Elation swelled inside her. She had killed five lycans without breaking a sweat. Five beasts she would not even have detected if not for her newly turned self.
Human life had been saved. Because Kit had been there, been able to help in a way she never could before. Because she was a dovenatu.
Because of Rafe.
Suddenly she felt herself smile. A great lightness rolled through her, chasing away the cloying darkness that she had permitted to shadow her heart. Myriad emotions washed over her. Relief, gratitude…shame.
A tremble snaked through her as she recalled all the horrible things she had said to Rafe before leaving him. She fought to swallow the sudden bitterness coating her mouth.
Her eyes shut in a pained blink. Slowly, she shook her head from side to side. Her knees suddenly felt weak, too weak for her to stand. She dropped to a boneless pile, the smack of her knees a loud crack on the asphalt.
“Rafe,” she whispered to the night, knowing in that moment that the nagging ache in her chest was for him. It had nothing to do with her physical transformation and everything to do with him.
She rested her forehead in her palm. Idiot. She had said and done everything in her power to push him away. Are you no more than an animal?
Why should he have wanted her around anymore? No wonder he had tossed her his keys and told her to hit the road. She’d been stubborn, at times cruel. She dragged a hand over her face, wishing she could take it all back, wishing she could see him again.
“Kit.”
Her head snapped up. A large, dark shadow stood at the mouth of the alley, still as stone, frozen, and yet there was something in his stance. Her nostrils flared as his scent came to her. She would have known him anywhere. In the darkest of nights, in the most packed crowds, her nose would find him, her heart would know him.
“Rafe!” She exploded off the ground and launched herself across the distance separating them. He still didn’t move, not even when she flung herself against him, wrapping her arms around his lean waist. “Rafe, what are you doing here?”
“You didn’t think you’d seen the last of me, did you? You know me better than that.”
She pulled back to stare into his dark eyes. Their dark depths stared down at her intently, the lights banked at the centers. “You’ve been with me all along? All this time?”
He moved then, one hand brushing her cheek. “I couldn’t let you leave without knowing you’d be safe.”
She dropped her face back to the warm wall of his chest, inhaling the scent that had become as familiar as her own.
He had never left her. Her chest tightened. She’d been such an ass, and he had never left her.
His voice rumbled in her ear. “I had to be sure you could handle yourself.” He drew a shuddering breath. “Now I am.”
She lifted her head, suddenly uneasy. “Rafe?”
“More important, now you can be sure you can handle yourself. Never doubt that, Kit.”
“Rafe, what are you saying?”
His hand fell lightly against the back of her head. “You’re strong. Stronger than me. I was born to this, and it took years for me to gain full control over myself.” His fingers flexed over her hair, and his breath turned to a soft hiss. “You’ll never lose control.”
She nodded, knowing she could continue hunting, could make a real difference now. Could save lives that she never could before. “I know I won’t, but why does this sound like good-bye?”
With a sigh, he set her from him, his hand sliding from her head. His dark eyes scanned her face intently, as if memorizing it, branding it in his head. An uneasy feeling began to root in her gut, intensifying as he said, “Because it is. You don’t need me. I told myself you did in order to try to keep you for myself. I won’t be that selfish. Good-bye, Kit.”
Coldness washed through her. She shivered in the humid night. “Rafe, no.”
“I watched you.” His lips curved in a humorless smile. “I saw you.” He nodded. “You were good. Very good. You can handle yourself.”
She snatched his arm. “I—” What would she say? That she didn’t want to do this alone. That she was sick to death of being alone. That she could not face the stretch of time, the generations yawning before her like that. Alone. Without him.
She decided on the truth. “I need you.” The words spilled from her mouth in a burning rush.
He shook his head. Slowly. Regretfully. “No, Kit.”
She dug her fingers into his arms, determined to convince him. “Yes.”
Standing on tiptoe, she pressed her mouth to his in a crushing, desperate kiss. She splayed herself against him, rubbing her breasts to his chest. Touching, tasting…loving.
“Please, Rafe.” Her voice broke on his name.
With a groan, he finally surrendered, delving his hands through her hair. Blood pounded in her veins, urgent and hard as he slipped his tongue inside her mouth. She whimpered, struggling to get closer, suspecting she would never be close enough.
This, she realized with a jolt, was what it felt like to love a man. To feel a deep connection with another soul. The very thing she had spent her life craving.
She wasn’t about to let it slip from her fingers.
CHAPTER 29
With a groan, he wrenched Kit from him, holding her back, with his hands braced hard on her shoulders.
“No,” he panted, the word a hard bite on the air.
“Yes,” she gasped, straining to return to his arms. It took considerable effort to keep her at arm’s length. “You were right, Rafe. We do belong together. You turned me. We’re both dovenatu—”
“No,” he ground out, dropping his hands from her shoulders as if the feel of her burned him. “That’s no reason.”
He turned from her and began to walk away, his pace quick and fierce, heading back down the alley. She followed him. “You’ve been through a lot, Kit. You only think you have to settle for me. Because we’re alike. Because it’s easy. Because aside from my brother, a continent away, we’re the only two dovenatus alive.”
“That’s not why,” she insisted, following him across a street. With a strangled, mirthless laugh, she added, “And nothing about us has been easy.”
“I admit it makes sense,” he agreed as though he had not heard her. “We’re both dovenatus. No one has to watch the other wither and die. We’re the same species, for God’s sake. But we shouldn’t be together because it makes sense. I realize that now.”
Coldness washed over her. Could he be saying he didn’t want to be with her? “Of course not.”
“But two people should decide to spend their lives together based on more than convenience. Not because I’m a dovenatu. Not because I turned you into one.” He cut her a swift glance. “They should love one another.”
She made a choking, strangling sound.
Didn’t he know she loved him? Couldn’t he look at her now and see it in her face? Feel it when she kissed him? Did she come across as a woman who didn’t know her own mind? Who gave her heart so easily?
He shook his head, his voice final, dark as the night surrounding them. “Our lives are too long to suffer them with regrets.”
“Our lives are too long not to give this a try. To give us a try.”
The line of his jaw hardened. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”
She worked to keep up with his fast pace. “I don’t want to live without you, Rafe.”
“You’re just scared, Kit.”
She let loose a laugh. “When have I ever been afraid?”
He halted before her, his gaze probing, searching. “Ever since I met you. Your tough-girl act never fooled me. You’ll always be that little girl who watched her mother turn into a monster and devour her father.”
Like salt to an open wound, she flinched.
She opened her mouth to hotly deny the charge, then swallowed hard. He was right. She had always been afraid. Afraid that revenge would consume her life. To the exclusion of all else. But not anymore
.
“You’re right. I’m still that little girl. I’m still afraid,” she confessed with a lift of her chin. Heavy metal music played in the distance, a dull throb in the night. “More than I’ve ever been. But I’m not afraid of the same thing anymore.” Thirst for revenge didn’t poison her anymore.
He arched a dark brow, waiting.
She still had fears. But they had changed.
More terrifying than living out her life alone with only revenge as a companion, was living it without Rafe.
She exhaled through her nose, peering over the dark outline of Rafe’s shoulder. The bar’s yellow neon lights gleamed ahead of them. Would he leave her now, convinced she didn’t love him?
Rafe was the one. She could not let him walk away.
“I’m scared of losing the man I love. You.”
Now Rafe knew what he had craved through the long years. Without even knowing he craved anything, he had craved this: Her.
It was torture. She was saying everything he wanted to hear. That they could be together. Life mates in the truest sense. If only she meant it. If only he could buy into the dream of it all.
Because it was a dream. A dream that she could love him. After so many years, he had found a woman to love who loved him back. A woman who wouldn’t age, sicken, and die in what amounted to only a blink of time for him. Someone who could live through the years by his side. Someone he had loved from almost the first moment he saw her. He couldn’t be that fortunate.
He had deceived her, turned her against her will, trapped her. He would not trap her a second time. Would not let her settle for him because he was her only choice.
He recovered his voice, fought for the distance his heart screamed against. “I still wouldn’t recommend you sticking around Houston. You might be stronger than before, but you’re not invincible. And everyone’s after you—EFLA, NODEAL, the packs. Start over someplace else.” He ignored the frustrated shaking of her head and continued, “Take a new identity—”
“Kit!”
They both swung around at the sound of her name. Rafe pulled her behind him, instinctively shielding her with his body at the approach of a scowling man.
“Gideon!” Kit rushed past Rafe and flung herself into her brother’s arms. “I told you I would meet you—”
“I decided to come anyway. Kit, what’s going on? I’ve been out of my mind.” He glanced toward the bar. “What are you doing here? You can’t be working.”
“I’m planning to leave town, but…” Her voice faded and she looked to Rafe, uncertainty flickering in her green gaze.
Gideon followed her gaze. Even in the dark, Rafe easily noted the narrowing of his eyes, the tightening of his hand on his sister’s shoulder. “Who is this?”
“This is Rafe. Rafe Santiago.” She tugged her brother closer, her small hand disappearing inside his larger one as she led him toward Rafe.
Lean and tall, with Kit’s same dark blond hair, Gideon March was a formidable man. He shifted a wary gaze from Rafe to his sister. “Who is this guy?”
Biting her lip, she sent Rafe a searching look, muttering, “It’s complicated.”
Rafe dragged a hand through his hair. Logic told him to leave, to let Kit explain everything to her brother. She didn’t need him around to do that. Instead he heard himself say, “Let’s go someplace and talk.”
Kit nodded eagerly and looked back to Gideon. “Let’s go to Grandmother’s house.”
Even as Gideon nodded, the expression he turned on Rafe was no less distrustful. “All right. Let’s go.”
The three departed, moving to their separate vehicles. Sitting behind the wheel of the car he had purchased outside Austin, Rafe flexed his hands over the leather and told himself he should just drive away, leave Kit for good no matter what he had just said. A clean break.
She would be fine now. And yet he found himself pulling out of the parking lot and falling behind the Hummer. Following her. Temporarily, he swore. Then he would leave.
Because it was the right thing to do. Even if his blood burned dark with the impulse to claim her, to keep her with him for all time. He would let her go.
The house was dark when they pulled up. From Kit’s file, he knew her grandmother busied herself outside of the home—knitting circles, bunko, antiques collecting.
The three of them entered the house from the back door. Kit flipped on the lights, and Rafe followed the siblings into the living room.
Kit sat down on the sofa, rubbing her palms over the top of her thighs as if suddenly cold. “It’s complicated, Gid.”
“You said that already.”
Rafe leaned against the arched doorjamb and crossed his arms. She glanced his way. He nodded encouragingly.
“I don’t know where to begin.” She pressed her fingers to her lips with a muttered curse.
“Start talking, Kit.”
She shook her head, her words muffled against her fingers. Dropping her hand, she asked, “Did Cooper ever tell you about the Marshan Prophecy?”
Gideon shook his head, releasing a heavy sigh. “Look, I’ve just driven across the state without stopping because I was convinced you were in danger. I left my wife in a cabin by herself in the middle of nowhere. Start making some sense.”
She nodded, suddenly looking pale—and Rafe understood. In that moment, it all became clear to him. She was worried about her brother’s reaction, his acceptance of her. Would he look at her as she looked at herself—at him—when he first explained the truth to her?
She straightened her spine and clenched her hands together, looking so much like a soldier facing battle that his chest grew tight.
“Basically it boils down to one thing, Gid. I’m a hybrid lycan. A dovenatu.” She gave a small, rolling nod. “We both descend from the world’s first lycan…well, before he became a lycan. We descend from his son, Christophe Marshan.”
Gideon stared at her in silence, still as stone.
“A dovenatu isn’t anything like a full-fledged lycan,” Rafe felt the need to volunteer. “They share many of the same powers, but bloodlust doesn’t rule them. They’re not evil. Or at least they don’t have to be.”
“Wait a minute.” Gideon pressed his fingers to his temple as if suffering a sudden headache. He snapped his gaze to Rafe, his green eyes as hard as polished malachite. “First things first, who the hell are you?”
Rafe tightened his lips, knowing this wasn’t going to go over well. If Kit were his sister, he sure as hell wouldn’t like what he was hearing. Especially Rafe’s role in it all.
Kit answered. “He’s a dovenatu, too.” She paused. Gideon pinned Rafe with a reproachful, suspicious stare. “He’s the one that turned me.”
Gideon’s eyebrows winged higher. “That right?” He took a menacing step toward Rafe. “You turned my sister into some kind of half-breed lycan?”
Kit stepped forward, grabbing his arm. “He saved my life, Gid. I was dying. If he hadn’t turned me, I would be dead now. You should be thanking him.”
Gideon looked down at his sister, an angry muscle rippling the skin of his jaw.
“Understand? He saved my life.” Her throat worked as she swallowed. Green eyes scanning Gideon’s face, she added. “And I love him.”
Despite himself, something loosened inside Rafe at her words. He suspected he would never tire of hearing her say that. His chest expanded and he felt a great releasing of himself into the night, a sense of joy he had never known.
Suddenly the hairs on Rafe’s neck prickled with awareness, ending his euphoria as effectively as a douse of cold water.
Uncrossing his arms, he spun around, muscles coiling tight in readiness. His nostrils flared, sensing the newcomer to their circle before he revealed himself.
An older, vaguely familiar man stepped into the room, a gun gripped in his hand. Easing away from the threshold, Rafe took several slow steps back, putting himself between the gun and Kit. Even if a bullet couldn’t kill her, it would hurt. And he would save her f
rom that pain.
“Jack,” Kit exclaimed, trying to step around Rafe.
Rafe blocked her, his mind working, recalling from his review of her file that the grandmother had a boyfriend named Jack.
“Looks like I just hit the jackpot,” Jack said. Nodding happily, he let his gaze fall on Kit. “The prophecy comes to life, eh?” He waved his gun up and down. “Good thing I’m packing silver.”
Silver. Rafe’s gaze narrowed on the gun’s unwavering barrel, bitter rage rising high in his throat, threatening to choke him. He had no idea if silver could kill either one of them, if that was one characteristic he and Kit shared with their distant lycan brethren. He and Sebastian had never risked finding out.
Hoping to divert his attention, he asked, “So who are you, really?”
“My name is Jack. But Burnett’s the last name. I used to work for NODEAL. Boston division. Years ago. Recently EFLA hired me as an undercover operative.”
“What are you doing dating my grandmother?” Gideon asked, inching away from Kit and Rafe and closer to Jack.
“Stop,” Jack barked. “Stay right there.”
Gideon stopped.
Jack swept all of them with his gun. “Getting rid of you three should get me a nice promotion.” A determined light gleamed in his eyes.
Gideon shook his head as if he could not believe it and began moving again, slowly. “But Grandma met you at that retirement community…”
“Do you know a better way to infiltrate? Dating that hag was genius on my part. No better way to learn about NODEAL’s rogue lycan hunters.” He took the last step toward Gideon, jabbing the gun close to his face.
Rafe tightened his hand on Kit. He had seen men on the edge before, in the First World War. Burnett had that same wild look about him.
Kit made a small sound of distress and tried to step around Rafe. He held her back.
“I can’t believe you’re still touted as NODEAL’s best.” Jack shook his head, glaring at Gideon. “Where’s the sense in that? You’re the traitor. You befriended one of the most monstrous lycans the world has ever known.”
“Étienne Marshan was hunted down and destroyed years ago,” Rafe inserted.
Kiss of a Dark Moon Page 20
