Everly touched her arm. “You need to go with him,” she said.
“Okay, now I know there’s something wrong with you,” Izzy said. “Because the friend I know would never suggest anything so insane, especially knowing full well what he is.”
Everly’s dark eyes filled with compassion. “I’ve seen the future,” she said.
“I know,” Izzy said. “We heard. Though a lot of it didn’t make sense, and you don’t seem to be in a hurry to elaborate.”
Tristan rested his elbows on his knees. “What exactly did you see?”
Everly’s dark gaze landed on him. “I don’t think you’re ready to hear what I saw. I don’t think either of you are, but it doesn’t matter.” She pushed her hair away from her face. “I’ve seen what’s going to happen...to us all. You can’t outrun fate. None of us can.”
A shiver tracked down Tristan’s spine.
* * * * *
Chapter Five
Izzy hugged Everly goodbye then stepped into the hall.
“You will see her again,” Tristan said.
She hoped he was right, but thus far Izzy hadn’t had any visions of the future. Did that mean she didn’t have a future to see?
Izzy frowned.
“Come,” Tristan said, but didn’t reach for her.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
His guarded expression made her think he wouldn’t answer, but then Tristan surprised her. “I must present myself to the Alpha of this area. He can aid us in finding shelter.”
“Why do I have to go with you?” Izzy asked.
“Because you have shown that you cannot be trusted out of my sight.” He smirked.
Once again Izzy had the overwhelming urge to slap the smartass expression right off his face. She’d try it if he weren’t so tall.
Tristan laughed.
“What?” she asked.
“Sometimes you are so easy to read,” he said.
Izzy tilted her head to get a better look at him. “I’ll keep that in mind the next time I think about hitting you,” she said.
“You’d only hurt yourself,” Tristan said.
“Of course you would say something like that,” she said, then muttered under her breath, “arrogant jerk.” He was right. Hitting someone that solid would probably break her hand.
Tristan chuckled. “You mustn’t be concerned about your friend’s visions,” he said.
Izzy stopped on the sidewalk. “I’m not. Why would you bring that up?”
He shrugged his broad shoulders. “I thought perhaps that was what you were upset about.”
“No,” she said. “I’m upset because you won’t leave me alone and insist on disrupting my life. Hint. Hint. Hint.”
“Oh,” he said. “I’m glad to be mistaken. Better to be thinking that than the possibility of us having sex.”
Her eyes rounded. “I wasn’t thinking about having sex with you.” Izzy’s gaze automatically dropped to the bulge straining the front of his sweatpants. He needed to change clothes.
“Good.” Tristan gave her a knowing smirk. “You can rest assured it’s never going to happen.”
Angry with herself for being distracted by his perfect body, Izzy rounded on him. “Damn right it’s not!” she snapped. “So just get that mental picture out of your head.” And she’d do the same just as soon as he got dressed.
They continued down the sidewalk toward the French Quarter, weaving their way through the growing crowds. Despite it being morning, the tourists were already out enjoying the delights the quarter offered.
“I have no idea what you’re thinking, but sex with you never even crossed my mind. Nor would it ever with a human,” Tristan said in disgust.
Izzy stopped again. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Tristan paused, his gaze scanning the people around them. “I do not sleep with inferior species,” he said, giving her body a once over.
Izzy’s mouth gaped. “Who are you calling inferior, Snowflake?”
His haughty expression spoke volumes. “You are human. Are you not?”
Anger rose out of nowhere. “How dare you!” Izzy shouted. “I am not a monster.”
Tristan’s jaw clenched, and he stepped forward until there was no space between their bodies. “Neither am I!” he snarled.
Izzy snorted. “I’m not the one who goes fuzzy once a month.”
“I am never fuzzy!” he groused.
Izzy took one look at his affronted expression and laughed in his face. It was the wrong thing to do, but she couldn’t help it. A picture of Tristan as a big, fuzzy, white dog popped into her mind, and she just could not shake the image.
“Take it back,” he said softly.
“No.” She crossed her arms.
“I said, take it back,” Tristan hissed.
“No.” Izzy shook her head. “Not until you do.”
His heated gaze dropped to her mouth, and the tension between them changed in an instant. Suddenly the New Orleans heat was nothing compared to the simmering air around them. Tristan looked at her as if he wanted to eat her alive, and not in a wolfie kind of way.
When he stared at her like that, Izzy forgot all about him being a werewolf and saw him as a man. Their kiss came back in vivid detail. Izzy’s traitorous body softened and swayed toward him, drawn by something primal.
Tristan’s gaze grew hooded, and he crowded even closer. Heat poured off his body, along with a spicy scent that was unique to him alone. He unclenched his hands and reached for her.
If he touched her, she’d lose it, lose herself. No! Don’t let him kiss you again. No matter how bad she wanted to feel his lips upon hers. Izzy’s eyes widened as the insane thought struck, and she took a step back.
“We can’t.” She held out her hand to stop him and encountered a wall of warm marble. Izzy’s fingers trembled as she pulled her hand away from his bare chest. Was it her imagination or had the color of Tristan’s eyes changed? “I’m inferior, remember?”
* * * * *
Tristan took a deep breath, and his body shuddered. It took supreme effort to tear his gaze away from the temptation her mouth presented. It had been hours since he’d claimed Isabel’s lips, but Tristan still tasted the honeysuckle on his tongue.
He thought about Everly’s vision. She had to be wrong. There were many ways for information to be interpreted. It didn’t have to be sex, though he couldn’t think of any other way that bodies intertwined. And damn if that didn’t make him hard.
Tristan glanced down at the front of his pants and cursed. He wasn’t a little man. The snug sweats he wore hid nothing.
Isabel followed his gaze. If it were possible, her eyes widened even more. She couldn’t seem to tear her attention away, which wasn’t helping his current condition at all. His nostrils flared. Her warm scent filled his lungs.
She was still scared, but beneath the fear Tristan smelled something else. Something utterly enticing and overwhelmingly feminine. Isabel may not like him, but part of her desired him.
And damn if that didn’t make his job that much harder.
Tristan’s gaze raked Isabel. He could see the definite outline of a feminine figure underneath her long skirt and loose blouse. Hell, even if he couldn’t, he’d felt her body pressed to his when he had kissed her. In that moment, whether she knew it or not, she’d surrendered.
The beast inside him roared to life. Tristan shook his head and grabbed hold of his shadow side. He couldn’t afford for his beast to escape. It didn’t think like he did. Didn’t reason. It acted on instinct. And right now its instincts were telling it to take.
“Come,” he said. “We need to hurry.”
He needed to get to Pierre La Fontaine’s home in the Garden District. If for no other reason than to get a break from Isabel’s company and regain his footing.
She had him thinking about things Tristan rarely contemplated. Work was his mistress, not wayward females whose sense of self-preservation was questionable at best.
He l
ed her through the French Quarter to Canal Street then hung a right. Trolleys ran down St. Charles Avenue to the Garden District, along with buses, but Tristan didn’t care to wait for a bus. He preferred the open air of the trolley.
The trolley wouldn’t take them all the way to Pierre’s house due to the construction in the area, but it would get them close enough. Once he checked in with the Alpha, he’d retrieve his truck.
Tristan waited for Isabel to board, then he climbed on after her. There weren’t any seats available, until he walked over to a couple of young men and stared at them. They suddenly jumped up and offered him their wooden seat.
He grabbed Isabel by the elbow and guided her onto the bench. She scowled at him, which was becoming an unwelcome habit. He much preferred her teasing. When she did that, Isabel reminded Tristan of his little brother, François.
He too had been a free spirit, floating through life without a care in the world. That was why it had been so easy for the lone wolf to kill him.
François had been so trusting, so innocent that when the wolf attacked, he’d been helpless to defend himself. His death had changed Tristan’s life forever—changed Tristan forever. The loss had turned him into what he was now. The cold distance kept the pain at bay.
Tristan glanced at her. Isabel and François really were so much alike that at times the similarity scared him. When that happened, he pushed her away using cruelty to make her withdraw.
He pictured his brother’s mangled body. Would Isabel meet the same fate?
The thought left him feeling decidedly uncomfortable. Tristan closed his eyes and clutched the window frame of the trolley until the wood moaned beneath his grip, then he slowly released it along with the bad memories. He didn’t like thinking about the past. There was nothing he could do about it, but he could change the future.
Tristan glanced out the window. “This is our stop,” he said.
Isabel waited for a couple people to pass, then stood.
Tristan followed her off the trolley then indicated to the far side of the street where a massive mansion took up half the block.
“Guess you guys don’t know the meaning of the word ‘subtle,’” she said.
Most Alphas didn’t, but that wasn’t how he lived. Tristan pictured his favorite home, an adobe nestled in the foothills of the high New Mexican desert. The place was warm, welcoming, and peaceful. Perfect for relaxing and clearing his head after a job.
“When you have to house an entire pack, you need a lot of space,” he said dryly.
Isabel froze on the sidewalk. Her hazel eyes widened, then widened again until they swallowed her face. “There’s a whole pack of monsters inside there.”
It wasn’t a question, but Tristan answered it as such anyway. “Yes, there is an entire pack of wolves in there,” he said. “Southern Moonlight Kin to be exact. They don’t take kindly to being called monsters, so I suggest you be on your best behavior, unless you want to end up on the menu.”
She blanched and swayed before his eyes.
Tristan grabbed her before she fainted. He’d meant to scare her a little, but he didn’t want Isabel so scared that she couldn’t function.
He didn’t like her viewing him and his people as monsters, even though it was best if she did. Why it bothered Tristan so much, he couldn’t say. He’d never been bothered by such a thing before.
She’s human, he reminded himself. Humans are weak. They believe they are the apex predators. They’re wrong.
Isabel turned green, and she looked as if she were going to be sick.
A pang of guilt struck. “I was just kidding,” Tristan said. “I will not allow anything to happen to you.”
The moment the words left his mouth, Tristan knew they were the truth. She had a smart mouth and he might want to strangle her at times, but he wouldn’t let anyone harm her.
Isabel’s gaze searched his face, then she glanced back at the house.
“I swear,” Tristan said. He’d vow anything to take away her fear. “Now come.”
He led her to the front of the mansion, where they were met by a couple of Pierre’s guards. The two men stepped forward and sniffed them. Their eyes narrowed when they caught Isabel’s human scent.
“I need to speak to Pierre,” Tristan said.
“Who shall we say is calling?” the wolf on the left asked, watching them both closely.
“Tell him that Tristan Chevalier, Enforcer for the Lycanian Elders, is in need of his assistance.”
The wolf on the right paled and took a step back. His gaze immediately dropped to the porch floor. The man on the left was slower, but he eventually followed suit.
Isabel looked at them then glanced at Tristan. This time there was confusion in her eyes.
Better that than fear, Tristan thought.
The man on the right pressed the doorbell and waited. A moment later, a short wolf dressed in an expensive suit popped his head out the door. When he caught sight of Tristan, he shoved the other two wolves out of the way and bowed.
“Sorry to have kept you waiting, Enforcer,” he said. “Please come inside and bring your little...” –he sniffed and his nose wrinkled like he’d smelled something bad— “friend with you.”
“After you.” Tristan ushered Isabel ahead of him.
The second they entered the foyer, her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open. Tristan had nearly done the same thing the first time he’d seen the inside of the Southern Alpha’s home.
Entering the mansion was like stepping back into the seventeen hundreds. Everything had been meticulously restored to its original grandeur.
“Tristan, my friend,” a booming voice said. “What brings you to my humble abode?”
The question almost made Tristan laugh, since there was nothing humble about Pierre’s abode, or the Alpha himself for that matter.
* * * * *
Izzy continued to reel from the news that Tristan was some kind of assassin. Her tumultuous thoughts were interrupted when a dark-haired man with lightly tanned skin came silently gliding down the staircase. Had he not spoken, Izzy wouldn’t have known that he was there.
No, she mentally corrected. There’d be no way to miss him. His presence filled the space, adding to its opulence.
Izzy stared, unable to look away. She had never seen anyone quite so beautiful. The man’s finely sculpted face could only be called pretty. How he managed it without looking feminine in the process was a mystery.
Tristan gave her an admonishing look then glanced back to the man. “I’m sure you’re aware of what has brought me to your fair city,” he said.
The man stopped before them and smiled. The move seemed too practiced for her liking.
Yet, Izzy felt that smile all the way to her toes when he directed the wattage at her. Was it hot in here? She resisted the urge to tug on her collar.
“Aren’t you going to introduce us?” the man asked, stepping closer to her.
Tristan looked as if he was about to refuse the request, then thought better of it. Why he cared one way or the other, Izzy didn’t know, since he’d made his views on humans perfectly clear.
“Isabel MacDougal, I’d like you to meet Pierre La Fontaine, Alpha of the Southern Moonlight Kin pack,” Tristan said.
So this was the biggest monster in town. Izzy stared at him until an image of his dark beast replaced his perfect features. He didn’t seem to notice, or maybe he had better manners than her.
Pierre took her hand before she offered it and kissed the back of her knuckles in such a way that Izzy had no doubt he’d done it hundreds of times before. A shiver tracked down her spine, but somehow she kept her hand from trembling.
While Tristan exuded an air of ice, this man was nothing but sweltering heat and hot summer nights. He used his smoldering good looks to full advantage.
Izzy couldn’t imagine many women turned him down once he crooked his finger in their direction. No doubt with one look, he could make panties drop from fifty paces.
> “A pleasure,” Pierre said. “I can’t remember the last time a Sighted-One graced my doorstep.”
Tristan cleared his throat and insinuated himself between them, forcing Pierre to release her.
Pierre’s amber gaze lit with speculation. “Perhaps, Enforcer, we should talk in private.”
“That would be best,” Tristan said. “What I have to say calls for discretion.”
“If you don’t mind waiting in the parlor, Isabel.” Pierre pointed to a room off to the left. “I’ll have refreshments brought to you.”
Despite the polite offer, it wasn’t a request. “Sure,” she said. “Take all the time you need. I’ll just go in there and fluff my petticoats.”
Pierre frowned in confusion.
Tristan laughed. “She’s a delight, isn’t she?”
The Alpha watched her. “She’s certainly...interesting,” he said.
Izzy walked into the parlor. Two navy-blue settees had been arranged in the middle of the room, facing each other. There were wooden side tables of various sizes and shapes spaced throughout the parlor, along with several chairs and stools.
Some of the tables held board games, while others housed lamps. All were covered in lace of some type or another. Everything looked so old and expensive that Izzy was afraid to sit down.
A minute later, the man who’d met them at the door came in, carrying a tray with a pitcher of lemonade and some finger sandwiches on it. The idea that wolves served finger sandwiches struck her as funny, but Izzy didn’t laugh. She didn’t think he’d appreciate her sense of humor.
The man set the tray down on a small side table then turned to her. “I thought instead of breakfast that you’d prefer a sandwich. If you need anything else,” he said, “just ring that bell.” He pointed to a cloth lever hanging from the ceiling next to the door.
“Thanks,” she said. “I’m sure I’ll be fine.” Izzy waited for him to leave then checked the sandwiches. As soon as she realized they were turkey and ham, she tucked into them. She hadn’t eaten last night or this morning. Right now, anything looked good.
Moonlight Kin 4: Tristan Page 5
