Moon Cursed

by Lori Handeland

  “I dinnae know about worst, but strange, aye?” Alan Mac took the pint Johnnie brought and drank it more slowly than he had the others. “The knife was silver.” His gaze held Liam’s. “And not just silver plated, ye ken? Pure silver, through and through.”

  Uh-oh, Kris thought. How many pure silver knives could there be in the area?

  It didn’t matter. She was pretty sure this one was hers.

  *

  Silver, Liam thought. Could Edward Mandenauer still be in the area?

  Ach, no. If the dead girl had been a shape-shifter, she would be ashes. No body left behind to become stuck in the lock at Dochgarroch. Edward, for all his faults, was very good about not stabbing humans with knives meant specifically for the inhuman.

  Still, everyone made mistakes, and Mandenauer was getting quite old. Though it would be best not to tell him that and meet the pointy end of another silver knife.

  Alan Mac continued to stare at Liam, lifting his brows up and down like a demented Groucho Marx. As if Liam didn’t know what silver meant. But if Alan kept it up, Kris soon would. If she didn’t already.

  Kris wasn’t a Jäger-Sucher, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t something else.

  Mandenauer had come here off and on for decades, if not centuries—Liam was not all that certain the man wasn’t immortal himself—and he’d never discovered their secret. However, Liam wouldn’t put it past the wily agent to pay someone like Kris—smart, resourceful, with an agenda of her own that paralleled that of the Jäger-Suchers—to keep an eye on things, then call Edward if anything turned up.

  Hell, Liam wouldn’t put it past Mandenauer to kill a few women, toss them in the loch, blame it on Nessie, then wait for her to show up and—

  Pow!

  Liam had gone so far into his thoughts, he actually jerked as if he’d been shot. Stabbed. Blown up. Whatever.

  Alan Mac frowned. Liam shook his head just once.

  Not now, he thought, then shifted only his eyes to the left. Later.

  Alan Mac’s chin dipped in a nearly imperceptible nod.

  Liam glanced at Kris, expecting her to be staring at him with lifted brow and a do you think I’m an idiot? expression. Instead, she stared at the door with longing. The dark shadow of a bruise already marred the perfection of one cheek.

  He’d promised to care for her, and less than a minute later she’d been hit. He’d said he’d see her home, yet he stood in the center of a pub while she became paler and paler.

  “Time to go,” he murmured.

  Her eyes met his, and something shifted in Liam’s chest, so sudden and startling, he rubbed at the spot. What was that? Both pleasure and pain, which left behind a sense of joyful sorrow. He’d never felt anything like it before.

  Outside, the night was cool and dark. Clouds had moved in, covering the moon and the stars. Liam didn’t mind. Sometimes the moon only reminded him of things he’d prefer to forget.

  Kris slid her arm around his waist, leaning into him. The warmth of her caressed; the scent of her soothed. He’d never strolled down the street with a woman before. Never held her to his side, matched his steps, his very breath, to hers. When Kris left, he was going to miss her for the rest of his days.

  When she left, the ghosts would come back. They would torment and haunt him. But it was nothing less than he deserved.

  Liam shook off the sudden melancholy. Kris was here; so was he. Yes, she’d leave, but that was for the best. If she stayed—

  He stiffened, pausing mid-step as Kris continued on. They came unstuck, and Liam was suddenly as cold as if he’d just dived into the loch.

  “You all right?” She offered her hand. He stared at it for several seconds before he took it with a nod.

  Once they were away from the village, the night grew even darker. They said nothing; however, the silence wasn’t awkward. Liam had never been with a woman who didn’t want to talk all the time. Not that he’d been with so very many, at least not lately, despite what that ass Dougal Scott had implied.

  The man had never liked him, and the feeling, even before tonight, was mutual. Dougal Scott was just one of those people who rubbed Liam, and a lot of others, the wrong way.

  Liam glanced at Kris. Should he say something about Dougal’s implication that Liam was the village lothario?

  Probably.

  Before he could, a movement near the loch distracted him. There, in the trees, a shadow slid from one to another and then on to the next. Silent, stealthy, whoever lurked there was very good. But Liam knew the banks of the loch better than anyone, and that shadow could slither all it liked, but that shadow did not belong.

  Kris stared straight ahead, oblivious. Why wouldn’t she be? She didn’t have the training, the experience, the background that he had. It was only through pure luck that she’d survived thus far.

  The idea of someone stalking her, perhaps killing her, made his skin prickle and his heart beat ever faster. The mental image of Kris in the loch with Nessie scared him more than anything had in—

  Actually, nothing had ever scared him. He did not like that suddenly something could.

  Liam considered running into the forest and grabbing the culprit, but if he did, he’d have to leave Kris alone, and he couldn’t.

  He’d see her safely home. Tucked into bed with the door locked.

  The door. The lock. He’d broken it.

  “Maybe you should stay at a hotel,” Liam murmured.

  “Why?”

  He could barely see her face; the night was so damn dark. “Your door’s broken,” he said. “Ye shouldnae stay there until it’s fixed.”

  “It is fixed. Rob had a note on his door. I thought that maybe you—?”

  “No,” Liam murmured. He’d been a little … busy all day. He always was.

  He didn’t care for that note, although why would anyone who wanted to do her harm have Rob fix the door?

  They reached the cottage, and Kris used her new key on the new lock. Liam was so glad to see it. If the door had still been broken he would have had to stay here; then he wouldn’t have been able to slip out and discover who had followed them.

  His luck, it would be Dougal Scott. The ass.

  “Dougal,” he began. “What he said…”

  Liam paused. Dougal didn’t know about Liam’s past—he couldn’t—the man had just assumed. Unfortunately, he’d assumed correctly.

  Kris walked inside and switched on the light. “Which is it?”

  “Which?” Liam repeated.

  “Effy said you were too long alone. Dougal implied you have more women than the Pasha of…” She spread her hands. “Pashaville.”

  Liam wanted to smack both Effy and Dougal, or perhaps knock their heads together. Kris had been lied to so often she trusted no one at all. He wished he could say that she should trust him, but he was lying, too, and he wasn’t going to stop. But he could clear up this misunderstanding.

  Liam shut the door, then crossed the room until he stood so close Kris had to crane her neck to see his face.

  “Both,” he said.

  “Both?” She let out a short, sharp laugh and stepped back. He caught her hand before she could turn away, holding on when she tried to pull free.

  Though he hated to agree with Dougal on anything, he’d vowed to tell her this truth. “Once I had more women than that pasha, ’tis true. But I have also been too long alone.”

  Aeons, it seemed. Such was the way of loneliness.

  Kris peered into his face with a measuring look. “You said the ghosts come to you.” He stiffened, and when he would have pulled away she held on. “Are they the reason you’re alone?”

  He sighed. Another truth he could share.

  “Yes.”

  “Your family? He shook his head. “Did you … love and lose someone?”

  Liam didn’t think he’d been capable of love. At least not until that night beneath the moon. Now …

  He still wasn’t sure.

  “I understand.” She sque
ezed his hand. “You turned to sex to forget.”

  At his confused expression, she continued. “You lost someone you loved, and you turned to meaningless sex with an endless string of women.”

  “They were mistakes,” he said. Horrible, terrible, haunting mistakes.

  Kris tilted her head, studying him. “Why me?”

  Good question. He wished he knew. What was it about her that made him break every vow he’d made since he’d become what he was?

  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I don’t care.”

  Because, right now, he was going to break every one of them again.

  CHAPTER 18

  There was something Liam was supposed to do, somewhere he was supposed to be. But staring into Kris’s eyes, soft and dark and filled with sympathy for him, made the ache in Liam’s chest both worse and a little better. When he kissed her, he felt reborn.

  “Liam,” she whispered, right before his lips met hers and the name—truly his and one he hadn’t heard for far too long—had his breath catching as his body hardened.

  He’d had women. Scores of them. But they’d been—

  Mistakes. Aye. He had not known any better.

  He wished he could forget them, but he was cursed to remember. And that was right; that was justice.

  Kris had said he’d used sex to forget. But he hadn’t.

  Until now.

  When he touched her, when he loved her, all that he remembered was her.

  The catch of her breath when he wrapped her in his arms, rubbed her breasts against his chest, and opened her mouth just enough for him to delve.

  She tasted of ale, but a hint, the tangy flavor enhancing what was hers alone. He drank from her, seeking oblivion. Finding it.

  His chilled hands crept beneath the hem of her sweater, and she jumped, then nipped at his lip. But when he would have removed his hands, she snatched them back, warming them with her own.

  Beneath the confines of her bra, her breasts blazed; his palms tingled from the heat. When he squeezed them she moaned. His name again, the sound of it enflamed him. No one had cried out his name in forever, and he discovered that he needed it.

  Her fingers encircled him. How had she gotten her hand down his pants? Not that he was complaining.

  His head fell back; his hair had come loose on the dance floor, and the slide of it along his neck made him shiver. The heat of her palm along his shaft nearly made him come.

  Though his body barked in protest, he encircled her wrist and removed that clever, clever hand from its home.

  “Keep that up and we’ll be done before we start,” he muttered.

  “We wouldn’t want that.” She ran a thumbnail up his erection. His eyes crossed, and she laughed.

  “Maybe I should—” She rolled her thumb over the tip. His jeans did little to alleviate the friction or that eternal, blessed, heat. “Take the edge off.”

  “Huh?” He couldn’t think.

  Mission accomplished.

  Her smile was all woman as she unbuttoned, then unzipped, his jeans. “Lose them,” she ordered.

  He did.

  “The shirt, too.”

  Liam drew it over his head and tossed the garment to the floor with the rest. Then he stood in the glaring light of the lamp and let her stare.

  He knew he was lovely to look at. Always had been, always would be. He couldn’t help it. He also knew that beauty could be as much of a curse as ugliness. Beauty seduced and it tempted, but beauty had no substance. It was as worthless as the sheen of the moon.

  Kris didn’t look long. Perhaps, as a thing of beauty herself, she understood how passing frail human beauty was.

  When she dropped to her knees and took him into her mouth, he was so shocked he let her. Then he was so captivated he could do nothing but yearn. He’d never had a woman’s mouth on him.

  The scalding, wicked, wet heat spread through him. Her tongue swirled over him, and she suckled.

  Ah, God. Why not?

  He cupped her head with his palm as she began to move in the age-old rhythm. Just a few seconds, he promised himself. Just a few—

  His hips thrust, in and out, in and out. The pressure. The heat. That tongue. What was she doing to him?

  He was seduction; he had never, yet, been seduced. He wasn’t sure that he liked it. He had no restraint. His body spun toward something he wanted, needed, craved.

  Liam pulled away. “No,” he said. “I’ll—”

  He bit his lip. He who had had so many women he’d lost count, who had taken them in ways they’d begged for, ways that had surprised but never shocked him, couldn’t find the words for a simple, inevitable response of the body.

  “You’ll come?” She glanced up, lips full and curved and wet. “That was kind of what I was going for.”

  As she leaned forward, her tongue darted out, swirling around his head. He lost control.

  “No,” he said again, reaching down and dragging her to her feet. Then he tossed her over his shoulder, stalked into the bedroom, his cock leading the way, where he dropped her onto the bed. “I’ll not come until I’m inside of ye.”

  Her eyes lowered; her gaze brushed over him like a caress, and his penis leaped. “You’d better hurry.”

  “I never hurry,” he promised, then slowly removed every stitch of her clothes, echoing the movements of his hands with the press of his lips, the skim of teeth and tongue. By the time he finished, she was writhing.

  “Liam.” She lifted her hips—an offering he could not help but take.

  His tongue darted out, and those hips jerked. His lips curved as he feasted. This was familiar. This he had done. Some women needed more … help.

  Not Kris. She began to swell against him; desire rolled toward them, given voice by the ever-increasing beat of their breath.

  She grabbed him by the hair. He knew better than to argue. Lifting his head, he met her eyes.

  “You said you’d come nowhere but inside of me.”

  “Aye.”

  “I don’t want to come with you anywhere but there, either.” She gave his hair a tug, and he followed that lead, sliding up and then sliding home.

  He’d kept his orgasm at bay by pleasing her. Not that the taste of her, the feel of her, didn’t arouse. But he’d used his mind, his powers of seduction, and now he let everything go.

  The blessed warmth, the friction, the press of her all around. Her hands on his shoulders. Her nails in his skin. Her mouth, her tongue, the memories of where both had last been.

  And still it wasn’t enough. Until …

  “Liam,” she said. “Liam.”

  He came in a rush so strong his sight ebbed, narrowing to all that was her.

  Her body answered, tightening, pulsing, welcoming him. “Yes,” she said. “Yes.” And then …

  “Liam.”

  *

  He fell asleep still tangled up in her. Her breath in time with his, her scent and the memory of that husky voice whispering the name he hadn’t heard in so long following Liam into a dark and peaceful land.

  He awoke tense, almost vibrating with the certainty that something was wrong. When he opened his eyes and saw her cuddled against him, her arm across his belly, her cheek against his chest, he understood.

  This was wrong. He’d promised without words something that could never, ever be.

  Liam gently disentangled himself from her body and her embrace. She murmured, turning toward him, reaching out, and he couldn’t help himself; he brushed her hair from her face and kissed her brow. She settled deeper into sleep, and he watched her, rubbing at the ache that seemed to have taken up residence in his soul.

  Did he even have a soul? He’d never been quite sure.

  A shadow passed between the moon—when had that come out?—and the house, a flicker against the shade, and Liam glanced up just in time to see a figure slide by.

  He was shoving his feet into his pants, his arms into his shirt, even as he raced on silent, bare feet for the door.


  This was what he’d forgotten—that shadow in the trees, which appeared to have graduated to Kris’s backyard.

  Liam yanked open the door, already stepping forward, prepared to run around the house and surprise whoever dared hover in the middle of the night.

  Instead, he nearly knocked over the man who stood, head down, deep in thought, directly on the other side.

  The guy glanced up, eyes wide and strangely familiar. Liam, whose reflexes were honed to an edge so fine he sometimes amazed himself, reached out, grabbed a handful of dark cotton shirt at the neck, and yanked.

  “What are ye doin’ creepin’ about in the night?” he demanded.

  The stranger blinked, then grasped Liam’s wrists and attempted to pry them free.

  Liam made a derisive sound—not in this lifetime, brother—and, spinning, slammed the would-be intruder against the open door. “Did ye dare t’ touch her? Did ye dare try and bring her harm?”

  His fingers tightened, and the man began to choke. Liam hadn’t heard that sound in years. He’d hoped never to hear it again, but right now he quite liked it.

  “Who are ye?” He pulled the stranger close, then shoved him back, bouncing his head off the wood with a lovely dull thud. “Who?”

  He sputtered, opening and closing his mouth, still pulling on Liam’s hands with a surprising amount of strength for one who would soon be dead.

  The lights clicked on. Both Liam and the newcomer were left blinking, though neither of them let go of the other.

  “You might want to loosen up on his windpipe.” Kris, wearing nothing but a T-shirt that came to mid-thigh—and hopefully panties—stood a few feet away. “Just until you can get a name.”

  Her hair was tousled, her lips swollen from Liam’s. The bruise that had been but a hint when they’d arrived was now the shade of ripe eggplant, puffy and pained. He wanted to drop the intruder to the floor and find her some ice.

  Liam must have been blocking her view, because when he shifted, Kris’s eyes widened; her face paled, causing the bruise to flare a shiny black, like the skin of the monster beneath the moon.

  “Marty?” she whispered.

  Liam yanked away his hands. He figured the man would slide down the door and pool at his feet, which would give Liam a chance to find out just who in hell he was and why Kris knew him. Instead, the stranger’s eyes narrowed on Kris’s face, then his own flushed with fury.