Why don’t you? his brain supplied. Your brother has decided the rules are just there to be broken, so why don’t you break them too?
The sensible part of his brain rebelled, warning him against the idea, warning him that doing this just for the sake of revenge on Matthew was wrong, stupid and totally reckless. But it was too late—Nathaniel had now squeezed again, and moved his face in front of Isaac’s.
“Hey, Isaac, are you all right?”
Instead of replying, Isaac snaked out a hand and clamped it behind Nathaniel’s neck, pulling him close. Pausing only briefly to suck in a breath, Isaac closed his eyes, then leaned in and kissed the other man.
Nathaniel’s grip on his shoulder increased but he didn’t use it to push him away. Nor did he resist. After a couple of seconds, which he’d probably needed to process the shock, he returned the embrace. Wrapping his arms around Isaac’s back, he closed the gap between their bodies and deepened their kiss.
Isaac moaned, opening his mouth willingly, eagerly, as Nathaniel’s tongue sought access. He could scarcely believe this was happening, but now it was he didn’t have the strength to stop it, despite all the reasons he should. Instead he brought his other hand up to cup Nathaniel’s face, reveling in the sensation of stubble against his palm. He wondered how it would feel on his stomach, his thighs, his cock.
Their tongues tangled together, fighting for dominance then breaking apart to explore before coming back together and starting the sensual dance all over again. Isaac was dizzy with lust—Nathaniel was an incredibly good kisser, and the feel of his hard body against his was incredible. And that was before taking into consideration the stiff cock he could feel pressing against him, eager to break free of the constraints of clothes. Isaac wanted to get naked and horizontal, and fast. To hell with the fucking consequences.
Chapter Twenty
Someone knocked on the door. The two men sprang apart, looking at the door then back at each other. Isaac cupped the bulge in his shorts, pushing at it in the hope it would go down before Nathaniel opened the door. “Fuck!” he spat. “Seriously? Who’s that?”
Nathaniel shrugged, his expression indicating that he was equally unhappy about the interruption. “I don’t know. I’m certainly not expecting anyone.”
Lowering his voice, Isaac replied, “Why don’t we just ignore it, then?” Grinning in what he hoped was a seductive manner, he stepped back toward his soon-to-be lover.
Returning his smile, Nathaniel said, “Good plan. I like your thinking. Come on—let’s go upstairs.” He reached out his hand and Isaac took it.
Before they could move, there was a hammering at the door so hard it shook the wood in its frame. “Isaac! I know you’re in there! Let me in!”
Matthew. Of course it was fucking Matthew. His cock went down like a deflating balloon. “For fuck’s sake,” Isaac said, pulling his hand from Nathaniel’s and clenching his fists, the rage he felt toward his brother growing fast. “How the hell does he know I’m here? And what in God’s name does he want?”
Nathaniel raised his eyebrows. “You two have a fight or something?”
“You could say that. I’d better answer it before he breaks the door down.”
“Be my guest.” Nathaniel indicated the door, then moved toward the kitchen. “I’ll give you two some privacy.”
“Oh don’t worry,” Isaac’s smile was wry. “I’ll be taking this outside.”
This time Nathaniel’s eyebrows almost shot into his hairline. “Um, okay…”
Stomping the couple of feet to the door, Isaac flung it open. Matthew stood there, red-faced and wild-eyed. “Get out here,” he all but growled.
“For fuck’s sake, Matthew, you’re my brother, not my dad.” He threw an apologetic glance over his shoulder at Nathaniel, then stepped outside, gently closing the door behind him. There was no reason to take his anger out on Nathaniel’s property. Breezing past his brother, he headed to the end of the garden path and out into the road. Turning, he said, “What the hell do you want? I told you I was going for a run!”
Looking his brother up and down, Matthew sneered, “Doesn’t look as if you’ve been doing much running. Another kind of exercise, maybe.”
Refusing to dignify the comment with an answer, Isaac replied, “How did you know I was here?”
“Call it a lucky guess. I’ve known you for over four hundred years, Isaac. It didn’t take much brainpower to work out where you’d go when you were pissed off with me. I mean, what better possible way to get your own back on me?” He jerked his thumb in the direction of Nathaniel’s house. “Good, was it? Didn’t last long.”
The arousal that had been coursing through Isaac’s veins only minutes earlier transformed into pure, unadulterated fury. An uncontrollable urge took over his mind and body and, hardly knowing what he was doing, he rushed at his brother, arms outstretched.
Matthew, clearly not expecting his usually placid brother to attempt to knock seven bells of hell out of him, didn’t react. So when Isaac pulled back then let his fist fly at Matthew’s face, he took the full brunt of it. His head snapped to the side, the sound of impact almost deafening in the quiet street. Automatically, he held his hand up to the area in question, and turned back to his brother.
“What the fuck was that for? That fucking hurt—if I was human that probably would have killed me. Snapped my damn neck!”
“Good. I’m glad it hurt,” Isaac replied coolly, much more coolly than he would have thought possible given the rage that still filled him, mind and body. “It was meant to. I was hoping it would knock some sense into you, but that’s clearly not the case. It’ll take a lot more than one punch, I suppose.”
“Christ, what the hell is wrong with you? Have you lost your damn mind? I just came to find you, that’s all, to let you know Richard is calling a meeting in the church. About, uh, you know…”
A little bit of the anger seeped from Isaac to be replaced by curiosity. “So why did you have to make snarky comments then? You deserved that smack just for what you said, never mind what else you’ve been up to today.”
Sighing, Matthew said, “All right, all right. I did, I know that. I’ve already apologized. But even so, there was no reason for you to come ’round here and put us in even more jeopardy, was there?”
“Shut up,” Isaac shouted, his fury boiling up again. “Just shut up, all right? Stop going on about that, as we’re never going to agree. Just tell me what’s going on with Richard.”
A creak came from behind Matthew and Nathaniel stepped out onto his garden path. “Everything all right, guys? I don’t mean to interfere, but I could hear you from in the house. And I’ve got double glazing…”
Giving Nathaniel a tight smile, Isaac replied, “We’re fine, Nathaniel, thanks. Just having a bit of a brotherly discussion. Sorry we’re so loud. We’re done now, I think. We won’t disturb you anymore. I’ll talk to you later, okay?”
Looking doubtful, Nathaniel stayed where he was. “Only if you’re sure…”
“Seriously, I’m sure. We’ll be fine. Go on inside. We’re leaving.”
Turning and heading up the street, Isaac waited for Matthew to fall into step beside him before speaking again. “So? Tell me what’s going on.”
“A meeting. Right now. Richard called me not long after you’d left to tell me. He’s getting in touch with everyone in the know and calling an emergency meeting in the church. People are heading there now. We need to be there.”
“Right, okay.” He was still furious with his brother but this took precedence. Over everything, up to and including his nonexistent love life. “Let’s go.” Picking up his pace, Isaac tried hard to force the anger away. The last thing he needed was to turn up at the church still looking pissed off—he’d probably scare the shit out of the villagers and give totally the wrong impression. And what they needed right now was to get them on their side, make them realize they were nice guys.
It was tough, though, as he was angry about that situat
ion too—the fact that he and Matthew had to play especially nice just because someone was framing them for something they hadn’t done. What the hell had happened to being innocent until proven guilty? Obviously it didn’t apply to werewolves.
He flinched when Matthew put a hand on his shoulder, softening slightly when he saw Matthew’s arm come up in a defensive maneuver. “It’s okay, brother,” Isaac said, starting to walk again. “I’m done fighting. You made your point, I made mine. We need to forget all that for now and focus on this damn meeting. Getting this crap sorted is the most important thing of all.”
“We agree on that at least. That’s progress.”
His tone was inflected with humor, and Isaac turned to see a small smile on his brother’s face. Allowing his own lips to curve up slightly at the corners, he replied, “Yeah, I suppose it is.”
They fell into a sort-of-companionable silence as they walked through the village and into the church. A handwritten sign stuck to the wooden door read, “Closed for Private Meeting”.
“Huh,” Matthew said, pulling open the door and stepping over the threshold. “Richard thinks of everything, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah, we don’t want any tourists popping in and crashing the meeting, do we?”
As they entered the religious building, the boys saw there was already an impressive turnout, considering it was a last-minute thing.
“I guess more people are on our side than we thought,” Isaac whispered, knowing his brother would still hear him.
“That or they’re here for Richard. Or because of their fear of God or something.”
“I don’t think people have that anymore, Matthew.”
“Whatever it is that’s brought them here, I’m grateful.”
“Hmm,” Isaac agreed.
Smiling and nodding at everyone he passed, Isaac followed Matthew up to the front of the church, where Richard stood looking as though he was doing some kind of head count.
“Hey,” Matthew said, moving up beside the vicar. “I found him. So, uh, can you bring us up to speed?”
The other man clocked the mark on Matthew’s face and his gaze slid momentarily to Isaac before shifting back. “Hi guys. Sorry about this—I just thought things would be easier if I called a meeting. After coming up with diddly-squat up on the moor, I’ve been racking my brains to try to figure something out. I know we’ve got the tranqs and cameras plan, but we need more. Plus people kept asking what was going on, so I thought the best way was to get everyone here and tell them all at the same time. You never know, someone might come up with something we haven’t thought of. Not to mention it’s a good way to tell your side of things, make people realize this isn’t you.”
Matthew clapped the rector on the back. “And I always thought Isaac was the brains of the outfit. Thanks, mate. We appreciate it.”
Isaac nodded in agreement. “Yeah, we do. Seriously.”
The church door swung open and a few more villagers came in. Richard moved his attention to them, his head moving a fraction as he counted each one. “Okay,” he said after a few seconds, “I reckon we’ve got at least one member of every family in the know here. That should be enough—they can be in charge of telling everyone else. There’s no way we can get every single person here—it’s just not doable. People are away, at work, ill…”
“Hey, it’s okay,” Matthew said. “This is brilliant. So what do you want us to do?”
“I hadn’t quite thought that far ahead, to be honest. This is all moving so fast. I guess I’ll speak first and tell everyone why we’re here, explain what’s going on and what we’ve done about it so far. Then you can both take it in turns filling in any gaps.”
Richard was right about things moving fast, Isaac thought. His brain had only just clicked into gear with what was about to happen and what the ramifications could be. If he was right in his suspicions, then the very person targeting him and his brother, or a member of that person’s family, was in the room. Was it a good idea to tip them off? Let them know that they believed it was one of them who was doing this?
Isaac cleared his throat. “Hey, guys? You got a minute?”
Richard frowned and Matthew shot him a querying look. “Yes,” the vicar said, “let’s go into the vestry.”
Once there the vicar spoke again, “So what’s up?”
Isaac outlined his concerns, also filling the vicar in on the part about it maybe being a woman Matthew had upset over the years.
Richard gasped. “Goodness, you’re right, Isaac. Absolutely right. That hadn’t even occurred to me. So what do we think? Just tell the story but leave out the part about us thinking it’s one of the villagers and possibly a woman, um…spurned? Most of them, I reckon, will come to that conclusion—the part about the villagers, not about the women—all by themselves. We don’t need them to know we already think that. You never know, it might even make someone fidget in a pew and point us in the right direction.”
“We can only hope,” Matthew said.
Isaac nodded. “Agreed. Okay, now we’re all on the same page, shall we get this over with?” His anger had gone now and instead a sick feeling sat heavily in the pit of his stomach. Christ, he wished the whole thing was over with.
“Yes, okay,” Richard said, pushing open the vestry door and heading back into the main body of the church. “Let’s do it.”
Isaac wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but he heaved a sigh of relief when Richard, Matthew and he had all said their piece. Weirdly it felt better to have it off his chest and out in the open. Now he just had to hope that the vicar was right, that someone might come up with an idea, a solution, anything. Because anything was better than the nothing they had at that moment.
After Isaac had finished speaking, the church erupted into a mass of voices, the volume growing higher and higher as everyone attempted to say their piece or simply express their disgust or disbelief at what was happening. He couldn’t understand a single word, couldn’t pick anything out. Staring out at the crowd, he quickly came to the conclusion that fidgeting and body language was a no-go area too. Everyone was moving, standing, shaking fists. The people in front of him were like a bag of cats.
Fortunately Richard took charge. Moving to his lectern, he switched on the little-used microphone—in such a small church, it wasn’t really needed—and tapped on it heavily a few times before saying firmly, “Quiet. Quiet, everyone, please.”
The silence wasn’t instantaneous. Instead the din reduced slowly, voices dying out one by one until they simply stopped.
“Thank you. I’m sorry, but all that racket wasn’t helping anyone. And that’s why we’re here—we need your help. Now you know exactly what’s going on and what we’ve got planned for the next full moon, we need you all to put your minds to finding out who’s doing this. These two men have lived in this village for over four hundred years. They knew your parents, your grandparents, your great-grandparents…you get the idea. And that entire time, they’ve done nothing but protect this village, help it. Helped it during its darkest time too. So you must ask yourselves, why would these two villagers—who are more a part of this village than you or I—turn against it? Eyam is their home. Why, tell me, would they put so much at risk? Their relationships, their jobs, their very lives? It just doesn’t make sense, and I don’t believe for a millisecond that those poor creatures were killed by these men, in any form. Someone else is doing this, someone else is slaughtering sheep and trying to point the finger at Matthew and Isaac Adams. And I for one won’t stop until that person is uncovered and brought to justice. So if any of you know anything, it’s your duty to let it be known. Your duty as people, as villagers, as God’s children. That’s all I have to say.”
Stepping away from the lectern, Richard moved back over to the brothers, his eyes glinting with passion and conviction. “Huh, that’s better. Seems I’ve been wanting to say that very badly.”
Isaac raised his eyebrows, then smiled, “I’m glad you did, mate. You said i
t very well indeed. And nice touch about the duty and the God’s children. Playing the Christian guilt card is always a good plan.”
Even the vicar had to smile at that one.
Chapter Twenty-One
Matthew watched the congregation with interest. Nobody was behaving peculiarly, so they had to assume that the sheep slayer was not in the room. The villagers were all chattering excitedly, angrily in some cases, and in spite of the circumstances Matthew felt good. The meeting had been a brilliant idea, it seemed. Bringing the villagers up to speed and making them realize that it couldn’t and wouldn’t be Matthew and Isaac killing the sheep had turned them back around, regained their confidence, their trust. Of course it was crap that they’d lost it in the first place, but when he tried, really tried, to put himself in their shoes, he could see how bad it looked for him and his brother. Without the full-moon factor, it likely wouldn’t have been an issue, but with that big fat coincidence thrown in their faces…well, he got it. He got why people might have thought it was them.
The myriad voices might be on their side now, but unfortunately nobody had yet come up with a genius plan or any information that might help them find the actual culprit. Or perhaps they had but they were so busy chattering amongst themselves that they hadn’t yet divulged anything to the group as a whole.
Matthew gave Richard a nod, and the vicar moved back to his lectern, tapped the microphone again. “Okay, everyone. The three of us would very much like to thank you again for being here and for your support. This has been a really tough couple of months, especially for Matthew and Isaac, and we’d really like it to come to an end. So on that note, does anyone have or know anything that might help us?”
A hand went up about halfway down the rows of pews. Dorothy Smithers. Matthew grinned. He hadn’t spotted their neighbor up until now, but he should have known she’d be there. He was surprised she hadn’t started beating up doubters with her walking stick before now.
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