Undying (30 page)

“Half-breed werewolf?” she questioned.

He nodded. “Probably Ukrainian heritage—on the sire’s side. They’re rare but nasty. I haven’t seen one in centuries.”

She looked away, staring out the windshield of his truck, dazed by not just what she had seen, but by what she was hearing now. “And you…you turned into a wolf and you fought it and you saved Fia.”

“You think that’s what you saw?”

“I know that’s what I saw.”

“And you’re all right with that?”

“I guess. No.” Her eyes widened. “How could…”

He exhaled, smoothing her hair, kissing the top of her head. “It’s complicated, Macy, but the best explanation I can give you is that God’s world is far more complex than you know. Than any of us knows.”

Her brow furrowed. “Am I dreaming?” she asked.

“You want to be?” He kissed her cheek, tenderly. She’d been through so much. He was so glad it was over for her. Of course it would never be completely over—he of all people knew that. But maybe now, with Teddy dead, she could start recovering from the loss of her family all those years ago and the guilt for not dying with them.

She closed her eyes. “I think I
would
like it to be a dream. There’s no way any of this makes any sense.” She opened her eyes for a second. “But I still want him dead.”

He nuzzled her neck.

“Arlan,” she murmured, clinging to him. “He really is dead? The…whatever it…he was that killed my family. Am I free?”

“The monster that killed your family is now dead, Macy.” He kissed her sweet, soft neck and then took a tentative, practice nip. “He’ll never harm anyone again.” He kissed her neck once more. “You’re free.” And then, before she could speak again, Arlan sank his canines into her.

The taste of her hot blood made him dizzy. Greedy for more. She relaxed in his arms and fell unconscious.

Pleasure stabbed his body. She was so sweet, so—That was probably enough blood, but—

“Arlan.” Fia leaned in the passenger’s side truck window. “You just want to erase her memory of what happened here, not make her one of us,” she chastised softly.

Embarrassed to have been caught in his selfishness, Arlan lifted his head, wiped his mouth, and then her neck, where two tiny trickles of blood oozed from his bite marks. Still holding her in his arms, he slid toward the passenger’s door. “Let me out. Where you want her?”

“Right there in the driveway near the door. I called it in, so you and Kaleigh need to hit the road.” She followed him up the dark driveway toward the garage where Kaleigh waited.

“You going to be all right, here?”

“Got everything under control. Local cops”—she stopped long enough to listen to the sirens—“will be here momentarily. FBI as soon as they can. An hour and fifteen, hour and a half, they estimated.”

Arlan kneeled in the driveway and gently laid the unconscious Macy on the gravel. “You’ll bring her back to Clare Point?”

“Initial questioning shouldn’t last long. I doubt she’ll remember even arriving here. That bump on her head gives us an easy explanation. But she’ll have to go to the hospital. They’ll keep her overnight. We should be back in Clare Point tomorrow.”

Hating to leave Macy, but knowing he had to, Arlan stood up. “You sure this is going to work out?” He searched Fia’s dark eyes, trying not to look worried. “With the FBI and all?”

“I’ll take care of it.” She rubbed his forearm and he closed his eyes for a moment, comforted by her touch.

Then he turned away. “Kaleigh?”

The teen loped toward him, seeming none the worse for the wear after her first experience, at least of this life cycle, with a werewolf. “Ready.” She walked past him. “You think we could stop at an all-night McDonald’s? I’m starved.”

Fia’s and Arlan’s gazes met and they both smiled.

Later,
he telepathed Fia.

Later.

N
aked, Macy lay on her side in bed beside Arlan, propped up on her elbow. In his sleep, there was a half smile on his sensuous lips, his dark hair pushed behind his ears, curling enticingly at his neck. The strong brow, the high forehead and broad jaw. She couldn’t be certain, but he may have been the most attractive man she had ever slept with. What she
was
sure of was that he was the kindest, the most good-hearted, the most selfless.

And she would hate to leave him.

But leave him she would. They had both known that inevitable fact since the first night they had made love in that hotel room in Virginia.

She brushed her fingertips over his bare chest, taking care not to wake him. This was the way she wanted to remember him. Relaxed, smiling. She dragged her gaze over his nude body, trying to put to memory every hard plane and muscle.

Macy had made it through the initial FBI interviews. She told the police what she remembered about the night Marvin Clacker kidnapped her, but at some point in trying to escape she had apparently fallen and hit her head, causing a mild concussion. She still couldn’t remember anything beyond passing the Philadelphia airport.

Apparently, when Arlan had realized she was missing and called Fia, Fia had followed a hunch. Marvin Clacker had been listed as a neighbor on the original police list of people interviewed after her family’s death. She had already tracked him down to the address where he had taken Macy. Lucky hunch, Fia had told Macy with a chuckle in that first interview. Her ex-boyfriend, Special Agent Duncan, had told Macy that
Fia gets all the big breaks.

Thinking about Fia made Macy smile. Fia had believed in Macy. She’d followed her hunch and tracked Teddy down, rescuing Macy. Now Teddy was dead and he would never torture and murder another family. Her parents and Minnie and Mariah could truly be laid to rest in Macy’s mind.

Taking care not to jostle Arlan and wake him, Macy eased out of the bed. She dressed slowly, standing in a puddle of moonlight on the floor. Perhaps moonlight should have had a bad connotation for her, but it didn’t. In a way, moonlight now represented survival to her.

Dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, Macy padded barefoot to the other side of the bed. Taking one long, last look at Arlan’s handsome face, she leaned down to kiss him. She had wanted to feel his lips on hers one last time, but the way his head was turned, she was afraid she might wake him. Instead, she kissed his neck.

Macy didn’t say good-bye.

She walked out of the bedroom, down the dark hall to the front door. Her car was packed and parked at the hotel. She didn’t know where she was headed. Maine, maybe. She knew the FBI would look for her, but she hoped they wouldn’t look too hard. She’d have to have a new ID made. Maybe change her name.

Macy rested her hand on the doorknob, feeling a little sad. For a fleeting moment when she woke up in that driveway and saw that Teddy was dead, she had thought maybe she was done running. Done roaming. But the truth, she realized, was this was still who she was. A drifter. A woman who didn’t lock her car doors and left windows unlatched at night.

Macy opened the front door. As she stepped out, she saw Fia sitting on the step. Macy should have been surprised that Fia was there at one o’clock in the morning, but she wasn’t. Macy still wouldn’t say she believed in psychic ability, but she would no longer say she disbelieved it. She and Fia had some kind of connection Macy could not explain.

“You’re leaving,” Fia said, her voice unnaturally soft.

Macy sat down beside her. “Yes.”

“We’re not finished interviewing you.”

“I know.” Macy stared out at the darkness, listening to the night sounds, peepers and crickets. Somewhere in the distance, she heard the hoot of an owl.

“We’ll have to come looking for you,” Fia said.

“I know.” She turned to meet Fia’s gaze. “But don’t expect to find me.”

Fia stared straight ahead again, clasping her hands in her lap. She was dressed uncharacteristically in shorts, a T-shirt, and flip-flops, her hair falling across her cheeks in a sleek sheet of dark red. “You didn’t tell him you were leaving, did you?”

Fia saw tears in Macy’s eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Macy said, sniffing and wiping her eyes. “I spent the last fourteen years of my life trying to let myself cry, and now it seems like I can’t stop.” She lowered her hands from her lovely face. “The thing is, Fee, I’m no good at good-byes.”

“He’ll be sad you’re gone. Hurt you didn’t tell him you were going.”

“He knew I was going, just not when.” Macy rose off the step, her cheeks damp with tears. “And you’ll be here for him, won’t you? You’ll love him in a way I never can.”

Macy followed the sidewalk to the street. She didn’t look back and she didn’t say good-bye to Fia.

Fia watched Macy walk away until she could no longer see her shining blond hair in the dark. Then she rose, crossed the porch and stepped inside the house.

Fia entered the dark bedroom to see Arlan asleep on his stomach in the middle of his bed. He was naked, his arms stretched out to each side, his cheek pressed into a pillow.

Gazing down at him, Fia slipped out of her flip-flops, wondering how long she had been coming to this. A few weeks? A few decades? The last century or two? Arlan had been telling her for the last thousand years that they were meant to be together.

Maybe he wasn’t as wrong as she thought he was.

She pulled her T-shirt over her head and stepped out of her shorts. Lastly, she dropped her lacy black bra and matching panties on the pile. Naked, she slipped into bed beside him and wrapped her arm around his narrow waist, curling up against him, feeling the heat and strength of his body against hers.

Arlan stirred and nuzzled her hair. Then he opened his eyes. “Fee?”

Fia smiled, feeling a heavy sadness in the pit of her stomach. She and Arlan would both miss Macy. “Arlan,” she said softly, smoothing his dark hair, which she still thought was too long to be respectable.

He searched her gaze and for a moment they were both lost in the past…perhaps a little in the future, where hope still gleamed for the Kahill sept, where redemption by God might still be possible.

“She’s gone, isn’t she?” he finally asked.

Fia nodded, not trusting herself to speak, closer to tears than she wanted to be.

He rolled onto his side so that they were facing each other. “But you’re here.”

“I’m here.” She looked into his eyes, for once willing to be vulnerable. “And I want you to love me, Arlan,” she whispered, her chest so tight she could barely breathe.

He kissed her lips, his attention slow and deliberate.

“Love me,” she repeated.

“Ah, darlin’,” he breathed huskily, smoothing her hair off her face so that he could gaze into her eyes. “Don’t you see that’s what I’ve been trying to do all along?”