Lone Wolf

by Karen Whiddon

  The silence stretched out while she pondered.

  “Answer the question.”

  “I’ve thought I was in love, yes.” With him.

  His expression was suddenly serious. “Then what happened?”

  “Life got in the way.”

  Realizing that, for whatever reason, how she answered was important to him, she thought long and hard about the rest of what she’d say. There wasn’t any way he’d realize she was talking about him. “We went our separate ways. I think we always sort of thought we’d get back together, but it never happened.”

  He nodded, then concentrated on the road.

  “Brigid’s dangerous,” he said, changing the subject. “You need to understand that. Whether you perceive her as a threat or not is beside the point. After that scene back there at her meeting, there’s no way we can even remotely believe she wants to help us.”

  Swallowing, she pushed away the hurt. Forcing her self to return to reality was necessary. “I did warn you.”

  “You did.” He gave a grim nod. “But this is more than that. I’m not sure what happened, why she told you that she couldn’t train you, but you had the power to deflect her spell.”

  Since she couldn’t disagree with this, she nodded. “I’m not sure how I did that, but it worked out.”

  “And Brigid will not have liked it. I think she’s running scared, afraid of losing the iron grip she seems to have over all the vamps. I don’t think she’s ever come up against someone with as much power as you before.”

  Here he went again. She sighed. “Beck, while I’d love to believe I’m some superpowerful vampire witch, I’m not. Brigid herself did the assessment. I came out subpar on all categories. I had so little magical strength that she couldn’t train me.”

  Though the words were painful, she went on. “That was a moment of great shame to me. Brigid rarely refuses anyone.”

  “Surely you must consider that Brigid wasn’t telling the truth. Especially now. I saw what you can do. If you feel like you have to hide it, then fine, but not from me.”

  “There’s nothing to hide. At least that I know of.” He’d given her much to think about.

  “Right.” He glanced at her. His dark gaze searched her face, sending a frisson of pleasure through her before he returned his attention to driving. “Marika, from now on, I don’t want there to be any secrets between us, okay?”

  Thinking of her feelings for him, emotions that had never really vanished but now grew stronger every second they spent together, she knew she shouldn’t agree.

  “Okay,” she said and nodded. “No secrets.”

  A yellow road sign flashed past. Alpine, twenty miles. One of the things she loved about this area was the way the burnt grasslands seemed to stretch on forever. And the complete and utter lack of traffic on the wide, well-maintained road.

  Just when she thought the silence had grown comfortable, he broke it.

  “You know,” he said, his casual tone at war with his serious expression, “when you vanished right after Juliet was killed, I couldn’t help but wonder if you had something to do with her death.”

  Shocked and momentarily speechless, she could only stare. “You knew me, know me. How could you even say such a thing?”

  “I thought I knew you, but then you were gone.” A shadow crossed his face. “You were the one person who understood how I felt, the single other who might have been able to grieve as intensely as I did. I thought we were…close.”

  “We were,” she protested, heart sinking.

  His hard stare never wavered from the road. “But you disappeared. No message, nothing. You didn’t even send flowers to her funeral, for hounds’ sake. It was almost as if, as far as you were concerned, Juliet never existed.”

  Though she deserved them, his words cut her deeply.

  No secrets.

  “I wanted to go to Juliet’s funeral. I intended to, actually, but I was busy trying to stay alive. The night Juliet was murdered, when we separated and you went to the bar to meet her, someone broke into our room and tried to kill me.”

  He went very still, his eyes narrow. “You’ve never mentioned this before.”

  “No.” She gave a self-deprecating laugh. “It was another reason to be wary of everyone. Plus, I didn’t think you’d believe me. I mean, come on. Why would anyone want to kill me? At first, I thought it was because we’d broken the big taboo and had an interracial relationship.”

  “They’re not expressly forbidden,” he protested, steering them smoothly around a wide curve.

  “No, but they’re not looked upon favorably, either. You know that as well as I do.”

  “Still, that doesn’t explain why you thought I wouldn’t believe you.”

  No lies.

  “When I learned I was pregnant, I didn’t know how to face you, what I’d say.”

  “Then after you’d had our baby, you were too busy avoiding me.” Bitterness colored his voice.

  “Yes.” Amazing how much truth hurt. Taking a deep breath, she continued. “Even if I had gotten the courage to find you, to tell you about Dani, I didn’t think you’d believe me. Or, quite frankly, give a damn. After all I’d done to you—disappearing, birthing our child and raising her without you knowing—I didn’t think you’d care.”

  Holding her breath, she waited for his reply. And waited. And waited.

  Finally, he nodded. “Fair enough. Now, tell me what happened.”

  Ignoring the ache inside her, she answered as best she could. “That night, after we made love, you went to Addie’s Bar to meet Juliet, and I took a shower in our hotel room.”

  He nodded, his expression emotionless.

  “Someone broke into the room. They were waiting for me when I got out of the shower. I fought him, naked. At first, I thought he wanted to rape me.”

  “Shifter? Or vampire?”

  “Neither. The intruder was human. And, once he began struggling with me, it was plain he hadn’t been told I was a vampire.”

  “You killed him?” Toneless, he spoke without inflection.

  “No. As odd as it sounds now, I let him live. I drank enough of his blood to satisfy me, and then I let him go.”

  Now she saw she’d shocked him. “You made another vampire?”

  “Yes.” She nodded. “He couldn’t hurt me, his maker. I never saw him again. So I don’t know what became of him.”

  “Why? Why’d you set him free? He tried to kill you.”

  Hesitating, she studied her hands.

  “Tell the truth,” he urged her. “I’m trying to understand.”

  “I don’t know if you will.” Lifting her head, she straightened her shoulders. “After what we’d shared that night, I didn’t want a human’s death on my conscience. Killing him would have sullied our lovemaking somehow. So I fed, then I let him go.”

  “Just like that. You turned him and let him go.”

  “Yes.”

  His dark gaze searched her face. “Then what happened? How did you learn of Juliet’s death?”

  “When you didn’t return, I called her cell.”

  He went very still. “That cell phone disappeared when she died. No one has ever been able to find it. Who answered?”

  “I don’t know. A man. He’s the one who told me, and he laughed when he did. ‘Juliet is dead,’ he said.” Remembered fury and pain clogged her throat. “He laughed, Beck. As if Juliet’s death was the funniest thing he’d ever heard. I knew then I’d find him and kill him.”

  “You should have come to me. Let me help you.”

  “I intended to. But I’m a Huntress, remember. It’s what I do. So first, I went hunting.”

  “And then?” His cold voice matched the chill in his eyes. “Did you find him?”

  “I searched for two months without pause, stopping only to feed. Finally, I realized with so little to go on, I needed the help of someone more powerful than me. I went to Brigid, asked for her assistance. Instead, she questioned me about my pregn
ancy.”

  “Brigid knew? Did you tell her?”

  “No.” She bit her lip. How to explain what she’d felt, finally sharing the news with one of her own kind? The absolute shock had given way, finally, to joy. For the first time in hundreds of years, she’d felt blissfully alive. Finally fulfilled as a woman.

  She was to be a mother, to carry a child in a womb that should have been dead, to nourish it through her own blood, her own body.

  A vampire carrying a living child. Hope had blossomed inside her, a miracle on a par with a virgin birth.

  She’d quietly rejoiced, and uncertain who to trust, who to turn to, she’d trusted no one. No one would have believed her anyway.

  The only thing ruining this complete and utter happiness were the two loose ends.

  “Brigid helped me find the man who’d killed Juliet. We ripped him apart limb by limb.”

  He went still. “Are you sure? Absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt, positive you got the right man?”

  This gave her pause. “I went by what Brigid told me,” she finally said. “I was certain then. Now, I’m not so sure.”

  Another silence fell while he digested this. Then, he raised his head and gave her a look so intent, so piercing, she gasped.

  “How do you feel about possibly tearing an innocent man apart limb by limb?”

  He’d asked for honesty, so she gave him that. “It’s haunted me for a long time. It probably always will.”

  “Still, why’d you never try to find me?”

  “I did,” she told him, her voice steady. “But Addie said you’d gone underground because of a dispute with the Protectors.”

  “That didn’t last forever.”

  “I know. Addie’d promised to notify me when you resurfaced. But before she could, Brigid warned me about you. She claimed to have seen a vision of you killing Dani.”

  “And you believed her?” His tone harsh, he glared at her. “You actually believed her?”

  “Yes.” Bowing her head, she felt ashamed. “I had no reason to doubt her.” Though she ached for his arms around her, this time, he made no move to comfort her, not even a hand on her knee.

  When she finally composed herself, Marika finished, telling her story in a voice as flat and emotionless as his had been earlier.

  “As my condition began to show, I went into hiding. Brigid warned me against everyone. It hadn’t taken long for my initial giddy happiness to be replaced by worry, terror and suspicion.”

  Haltingly, she told him of the poisonous words Brigid had used. She’d painted a clear picture, using the fears of a woman who’d never thought she’d ever be a mother, to make her afraid of everything and everyone around her.

  “She was isolating you. I think even then, she meant to get her hands on the baby.”

  She glanced up at him through her lashes. The tenderness she saw in his face stunned her.

  “I was so naive, so trusting. Because her vision had led her to the truth of my pregnancy, I trusted what else she told me she’d seen.”

  “She duped you, Marika.”

  “I was a fool. I can see that now. But I was so stunned by the miracle of my pregnancy, I believed her and let her help me.” When all along, she could have found Beck and had their child with him by her side. How much they’d both lost because of Brigid’s poisonous lies.

  Eyes filling with tears, she turned away, covering her face with her hands, alone in her pain.

  He pulled the truck over to the side of the road and pulled her into his arms. He simply held her, smoothing her hair and murmuring sounds of comfort.

  Then he spoke four words that made the tears start anew. “You’re no longer alone.”

  As she struggled for composure, she knew a sense of overwhelming gratitude for the fact that fate had seen fit to bring them back together. Relief that this man, Anton Beck, had been the one to father her daughter—correction, their daughter.

  And, even though she hadn’t told him everything yet, for the first time since she’d learned Dani had been taken, Marika felt hope.

  As he held the woman he’d once believed was his mate, Beck realized he still didn’t have all the answers he needed.

  “But you got away from Brigid, obviously. When and how?”

  Sniffling, she gave him a watery smile and wiped at her still-streaming eyes with the back of her hand. “Brigid had business in Europe. She left me with a member of her inner circle, believing my trust and respect for her was so strong that I’d never leave. And I probably wouldn’t have, had not her lieutenant made clear his contempt for me.”

  “Because you were pregnant?”

  “Not just that, but because I carried a mixed-race child. I’d sullied my vampire blood, mixing it with that of a shifter.” She gave him a sideways glance, full of concern. “He called you a dog.”

  “I’ve been called worse,” he said mildly. “Did he attempt to hurt you?”

  “Not directly. I think he was too afraid of Brigid for that. But he tried to make me hurt myself, to harm my own baby.” Fury and disbelief mingled in her voice. “But his magic wasn’t strong enough. No magic is strong enough to make me do that.”

  “How? Did he use spells against you?”

  “I think so. He hammered at me with words, too, and tried to use his own kind of logic to convince me. I realized then that many vampires—no, most vampires—would never accept my baby, our baby. So I ran. From all of them. I went into hiding and even Brigid couldn’t find me.”

  “How did you escape? Even with him badgering you, using his magic, you were still able to flee?”

  She lifted her chin, a flash of pride shining in her eyes. “I convinced him that I believed the truth of his words, that he was right, that his magic had worked on me. I told him I needed privacy to make myself abort. Fool that he was, he believed me. He let me go into the mountains alone.”

  “See, I told you that you have strong magic.”

  “Whatever. He let me go and I ran.”

  “I’m sure Brigid dealt with him harshly.”

  “No doubt.” This definitely didn’t trouble her. “And even though I didn’t know if he was working on behalf of Brigid or just a maniac who happened to be in her employ, because even Brigid couldn’t keep me safe, I made sure I stayed hidden.”

  “She couldn’t use her magic to find you? Maybe this Brigid isn’t as powerful as she made it seem.”

  “No. Just like she can’t use her magic to find Dani.” She frowned, looking thoughtful. “And therein lies the flaw of your theory. If Brigid is the one after Dani, then she has many allies. Why would she need us or Addie’s sister to use against us?”

  “Unless…” He swallowed. If they were to no longer hide the truth, he had to throw at her any and all possibilities. “Unless Addie and Dani somehow escaped.”

  She pressed her lips together. “Do you think that’s possible?”

  “Why else would Brigid still be searching for them? I mean, if she captured them in the first place, she already knows where they are, right?”

  “What about all the other children? Especially the one who they captured with the parents?”

  “Again, we only have Brigid’s word on that. There’s no proof that these other children even exist.”

  Their gazes locked. He saw the moment she realized the truth. “She’s playing us?”

  Before he could respond, she answered herself.

  “Of course she is.” Anger vibrated in her voice. “That’s how she operates. Nothing is ever straightforward. It’s all games and lies.”

  He waited, knowing the larger implication would sink in eventually.

  A second later her eyes widened. “But that would mean Dani is…”

  “Safe.” He took her hand. “But on the run, trying to hide from everyone who’s trying to find her. And since Brigid has her own small army, that’s a lot of vampires.”

  “Not to mention shifters,” she responded, squeezing his hand hard. “That’s the one flaw. Thi
s theory with Brigid as the bad guy doesn’t account for the involvement of so many shifters.”

  “Actually, it does. I’ve said before that they might be trying to help Dani, to keep her from Brigid.”

  Marika nodded. “Either way, we’ve got to find them.”

  He pulled out his cell. “We’re nearly at Alpine. Let me give Addie’s sister a call on the off chance Brigid was lying about capturing her.”

  Punching in the phone number, he listened for a moment before closing the phone. “No answer. But I know where she lives. We’ll just drop in on her unannounced.”

  He put the truck in Drive, and they pulled back out onto the road. A few minutes later, they reached the outskirts of Alpine. He turned into a residential area, then onto a dead-end street. The houses at the end backed up to the endless grasslands of the high desert.

  They pulled up in front of an unassuming frame house that had been painted the same khaki color as the dried lawn.

  Killing the engine, he sniffed the air. “Something’s wrong.”

  “I sense it, too.” Slowly, she got out of the truck, studying the house. “Nothing looks out of place. I’ll go around back while you ring the doorbell.”

  But before she could even start, a woman came out of the pink stucco house next door.

  “Are you looking for Annabelle?” The short Hispanic woman walked over, studying them with bright eyes. “You’re the second group of people to come here in as many days. But you’re too late. Annabelle passed away two weeks ago. What’s really weird is that we couldn’t find her sister, Addie, even to come to the funeral.”

  “Really.” Beck and Marika exchanged a look, no doubt thinking the same thing. Had Annabelle really died or was she now a fledgling vampire?

  “Who made the arrangements then? I though Addie was the only family Annabelle had.”

  “She was.” The woman shrugged, pushing her dark hair out of her face. “But everything had been prearranged, from the casket to the burial plot. Even the tombstone was ordered in advance.” Thanking the woman, Beck walked back to the truck, while Marika stayed behind to scope out the premises.