Tieran snorted.
“Okay, so it’s a huge difference. On a full moon, many of my kind shift into wolf form.”
“Many of you? You don’t all do that?”
“Yes,” he said, pulling out a chair next to her and sitting so he faced her. “But here’s where humans come into play. Generations ago, it was discovered that if a shifter mated with a human woman, their child had the ability to control the shift. Half-bloods can change forms whenever they want, like me. Full-bloods cannot. It’s once a month for them, no matter what.”
He watched her swallow and let the information sink in. When she lifted her gaze, it was full of questions.
“So by mating you mean…”
“I mean finding the one woman in the world who is your other half and claiming her.”
Tieran’s hand flew to the spot on her neck where he’d bitten her. Her eyes were wide, shocked.
“Yes, I claimed you. And I’m not sorry, and I can’t take it back.”
Her breath hissed out. “That’s what my grandmother meant.”
“Your grandmother? I don’t know your grandmother.”
“No, but she knows you,” she muttered.
“Oh stop, you’re making me blush, Tullabelle.”
Tieran snorted. “As if that’s possible.”
“Explain,” Caelan barked.
Tieran jumped in her seat. At least now he was the one confused for a change. The skin on her neck pulsed where he’d bitten her. How do you explain something that can’t be explained?
“I think he explained his side rather well, wouldn’t you say so?”
“Well, what the hell am I supposed to say? Caelan, it’s like this. I talk to my grandmother. Oh, and by the way, she’s been dead ten years. That ought to go over really well.”
“Again, Tulla, the man just told you he is from another race of people. You don’t seem to be having too hard a time believing him.”
Yes, but apparently the public didn’t know about his abilities. The few times she’d told others about hers, things had ended very badly. She was still uncomfortable sharing that part of her life. To make matters worse, Peter knew about her visions, but she’d never told him about being a medium with her gramama. The visions were more than enough to make him run.
Except Caelan didn’t seem to care that she could see things.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, Caelan is still here. The man can handle anything you dish out. Trust me.”
“Hello? Did you go away?”
“No, I…” The doorbell intruded. “I better get that.” She let out a breath with an audible whoosh and all but launched herself from the chair. She darted toward the front door, and heard him bounding after her.
“Tieran, wait.” His foot came down on a box of food still in the middle of the foyer.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Caelan stumble. His arms windmilled as he tried to catch his balance. She started to take a step back toward him when the doorbell pealed again.
“Hold on, would you?” she muttered. “Why is everybody always in a hurry?” She braced her feet shoulder width apart and grabbed the doorknob with both hands but paused for a split second to look back.
Caelan finally caught himself with a hand on the desk. “Don’t open the…”
Tieran yanked the protesting door open.
“…door,” he finished with a curse she chose to ignore.
“Oh look, it’s the clone.” Her voice sounded dry as dust even to her own ears. And why shouldn’t it? She was faced with two shape-shifting werewolf…beings, one of which had claimed her without her consent. She would not think about how earth-shattering the idea of him claiming her was.
“No need to be snotty, Tulla.”
“Goddamn it, Tieran. Don’t you ever fucking open this door again unless you ask who it is first.” Caelan grabbed her by her shoulders and swung her around. He shook her as if scolding a child for not looking before crossing the street. Her teeth clanked together as her jaw snapped shut.
“Just who in the hell do you think you are?”
“Your mate.” His roar made Tieran flinch beneath his hands.
“Well, I didn’t ask to be your mate, you big oaf,” she shouted back.
Their noses touched, their breathing turned heavy, their eyes dilated.
He kissed her hard, relinquishing his bruising hold on her upper arms and hugging her closer to him. Her tongue tangled with his, exploring his mouth in a parry and retreat dance. Their lips melded, sealing in the moans coming from both of them.
“Break it up, you two.”
Caelan pulled his mouth off Tieran’s and steadied her before turning to his brother, leaving her wondering what had just happened.
“Eli.”
Eli grunted. “Who else did you think it would be?”
Tieran stuck her head around Caelan’s arm and answered for him. “The pizza man.”
Eli’s gaze roamed over her face then took in her bare legs beneath Caelan’s T-shirt as she stepped out from behind his overprotective twin. He poked his nose up in the air as if he smelled something and grinned a huge wolfish grin.
No, not wolfish, stop thinking about wolves!
“They aren’t going to go away, Tulla.”
Eli slapped Caelan on the shoulder. “Congratulations, Bro.”
“For what?” Tieran swept her gaze between the twins. Eli’s eyes twinkled with pure delight, Caelan’s were narrowed and dangerous. She’d have missed the tiny shake of Caelan’s head had she glanced away one second earlier. Eli’s smile faltered and he dropped his hand.
Eli cleared his throat and tried to be surreptitious in looking around the room. “What happened here?”
Damn, she really needed to get this place cleaned up so she could get on with her life without rehashing this particular story again. “I was attacked by…”
“He’s already fucking found her?” Eli’s explosion drowned out the rest of her sentence. He grabbed the door and slammed it shut, only to have it bounce back and smack him in the ass. Tieran jumped back and out of reach of the suddenly angry man who’d just entered her home. She couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled up. It was too funny to watch a grown man struggle with the complexities of a piece of wood.
“…the door.”
“By the door.”
Caelan and Tieran spoke at the same time. She covered her mouth with her hand, deciding it was better not to let the man think she was laughing at him. He appeared ready to spit nails.
Then it dawned on her. What did Eli mean by…? “Who is ‘he’, and why is he looking for me?” Tieran tried to walk between the brothers. There had been enough space for her to fit without her accidentally touching Eli, except he took a step at the same time. She dodged him by practically tripping over herself and backing up to the door. Eli reached out, a surprised look on his face, and grabbed hold of her arm to steady her.
A streak of pain shot through her temples. She hissed and fought the instinctive need to grind her palms into the throbbing veins at the sides of her head.
Pictures flashed in her mind like a warped movie. An old warehouse, a cracked, overgrown, weed-filled concrete lot, a sign, half-hanging from its post, the letters faded beyond recognition, and woods. A man got out of a pitch-black sports car and walked toward the building. His gait was purposeful, but his eyes were wary. He jerked his gaze over his shoulder at the rumble of another engine and turned around just before he got to the rusty-hinged set of double doors adorned with a brand-spanking-new, shiny padlock. “Dane Christian?” There was a flash of metal through the air and darkness.
“Hello? Jesus, where the fuck did you just go?” Eli asked.
The pain subsided as quickly as it had attacked. Tieran sucked in a breath and tried to focus. She sagged against the door and braced her hands on it, scratching at the wood with her fingernails. She prayed for mercy and waited for the churning of her belly to diminish. Only then did she attempt to put all of her weight on w
obbly knees.
“Nowhere. Nothing’s wrong,” she lied as calmly as possible, fumbling for the knob and slamming the door shut with the aid of her butt. A fine sheen of sweat had broken out on her upper lip. “Twist the knob to close the door.” She leaned against it, wrinkled her nose at them and crossed her arms over her chest like nothing strange had happened. The vision had lasted scant seconds. She could easily downplay what they’d seen without giving herself away. Later she’d worry about whether she needed to assimilate what she’d seen, which wasn’t much.
“Bullshit, nothing, Tieran,” Caelan barked. She startled, dropping her hands to her side. “One minute you’re fine, the next you look like someone rammed a spike through your heart.”
Eli glared at her. Clearly he held the same opinion.
“You had a vision, didn’t you? Just now, when Eli touched you. He triggered something, didn’t he?” Caelan demanded.
Arrogant…
“No, I did not,” she answered succinctly. “I…stubbed my toe is all. When I tripped going past him. Hurt like a sonofabitch.”
Both men stared at her like she’d grown devil’s horns. As if on cue they focused on her feet. No redness, no bouncing on one foot. They didn’t believe her toe-stubbing story any more than she would.
A look passed between them. One of those, “she’s deranged” looks. See? That’s why she never told anybody. They always ended up seeing her in the same way. A wacko who needed a padded cell. She’d thought Caelan might be different, especially because of what he could do.
The door shook with a pounding from the other side, vibrating the length of her spine.
“Shit!” Tieran jumped forward and threw her arms around Caelan’s waist, vision forgotten. His arm whipped behind his back and when he brought it forward, there was a gun cradled in his palm. How had she not noticed he was carrying a weapon?
“Because you were too enamored to notice, Tulla.”
“Who is it?” Eli’s voice was loud and commanding.
“Pizza.”
Tieran groaned into Caelan’s chest. She’d gotten so distracted by the door mishap, Eli’s mysterious words, the vision, and now to top it all off, she’d forgotten all about their dinner.
“Ooh, good, I’m hungry.” Eli rubbed his hands together and Tieran’s head swam at the abrupt change of his mood.
* * *
Caelan stared at her mouth with such intensity he was giving her a complex. Tieran licked her lips and found the object of his scrutiny. The spicy tang of tomato sauce bombarded her tongue. She wiped at her mouth with the back of her hand, making sure she got it all.
“So, you do that freaky werewolf thing too?” she asked Eli.
Caelan groaned and dropped his head onto the back of the couch in the living room where they’d gone after devouring the pizzas. She gave him a snide look. He should have known she wouldn’t let this subject go for very long. Caelan took a long drag off the beer Eli had brought in. Thank God the man had stopped at the grocery store for a few of his “essentials” before coming here. There still was no food in her house. Whatever gifts she had, teleporting objects wasn’t one of them. If she wanted to eat tomorrow, it was either go to the store later tonight or go out to eat in the morning.
With a grimace and a shudder, Eli glanced away from the pictures he was studying on the wall. “I prefer to think of us as shape-shifters.”
“That’s what I said.” Caelan sat up and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
“Do you, or do you not, turn into a wolf?” she demanded.
Caelan smiled. The smug bastard.
“Yes.” Eli lowered himself onto the loveseat across from Tieran.
Ugh. That’s the same answer Caelan had given her. “Then you’re a werewolf.”
She watched Caelan mouth the words with her and nearly gave in to the temptation of kicking him in the shin.
“Werewolf has such a negative connotation.” Eli’s voice was whiny and slightly offended.
“Oh, for God’s sake.” Tieran slapped her jeans-clad thighs and stood. She put her hands on her hips and glared at both of them. “I am in a serious déjà vu.”
“What’d I say?” Eli blinked in innocence.
“The same exact thing your brother did. You guys turn into wolves, you’re werewolves. End of discussion. Now tell me what you were talking about at the front door. Something about somebody finding me already?”
Caelan sighed, the sound adding to her irritation for some reason. She wasn’t the one who’d brought it up, they had. The least they could do was fill her in. Especially with Eli’s earlier angry reaction at the door.
“A couple of mates from local packs have…died in recent weeks,” Caelan answered, albeit reluctantly. She couldn’t blame him, not really, especially when she couldn’t bring herself to come right out and say what she’d seen in her vision.
“Died how? Car accidents, disease?”
Eli cleared his throat. “No. They were murdered.”
Tieran sucked in a breath. Knowing now what she did about Caelan’s abilities, she had a very bad feeling that the wolf she’d seen killing that woman wasn’t a wolf at all. Her face blanched.
“By who?” she whispered, unable to conceive either of these two men as a cold-blooded killer. But oh God, the one in her vision had looked so much like Caelan had on her bed. Since Eli was identical to his twin in human form, was he also in wolf form? Did the whole group of them look the same? Her heart thumped wildly with the implication.
“We don’t know, my own. We’re pretty sure he’s a shifter like one of us though. No, we’re positive.”
Tieran’s knees buckled and she found herself sitting on the couch. She had witnessed the killer. The last time she’d had a vision this momentous had been down in Florida. She could not go through something like that again.
“You won’t have to, Tullabelle. They will understand.”
“That’s what momma said about the police.”
“Oh, honey, Caelan’s not like them.”
“But what if he is? You weren’t there, Gramama. You can’t know how they made me feel.” She swallowed. Jesus. Somehow, she’d already fallen for Caelan. It would rip her heart to shreds if he rejected her. “Why is this happening to me?”
“Because you’re his mate, Tulla.”
“You okay, Tieran? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Caelan took hold of her hands. She wanted to laugh hysterically. No, she hadn’t seen a ghost, just spoken to one.
The physical connection of his thumbs rubbing her knuckles brought her fully back into reality. She blinked when Eli suddenly spun around, his gaze jerking from one corner of the room to the next. What the heck was he looking for?
“Where the hell did that come from?” Eli demanded.
Caelan snorted and rose to stand next to his brother. “I was beginning to think it was just me.”
“What are you guys talking about?” Totally bewildered by their actions, she switched her gaze back and forth between them for some clue.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t just feel that cold air.” Eli pointed an accusing finger at her.
She sucked in a breath. As if she’d been the one to bring forth whatever delusional wind…
She groaned and turned her face toward the ceiling. Damn the woman for meddling.
“Gramama!”
“What?” her grandmother answered.
“Don’t pull that innocent crap on me.”
“What the hell is going on, my own?” Caelan took a step forward.
“Why? Why are you talking to them, Gramama?”
Tieran waited for a response. “Hello? What, now you leave?”
“Tieran,” Caelan growled.
“What?” she snarled. Sighing, she collapsed back into the soft, worn fabric of the sofa she’d spent many a night on as a child. “It’s my gramama.”
“Your grandmother is here?” Eli sat, looking ridiculously large and out of place on the floral print love
seat. He also looked thoroughly confused. Caelan stayed standing, his arms across his chest, emphasizing the hard muscles of his pecs.
Oh, don’t do that . Her mouth watered and her pussy clenched.
How could she possibly want him again?
“No,” she said carefully.
“Then she has a particularly drafty old house? It’s seventy degrees outside, and not the least bit windy.” Eli’s right eyebrow hitched upward. He didn’t believe her.
Damn. She really thought she’d gotten out of having this conversation. Having it with a lover who didn’t seem too upset about the fact she’d wigged out on him earlier was one thing. Talking about it in front of a stranger was another. Didn’t matter that the stranger was identical to the lover.
“Anyone ever tell you you’re stubborn?” Caelan asked.
She bit her lip and waved him off. “All the time.” Nearly every time she mentally communicated to the meddling woman who, right now, seemed to have something up her sleeve.
“Oh fine. I’m a medium. With my gramama anyway, not everybody, and I’m glad because that would be just way too weird. I mean, can you imagine having a bunch of dead people talking to you all the time, asking you for things, telling you what they wanted you to do, who to talk to, explain to their loved ones why they’re gone, all the while hounding you wherever you go because you can’t go anywhere without having a dead person hanging over your shoulder. They know who you are and what you do and it’s…”
“Take a breath,” Caelan shouted. “God damn. Ask one little question.” He sat on the coffee table in front of her and took hold of her hands. “Just tell us about the cold air.”
“Oh, that.”
“Yeah, that.” Eli grabbed his beer off the table and settled back in his seat, flipping his feet up on the coffee table. He appeared ready to stay all night if he had to.
“It’s my gramama’s way of talking to you. You can’t hear her but the air gets cold.” She pulled her hands free and twisted one in the air. “Or sometimes objects do.”
Seeing Eye Mate Page 7