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Callan,” Taber’s voice was less violent, but the potential of it throbbed just beneath the surface. The jaguar breed his DNA was mixed with could be calm and patient, or savagely aggressive.
    “Dayan?” Callan questioned him, his voice hard.
    Dayan shook his head. “We are not normal.” He seemed more subdued now, backing down from the others. “It’s insanity to pretend we are.”
    “None of us attempt to pretend that we are normal.” Callan raked his fingers through his hair in frustration. “Go home. See if you can find your patience before tomorrow night. I want you and Taber patrolling the ridge for soldiers. We can’t let down our guard, especially now.”
    Other than a brief nod, Dayan did little to respond before he turned and stomped from the room.
    “Dawn?” The young woman still seemed to cower behind Tanner and Taber. “Come out of there, little sister. Why would you still be frightened?” Because shadows and memories tore at her, tormented her. He knew well why she feared.
    She moved from the safety of the other two men, glancing back at Taber as though for reassurance.
    “Dayan is trying to force her to move in with him,” Sherra said as she began to help Doc pack their supplies. “His desire for her frightens her.”
    Dawn paled. Callan breathed a weary sigh. There were days he wondered if they would survive with their sanity in tact.
    “Take her home with you, Sherra,” Callan ordered. “I don’t want her left alone.”
    He ignored Dawn’s look of surprised thankfulness.
    “Keep her there,” he continued. “I’ll have my hands full running Ms. Tyler off. I need no other worries.”
    “Good luck,” Doc said as he studied a page from the thick notebook he had stolen from the lab years ago.
    “What have you found?” Callan frowned, easing closer.
    Jacob Martin shook his head worriedly, his lined face creasing into a scowl as he read the information he had found.
    “There was a case of this, with the first Leo created, about ten years before you. He was kept in another location. This occurred with a female scientist, actually.” He turned worried eyes to Callan. “It affects not just you, Callan, but the woman as well. The two of you are in a ‘mating frenzy’.”
    “Mating frenzy?” Callan asked carefully.
    “I must have missed this, because you’ve never displayed these symptoms before.” The scientist shook his head in confusion. “It’s just a small notation, really. The Leo and the female were destroyed, so there were no tests done regarding the phenomena. But extreme sexual distress, fevered conditions, heightened senses, the ability to scent the female’s arousal, were all notated. The scientist labeled it as ‘mating frenzy’. A condition similar to that of feline animals.”
    Callan sat down as he breathed out wearily.
    “No tests mean no way of knowing what will happen,” he said wearily.
    Doctor Martin shook his head. “There was mention that several scientists wanted to study it, see if the Leo could breed with the woman, but those over the project wouldn’t allow it. They destroyed the pair.”
    Callan braced his elbows on his legs, his hands hanging between his knees as he lowered his head, shaking it in horror. The decisions of life and death were made so easily within the hell they had been created in.
    “Someone has to keep an eye on the woman. I need those tests from her, Callan,” the doctor warned him. “We need to track this, for the others if for no other reason. If it happens with you, then it will happen with them. And we don’t know if the woman is in any danger from this.”
    Callan wondered if the night could possibly get any worse.
    “You need to check on her, Cal,” Sherra warned him. “Or let one of us.”
    “I’ll do it,” he growled, he wanted none of the other males around her. “I’m taking the cell. Doc, you and Sherra hang around here for now. I’ll contact you if she’s still—” He shrugged.
    “Horny?”