On the Prowl Read Free Page A

to happen, Nicolas Preda had to marry her. It was that simple.
    Pushing the question of her future father-in-law’s mood to the back of her mind, Saskia mustered up another social smile and got back to the task at hand. Time to show the crème of New York society exactly how happy she was to have landed herself a man such as Nicolas Preda.
    *   *   *
     
    Nic realized early on that the party was going to last until approximately the end of time. The invitations had requested the guests arrive at 7:00 P.M. By 7:45 he had had his fill of glad-handing politicians and schmoozing executives, and by 8:00 he’d had enough of his future father-in-law. Gregor Arcos was a highly intelligent, crafty old sonofabitch, a man who had inherited his place in the world but who hadn’t been afraid to fight to keep it, and to fight dirty if he had to. That was a quality Nic could respect. What drove him crazy was the way Arcos seemed to believe that by getting Nic to marry his daughter he’d somehow acquired the power to control or guide Nic’s actions. Nic would have to find a way to disabuse the man of that notion, and quickly, without sparking a full-fledged battle of wills. Nic had no doubt he’d win—eventually—but he wasn’t prepared to risk the collateral damage. Not unless he had no other choice.
    By 8:15, his own father had appeared on Nic’s shit list. Stefan Preda knew better than to let his son see his attempts at manipulation, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t working behind the scenes with all the determination and finesse of a master puppeteer. He might realize laying a hand on Nic’s strings was a bad move, but he showed no compunction about tugging Gregor’s here and there, or about doing his best to gather Saskia’s strings into his controlling grasp.
    Nic couldn’t decide how he felt about that. Intellectually, he knew his father’s end goal was nearly the same as his own—to carve out a secure and significant niche for the Preda and Arcos streaks in Manhattan and to ensure the future of the Tiguri in local Other society, including winning a place on the Council of Others. The problem was that Nic’s social ambitions ended there. He reserved his other plans for his business, the family company he’d recently taken over from his father. Maybe that was part of the problem. Maybe now Stefan had too much time on his hands and the elder Preda was out to control Saskia from a sense of boredom or uselessness.
    Maybe that was it, but either way, Nic found himself less than pleased over the way his father had treated his fiancée over the course of the evening, which was odd. He hadn’t expected to particularly care one way or the other. Oh, he would never tolerate anyone treating the woman with disrespect; to do so would be to show disrespect to Nic and his family, as well; that wasn’t the sort of thing a ther —a dominant male—would countenance. Still, Nic hadn’t expected the possessive instincts the small female seemed to call up within him. At least, not at this point in the relationship. Later, after they were mated in truth, he figured thousands of years of species memory would likely make him damned possessive where his woman was concerned. But now? They barely knew each other. It was too early for the beast inside him to be growling every time someone so much as said boo to Saskia Arcos.
    Nic had struggled with the feeling all night. First, he noticed it when he and his father had gathered with the Arcoses before the party began. The families had known each other for generations, so the regular meet-and-greet introductions hadn’t been necessary. Nic had shaken hands with Gregor and his wife, Victoria, formally slid his ring on Saskia’s slender finger, and offered to pour everyone drinks. Fifteen minutes of polite chitchat and the party could get rolling.
    Something unexpected had happened, though, the minute Nic slipped the diamond and platinum engagement ring past his fiancée’s knuckle.