New Species 04 Justice

Justice

Laurann Dohner

Book 4 in the New Species series.

Justice North is the face of New Species. Seeing him up close makes Jessie’s heart

race. He’s the ultimate alpha male—big, muscular, exotically beautiful…and dangerous.

Of course he’s off limits. But then the sexy man purrs and all bets are off.

Jessie Dupree is a mouthy, fiery human female who brings out the animal in Justice.

She wants to show him how to relax, and he’s all for
anything
she wants to do, but Justice has sworn to protect his people and to take a Species mate. He’s torn between

the woman he wants and the oath he’s taken.

Jessie knows a relationship between them probably won’t end well; heartbreak is

inevitable. But that won’t stop her from freeing the wildness inside Justice and

spending every moment she can steal wrapped around his hot body, making him roar

with passion.

Ellora’s Cave Publishing

www.ellorascave.com

Justice

ISBN 9781419937569

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Justice Copyright © 2011 Laurann Dohner

Edited by Pamela Campbell

Photography and cover design by Syneca

Model: Nick

Electronic book publication November 2011

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JUSTICE

Laurann Dohner

To my wonderful Mr. Laurann, who has always shown me that love is possible and

true love is lasting.

Laurann Dohner

Jessie watched Justice North from the far corner of the room and bit her lip. She

really wanted to work up the nerve to approach him. He’d been on the news often but

he appeared even taller and better-looking in person.

Not too many people intimidated her but the man who had been appointed the

leader of the New Species Organization by his own people was one of those rare few.

She respected strength and courage, something he seemed to have in abundance.

She debated the wisdom of having a conversation with him. Justice gave orders to

her bosses and held the power to change some of the task-force policies that she didn’t

agree with. The chance of finding another opportunity to have a chat with him was slim

to none. She wasn’t allowed to attend briefings her team leader held with the tall

Species leader. Her opinion was irrelevant to him but the issues were important.

She hesitated, considering the ramifications. Tim Oberto would haul her ass into his

office if he found out she’d gone over his head. He’d be his normal loud self and tear

her to verbal shreds.

Her gaze swept the room, studying the New Species. They were brave for all they’d

endured, every single one of them a victim of big business screwing them over.

A pharmaceutical company, Mercile Industries, had created genetically altered

humans using animal DNA, had reared them inside secret facilities and forced them to

endure decades of horrendous testing on their tortured bodies. They’d done it to make

money and worse, they’d been funded in part by the government.

My tax dollars
, she grimly acknowledged and clenched her teeth over how deeply

that pissed her off. Mercile had pitched proposals to come up with miracle drugs that

would help injured US soldiers heal faster, become physically stronger and enhance

their reflexes. Those idiots in DC had eaten it up and signed the checks to pay for the

research but later denied having knowledge that live test subjects were involved.

She gave them some credit for acting immediately to discover the truth when

rumors surfaced of the illegal practices. Once officials had proof, military and police

forces had worked together to rescue any survivors imprisoned by Mercile Industries.

New Species were created with US tax dollars and born on American soil, which made

them citizens.

The first facility had been raided and the survivors had been rescued—freed.

Locations of three more hellish places were discovered after employees were

interrogated. The teams had hit them hard and fast, rescued more victims and all hell

had broken loose. Hundreds of victims needed to be housed. They’d been placed in

secure locations and the blame game began. The US had given the New Species a newly

built military base, which they turned in to Homeland, a Species-run community to

6

Justice

keep them safe from the outside world. Under pressure from the government, Mercile

Industries was quickly settling claims brought by New Species. With some of that

money they’d bought a second large section of land they named Reservation.

A big body bumped Jessie, drew her from her grim thoughts and she smiled up at

the male. New Species were easily identified by their animallike features. They weren’t

completely human but weren't all genetically altered with the same genes either and

dubbing them with that title spanned all the differences. Some had been mixed with

large-feline DNA, some with canine and some with primate.

“Sorry,” he grumbled as she peered into a pretty set of catlike eyes.

Feline
, she silently identified his mixed species. “No problem.”

He moved on and she sighed in disappointment. Not many of them wanted to talk

to humans. She couldn’t blame them after all they’d been through. Mercile Industries

had labeled each one with a number and called them experimental prototypes. The staff

had treated the children as if they were subhuman, lab rats, without souls. They’d led

cold, harsh lives, only leaving their cells for training or testing.

The new race they’d created wasn’t docile as Mercile had projected in their grand

scheme. Some of the growing Species rebelled and killed the humans who had spent

years harming and torturing them. Instead of lab rats, the company had hundreds of

angry, bitter, really strong prisoners who’d had enough of their shit. That fact made

Jessie smile.
Good for them. I hope they took out a bunch of those bastards.

Mercile decided to see if they could produce children from the males and females. It

was a faster process for a female to give birth to another altered child than it was to

spend millions of dollars to replicate the procedure that created them. Mercile had

wanted to be rid of the originals, start over and learn from their mistakes. Their

attempts to breed the unfortunate victims were unsuccessful. The males and females

were unable to procreate.

That’s when Mercile started selling the other experiments they'd created. Jessie felt

rage thinking about the Gift Females the drug company used to lure in more investors.

They purposely made smaller females with nonaggressive-animal DNA and used drugs

to control their growth rate to make certain the females never reached over five foot

four. The board members of Mercile Industries and all the rich contributors to the secret projects were given Gift Females when enough money exchanged hands. Jessie

wondered if that was why the original scientist walked out on Mercile. The doctor who

had designed the New Species had destroyed her research and disappeared, taking the

knowledge with her. It was bad enough they’d created people as test subjects but to

hand them over to sadistic perverts seemed a hundred times worse.

Gift Females were sold into sexual slavery. They'd been locked up, hidden away

and grossly abused. Those were the females that Jessie helped recover and the ones that

kept her up at night, unable to sleep.

7

Laurann Dohner

She pulled her thoughts back to the present and stared at Justice North across the

room, deciding she could do her job better if she could get him to hear her out.
Tim can
be pissed but this is about making it easier for those poor women.

She’d never seen Justice in jeans and a tank top before. He usually wore business

suits at his press conferences. His bare arms revealed thickly muscled biceps, golden

skin and he stood with a relaxed ease that made him more approachable. She took a

deep breath, blew it out and advanced.

More tiny details became apparent as she drew closer to the tall leader of the New

Species. His hair was auburn with streaks of blond. On television and in pictures it

seemed a dull, universal brown color. His catlike eyes were exotic and darker, almost

black. He possessed the distinctive wide cheekbones that jutted outward more than a

typical human’s and his nose flattened, seeming more animal than not. It always

fascinated her that so few of them had facial hair and she wondered if they shaved to fit in more.

Her breath caught when he suddenly laughed and it was a husky, sexy sound. His

full lips were the kissable kind that she enjoyed nibbling on. That realization brought

her to halt.
Bad, Jessie. Don’t go there. He’s the boss of your boss and off limits. I totally need to
find a man. I’m to the point where I’m fantasizing about guys I work with. Big mistake.

She took note of his perfectly white, straight teeth, which were revealed when he

laughed. She didn’t see any fangs but it was possible he was one of the rare few who

didn’t have them. Of course, she also noticed he smiled with his lips close together. Mr.