But if the council got word, they’d send in a government official to investigate a rash of turnings. That was the last thing they needed at this point.
As she followed Liam, she nodded. “You make a valid point about the council. But what I mean is, you don’t have to honor the kind of vows a mate honors. Once this is over, and I’m either hanging high or free to do as I choose, we can go back to being Freya the introverted lawyer who never wants to leave her house, and Liam the crabby, sullen excommunicated vampire biker who’s a difficult werewolf hater.”
He stopped in the middle of a short hallway leading to a single room with an enormous bed covered in a quilt and a glossy white claw-foot bathtub. Spacious and crisply clean, it had simple lines and sparse furniture, with the exception of the bed.
“You still don’t get it, do you?”
She was so distracted by the gorgeous tub, she’d lost her train of thought. “Get what?”
Liam cupped her chin, his eyes boring holes into hers. “You’re not just my occasional mate, Freya. You’re my mate through thick and thin. Just like humans and a good old-fashioned shotgun wedding. I knocked you up for lack of a better term—you’re mine. That means you can’t ever mate with anyone else by clan law—forever.”
Her stomach tightened. “You can’t be serious. How would they even know if I mated with someone else?” Was it like pack law? No divorce ever? She should have paid more attention to Claire when she’d gone on and on about mates and clans and their various similarities.
He brushed a finger over the bridge of her nose. “I’m as serious as those pack members who want your head on a stick. They’d know. The clan always knows. And if they know we can drink from each other rather than use up valuable synthetic blood, there’s no way you’re getting out of this. They’d force you to stay mated to me for that reason alone.”
Freya blanched, gripping the edges of her sweater before crossing the room to move anywhere but where Liam was. The moment his hands touched her, no matter where his touch landed, she was instantly on fire. “About my head on a stick…” She’d never been on this side of the law. She didn’t know how to behave, looking through the other side of the cell bars.
“We’ll figure it out.”
He kept saying that. “How can we figure out murder, Liam? My clothes were at the scene of the crime, Night Dweller. I came home with blood…” She couldn’t say it out loud. But it was the elephant in the room.
Liam pursed his lips. “Yep. You did, Mrs. Night Dweller. But that doesn’t mean you killed Ethan. Why would you kill Ethan? What’s your motive, lawyer? He was a harmless werewolf. Nice enough guy, as werewolves go.”
Her legs trembled when she shook her head. “Why would I kill anything? But I clearly killed something, Liam. I feel very out of control right now. Very unlike Freya Ashe. Yesterday, when Courtland showed up, I visualized killing him, and it felt damn real. It also felt damn good, because if I’m honest-to-God truthful, I’d rather he be dead than mated to me. I know that’s wrong, but those who’d call me wrong don’t have the threat of sleeping with that uneducated Neanderthal on their plates. He’s disgusting. So the truth is, I’ve wished him dead more times than I care to count since the night before last, when he called me out. Who knows how I felt when I left you last night? Maybe I took that rage out on Ethan.”
That rash of fear came back in spades, making her reach for the bed for support, dropping down onto it. Every emotion, every one of her senses was so magnified, so over exaggerated, she didn’t know how to contain them, and the fear she might have killed someone almost overwhelmed her.
Liam dropped down beside her and nodded. “You’re still inherently you, Freya. I just don’t think you’re capable of murdering someone, even as out of control as you feel. So how about we go over last night? What’s the last thing you remember?”
The best sex ever? “Passing out.”
“And what do you remember next?”
“Coming in the front door of my house.” Yes. That was what she remembered. The color of her front door and then seeing Liam. And the panic. The overwhelming, sticky choke of panic, rising in her throat and threatening to incapacitate her.
“And absolutely nothing in between?”
Freya scrunched her eyes shut, forcing her mind’s eye to search her brain. Nothing. It was like a black void. “Nope.”
“Okay, then. We try to retrace your steps.”
She turned to face him on the bed. “You believe me?”
“I do.”
His belief in her warmed her far more than she’d like to admit, even internally. “I don’t even know if I believe me. Why the hell would you?”
“Because if you did murder Ethan in cold blood, and I can’t help but venture that’s a big if, knowing you, you really might not remember it due to your state of mind.”
She wasn’t sure if she should be offended or flattered by his assessment of her character. “What does ‘knowing me’ mean?”
“It means you’re a harmless quilter, disillusioned with her new station in life and unclear about her future. Those don’t strike me as murderous qualities.”
“I was an attorney. I know all the ins and outs of murder. And I’d bet lots of quilters aren’t as harmless as you think.” Harmless. That’s not what they used to call her in the courtroom. When had she become so washed out? So inconsequential?
He grinned again, something he was doing more and more, and it didn’t sit well with her. He wasn’t supposed to smile, and have that smile make everything okay.
“You were a corporate attorney. I can’t remember the last time a corporation murdered another corporation unless it was in the boardroom. And I’m not insulting you. Quilting goes to your character. It takes determination and dedication to put all those little squares together and make a big blanket. Quilters are too busy being studious to be killers.”
Oh, Jesus. She really was the most boring person alive. “Okay, so that aside, you can’t hide me here for long. If you end up caught with me, we have double trouble. Not only because you turned me, but because I’m a fugitive on the lam. You’ll be harboring. Aiding. Abetting. And if your BFF Courtland finds out, well, we discussed that. So where do we go from here?”
“My purpose for bringing you here is twofold, Fugitive. One, not a chance in hell I’m letting anyone get their hands on you until we know what really happened. And no matter what we find out about Ethan’s death, I’m not letting anyone get their hands on you anyway. So take that off the table. Also, you’re not leaving my side, even if I have to handcuff you to me to prevent you from getting into any more trouble. If you’re blacking out because of your change, I want to be there. Next, you need some schooling about vampires, about living as a vampire, about controlling all that rampant emotion you have boiling through your pretty veins.”
“So like a Vampire Academy thing? You’re the sensei, I’m the grasshopper?”
Liam barked a husky laugh. “Only you could put Dracula and Kung Fu together in one analogy. But yes. A lot like that. I’m sure Claire told you all about her adjustment period.”
Freya snorted, stretching her legs. “You mean when they actually came up for air during their Nine-and-a-Half-Weeks style adjustment period? She mentioned a little bit about it, but she didn’t go into great deal. Her hands were pretty full with Hadley and whatever you bikers do at your club.”
Liam raised one of those raven-dipped eyebrows at her. “You make ‘bikers’ sound like a dirty word. We were just hog enthusiasts before all this went down with the government, Freya. Weekend warriors, so to speak. I was a professional once, too, you know. The Fangs are just trying to do right by everyone since we were thrown together, but we weren’t bikers like the Dogs. We were civil, law-abiding citizens who drank from something other than a red Solo cup. So do me a favor and don’t categorize us with them.”
Touchy, touchy. “Well, that was a rather kind endorsement for a bunch of men who kicked you out of their club.” Som
ething wasn’t right about this alleged discord between him and Irish, and she wanted to know what that was.
Instantly, he clammed up as though he had something to hide. “That’s not up for discussion. What is up for discussion is getting you acclimated and finding out who really killed Ethan.”
“And how do you propose we do that from here? We’re almost in the Zone. That’s a good distance from Rock Cove.”
Now his eyes twinkled. “We’re also vampires with super speed and night vision to rival those goggles the military has. We can investigate covertly.”
She smiled, too. “Why do I get the feeling this mess is tapping into the twelve-year-old in you?”
“Because your feelings are out of control and sending your brain ridiculous mixed messages?” He rose from the bed then, making his way to the door. “I have some clothes in the dresser that’ll probably fit you. Grab a bath if you want and change out of your sexy sweats.” He pointed at her ugly navy-blue sweats. “We also need to burn your killin’ clothes from last night.”
The notion she might have harmed Ethan pierced her gut again. “Not laughing.”
“Just take a bath and try to catch your breath, then we’ll nap. You need to rest. We’re safe here for now, Freya. I’ll be right outside this door if you need me. So don’t even consider making a break for it,” Liam teased.
He shut the door behind him, leaving her to stare blankly at the quilt on the bed—and she realized it was familiar. In particular, the red fabric—a crisp, almost red black—had been hard to come by. Mixed with a periwinkle blue, at the time, she’d loved the colors so much together she’d been torn about whether or not to keep it for herself.
This quilt was one of hers. One she’d given to the ladies at the VFW hall to raffle off when they were raising money for the new playground they wanted to build next door to the square.
More warmth spread through her limbs. Did Liam know she’d made it?
Christ. She was becoming one of those women she despised. Women who turned the purchase of a quilt for a good cause into a reason to book a banquet hall for their upcoming nuptials.
Liam probably had no idea she’d made it. It suited his rustic décor, and that was that.
Sliding from the bed, her second thought went to his mention of clothes in the dresser. Why would Liam have clothes for a woman in the dresser?
Because obviously he sequesters his lovers here, and lovers always need a change of clothing after they’ve made whoopie all night long.
The very idea of Liam with anyone else made her want to eat the imaginary woman’s face off.
Stop projecting right now, Freya. Of course there were others before you. You didn’t exactly come into this a virgin either. Now take off your baggy, heinous sweats and get in the tub.
She made a face. Right. Enough of this weak, overemotional, simpering nonsense.
But the tote Liam had left at the threshold of the door called to her. It held the clothes she’d worn the night before…the ones they needed to burn.
Liam shouldn’t have to do that. He’d done enough just by giving her a place to hide. It was time to find the old Freya—the one who didn’t cower in fear, but snarled back.
With purpose, she opened the tote and pulled the clothing out, forcing herself to look past the blood stains. But when she shook the sweats out, something fell to the floor from the pocket.
Something shiny and reflective.
Freya stooped to dig through the thick shag rug, her fingers wrapping around a cool metal object.
She held it up and peered at it…
Then her stomach rolled and she fell back on her haunches.
It was a dog tag with a piece of chain still hanging from the small hole.
And it had Ethan Dempsey’s name on it.
Chapter 10
Liam rose from their nap first, heading to the kitchen to find his phone. He scrolled his texts while he waited for Freya to wake, scanning them to see if word had gotten out about Freya’s disappearance. One text made him grip the edge of the counter.
How the hell was he going to get out for a meet if he had to keep Freya glued to him at all times? He texted back a quick reply to stall so he could focus on the issue at hand.
Ethan Dempsey’s murder. Not for a second did he believe Freya had killed the were. He couldn’t explain why, because it was entirely possible for her to have killed someone as a newly turned vampire. Back in the day, it had happened all the time. But in the recent century, where integration into everyday society was mandatory, there’d been a big clan crackdown on human deaths. Add in the new government laws, and it didn’t happen nearly as often as one would think.
Still, he didn’t believe Freya was responsible. His gut told him she was being framed. The question was why? She’d never done anything to anyone. She led a pretty quiet life—didn’t mingle much except with Claire and the little old ladies in the quilting club.
So who’d want to kill Ethan? He was a nice, innocuous guy, and definitely led a lifestyle similar to Freya’s. Certainly not one of the more likely Rock Cove candidates for murder.
And then there was Freya’s run-in with Seventh Heaven. How the hell had she ended up with it in her system? Someone had to have given it to her, and if his intuition about her was right, she hadn’t taken it willingly or knowingly.
So who had wanted her to have sex with a vampire? Had the target vampire been him, or would any old vampire do?
If Freya had in fact been drugged, the intent was to see her turned—or killed. It had been malicious. That stuff didn’t just get into your drink by accident. You had to crush the pill up…
The bedroom door opening made him tuck his phone back in his pocket. Freya entered the living room looking paler than she had before he’d found her in bed, succumbed to vampire sleep after her bath. And fragile. The latter was not something he normally attributed to her.
She might appear on the outside to have lost her way since she’d been in Rock Cove, with her disheveled clothes and her haphazard ponytail, but on the inside, she was still as sharp as ever.
To see her this way, swallowed up by the clothing she’d found in the dresser, her eyes worried, made his gut tighten and his protective instincts kick in.
So he plastered a smile on his face. “How was that nap?”
“We have to talk,” she said, hiking up the legs of the too-long satiny pair of zebra-striped pajama pants she wore as she made her way to his couch.
“Is it about those pants? Because wow. Fancy, huh?” He whistled.
She grimaced, but she wasn’t laughing when she patted the cushion of his couch. “Sit.”
Liam did as she asked, sliding onto the sofa beside her, trying to keep his voice and expressions positive. “What’s up?”
“This.” She held up a dog tag, thrusting it toward him.
He peered at the tag, glinting beneath the glow of the fire.
Fuck. “Where’d you get this?”
“The pocket of my sweats.”
Instantly, Liam twisted the metal until it was unrecognizable and lobbed it into the fire with a fury that began to simmer in his gut.
Freya jumped up from the couch, almost tripping on her pajama bottoms. “Why did you do that?” she yelped.
“Evidence. You don’t need any more against you, do you?”
Her face changed then, going slack and defeated once more. She slid back on to the couch, tucking her legs under her. “Oh, God. What have I done?”
She sounded so small, he almost couldn’t bear it. Gritting his teeth, he shook his head. “You didn’t do anything that we’re certain about, Freya. Stop jumping to conclusions.”
“Conclusions,” she muttered, her voice thick with misery. “Are you kidding me? I had Ethan’s dog tag, Liam! If I did this, I need to own it! I won’t be able to live with myself if I don’t. Ethan was a nice man. He was a lot like me. A little lost after losing his optometry practice in Anaheim. I mean, who needs an optometrist in a town fu
ll of vampires and werewolves? He was a nice man who died a brutal death, and if I did it, I want to be punished for it. I deserve that!”
Her body trembled violently when she spoke the words, making him reach for her and pull her into his lap, tucking her against him. “And that’s all very honorable. But if you did it, we’ll find out on our own and deal with it then. No way am I letting you hand yourself over before we know for sure. You wouldn’t get a fair trial with your damn pack, that’s pretty clear after this morning’s vigilante-style hunt.”
As her body began to relax, so did he. He stroked the curve of her spine, willing his body to stop responding to hers in a way wholly inappropriate for the moment.
“This looks so bad.”
It damn well did, and he wasn’t going to lie to her. “It does. But we’ll figure it out. If we wait until tomorrow night, maybe things will have simmered down back in Rock Cove, and we’ll go on a fishing expedition. For now, we sit tight and you don’t leave my side. Got it?”
“Okay,” she mumbled against his chest.
There was a sharp knock at the door, putting him instantly on the defensive, but Freya patted his chest. “It’s Claire. Don’t worry.”
He sat her next to him and scowled. “Why would you tell her where we are? The fewer who know our whereabouts, the better. She can’t tell someone anything if she doesn’t know anything. Does tonight’s vampire mood have you leaning toward crazy?”
She nodded, her blue eyes glittering when she hopped up from the sofa and went to answer the door. “Probably so, and not just the kind of crazy that requires meds, but the kind of crazy that kills. So I’d watch it, were I you. And Claire can be our eyes and ears, Liam. Christ knows you don’t have any friends back in Rock Cove, unless you count Courtland, and you swiped his mate right out from under him. I doubt he’s going to adhere to the ‘thou shalt not kill your BFF’ rule when he finds out about that. Now relax. I trust Claire. I know you don’t like that, but you’ll just have to learn to deal. She’s my best friend and my ear to the ground back home.”
Outlaw Alpha Page 9