by Laina Kenney
Chapter 10
The next morning on the way to campus, it was all Bliss could do to leave the little love bite alone. It was itching fiercely, and every time she found herself touching it, her pussy heated and clenched around the memory of Egan’s hardness inside her.
It should be a brilliant strawberry on her throat, but it wasn’t. There was hardly a mark left to see. It was bizarre and impossible. It ached and burned on the inside, even though there was no mark on the surface.
Twice she had almost moaned aloud on the public bus. There were some people who did things like that, but Bliss never intended to be one of them, thank you very much.
Egan’s passion was making her over into a woman she had never known she could be, but she wasn’t going to be wandering that far off her normal course.
Still, her body had been thoroughly awakened by him, and she knew there was no going back to the way it had been, the way she had been. He had changed her, and she couldn’t regret it.
She sighed and pulled the cord to indicate her bus stop.
When she got off the bus, Jason was standing there. Some mornings he waited for her and walked with her to their chem lab. She had never asked him to, but there was no harm in it and she didn’t quite know how to tell him to stop.
His eyes settled on her hand covering the side of her throat. He flushed red.
“Is that a hickey?” he asked belligerently.
“No,” Bliss said honestly and moved her hand. “But I did have a date with Egan last night.”
“I don’t like him.”
“I made my choice. That’s the end of the story.” She started walking to her locker. She didn’t have class today, but she needed to get some of her notes.
“It’s not jealousy. I don’t like the way he treats you.”
Bliss said dreamily, “I do.”
Jason swore and walked away.
Bliss hung back a bit and let him go. She didn’t have time for spoiled boys when she was meeting her man for lunch.
And with that incredible sense of timing that seemed to be innate in him, Egan appeared around the side of the science and rehabilitation building carrying a familiar take-out bag and two go-cups. He was in the centre of the paved path, but she somehow couldn’t hear his footfalls.
She had noticed before how quiet he was, but it was uncanny to see his feet hitting the ground and hear nothing at all.
She could hear the ivy leaves clinging to the red brick façade rustling in the cool breeze, and the chattering of squirrels playing under the shadow of a large tree by the long hedge, but she couldn’t hear Egan until he was almost to her.
With a quick peck on her cheek that tingled even when he had straightened, Egan ushered her to a sheltered spot by the hedge. Without needing any speech, they sat on the soft grass to enjoy their submarine sandwiches. Her sandwich was half the length of his, but he had polished his off long before she was finished.
“You’ve thought of everything,” she said when he produced two wrapped brownies from his jacket pocket.
“Thank you, my lady.” He pretended to bow before her, and then spoiled the effect by eating his brownie in one snap of gleaming white teeth.
“I’ve never met any man like you,” she said after the first pinch of appetite was satisfied.
Egan cleared his throat. He spent a moment crumpling sandwich wrappers and stuffing them into the clear plastic bag.
“You have,” he said finally. “Ives is like me.”
Bliss stood and cocked her head down at him.
“Yes,” she said slowly. “I think there are similarities. Certainly you have the same man-is-the-protector attitude. That will drive me mad, I’m sure. We’re so different that I had no idea my sister and I would have the same taste in men.”
She giggled, but he didn’t crack a smile. He was studying her in a way that made the nerves in her stomach jump.
“What?” she asked.
He looked around, as if to be sure they were alone. Was he going to kiss her?
“I cannot wait. Please do not scream,” he said, and she stepped back in sudden alarm.
A twinkle of stars surrounded him for a moment, but when she blinked, a large black wolf stood in his place. The wolf swiped his rough tongue along the tips of her fingers, then the stars twinkled again and Egan was standing before her.
He reached out and caught her as her knees buckled.
“Bliss.”
She touched his face. His eyes were glowing a brighter green, and apparently it wasn’t a trick of the light.
“That’s not possible.” Her voice came out hoarse and she cleared her throat painfully. “What you did, it can’t happen.”
He sat on the green grass with her cradled in his lap. The concern was clear in his eyes.
“It happened.”
“No. The human skeletal structure wouldn’t allow such a huge transition. Changing the spine alone would be horribly painful. And it should be loud, but it didn’t make a sound. Plus it happened in seconds, when multiple surgeries should be required. It can’t be possible.”
“It is possible, it is even natural.” His eyes were serious. Seriously glowing. “It happens every day for my people. We are Vulfen, not human like you.”
She stroked her fingers over his lips.
“Werewolves? How?”
He smiled for the first time.
“Well, there you have me.” The puzzlement on his face was adorable. “I’m damned if I know how, exactly. I am not anything like the human concept of a werewolf. I don’t know if the legends come from humans seeing some of what we can do and making up the rest over a few centuries, but it is mostly false. My wolf is just a part of me, and always has been.”
“You’re magic.”
She was fascinated to see the faint flush that climbed his cheekbones.
“There is a line of magic users in my family tree. My maternal grandmother is a strong and gifted woman, but I am not so gifted. No, I don’t have—”
“Okay.”
She smiled up at him and he subsided. Even if he was a supernatural creature, that bone-deep honesty said that he was still her Egan. He didn’t try to make himself seem more amazing. He just wanted her to understand him.
She would never understand a man who could stand as a man then in a shower of stars become a wolf, not in a million years, but she didn’t seem to be having too much trouble accepting him. He had accepted her dangerous life, her false last name, and her mad study schedule. Really, was turning into a wolf so bad compared to that?
Being furry every now and then must have some serious benefits. Maybe his sense of smell was better than hers, and his eyesight was definitely better. The man could see in the dark.
“Are you a secret? Because I didn’t ever know about this.” A thought occurred. “Does Maressa know already?”
“We are and she does.”
Bliss frowned and sat up.
“Well, that’s annoying. She knew before I did. She’ll be smug about that, probably.”
Egan laughed.
“Ives and Maressa are mated, and have been for months. And they are getting married in the human way also, mostly for you and your Aunt Belle, I believe. But you are upset because she knew about the vulfen people before you did.”
“Well, if your twin knew something this big before you, wouldn’t you be?” she challenged, getting to her feet and brushing loose grass from her legs.
Egan raised his eyebrows. “If I thought it was important, I might,” he allowed.
“See?”
He tipped his head in agreement.
“I’m sure you have heard some of the human legends of the werewolf. We are not werewolves, but Vulfen. And as is usually the case, most of the legends are interesting but bogus. Some are quite funny, though they are meant to be frightening. Please do not be afraid.”
“What about silver bullets? Will silver bullets kill you?”
He snorted. “Any bullets will if there are eno
ugh of them.”
“Nothing special about silver?”
“No. The touch of cold iron bothers some of the kelpies and some of the other magic users, so I have heard, but it does not apply in my family. I do not know of anyone who is bothered by silver.”
She paced back and forth.
“What about the full moon? Does it make you crazy?”
“Not as crazy as your scent does.”
She glanced over, but he was grinning.
“Bliss, I assure you, I do not become a monster once every month.”
She smiled a little.
“Well, I do, so watch out. There should always be an emergency supply of chocolate around. You’ve been warned.”
He gave a great shout of laughter, then bowed from the waist. He seemed to like it that she would tease him.
“So noted. I have been warned.”
“You think I’m joking. I’m only half joking.”
“You are my mate, my heart. My sister-in-law is a chocolatier, so although there may be strife in our future, I do not foresee a shortage of chocolate becoming a problem.”
Bliss stopped suddenly, half turned away from him.
“You bit me.”
* * * *
Her hand flew to her neck and her eyes, when she turned to him, were wide.
“The mating bite should not affect you adversely. Most human mates notice no difference.”
“It itches and burns like crazy!” Bliss said.
Egan hesitated.
“Ah.”
Bliss held her hands up between them.
“No. Don’t say ‘ah’ like that. It makes me nervous.” She pinned him with a stern look. “Is this bad? How bad? Am I going to be a wolf, now? Is that what that ‘ah’ means? Or maybe it won’t work and I’ll die in your arms.”
“You will not die,” he said, and what he didn’t say was that she was being ridiculous. “As to the rest, I cannot say.”
She gave an incredulous half laugh.
“Try.”
“It has happened, in rare cases, such as that of our Alpha’s mate. She was human, but now runs with the pack. She is a very pretty wolf. But they were more than usually compatible, and though she has not been trained, she is a very strong healer.”
Bliss waved her hands toward her chest to indicate herself.
“Me, too! I can heal. I can do things for people who are ill, things I’m, well, technically not supposed to be able to do. Things no one is supposed to be able to do. And I can tell, sometimes, if test results are inconclusive, that something is still wrong because my hands tingle so hot I just know. I can take away pain especially for children or old people, but it’s exhausting. And sometimes, I can make small things better. My hands get even hotter for big problems, but I run out of energy. But I just keep trying to do it because I can’t say no.”
She stumbled to a halt and just watched him. The apprehension in her eyes flayed him to the bone.
He stood and pulled her hands to his chest to rest on his suddenly pounding heart.
“Are you afraid I will judge you? I, who kill on command? I, who have taken so many lives I have lost count of the holes in my soul, judge a rare natural healer?” He struggled with the tears that wanted to come at the staggering realization of Bliss’s true ability. He almost went to his knees at the magnitude of the gift given to him to protect. “I am humbled by you.”
She stroked his chest and laid her head over his heart. He held her close, chin resting on the top of her silky head.
She was his to protect.
“My heart,” he said. “My soul. My Bliss.”
Chapter 11
In the evening, when the shadows were darkening to black, Egan stood watch outside Bliss’s house. He was one with the night, his vulfen vision and instincts making him at ease in the darkness.
And in his current position, he had an unparalleled view of his mate, hunched slightly as she sat curled in her dormer window with a thick textbook in her lap and her golden hair held up by a pencil except for the few stray wisps that gently framed her face.
He was giving her some time to come to terms with the afternoon’s revelations, but his mate was choosing to study. He didn’t mind. He was enjoying the view.
Unfortunately, Egan was not alone to enjoy his current vision of loveliness. Balke had prevailed upon him to take over Brax’s training for two hours.
Only two hours.
He had thought at the time that two hours was little enough to ask, but after five minutes, he understood why his brother needed a break. After thirty minutes, he was clenching his teeth, and when Brax snapped a twig that sounded like a gunshot in the quiet neighborhood and started a tiny poodle howling, Egan wanted to howl, too.
Had he been so clumsy as a teen? He thought not. He and Balke had already been training with their older brother Miros, a full-fledged Cadre member by then, before they reached the age of seventeen. They had been tracking the human hunters and running missions at nineteen with no backup but each other.
When Brax sidled up to him, Egan bared his teeth.
“This is boring. There’s no one out there,” Brax said in an exaggerated stage whisper. The sound was loud in Egan’s sensitive ears.
“Guard duty is not exciting as a general rule.” He hoped that his tone would discourage further conversation, but he was not so lucky. “On a normal night, the guard is hoping the target will not be attacked.”
Even the thought of Bliss being a target caused his fangs to drop and his claw tips to protrude from his fingers. Damn, he had it bad.
“When are we off-duty? I’d like to visit that bar again.”
“It was a pub, and you will not be going to a Cadre event again until you prove yourself.”
When Brax opened his mouth again, Egan cut him off.
“And bitching to one of your trainers that you are bored because his mate is safe for one night isn’t the usual method of getting invited to join a league of warriors.”
Brax finally got the picture and closed his mouth. He stepped back, tripped, and smacked his elbow on the side of the tin shed with a resounding clang.
A cat yowled in a nearby yard.
Leaves rustled across the street and Egan caught a flash of reflected light. He was on the move and beginning his instinctive shift when he sensed as much as saw a furtive movement near the backdoor of the house.
He twisted in midair and barked out a sub-vocal command before he lost his human vocal cords.
Brax stood up and ran after the man with the camera, who had emerged from the cover of a lilac bush across the street.
Egan, in his wolf form, almost ran over the smaller fox, who was nosing around the door and yard of the house. His jaws were stretching wide to leap and bite through the spine when he realized why he recognized the fox’s scent.
Egan woofed in disgust and stood up as a man just as Officer John Commander, policeman and Fox Clan shifter, stood up facing him.
“Hey,” John said, brushing leaves off his uniform. As a fox, his shifting magic left a slightly different flavor in the air than that of the vulfen warrior, but he was a protector and Egan recognized it in him.
“I almost broke your neck,” Egan said softly.
John’s grin flashed in the night.
“You almost tried,” he said.
Egan had to hand it to him, he kept his cool. Most of the other shifters walked wide around the vulfen elite warriors, but John Commander didn’t seem to give a damn.
Brax walked back over.
“The guy’s gone,” Brax said. “No problem.”
Egan said nothing, afraid he would flay the skin from the boy’s bones. Brax had let the man run off.
“Did you eat him?” John asked, fixing Brax with a beady eye. “When my brother-in-law says ‘no problem,’ it means he broke somebody’s neck, or pulled out their spine backward, or just plain ate them. Fucking savage wolves, leaving a trail of bodies from City Hall to the harbor and telling the cops
‘no problem.’ FYI, cops don’t think murder is a great problem solver,” John finished in a disgusted mutter.
“No. I did not eat him.” Brax sounded startled. He looked to Egan.
Egan held back a sigh.
“Officer John Commander. His brother-in-law is Matsij Gabrov, our Vulfen Shadow.”
Brax stood up straighter at the mention of Matsij’s name and in the midst of disaster Egan was tempted to laugh. It looked like the kid was about to salute, or something.
“Did he”—John raised an eyebrow—“get away?” John sounded so incredulous that Egan wished he had bitten the fox when he had the chance.
“Lay off,” Egan said without heat. “If anyone gets to bust his balls for screwing up, it’ll be me.”
“I guess it will be. It’s your mate standing in the line of fire,” John said matter-of-factly. “You’ve more than got the blood right. If he ate the bastard, at least that would be one problem off my plate. Shit, I’m starting to think like my fucking brother-in-law. But if that bastard got away, it’s a screw up of epic proportions. Can’t interrogate a suspect, son, if you don’t know where the hell he is.”
Brax’s flush was visible to both men in the faint moonlight.
Balke’s SUV pulled up at the curb. Egan didn’t know whether to kiss his brother or shake him for leaving the untrained Brax with him in the first place. If Balke made even one smart remark about it, Egan was liable to bite him.
“Go and report to your trainer what just happened. Everything. Do not leave anything out.”
Brax bowed his head in respect and loped over to Balke.
“Jesus, the kid’s green. Did we ever do something that dumb?” Egan asked in a low tone.
“I fucking hope you didn’t, ‘cause I sure as hell didn’t. I was so focused I scared my own mother when I was a kid,” John said. “He’s away clean, then?”
Egan shook his head. “We’ll get his scent. But I want this mess cleaned up and over. My mate was terrified, just because some man snapped our photo. However we stop it, it needs to stop.”
“Come with me tonight and meet Detective Ron Rolland from Chicago.”
“He’s here in Boston?”