Auden Scott? Nightmare of a problem that technically had nothing to do with him—and that would gnaw at him every second she was in his vicinity.
So of course he reached their border to discover her holding a deadly little gun all wrong while facing a homemade target—a piece of card stuck to a big stick that she’d poked into the ground. On the card was a wonky hand-drawn bullseye.
Then she shot and it went so wide of the mark that it wasn’t even in the same galaxy.
His leopard hung its head in reflected shame.
Groaning, Remi deliberately made a lot of noise as he walked out, so that she wouldn’t shoot him by accident—though her chances of hitting him were so low as to be miniscule. When she swung around with the gun pointed, he held up his own hands. “I mean, you have a point one percent chance of actually hitting me, but don’t shoot.”
A glare.
Yes, a definite glare, before she smoothed it over with the ice-coated exterior of Silent perfection she’d shown him yesterday. His heart kicked anyway, his leopard on the hunt.
There you are, the cat purred.
“I apologize.” She lowered the weapon and the movement disturbed the air currents, sending more of her luscious scent in his direction. “I didn’t intend to convey aggression . . . but you did sneak up on me.”
His body stirred in a way unexpected, as drawn to this Auden as he had been disturbed by the woman he’d first met. “I made enough noise for a herd of drunk bears.”
This time, she looked like she really wanted to shoot him.
Amused, he nodded at her target before she could give in to her rage. “Let me guess—your first time with a laser weapon?”
A pause and he knew her training was telling her to lie—according to what he’d picked up from hanging out with Arrows, powerful Psy were taught to cover any and all vulnerabilities. Or they had been under Silence. Who knew how long it would take for that to change, or if it ever would. A century of indoctrination wasn’t exactly easy to shrug off.
Auden finally seemed to realize there was no point in lying when he’d witnessed her stumbling attempted shot. “Yes,” she said at last. “It’s probably not safe for you to be close by.” A grudging warning.
His cat, contrary feline that it was, liked her better for being aggravated by his teasing. “I can’t leave you here with that.” He sighed to further nudge up her anger, to better see her. “I’ll lose my mind worrying that you’d lasered off your foot or blasted your cheekbone.”
Her eyes went black.
Remi stayed relaxed, his hands on his hips—he’d seen other Psy eyes do that when in the grip of great power—or great emotion.
Auden Scott was becoming more fascinating with every second that passed.
Copyright © 2024 by Nalini Singh
