Captured by Moonlight

by Nancy Gideon

  “How are you feeling, baby? Is the headache gone?” She brushed his brow with her fingertips.

  He shifted slightly to evade her touch. “I’m fine. I feel the same way I’ve felt every morning for the majority of my life.”

  Not much of an answer. Or was it? What was he trying to tell her? That his desire for her had disappeared along with the urgent instinctual needs?

  “And you?” he asked carefully. “How are you?”

  “Fine.” She paused, giving him the opportunity to say more, to tell her what was really going on.

  But he said nothing, letting the silence stretch out. Everything or nothing could have changed in their relationship over the past hours. Wasn’t he the least bit curious which it was?

  She said, “I’m great, actually. My ankle doesn’t hurt anymore. But I’m worried.”

  “What about, sha?”

  “About why you haven’t touched me or smiled at me. About what you’re not saying. About what happened last night between us.”

  “I need some time, Charlotte. Now that my head is clear, I’ve got some things to sort through. Could you give me some time?”

  She would never betray how that wounded her.

  “Sure. Whatever you want. I’ve got court and I’m late. I guess I’ll see you…later.”

  As she started to rise he caught her hand lightly, holding on to her. Then he let go without another word.

  But she couldn’t let him go that easily.

  She heard his quick inhalation as her lips touched his, felt his heart jerk, his pulse leap. Yet his eyes never flickered; his mouth was pliant yet unresponsive. She forced herself to stand up. Her smile was small and wry, her tone tough.

  “See you around, Savoie.”

  She walked away, her stride brisk with a confidence she didn’t feel. She didn’t see the way his expression buckled briefly, but Helen did as she waited with a travel mug.

  Cee Cee took the coffee with a nod of thanks, then paused as the housekeeper said, “Here. For court.”

  Mystified, Cee Cee looked at the objects placed in her palm. A simple gold necklace and small hoop earrings to relieve the severity of her appearance.

  “Thanks.” An unexpected knot of emotion rose in her throat. Swallowing hard, she said quietly, “Take care of him, Helen.”

  “I will, detective.”

  HER STINT ON the witness stand was brutal, but the hammering questions from the defense couldn’t shake her or her testimony. Not even when the slick attorney casually slipped in the fact that she was romantically linked to high-profile criminal Max Savoie. Her stare cold as a double barrel, she asked the relevance of her personal life to the fact that his client had shot two young video store employees, both in retaliation for his own firing and for the one hundred seventeen dollars and thirty-nine cents in the cash register. The defense backed down, but the smudge was already on her credibility. It wasn’t enough to outweigh the evidence she’d gathered, though, or the strength of Babineau’s collaborative statements.

  Then her news nemesis, Karen Crawford, was on the courthouse steps afterwards, thrusting her microphone at her like a knife.

  “Could you tell me the connection between your lover, Max Savoie, and this case?”

  “None, other than what you’d like to invent in your ratings-hungry little mind. Get out of my face unless you have any real questions.”

  When she and Babineau returned to the squad room to dig into paperwork, he said nothing due to her tense and angry mood. She couldn’t wait to leave but had nothing to go home to, and that unhappiness added to her temper.

  When her cell rang, she answered with a growl. “Caissie.”

  “I saw you on the news. You looked very sexy in my shirt.”

  The sound of his voice was an immediate balm to her emotions, but she refused to be placated. “Yes, that’s the impression I was going for: the hot girlfriend of the city’s crime lord.”

  Silence, then a low chuckle. “My, you’re in a bit of a snit, aren’t you, detective? I was going to invite you to join me for a drink, but perhaps there’s some other activity you’d prefer.”

  “Are you offering to let me slap you around, Savoie?”

  “If that’s what you’d like to use me for, I’m all yours.”

  “Are you?”

  “I’m not about to let anyone else take my place. I’ll have that drink waiting for you.”

  She snapped her phone closed and stared at it for a long moment, at odds with the anticipation percolating through her. She was so easy, she concluded in disgust.

  “Go ahead,” Babineau urged. “I’ll finish here while you go kiss and make up.”

  She looked at him, startled.

  He snorted, irritated by her surprise.

  “What? I am a detective. It’s not that difficult to track your surly humor back to Savoie. You’re getting to be as predictable as an old married couple.”

  As she was striding toward the door, Joey Boucher called to her. She waited for him to catch up, fingertips tapping impatiently on her thigh.

  “Hey, Ceece. News from the chief on our missing John Doe.”

  “Yeah?”

  “No records of any official Federal business. D’you think that means something unofficial? Something with some different initials? Maybe some black bag group snatched our vic to cover up whatever they were doing?”

  “You tell me, Joseph. ’Cause they sure as hell aren’t going to.”

  SHE STOOD IN the shadows of the club, letting the music pound against her. She couldn’t see him but she waited there, thinking about him, concentrating on him, reaching out for him with her thoughts, with her emotions.

  Max, can you feel me? I can’t find you.

  Nothing. Just noise and haze and the smell of alcohol.

  Perhaps it didn’t work with an outsider.

  She started through the crowd. She hadn’t gone ten feet before they were all aware of her. They knew that she was with Max Savoie, knew she wasn’t one of them. They didn’t like her, didn’t trust her. But there was something else in the mood swirling about her. Something uneasy and curious. The second she saw Max, she forgot about everything else.

  He was at his usual table. The jacket of his elegant charcoal pinstripe suit hung on the chair back. The top three buttons of his stark white shirt were open and its sleeves rolled up to the elbows, displaying a good deal of blatantly masculine chest and forearm. The designer clothes and hard lines of his face created a contrast snarling with harsh intrigue and sensuality. Desire rolled through Cee Cee as she approached him.

  Her Jack and water was on the table. Using the toe of his red Converse sneaker, he pushed out a chair.

  “Detective, you look so good you’ve got my mouth watering.”

  She smiled, pleased to hear it, because she’d dressed for him in a short denim skirt and mile-high heels that bared her toes. The open weave of her baby blue shrug-on sweater revealed teasing glimpses of bronze flesh not covered by the tight, white, spaghetti-strapped tank top. She was all sleek limbs and curvy handfuls, tempting him as she stepped close.

  His eyelids lowered into long slits as he breathed in.

  “You smell like warm, naked skin on my sheets.”

  Her fingertips brushed under his chin. “And you look like hot sex, right here with me on your lap.”

  She sat down, close but not touching, and his lungs emptied in a shaky gust. “I thought you wanted to smack me around until you felt better,” he goaded softly.

  She gave his cheek a light tap, then spread her fingers to explore the lines of his face and mouth. “No, you misunderstood me. What I want is to roll around with you until we both feel better.”

  “Ahh. My mistake.” His smile curved up slightly and the mood between them simmered with heat.

  Dare she hope that things were back to as normal as they could be? “Not interested?” she teased.

  He nipped her fingers lightly. “I am so far past interested, it’s becoming embarrassing
.”

  “Good.” She sat back to sip her drink, and glanced up as Jacques LaRoche’s hand settled on the back of her chair.

  “I need to borrow Max for a minute.”

  “Just for a minute,” she allowed, feeling generous because Max was smoldering so delightfully. She didn’t think he’d go far.

  When the two men stepped away to talk, Amber approached up to refresh their drinks. She slid a cautious look at the policewoman.

  “You left your jacket here last night. I put it behind the bar.”

  “That’s not the only thing that belongs to me that I left here last night. But that doesn’t make him any less mine.”

  Amber took hold of the neckline of Cee Cee’s sweater, pulling it over far enough to expose the telling mark. Awe and regret flicked across her face.

  “I would have done anything, given anything to have him just once, for the chance to take a part of him with me,” she confessed. “But all he wanted was you. I won’t ever intrude again.”

  “I did what I had to do to keep him. Now that I have him, I’ll never share him.”

  “You can have his children—but they’ll never be what they could have been with one of us.”

  She left Cee Cee considering that when Max rejoined her. His gaze followed the retreating waitress, lines furrowing his brow. Cee Cee turned his attention back to her with her quiet request. “Kiss me, Max.”

  He leaned forward without a word. He could taste her desperation in the way she latched onto his mouth so urgently, in the way her hands moved restlessly up and down his forearms. He didn’t let up until he felt her relax, her hands sliding down to curl about his.

  “I love you beyond all measure,” he whispered against her soft lips. “You know that, don’t you, cher?”

  Unshed misery sparkled in her eyes. “Then why weren’t you with me when I woke up this morning? Why did you push me away in the study?”

  “I got a little scared for a minute.”

  “Of what? Us?”

  He brought her hands up to his mouth for quick kisses. “No, sha. I have no doubts there.”

  “Does it have something to do with what you were discussing with LaRoche?”

  He should have known better than to think her shrewd cop’s brain wouldn’t be alerted. “Some of it. The rest would just make you angry.”

  His smirk made her scowl. “What? Tell me.”

  “The minute I stepped in here, every one of them knew my, umm, circumstances had changed. They were betting on who I’d been with.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “And what did you tell them?”

  “Nothing, darlin’. A gentleman doesn’t discuss such things.”

  “Who won the bet?” When he inclined his head toward the bulky bartender, Cee Cee stood up and called LaRoche’s name loudly. When he glanced up, she pulled aside her sweater to display Max’s brand.

  “Charlotte, sit down.”

  The hiss of his voice made her obey, but not before she saw LaRoche swat several of the men at the bar, then extend his palm with fingers beckoning for them to pay up.

  Max quickly righted her clothing. “Don’t do that.”

  “Why?” Defiance edged with hurt. “Are you ashamed that you gave yourself to someone outside your own kind?”

  “No. I don’t care what they think.”

  “Then why?”

  “I’m afraid of what they’ll do,” he snapped harshly. “I’m afraid of what they might do to you.”

  Seventeen

  WHAT DO YOU mean? I’m not afraid of them.”

  “And that’s what scares me. You should be terrified of them, Charlotte. I am, because they’ll get to me through you. And that will kill me. I won’t be able to go on if anything happens to you.”

  He was so earnest, so fierce. She tightened her grip on his hands. “I understand now. That’s why you’ve been poisoning yourself with the silver. So you’ll be strong enough to protect yourself.”

  He shook his head. “No. So I’ll be strong enough to protect you.”

  Her heart turned over with a glorious shudder. Then she was all business. “So what are we looking at? Who’s coming for you? This lot? You can take them easily.”

  “No. Something horrible. Part of what we are, but different. Cold and cunning and dangerous. They’re the reason my mother force-fed fear into me to keep me safe. And the reason Tina Babineau’s mother hid her among strangers to survive.”

  “Trackers.” Icy slivers of panic prickled. “But you can sense them, right? You’ll be able to recognize them.”

  “No, not unless they allow me to. The same way they won’t know me, unless I alert them by using energy unwisely.” At her puzzled look, he explained, “Changing form, healing myself, casting off glimmers.”

  She went cold. “In other words, you’re powerless to use anything that would help you defeat them.”

  “It’s a game of patience and skill, waiting for the other side to make a mistake first. They’re already here, Charlotte. That’s what LaRoche wanted to tell me. Strangers asking questions about Oscar, about Tina. I’ve put several of my men on the boy, professionals that Babineau won’t spot and arrest on suspicion. I’m not sure if they know about me yet. Maybe my father never got the chance to pass on any hard facts. Maybe he never planned to.” His expression grew sad, then he sighed and shook it off. “I don’t know who sent them or how many there are. I don’t know what they can do.”

  “But you have something they don’t.”

  “What’s that, sha?”

  “You have me. They won’t expect you to have told a human all your secrets. They’ll think their King of the Beasts is trifling with a weak, helpless female. They won’t know they’re wrong until it’s too late. Then we’ll have them, baby.”

  He stared at her, amazed by her fearlessness, especially after she’d already done battle with their enemy.

  “You and me, together. Not separately. We’re only strong when we’re together. Then we can take care of each other.”

  It was that simple. That outrageously complex.

  “I love you, Charlotte.”

  “You’d better. Why do they want you so much? What’s in it for them?”

  “If they can catch me, they’ll want to study me. I’m somehow different, more powerful, more of a threat to them. I don’t know why. And they’ll want to breed me, to sell the next in my line.”

  “Now there’s something to look forward to.”

  Max grinned wryly. “I don’t think they plan to buy me dinner and take me dancing first.”

  A faint smile. “And if they can’t catch you and make you behave?”

  “Then they’ll hunt me down and kill me.”

  “No way that’s going to happen. They’re not going to find it easy to take you away from me.”

  Max stroked his thumb down her soft cheek. “Sometimes I forget what a warrior you are. How foolish they are, to think the children I’ll share with you will have no value.”

  Her eyes went blank, her expression flat. And part of him went cold with despair.

  “You don’t want to have my children?”

  The answer was there in the starkness of her reaction. He tried to take a breath but couldn’t, as his dreams folded in upon one another. He’d thought she’d shared them. He’d always assumed…He asked again, praying he’d misunderstood.

  “You don’t want to have a family with me?”

  “It’s not that, Max.” Her words were soft, weak.

  “What is it, then? Because I have blood on my hands? Because I can’t make you proud of who I am, because of what I’ve done? Because I’m a monster?”

  He thrust out of his chair, making her jump to catch him. She held to him as tightly as she could, knowing he wouldn’t risk harming her by shaking her off.

  “Let me go, Charlotte.”

  “Not an option. Not until you listen to me. Please, Max.”

  “I’m listening.” His tone was low and fierce.

  “Not here
. Will you walk with me?”

  He nodded once and she released him, retaining his hand in case he decided to bolt. Hers was sweating.

  Twilight seeped across the city, making dark shadows between the buildings, spreading deep and thick across the Mississippi. The air was ripe with the rich, muddy dankness of the river as they walked along the levee.

  Max remained silent while Cee Cee struggled to tell him what she didn’t want to remember, what he wasn’t going to want to hear. Finally he came to a stop, looking out over the wide waters.

  “Tell me.”

  She took a breath, studying the grim set of his profile.

  “I should have said something before we got so carried away. It took me by surprise, loving you. Things were all teasing and playful, and then you kissed me and I was drowning in you. I never thought…I never believed I could want someone so desperately, so completely. I was selfish and greedy and excited. I never thought beyond just you and me.

  “It never occurred to me that you’d want more…until I saw you with Tina and Ozzy. And then I didn’t know how to tell you. I was so afraid I’d lose you, and I couldn’t let you go. I…let you bind yourself to me without telling you a truth you had the right to know. I’m so sorry, Max. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right.”

  His arms came up around her, his voice steady. “Tell me, Charlotte. Trust me.”

  She gripped his shirt and forced her gaze to meet his. “There’s nothing I’d like more than to make children between us. But I can’t, Max. I’m sorry.”

  His brow crowded with puzzlement. “Because of your job? Do you think I’d demand you give up something that’s so much a part of you?”

  She pressed fingertips to his mouth to halt him. “No, baby. Listen to me. I can’t give you children. I can’t have them. Ever.”

  His expression blanked in shock, in disbelief, in objection. Finally, he murmured, “How do you know? Are you sure?”