The Mating Game: Werewolves of Montana Book 8

by Bonnie Vanak

  Gideon’s ire flared. He strode over to the girl and took her elbow to help her rise. The moment his hand made contact with her bare skin, a spark jumped between them, thickening his blood. Desire, hot and heavy, surged in his loins.

  Troubled, he forced his male passions to simmer and touched the girl’s cheek where the fire had left a slight, yellow burn. It healed instantly.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “Fine,” she murmured, not looking at him.

  Not at him but the dagger on his belt, with such intent he knew she wanted to seize it and use it. On him? Or someone else?

  Gideon seized her wrist. “Don’t,” he murmured, for her ears only. “Not unless you wish to live out your days in a pain-filled cell of iron, only darkness for company.”

  Alia moistened her mouth again. “Perhaps such a place would be preferable to here.”

  Troubled by her words, Gideon gently touched her cheek again, marveling at her velvet-soft skin and the courage in her deep blue eyes. “Do not entertain such thoughts, little one. You are far too young and innocent to know the grip darkness can have on your soul.”

  He turned to the king, guarding his thoughts. What in seven hells happened to this court? Gideon made a note to investigate further. For now, he had to confirm his suspicions about the Seelie King.

  Alia had not sacrificed the Trolls on the rock in the national park. Her aura pulsed with soft, gold light, threaded with unhappy grayness but no hint of malevolent purplish-black.

  And…

  Interesting. A flare of deep crimson, the color of passion amongst the Fae.

  Gideon approached Prince Maurico, who stood and gave a stiff bow. “My Lord Gideon, how may we assist you?”

  Sniffing, Gideon caught no foul stench of evil. The prince’s aura was the same as his half-sister’s, with equal amounts of unhappy gray.

  “It has been too long since I last paid a visit to the Summer Court.” Gideon scanned the rest of the royal crowd. “I am long overdue.”

  The Seelie King inclined his head. “You are most welcome here always.”

  False words but courteous.

  King Oren’s aura was the most powerful, pure gold like the summer sun, with tendrils of arrogant purple. Gideon examined it closely and caught no scent of tainted evil, only overwhelming conceit.

  A malevolent thread of black and deep purple pulsed in his vision as he turned to the lesser lords, Oren’s nephews. Among them were courtiers from the Unseelie Court, who came here as a condition of the truce Gideon had negotiated. The scent of sweet summer jasmine mingled here with the richer fragrance of his people—woodsmoke and snow.

  The Dark Fae lords had been invited to the Summer Court as a gesture of peace in the longstanding truce. Gideon caught a hint of rotting flesh. He followed it until he came to Lord Aston Moxley, an Unseelie. Moxley was a favorite of King Oren’s. Moxley was quite close to the Summer King. Gideon knew Oren was arranging a match between his daughter Alia and Moxley in order to seal the peace between the two courts.

  The thought of Alia mating with this Fae made Gideon’s stomach clench hard. She should be mine.

  Startled, he shook his head. Absurd. He would never take a mate. He was the Crimson Wizard, who must dedicate himself to judging and guarding the Fae.

  Eyes burning from the stench of evil, he stared at the Dark Fae. Moxley looked away.

  The Summer King leaned forward. “Is there something you desire from them, my Lord Gideon?”

  “The truth,” Gideon said softly. “Moxley, who is your master?”

  The Fae stared at the ground but shuffled backward in his gold slippers.

  Gideon seized the young lord by the throat, lifting him up as the court gasped and Moxley choked. “Your master.”

  Letting his powers surge, knowing his eyes turned blood red, Gideon forced the truth from the Unseelie.

  “The…Dark…Lord,” Moxley sputtered.

  Dropping him onto the marble floor with disgust, Gideon waited. He knew his intentions but wanted to see what Oren would do.

  The king bolted off his throne and yelled for his guards, who grabbed Moxley by the arms.

  Moxley screamed and raged in their grip. “How dare you touch me? I am under the authority of the Unseelie King!”

  “You will pay for this, you young pup,” Oren hissed. “You bring such filth, such darkness to my court? You dare to attempt to break the peace lasting between our people for more than nine hundred years?! And to think I thought of wedding you to my daughter?”

  King Oren glanced at Gideon. “I cannot dispense justice to him without risking the truce.”

  Moxley laughed, a chilling sound that iced Gideon’s blood. His face began to change, turning blackened and shrunken, his eyes a violent yellow. Now the taint of evil was clear, the stench almost unbearable.

  “Truce? Balderdash, there can never be real peace between our people, Oren! We shall rise up and fill the world with darkness. You cannot stop us! Nothing can stop us!”

  “Oh?” Gideon asked. He nodded at the Fae holding Moxley. “Release him.”

  After they did, Gideon flicked out a hand, and Lord Moxley screamed. Red and white flames consumed his flesh, burning him as he danced about the marble floor, and then he finally collapsed.

  Moxley burst apart, showering the startled courtiers with noxious, gray ash.

  Gideon’s gaze flicked to the shocked Summer King. “Are there any more surprises hiding amongst your lords and ladies?”

  Oren shook his head, the scepter quivering in his hands. “I hope not.”

  The Crimson Wizard scanned the silent crowd. Many had backed away, refusing to look at him. They quivered in their soft, velvet slippers and boots.

  Such was the way of the Brehon. He must command respect and fear to keep order, for the Fae of both courts had the power to begin a war that would cause earthquakes, floods, and plagues upon the Skin world.

  All the Fae, even Oren, seemed deeply shaken at what they’d witnessed. Well, all but one.

  Alia boldly looked straight at him.

  “Thank you. I had no desire to marry him. I would sooner mate with a wart hog than that one.”

  Gideon gave a grudging laugh as King Oren hissed a reprimand.

  In Alia’s expression, he saw hope and a flash of deep desire. Lingering, he held her gaze for a full minute before she flushed and looked down at the floor.

  He was the Crimson Wizard and did not dare to exercise his darkest desires in either court, but most of all, here. Still, that look—it went straight through him like fire.

  Gideon addressed the king, who finally took the throne again. “Know this, Oren. Darkness is not confined to the Unseelie. I will be watching. All of you.”

  Waving a hand, he dematerialized back to the Skin world.

  He knew he had not fully eradicated the problem. It waited in silence to strike again. And when it did, he would be ready.

  19

  Xavier tried to put the odd incident in the park out of his mind and concentrate instead on Ciara. The lovely Nymph with flowing, golden curls, sparkling, green eyes, and a sexy, kissable mouth would soon be in his bed.

  He had grilled the steaks to perfection through magick. The entire meal was crafted from his ample powers.

  As they sat at the dining table by the window overlooking the river, Xavier asked Ciara about her work and how much the job meant to her. She gave a shrug of those slender shoulders.

  “It’s a means of paying the rent. Joseph and Renee aren’t bad, but they think I’m too vapid to learn the real estate business.”

  A protective feeling arose in him. Xavier set down his wineglass. “Do you wish me to speak to them?”

  She gave him a look from beneath her lashes. “I doubt it would do any good. For Skins, they’re quite dense, though they make plenty of money.”

  Xavier flexed his fingers. “I am a being of great power.”

  “Oh?” Her smile was infectious, and her slight laugh e
nchanted him. “If that’s the case, then conjure a fire. I’m slightly chilled.”

  Immediately, he flicked a finger at the fireplace, and a fire blazed on the hearth. She sucked in a breath, staring at him.

  “I do not know how I acquired this power or what it is for, but I will not hesitate to use it to benefit you if you are in trouble.”

  She blinked. “I can see. Would you ever sacrifice it to save another? Does this magick mean much to you?”

  “My magick means everything to me. I would never give it up.” Xavier felt the familiar pounding in his temples. “I could not see how I’d be forced to surrender it when I am capable of using it to save someone.”

  Again, he cursed his lack of memory. He must have done something quite dreadful to have this black hole where his memory once resided. Instinctively, he knew that memories were the most precious thing to him, besides his magick.

  “Who am I?” he asked her. “You knew me in the drive-thru. You aren’t surprised that I possess powerful magick.”

  Those wide, green eyes, as mysterious and earthy as the forest he loved, searched his face. “You’re a very strong being with a kind heart and a deep need for justice. I can say no more than that.”

  “Why not?”

  She moistened her mouth, and his hungry gaze tracked each move. “Xavier, let me put it this way…you are someone with tremendous magick. If someone stole your memory, it must have been someone very powerful I don’t want to offend.”

  He offered his most charming smile. “What if I fell and hit my head and lost my memory that way?”

  Ciara laughed. “I doubt that. You never were that clumsy, and if you did, you’d simply snap your fingers and your wound would heal.”

  Ah, some information he desired.

  “How well did we know each other? Were we intimate?”

  She blushed a becoming pink. “Very intimate.”

  Filled with purpose, Xavier poured Ciara another glass of wine. The vintage, a Chilean Carmenère, proved delightful to his palate. Ciara sipped sparingly, which pleased him.

  He didn’t want her inebriated when he took her.

  He wanted her awake and aware of every single moment of pleasure he planned to give her. And afterward, when they were both exhausted and sated, he would delve into her mind and demand answers to his identity.

  For now, he could not stop craving her, needed to draw her close. Ciara was like a drug. He could not wait to kiss her again.

  Perhaps I’ll start with that delicious curve of your throat, running my tongue along there, slow and teasing. I do love the little excited cries you make when you come…

  Startled, he set down the bottle. The only way he’d know her reaction during orgasm was if they’d previously made love. Not once but a few times. And it bothered him greatly he had no solid memory of such a past.

  For he wanted to remember making love to her, wanted to know the erogenous zones that delivered the most pleasure, wanted to relish the memory of becoming her lover for the first time.

  Jealousy flared suddenly as he thought of other lovers she’d had, other men who had sampled her charms, had known the exquisite sweetness of having her tight, wet sex surround them as they joined their bodies.

  Mine. The possessiveness startled him as much as the jealousy had.

  But he instinctively knew it came from a more intimate knowledge.

  You were her first lover. The very first to enter her young, innocent body, the first to tutor her in passion, the first to watch in tender satisfaction as she cried out in bliss, shattering in his arms.

  Tonight, he would take her there again.

  When dinner was finished, he insisted on Ciara sitting in the living room before the fire, watching the newly fallen snow as he cleaned up. Then they shrugged into their coats and went outside, walking along the riverbank.

  Their footprints left trails in the virgin snow, his solid and large, hers more delicate. Everything about Ciara seemed ethereal, and yet, with her curves and generous breasts, she seemed less Nymph and more…

  Shifter.

  Interesting. He did not know how he knew of shifters, but the thought nudged him like a sharp elbow.

  Snow began to fall again, dusting the evergreens and sprinkling on the rocks bordering the river. Xavier led Ciara to a covered pavilion and switched on the overhead heaters. He instinctively raised his body temperature to deal with the cold, but the heaters would keep Ciara warm.

  As they sat on a sofa beneath the pavilion’s sheltering roof, Ciara stared out at the falling snow in the street lights scattered around the complex.

  Snow dusted the evergreen branches like powdered sugar. It covered the crackling grasses of the lawn and fell upon the rocks scattered around the trees in a neat circle. It drifted into the river, and the cold water ate it—pretty, square and oblong flakes vanishing into the bitter cold water as it gurgled its way down the mountain.

  Even in the hushed silence of snowfall, broken only by the river splashing over rocks as it streamed down the mountain, Xavier felt comfortable with Ciara.

  Sensing he’d had many lovers over the years, he wasn’t certain why Ciara tugged at his heart. He didn’t know why this lovely female with the masses of gold hair tumbling down her back, the solemn, green eyes, and the full, rosy lips made him feel so dizzy with need.

  He only knew that when they were together, he felt connected, as if he’d known her for many, many years. Ciara made him happy. Deep down, he suspected he had not been so in many months before losing his memory.

  She shivered in the cold, and he moved closer, taking her hand. She smiled.

  “You always had great body heat.”

  His gaze focused on her mouth. “I can keep you warm, Ciara. In many ways.”

  But as he bent his head to kiss her, a sudden tingle rushed down his spine. Xavier pulled back, his senses sharpening.

  “Someone’s out there.”

  She looked around. “This place has been deserted up until last week when the widow moved in. I know, because I come here at times to keep up with the fairy houses.”

  Glancing at the whimsical doors in the nearby trees, he shook his head. “No, I feel it. Little ones.” Closing his eyes, he inhaled, taking in the scent of dank earth, water, and fear. “Trolls.”

  Xavier stood, filled with fresh purpose, and determination. He didn’t know why he worried about Trolls, only knew that deep in his blood, he had to save them. Tugging Ciara’s hand, he ran with her to the nearby bridge over the river.

  Snow began falling faster now. He squatted down and peered under the bridge.

  His eyesight enabled him to see in the dark and pick out three young girls huddled together on the rocks beneath the bridge.

  “Troll girls,” he muttered. Xavier stretched out his hand, and a brilliant, white light shone from his fingers, illuminating the darkness.

  “They look lost. I believe their parents came here once to visit.” Ciara peered beneath the bridge. “Girls, please come out. We want to help you.”

  But the three Troll girls huddled deeper into the shadows.

  Remembering Gregory’s words, he felt a sudden chill. “They’re not lost. They’re orphaned. Something murdered their parents last week. Gregory told me. Stay here, Ciara,” he ordered. “They’re cold, and they’ll need blankets. I’ll be right back.”

  He started to climb down the embankment, but the girls shrieked and began moving away. Not going to work. They were too frightened. They must come out on their own.

  After retreating to the riverbank, Xavier knelt down on the damp grass, ignoring the snowflakes falling into his eyes. He stretched out a hand. “Hello, girls. Please come out. I won’t hurt you.”

  Bolts of energy shot from his hands, tendrils of red magick. He felt the air shift with his powers and turn warmer.

  Then he moved his fingers, and the red light glittered and began to dance in the air. The Troll girls moved toward it, seemingly entranced by the pretty, sparkling light
.

  One by one, they emerged from beneath the bridge. So small. The youngest looked about four, and the oldest couldn’t have been more than ten. His chest hurt as he gazed at them, feeling their fear and their suspicions.

  Using his powers, he surrounded them with the red light and lifted them into the air, gently guiding them over to the riverbank. As he set them down, the light vanished, and they all shivered.

  After he conjured three thick blankets, he and Ciara draped them around the girls. They looked shell-shocked.

  Knowing his formidable height could intimidate, he crouched down. “Don’t be afraid. I’m going to help you.”

  The oldest—a gangly girl with caramel-colored eyes, who wore a dull brown dress—looked at him with suspicion. “And why should we believe you? You could be the one who killed our parents.”

  He gave them his gentlest smile. “I’m not. I promise, I’m going to see you are cared for. How long have you been here?”

  The middle Troll girl, rubbing her nose, looked the most upset. “Three days. We’ve been sleeping under the bridge, and during the day, Nellie catches fish to feed us. But it got so cold today, and we were scared to come out.”

  His heart twisted at her woebegone expression. “You no longer have to sleep under the bridge. I’m taking you to someone who will keep you safe. She’s a very nice widow lady, and she’ll take good care of you.”

  Together, he and Ciara escorted the Troll girls to the elderly widow’s home. When she opened the door, Mrs. O’Neil exclaimed over the girls and hustled them inside. “You poor things, look at you, all shivering and frozen! I’ll make you some hot soup.”

  He and Ciara got the girls settled on the worn living room sofa. Using his powers, he lit a roaring fire in the hearth and then looked at three sets of big, wide, brown eyes.

  “Who likes hot chocolate?”

  Three hands went into the air.

  “With marshmallows!” the middle Troll girl piped up.

  Xavier laughed and waved his hands, conjuring three steaming mugs of hot chocolate, one with tiny marshmallows, on the coffee table before the girls. The Trolls grabbed them and blew on them, their faces brightening.