Unfortunately a kill was still inevitable after the initial change. It was the only way to come back from the edge of insanity. After that, however, Julian’s wolves were loath to kill again. The core of evil that characterized other werewolves did not exist in his.
Once upon a time Julian had attempted to prevent his wolves from making that original kill—supplying them with fresh human blood instead as he did on all of the full moons that followed. But it didn’t work. For reasons he couldn’t fathom, not killing that first time turned them into killing machines ever after.
A fate he didn’t want for Alexandra. No, he wanted her to regain her humanity and experience the anguish of being unable to stop herself from killing, then live with it as they all did. He wanted her to understand that once the initial change and kill were behind them, some werewolves were just like everyone else. When she’d shot Alana, she had murdered a person; she had not rid the world of a monster.
He could have stayed and watched but he hadn’t survived for more than a thousand years by remaining at the scene of any one of his crimes. He did not plan to be at this one when all hell—now known as Alexandra Trevalyn—broke loose.
Julian had no doubt that a Jäger-Sucher would show up eventually and put her out of her misery. And while he’d love to see how she liked it, he had no desire to run into any of Edward Mandenauer’s superior hunters again. He’d already had to dispose of far too many, and Edward was not a man who forgot such things. The old warrior would do his best to exact vengeance, but Julian did not plan to give him the opportunity.
After exiting the abandoned apartment building, Julian drew on his ability to move faster than the human eye could track—with age came many advantages, and this was one of them. He was several miles away when a strange, cold, somewhat sick feeling invaded his consciousness. He slowed and nearly knocked over a kid running in the other direction.
“Jeez, dude,” the young man said.
“Pardon me,” Julian muttered.
“Pardon?” The boy laughed. “Man, where you from?”
Julian didn’t bother to answer. He was both history and legend, from a time and place so far away there was no one left of it but him.
And one other.
The kid eyed Julian’s new clothes, clean hands, and expensive shoes. A spark of avarice lit his eyes, and his grubby paw disappeared into his pocket.
“You don’t want to do that,” Julian said.
The young man glanced up, and Julian let him see what lay beneath his smooth human veneer. Next thing he knew, the boy was scurrying back in the direction he’d just come, leaving Julian alone to examine what had caused him to stop running in the first place.
The sick sensation still lodged deep in his belly, and the breeze, which he knew to be hot, slid across his skin like an ice cube. He’d think he had a fever, the flu, except he didn’t get sick. Not since he’d become a werewolf.
He’d learned to listen to his feelings. In wolf form they would be called instincts, and they were as reliable as the sun at dawn.
Julian continued to walk in the direction he’d been headed. Immediately he began to shiver, and his stomach cramped.
“Knull mæ i øret,” he muttered. The only time his native language came naturally anymore was when he cursed.
Slowly he turned in the other direction and retraced his steps. As he did, the pain lessened. He was unable to move very quickly, but the closer he got to where he’d left Alexandra Trevalyn, the better he felt.
Which made no damn sense at all.
Julian sat on a crumbling cement stoop in front of a half-burned ware house. He breathed in and out, ignoring the scent of soot as he calmed his roiling belly. He managed to get past the nausea, but he couldn’t make himself stand up and go. Eventually he faced the truth.
He couldn’t leave her here. She was pack now.
“Knull mæ i øret,” he said again, then he laughed.
He’d made other wolves in his lifetime. But he’d never tried to leave any behind as soon as he’d made them. That would have been a recipe for disaster.
New wolves were…a problem. Until they became accustomed to the changes, Julian always remained close. Because of that, it had never occurred to him that he would be physically unable to let Alexandra fend for herself.
Julian sat on the stoop and tried to enjoy what he knew would probably be his last peaceful moments for a good long while. He was going to bring one of his most hated enemies into the heart of his existence.
Whose vengeance was this anyway?
Edward snapped his fingers, and a woman walked through the door.
“What is this, Grand Central?” Alex asked.
Edward, who’d always had a problem with sarcasm—probably because of his English-as-a-second-language issues—frowned. “This is Los Angeles. Grand Central is in New York, is it not?”
Alex rolled her eyes and caught the ghost of a smile on the newcomer’s face.
The woman was tiny, and that wasn’t just because Alex stood five-nine barefoot. She was petite, too, in a way Alex could never be, her youthful face framed by dark hair with a slash of white at the temple. Her eyes were clear blue, and held an honest, earnest expression Alex wanted very much to trust.
“I’m Cassandra,” the woman said. “Your friendly New Orleans voodoo priestess.”
Alex’s desire to trust evaporated. “Sure you are.”
Cassandra’s only answer was a widening of her smile, which convinced Alex more than any bones in the nose would have.
“Voodoo?” Alex glanced at Edward. “You finally lost that last marble, didn’t you?”
Cassandra choked.
The lines in Edward’s forehead deepened. “I do not understand why everyone is always discussing my marbles, or lack of them. I have not had any marbles since I was a boy.”
“Got that right,” Alex muttered, and Cassandra began to cough.
Edward pounded her on the back, more in irritation than to be helpful. “Move along,” he ordered. “Alex has been holding off the demon thus far, but I worry it will overtake her soon.”
Alex worried about that, too. She could practically hear their human hearts beating; she sensed the swoosh of blood through their veins. The scent of warm flesh made her stomach cramp and her mouth water.
On top of that, her own skin felt too small, her teeth too big. She kept hearing howls and growls, but they weren’t real; they were in her head. Every once in a while she flashed on a forest, on prey, and her pulse accelerated in anticipation of the kill.
And there would be a kill. There had to be.
“Do something,” she managed.
Cassandra got down to business, pulling bottles and vials and bags of what appeared to be grass out of her backpack; then she removed a clay bowl and set it on the table.
Tossing in a little of this and a little of that, she sang a song Alex had never heard before in what seemed to be a combination of French and something else. As she did, the sounds in Alex’s head faded.
“Come here,” Cassandra said.
Alex cast a quick glance at Edward. He had his gun pointed at her head. “Touch her and I will shoot you.”
“You’re under the delusion that I care if I live or die.” Alex strode closer to Cassandra.
“You might not care,” Edward said, “but the demon does. It wants to kill. It will fight what we mean to do.”
“Just say no,” Cassandra quipped, then she lifted a dagger.
Alex took a quick step back, the scent of the silver burning her nostrils. But Cassandra slashed her own palm before grabbing Alex’s. A jolt, reminiscent of the stun gun, went all the way through her.
Cassandra released Alex, and she fell to the ground, dizzy with the crackle, the scent, of flames that weren’t, the raging of a battle that was going on inside. She felt like a cartoon, as if her skull should be shaping and reshaping while the demon within poked and kicked and battered to be free.
Edward was right. It wanted h
er to kill. Them. Now.
The change threatened. Her teeth itched; so did her skin. She stared at her fingernails, waiting for them to grow. Once she shifted, she would be unable to control herself. She’d listen to the urges within her, urges that were no longer voices but instincts; they would be impossible to ignore. She would kill whoever was the closest, and she would enjoy it.
“No,” she said. “No.”
Everything stilled.
Cassandra knelt on the floor next to her, gaze intent on Alex’s face. “You okay?”
“Saying no actually worked.”
Cassandra shrugged. “Figured it wouldn’t hurt.”
“Is she clean?” Edward asked.
“She’s right here,” Alex muttered. “And I wasn’t dirty.”
He sniffed. “That is a matter of opinion.”
“She’s cursed.” Cassandra got to her feet. “Just like you wanted.”
“You cursed me?”
Cassandra flushed. “Yes and no. I took away all evil desires—what we refer to as the demon—but not the necessity of shifting under the full moon.”
“Gee, thanks,” Alex muttered.
“You cannot be too different,” Edward said, “or he will know. You must fake the demon somehow.”
She could probably do that.
Alex glanced at Cassandra. “I still don’t understand how this is a curse. More like a blessing.”
“Yes and no,” Cassandra repeated. “Once the demon is removed you remember what you’ve done; you understand how wrong it is. The spell gives those without conscience a conscience.”
“Which, if I’d actually been eating people, would drive me kind of mad.”
“Exactly.” Cassandra dusted off her hands. “Well, my work here is done. Nice to meet you, but I really need to get back to New Orleans.”
She tossed all the voodoo paraphernalia into her backpack and headed for the door. New Orleans was definitely the place for her.
“Use the exit we devised,” Edward said.
Cassandra glanced over her shoulder. “I know better than to waltz out the front.” She held up her hand before he could speak. “Or the back.”
“Go,” Edward ordered, and with a roll of her eyes, Cassandra did.
When she was gone, Alex asked, “What exit?”
“We came in through a hidden connection with the building next door,” Edward said. “We don’t want Barlow to realize you’ve been in contact with me.”
“Does he know I once worked for you?”
Edward shrugged. “If he does, he also knows you don’t anymore. And he’ll have heard that I don’t suffer rogues gladly.”
“How do you suffer them?”
He lifted his brow. “If they step too far out of line, they do not step out again.”
“You kill them?” she asked, not surprised, not really.
“Why would I do that?”
Edward had always had the annoying habit of answering questions with questions, which weren’t really answers at all.
“You will report back to me in a month,” the old man said. “With detailed directions to his lair.”
Alex bristled. She couldn’t help it. “And if I don’t?”
“Until you give me what I want, I will not give you what you want.” He shrugged. “Remain furry as long as you like.”
He had her and he knew it. She would do his bidding as quickly as she could, if only to get rid of her tendency to grow a tail.
“How am I going to find this guy,” Alex murmured, “if the great and powerful Mandenauer couldn’t?”
Instead of responding, Edward shot her with the damn dart gun again. Alex wanted to grab the thing and shoot him, see how he liked it. But whatever was in those darts worked fast. Everything shimmied.
As she slid to the floor, Edward’s voice seemed to come from a long way off. “Don’t worry, Alex. He will find you.”
Chapter 3
“Alexandra.”
Something wailed in her ears, so shrill, so loud, she’d never be able to go back to sleep. But she couldn’t seem to stay awake, either.
“Alexandra!” Shake, shake. “The police are coming.”
Whoever was doing the shaking stopped and slapped her across the face. Alex’s eyes snapped opened; Julian Barlow hovered over her.
“Wha—?”
She was confused, dopey, but things started to come back. The gun, the dart, Edward’s words.
He will find you.
The old man had been right again.
She sat up, then clutched her head. What the hell had he shot her with that time? If she ever saw Edward again, she was going to—
Alex wasn’t sure what. But something painful.
She glanced down and a low moan escaped. Not because she was still naked, but because she was still naked and covered in blood.
Her head cleared at the sight, and she peered around the room, which appeared to have been prepped for a scene in Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Return.
The trussed man lay on the floor. From the amount of blood on the guy, he was dead. From the amount on Alex, she’d killed him.
Or at least that was what Barlow was supposed to believe. Alex didn’t remember doing it, and there was one thing that made her almost certain she hadn’t—the voodoo curse that had removed the desire to commit evil acts.
But was killing a very bad man an evil act? Hard to say.
Someone had killed the guy. The situation smelled to high heaven of Edward—king of the setup. Except—
Would Edward murder a man just to cement Alex’s cover? That she wasn’t quite sure disturbed her. She was starting to wonder just who was possessed by a demon around here.
“Put this on.” Barlow shoved a pair of sweats and a T-shirt into Alex’s hands as she stood. Both read UCLA and looked much worse for someone else’s wear. They didn’t smell too bad, yet she hesitated. The thought of putting clothes over all the blood nauseated her, and besides—
There was another way to escape.
The change rippled beneath her skin, calling to her, tempting her with the promise of speed and power. She took a deep breath and caught the scent of trees; her eyes drifted closed and—
“We don’t have time to shift,” Barlow snapped. “Or at least you don’t.”
Her eyes opened. He was right. Damn him.
“Why do you care if I’m caught?” Stifling her disgust, Alex pulled on the clothes.
“I don’t care if you die screaming in the electric chair. But if they keep you behind bars until the next full moon—” He glanced at the dead man. “—and I’m pretty sure they will, there’ll be too many questions once they see what happens then.”
“Again, what do you care?”
“I hate questions.” His fingers dug into her arm as he dragged her toward the door.
“I hate you,” she muttered.
“Aw, and here I was hoping you’d fall madly in love with me, just so I could spit in your face.”
Oh, boy, this mission was going to be so much fun. Especially when she nailed him.
Suddenly Barlow stopped, tilted his head, listened. Footsteps clattered closer. The police had arrived.
Alex tensed. What if Barlow decided to kill the cops so the two of them could go on their merry way? What would she do?
An evil, satanic wolf bitch would jump right in and help.
Decisions, decisions.
Luckily she didn’t have to make one. Barlow tugged Alex into the corner, then closed his eyes. His face became intent, as if he was trying very hard to imagine unimaginable things. A rumble came from deep in his throat; a flush darkened his skin. She could have sworn she caught the scent of…anger. And that she could smell anger distracted her for all of an instant before something else captured her attention entirely.
A weird, shimmery glow drifted downward; crystal waves cascaded between them and the rest of the world. A pair of officers thundered down the hall and into the room without a glance in their direction.
“Shit!” said one.
The other gagged. He must be a rookie.
“Who called this in?” the first demanded, probably more to get his partner’s mind off the mess than anything else.
“Dispatch said—” Cough. Cough. “Some old guy from the neighborhood.”
Edward. Asshole. He’d meant for Alex to get caught, or nearly so, to draw Barlow out.
As she and Barlow waited for the officers to leave, they remained crushed together in a cocoon created by Barlow’s magic, her nose pressed to his neck, his chin brushing the top of her head.
He smelled wild, but not in a feral, unpleasant way. Instead Alex caught the scent of evergreens, snow, and fresh air. The great outdoors.
She leaned in and caught again the drift of anger, like jalapeño peppers preserved in ice. How strange. That scent seemed to swirl both around, then through her. Her entire body tingled, nerves dancing, the hairs on her arms, her neck, everywhere, alight with sensation.
He pulled her closer. The movement caused her lips to brush his collarbone. The texture both smooth and hard, she was compelled to taste.
Her tongue darted out, and she relished the flavor of man. His blood sang, just below the surface, and she wanted it; she wanted him. Her moan was protest, or maybe arousal.
“What was that?”
Vaguely she heard one cop speak, another murmur; then the two of them stepped into the hall. Alex didn’t care. Her body seemed to have a mind of its own, or perhaps no mind at all.
Her hands crept under Barlow’s shirt, touching his skin, the hills and valleys of his rib cage, his abdomen; her teeth scraped the vein in his neck as her thumb traced below the waistband of his trousers and over the hard, smooth head of his shaft.
His breath caught; she glanced up. Fury suffused his face, flushing his skin, honing the fine bones beneath. He glanced over her shoulder as the two men came out of the room, then grabbed her hair and yanked her head back so hard her neck cracked. She figured he was going to kill her, or at least try. Instead he crushed his mouth to hers.
Marked by the Moon Page 3