Taken by Moonlight (26 page)

He’d gotten
to the point of thinking he would have to find and take the girls himself, when
another thought occurred to him. The Council. Maximilian had been in opposition
to the idea of an interspecies council, but he’d been outvoted by his fellow
Grand Wizards. Still, he occupied a seat due to the size of his covenant. As
he’d thought of the girls, he remembered one of the laws passed by the Council,
a law that he could now use to his advantage.

“What did
you find out?”

Conall stood
in front of Vivienne’s bedroom door, the cordless phone pressed to his ear.
After listening to Evelyn, he’d learned interesting details about his mate.
Like the fact that although she’d presented as human, then witch, Vivienne was
actually a druid. When Evelyn had mentioned that, Conall’s eyes had come close
to falling from his head, Max had sputtered, and Vivienne’s human friend had
made a strangled sound.

Vivienne
had been the only one unaffected, as fifteen minutes after taking a seat, she’d
fallen asleep. She hadn’t even awoken when he’d lifted her into his arms and,
trailing her mother, carried her to bed. When he’d thought her a human and
taken her for his mate, he’d anticipated the complications, both with their
relationship and his pack, but finding out his mate was actually a mixture of
races that culminated in a druid, was even more complex.

“I don’t
think it’s the vampires. I spoke to Hastings. He hasn’t heard anything that
would call for a Council meeting. He said he’d make a few calls, just to make
sure,” Sloan replied through the phone.

“The
witches?” Conall asked softly. Something Evelyn had mentioned was replaying in
his mind. She’d said that Maximilian Cronin had killed both of her parents, and
had been hunting her family for years. Since his arrival in New York, Cronin
had been on the Council. Could it be Cronin?

“That’s my
guess. It’s definitely not our people
.
We would have heard something
before now, and Hastings would have heard if anything was happening with the
vampires.”

There was
no need to mention the fact that they had no contacts with the witches.
Centuries of deserved suspicion on the parts of the
weres
and the
vampires made it hard to give trust to any witch. Even now.

Conall
sighed. “The compound’s secure?”

“Yea.
Patrol started about three hours ago. Everyone’s accounted for. Raoul’s at
Fangs.” Sloan paused and Conall knew from the silence that his beta was trying
to figure out how to tell him something. No doubt something he wouldn’t like.
“Some of the Elders aren’t happy about your human.”

 Conall
resisted the urge to snarl. “Who?”

“Gresham
and Brennus are the most vocal about it. I’m not sure who else.”

He felt his
body relax slightly. Their opposition was understandable, expected even. Samia
was Brennus’s youngest, and the only of his children still with him. He also
had the tendency to oppose everything that Conall did. Gresham was a loyal
supporter of Brennus. Because they were usually the only two opposing him, he
found it easy to ignore them. This was no exception.

He tugged
against the collar of the T-shirt he’d borrowed from Max. The thing was tight
on him, and he felt stifled. “I’ll be back tomorrow to smooth everything over
with the Elders. Do you have this number?”

“The caller
ID picked it up. Where are you and what happened to your phone? It goes
straight to voicemail.”

“I’m in Scarsdale. My phone was incinerated. Trackers tried to take Vivienne.”

“What? The
witches attacked you?”

“Yes. I’ll
tell you everything tomorrow. Call me here if
anything
happens.”

Drew had
watched Conall gently lift Vivienne into his arms and follow Evelyn from the
room. Prior to their leaving, the conversation had revolved around druids, and
Max’s father. Like many other things she hadn’t known before today, she hadn’t
known druids were real. She was finding it much easier to accept that surreal
things were happening when they were spoken about in a normalized setting. Drew
was contemplating that when she recognized she was now alone with Max.

A distinct
chill crawled up her spine, and she scooted farther into the sofa. She wasn’t
afraid he’d hurt her. She still trusted that Max never would. She just had no
idea what to expect from him, which was damn scary.

He remained
in the same position he’d maintained during the conversation with Conall and
Evelyn. His upper body was pushed forward, his elbows against his thighs, chin
resting against his hands, eyes downcast. Her feeling of agitation dimmed as
she tried to read him. She’d never seen Max look like this before. Ever. Max was
usually the life of everything, smiling, teasing, goading, even annoying, but
she’d never seen him look…like his world had caved in around him? Then she
remembered bits and pieces of the conversation about his father. From what
she’d gathered, Max’s father was evil with a capital “E.” And she got the
feeling that Max was taking it pretty hard.

As if
sensing her stare, Max lifted his head. A lock of blond hair fell into his eyes
as they each tried to figure out what the other was thinking. Max broke eye contact
first by standing and walking over to the window. It was steadily growing dark
outside, and she wondered if he was looking at anything in particular.

With his
back to her, he said in a low voice, “Maybe you should go check on Vivienne.”

Drew was almost
to the door when she paused. Instead of heading through the door and up the
stairs, she walked over to him. The living room looked out on the large back
yard, which Drew could barely see due to the oncoming darkness.

She looked
up at him, taking in the strong jaw and straight nose and said the first thing
that came to her mind. “I can’t believe you gagged me and tied me to your bed.”

His gaze
never wavered from whatever it was that held his attention but he snorted
softly. “Why not?”

“B-b-because,”
she sputtered, glaring at him and shaking her head. “You just don’t tie people
up and gag them, Max! What century are you living in?” She paused. “You were
born in the twentieth century, right?”

A little
smile touched his lips and he nodded. “Yes.”

“And you’re
not like ninety years old or anything, right?”

“Hate to
disappoint but I really am twenty-five.”

He suddenly
turned to look down at her. His eyes were once more warm, and although the
smile on his face didn’t fully reach his eyes, he no longer looked as…defeated.

Drew looked
away. The warmth in his eyes was lending him a type of vulnerability she’d
never seen before. It was…unnerving.

She heard
him sigh and looked up in time to see him run long fingers through his hair.

“You know,
we don’t choose our parents,” she said softly, lifting her eyes slowly to his
hazel ones. They were currently a vivid shade of green but she could still see
the flecks of gold-brown inside. “We just choose the types of lives we live.
From what you’ve done today, what you’ve been doing since you found out about
Vivienne, you chose a different path from your father.” She swallowed when his
eyes grew darker, from moss to leaf green in the span of milliseconds. “I think
that’s pretty admirable.” She smiled and pulled her gaze away from his,
blinking as she tried to focus on anything in the gradually darkening back
yard.

No words
were spoken for minutes as they stood there, and then Max turned to face her.

Feeling
slightly self-conscious, especially as she was still wearing one of the old
thigh-length T-shirts that served as her sleepwear, and no bra, she crossed her
arms over her breasts before turning to face him.

There was
no smile on his face, no teasing grin. His eyes were sincere.

“Thank
you.” Before she could blink, he leaned down and placed a kiss to her forehead.

She cleared
her throat and stared at him in confusion. Except for the crowding in the
bathroom when she’d had her client over, and him tying her to his bed—she still
remembered that look in his eyes as he’d untied her—they’d never been this
close.

When he
stepped back, Drew blinked, uncertain of what she was to do next. She spun
toward the window, reminding herself that Max might be one extremely
good-looking guy, but he was still Max. He’d teased her to the point of tears,
and he was a huge slut—she shouldn’t forget that—and the big whammy, he was not
human! For crying out loud, it was Max. It was Max and she was feeling
butterflies in her stomach from that peck that shouldn’t even be called a kiss.

Max took
his time turning back to the window. When he did, his voice was light and
almost teasing. “I know you’ve got a million and one questions swirling through
that big brain of yours.” He paused, lifted a brow as if daring her to
contradict him, and then grinned down at her. “Go ahead. Ask me anything. My
life’s an open book.”

Conall
checked on Vivienne, who was tucked under her covers, sleeping deeply, before
making his way downstairs in search of Evelyn. After his conversation with
Sloan, he had questions he needed answered. He found her in the kitchen,
placing a large baking dish into the oven.

Without
turning to face him, she asked in a voice laced with amusement, “You have more
questions already, Conall Athelwulf?”

She
straightened, took her baking gloves off, and turned around. A small smile
appeared on her lips.

“What’s
your relationship to Cronin?”

The smile
faded and her eyes hardened. “Relationship?” she asked in a calm, quiet voice.
“The only relationship I have to Maximilian Cronin is the grudge I hold against
him for murdering my parents and threatening my family.”

“Were you a
part of his covenant?”

Evelyn
scoffed at that. “Never. If I were, one of us would be dead.” She paused and
moved back over the stove, where the cover of a pot was bouncing as the
contents began to boil. She tilted the lid ever so slightly before turning to
face him once more. “What’s your interest in our relationship?”

Conall
leaned against the island. He wasn’t certain, but he’d learned centuries ago to
trust where his instincts led.

“Someone
called a Council Meeting for Saturday. It might be one of the witches.”

Evelyn’s
nostrils flared. “Cronin? Over my daughters?”

He nodded.
From what Sloan had told him, he was almost certain that one of the witches had
called the meeting, and with the events that had taken place, instinct was
telling him this meeting was somehow related. His mind swirled with the range
of possible things that Cronin could claim in an attempt to get Vivienne. One
thing stood out above all others.
Kinship.
It was one of the laws that
every race agreed to abide by.

“So you
were never in his covenant?”

She shook
her head fiercely. “I was never in his covenant.” She stopped abruptly before
rattling off a few French curses under her breath. A brief look of disbelief
touched her face before her teeth snapped together. Conall’s ears perked up,
knowing she’d recalled something important.

Her teeth
were still clenched tightly together, her accent much more pronounced, when she
said, “
I
was never in his covenant but my mother was.”

Cassandre
groaned when she opened her eyes and found herself staring once more at the
blue-green waters of the beach.

After the
dream, she’d awoken, late of course, and gone to the lab. It had been a slow
day, and by six o’clock, she was leaving for her small, though eco-friendly, SoHo apartment. Despite the ridiculous number of hours she’d slept the night before, she
barely managed to drag herself to her bed at nine o’clock and was certain it
hadn’t taken more than a few seconds for her to fall asleep. The only question
she now had was why was she dreaming about the beach…again?

“Because
you’ve yet to learn what I have to teach you.”

She wasn’t
one to be scared easily, that was Vivienne, but at that moment, Cassandre
understood the meaning of “jumping out of one’s skin.” Her hand flew to her
rapidly beating heart as her head turned to the sound of the voice.

Pale eyes
and a perfectly formed face stared back at her. She blew out a relieved breath
before cutting her eyes at him.

“Don’t do
that again.”

He shifted
ever so slightly on the bed, removing one hand from behind his blond head, and
replied in an even tone, “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“You didn’t
scare me. You
surprised
me.”

Thin lips
curled upward and he corrected, “I didn’t mean to
surprise
you.”

She shook
her head and allowed her eyes to travel down his body. He was dressed
differently this time. Instead of those fitted swim trunks, which she of course
hadn’t minded, he wore loose pants that hung a bit low on his hips. His chest
was still bare, though she didn’t quite mind that either. Her eyes flew to his
face, and she could tell from the raised eyebrows that he knew what she was
thinking.