Mark of the Moon

by Beth Dranoff

  “I know,” I said. “But it could have just been the one time. We’ll see.”

  Lynna rolled her eyes and finally, thankfully, changed the subject.

  * * *

  Brunch with my mother the next day was a bleary affair. Bleary for me at least since I hadn’t gotten much sleep after all last night’s excitement. But I was famished, and the food was her treat, so bagels and cream cheese and lox with a side order of perfectly crispy, lightly salted fries was the ideal distraction. Plus, the company was good. Until I had to start side-stepping questions about where I was staying and why.

  “I know I’m supposed to not ask too many questions,” she started, “but do you think you could give me a hint? Because I have to hope that whatever is going on with you—and don’t try to pretend there isn’t,” she said, when I opened my mouth to deny it, “is far better than the horrors I’ve made up in my head worrying about you.”

  I paused to crunch on a few more fries while slathering white, full-fat cream cheese on my poppy seed twister bagel. Knowing that each second I delayed in responding only added to her clearly heightened anxiety. But what the hell could I say? Crap.

  “My kitchen had a gas leak.” I skirted the bigger issues for a moment as I speared a slice of oily lox and gently layered it on top of the dairy goodness. “So I’m staying with a friend for a few days. I kind of dropped my phone as I was running out the door and I haven’t gotten around to replacing it yet. No drugs, and I’m fine for money.” A lie, but a white one.

  She seemed unconvinced, but didn’t press the matter further. Well, much further.

  “If you say so,” she replied. “But you know I’m here if you change your mind and want to tell me the truth, okay?”

  I grunted noncommittally as I bit into my bagel.

  “By the way,” she continued, allowing the subject to drop, “Ezra Gerbrecht was trying to get in touch with you. Your old professor? The one who used to work with your father?”

  I paused, food halfway to my mouth for another bite, and stared at her. “Huh?”

  “Yes,” she said. “His assistant called trying to track you down. Said it was important. She left a number if you want it.”

  “Huh,” I repeated. Very profound. “That’s weird. Did she say what it was regarding?”

  “No,” Mum replied. “Seemed very hush hush. I do hope you’re not planning to get involved with all of that cloak and dagger stuff again.”

  Mum knew I’d been working for the government, like my father before me, before I left it all behind for the glamorous world of bartending. Worst few years of her life, she always said. My father died in the line of duty; she was always afraid the same thing would happen to me. Best day of her life, after her wedding and the day I was born, was the day I became a civilian again.

  “Not exactly,” I said. “I dropped by Ezra’s office a couple of days ago with some questions about my vaccines, how long they were good for, but that’s about it. He was acting pretty weird though. Spacey. I wonder if he’s okay.” I thought about it a moment. “Even if he’s not, I’m not sure why his assistant would be looking for me. Did you tell her where to find me?”

  Mum looked pretty pleased with herself, biting back on a Cheshire Cat grin while trying to look innocent. On a woman of sixty-four, with clear skin and grey hair swept up in a loose bun, it was both disturbing and hard to believe.

  “I said I hadn’t spoken with you in a few days and that your phone seemed to be out of service, but if she did manage to track you down to please ask you to check in with your mother.”

  I let out a low whistle of appreciation. “Ma, you’re good. Are you sure you never worked for the Service?”

  That netted me a real smile. “I picked up a few things over the years with your father. Rule number one: never assume that someone who is hard to reach wants to be found.”

  “Good call,” I said.

  “What’s going on with you has something to do with your vaccines?” Damn, she really wasn’t letting it go easily. Was it fair to keep her completely unaware? Ignorance wasn’t necessarily bliss.

  “Yes.” Cracking open the can of worms I’d been doing so well at ignoring. “I was scratched by a were-cat a few days ago, and I’ve started having some, um, shifting issues since then. It didn’t make any sense to me because I was supposed to have been vaccinated against all of that when I worked with Ezra. So I dropped by the office to make sure I hadn’t missed a booster shot or anything like that. Ezra was kind of spaced, but he said the shots should still have been good.”

  My mother had gone very pale while I spoke. She started picking apart her napkin at my words.

  “Uh, Mum?” Silence. “Is there something you want to share here?”

  She didn’t look me in the eye. Just took a sip of cold coffee, cream congealed along the sides of her cup. Until she found the words she was looking for.

  “Your father was a shifter,” she said. I gaped at her.

  “What? And I didn’t know this why exactly?”

  “There was no reason to tell you,” she replied. “Stuart and I agreed to wait and see. He figured that if you had the gene, it would present itself at puberty and we’d know—we’d deal with it then. And you never showed any signs. So we thought maybe it had ended with you, or maybe it would show up in one of your kids.” She smiled at me, but she looked sad. “I miss your father so much,” she said, sighing. “He would know what to do.”

  I thought furiously for a moment, trying to piece together the various fragments of these new facts.

  “So let me see if I’m understanding you here,” I said. “My father was a shifter.” Mum nodded. “And he worked for the government.” Another nod. Okay, I already knew that part. “So I’m probably carrying the shifter gene from him, right?” Nod. “In which case?”

  “In which case the vaccine wouldn’t have done you any good,” Mum said, finishing my sentence. “Speaking of which,” she continued, “how exactly did you get scratched?”

  I looked away with a half-smile quirked on the side of my mouth. “I’m going to have to plead the Fifth on that one, ‘K, Mum?”

  She huffed a bit but let it drop after reminding me that the Fifth Amendment only worked in the United States, not here in Canada.

  * * *

  It was my last day before I shifted fully. Anshell’s theory, not mine. He thought the power of the full moon might be enough to pull the shift out of me.

  I felt like my entire life had just shifted. More than losing my home, more than losing my safety—I’d found out my father wasn’t what I’d thought he was, and that consequently, I wasn’t what I’d thought I was. Anshell had offered to teach me about shifting but I’d procrastinated, and now I was running out of time. Tomorrow night I was probably going to change for real, and nothing I had learned up to this point could prepare me for the experience.

  Meanwhile, it was time for work. I suspected I’d be taking some time off for the full moon, so until then I wanted to get in as many paid hours as I could. Sandor had managed to get the Swan Song repaired and cleaned up surprisingly fast—something about a special waiver in his insurance policy covering acts of “impending full moon” vandalism—and he’d left a message at Anshell’s that I should show up for my 3:00 p.m. shift.

  Enough time for a quick shopping trip—black and red anyone?—then a pit stop at Anshell’s to take a shower before heading back out. I’d just stepped out of said shower and was toweling off when there was a knock at the bathroom door.

  “Someone in here,” I called out. “Try the bathroom downstairs if you’re desperate.”

  “Dana, it’s me,” Sam said. “Can I come in?”

  I gulped, my heart pounding in my ears, and suddenly I was damp between my thighs. Crap.

  “Dana,” he repeated. “Knock knock, pussycat. Plea
se let me in.”

  I wrapped the towel around me as tightly as possible and unlocked the door. Watched the handle turn as I edged away. Sam’s bulk filled the entryway as he took in my tousled hair, the moisture on my shoulders and the steam billowing around me. A low growl rumbled in his throat as he stepped in, pulling the door shut behind him and locking it. Oh boy.

  “Sam,” I started, unsure of what to say next. “I...”

  He reached over, wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me towards him, meeting my lips with his. So soft. So warm. So unlike Jon. There was no question, as he pressed up against me, that parts of him were very happy to see me.

  “Ssshh,” Sam said. “No talking.” He kissed me again. “Just this.” He kissed my neck, lips trailing down behind my ear. “And this.” He gently pulled my towel loose and dropped it to the floor as he went down on his knees and alternated between my breasts with his hands, nails and teeth. I grabbed his hair and arched my back, leaning against the basin sink.

  Whoa.

  His mouth nibbled lower, tonguing my belly button, pulling ever so gently on the ring I had there. I groaned. He went even lower, teasing me, his lips whispering against my abdomen, lower still, burying his mouth and tongue between my thighs. Fuck. I gripped his shoulders, nails digging into his shirt, as I came, hard. I yanked him up by his hair, my juices still on his mouth, as I scrambled to unbuckle his belt, undo his pants. There was too much clothing between us.

  It was all I could do to pull his hardness out in time. Three tries to tear the condom wrapper with my teeth and roll it on without getting anything caught in his zipper. Fully clothed, poking out from his jeans, Sam clasped my ass and lifted me up to the edge of the sink, spreading me, pulling me forward and onto him in one smooth thrust. Face to face. So fucking intimate. The basin shook with our pounding; the tiles could have been falling down around us and I wouldn’t have noticed.

  All that existed was us; our bodies, our sweat, sensation. And then, finally, release.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I was about twenty minutes late for my shift. Couldn’t stop grinning. Sandor raised two of his three eyebrows at me when I rolled in with my perma-smile and sidled up behind the bar. I shrugged and started setting up the glasses, making sure we had enough ice for the after-work rush.

  Afternoon delight indeed.

  The post-sex glow lasted into the evening, drifting over cranky customers and netting me surprisingly good tips regardless—as though my super-juiced endorphins were sprinkling happy dust on the patrons around me. People laughed and touched and drank and ate. No weeping tonight, and surprisingly few fights for the night before the full moon. Last call came quickly, and soon we were eyeing the doors and waiting for the last few straggling customers to settle their tabs and leave so we could close up.

  Good time for a bathroom break. I wondered whether Sam would be around when I got back to Anshell’s place. Whether we might pick up where we left off earlier. I was still a little sore but, gyah, I could be convinced to go for another round. Couldn’t stop grinning as I ran cold water and soap over my hands, splashing a few drops onto my face as well.

  I stepped out the door to the bathroom and directly into Demon Chick. Cybele. The one from the other night; the one from Ezra Gerbrecht’s office. Huh.

  “Hi, Dana.” She smiled at me. “I’ve been trying to get a hold of you.”

  “Oh?” Wary. “How come?”

  She stepped in closer, breathing into my personal space. I could smell cranberry juice and vodka on her breath. Closer, and her lips brushed against mine. Damn. What was in the water around here tonight?

  I tried to edge away even as Cybele bumped me up against the wall with her torso, pinning me in place, a hand on either side of my shoulders. She peered into my eyes, reflecting black with glints of gold back at me. I pushed back and tried to duck out and away to the side, but she followed. Okay, this wasn’t fun anymore. I tried to call out for Sandor but she slapped her hand across my mouth and pushed me against the wall again, harder. I glared at her from behind her hand.

  “Play nice,” Cybele said. “This will all be over soon.”

  Over her shoulder, a shadow and the smell of something chemical and strong. A cloth covered my nose. Can’t. Breathe.

  Darkness.

  * * *

  I woke up, slowly, and couldn’t move. Strapped to yet another hospital bed. No shriveled roses this time, though. No pumpkin orange on black carpet. Instead there was a flickering blue-green fluorescent bulb above my head, snot-green walls and brown/beige pebbles of color on the institutional-style linoleum floor. Round patches with wires coming out of them stuck on my arms, abdomen and legs.

  I remembered rooms like these. I revisited them on a regular basis in my nightmares.

  This was so not good.

  How had they gotten me out of the Swan without Sandor knowing? What if he’d seen something and was in trouble? What if he’d seen it go down and did nothing?

  My mouth felt like cotton wool; an aftereffect of the drugs, I was guessing. The subjects of our experiments had often complained of thirst when they first woke up. Later, they would forget their thirst in a haze of pain and fear. I hadn’t been responsible for the pain, but I couldn’t absolve myself fully either.

  The door opened and Ezra strolled through. He had a glassy sheen to his eyes, and didn’t seem to recognize me at first. Until he picked up the chart. Hawkish, he focused first on the paper then back up at me.

  “Dana? Is that you?”

  “Hey Ezra,” I replied, going for casual. “What’s shaking?”

  “Not you, apparently,” he said. No smiles now. “What brings you to us in this fashion?”

  “You tell me,” I said. “Can you give a girl a hand, get me out of here?”

  “No can do,” he replied, shaking his head. “You’ve been messing with some bad stuff, my dear. Poking your nose in things you shouldn’t be.”

  “I...what?”

  “We’ve heard you’ve been hanging out with a bad crowd,” he said. “Shifters and vampires. Helping to free an offering who should have been left to die.”

  I processed this. Offering. Was he talking about Mr. Gothy from the other night? I tested my theory.

  “Uh, who? Offering?” Didn’t have to fake my befuddlement. Much. “What are you talking about?”

  Ezra pulled up a squeaking pleather armchair in cheese-from-a-can orange, settling into it and propping up his feet before continuing.

  “Now, Dana,” he said, moving around to get more comfortable and pouring himself a glass of water from the side table. “You know how this works. In this case, you’re operating at a disadvantage. As a human, you won’t be able to last as long as some of the abominations can. Make this easy on all of us and tell me what we want to know.”

  Interesting. My new potential—okay, probably likely—shifter status wasn’t common knowledge yet. Keeping that information to myself might be a good thing.

  “I hear asking nicely works too,” I commented dryly. Ezra smiled mirthlessly at that.

  “Fair enough,” he said. “How about this. I’ll ask you questions, nicely, and you tell me the first thing that comes to your mind. If I think you’re telling the truth, we’re good. If I think you’re lying, you’ll feel this,” he said, pressing a button on the arm of the chair. My entire body lit up with pain and I arched and writhed on the bed. After about five seconds, it stopped when Ezra depressed the button.

  “Holy fuck,” I spit out, panting. “What the fuck, Ezra?”

  “Now, now, Dana, that’s not polite. I wouldn’t want to have to shock you again before we’ve even begun. Would you?” He peered down at me through his wire-framed reading glasses.

  I bit my lower lip to keep from swearing at him a second time. He took my silence as assent and c
ontinued.

  “Good girl,” he said. “Okay, first question.” I nodded to confirm my readiness. “Is your real name Dana Markovitz?”

  I looked at him blankly. “Of course it is,” I said. “You know that. You did the background search on me before I joined the Agency, remember?”

  Ezra jotted something down on his clipboard. “Quite right, quite right,” he said. “Next question. Are you, or have you ever been, a member of the Moon with Seven Faces Pack?”

  Another blank stare. Fake it till you make it. “The huh of what? What are you talking about?” Ezra watched me, closely, and pressed the button. Another five seconds of pure agony.

  “Jesus fuck, Ezra, what’s your damage? What the fuck are the Moonie Faces Pack?” Poker pain face poker pain face poker pain face.

  Ezra made another notation before moving on. “Next question,” he said. I sighed. Truth or lies made no difference at this point; I lay back and waited for the pain. “Have you ever met a man named Anshell Williams?”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Yes,” I said.

  “What is your relationship with him?”

  I thought about that a moment, too long, and saw Ezra reaching for the pain point. “Hang on! Hang on,” I said. ”I was just thinking about that. Anshell Williams is a friend. A new friend. Kind of an acquaintance, but maybe a friend. Is that what you were looking for?” Ezra made more notes.

  “How did you meet him?”

  “I, uh...” Ezra didn’t hesitate to push the pain again. ”Fuck, Ezra! Fuck. I can’t think when you keep jolting me. Give me a sec here.”

  “Answer the question and I won’t have to hurt you.” He smiled. “Much.” Edges of evil. He was enjoying this. Fucker. “I repeat, how did you meet Anshell Williams?”