It was sad that in death Mason reverted back to his human form. He looked so innocent, almost sweet. No harshness, no cynicism, no obsession.
Before Connor shifted back, he had howled into the night but it wasn’t a howl of triumph. It was a call to the others. That he’d taken no satisfaction in Mason’s death made me love him all the more.
I didn’t know where Kayla had found the blanket but she knelt beside Mason and draped it over his still form. With gentle fingers she combed back his hair. “Find peace, Mason.”
Earlier in the summer they’d been friends. It occurred to me that it was his obsession with the Shifters more than the formula that had destroyed him.
And that left me to wonder if I was any different. Was I letting my obsession with not being a Shifter destroy what I might have with Connor? Or was I truly being unselfish in my desire to let him go?
“Found Dr. Keane—or what’s left of him,” Rafe said, as he and Lindsey joined the group. “Looks like he was Mason’s first victim.”
I wanted to believe that Mason hadn’t realized he was killing his father, that every aspect of him that was human had disappeared until he was only a beast that he couldn’t control.
“Poor Mason,” Kayla said. “I like to think that in the beginning he did want to do something good for mankind. Our healing properties are miraculous.”
“He got greedy,” Lucas said, slipping his arms around her. “We can lay him and Dr. Keane to rest at Wolford.”
She glanced back at him and smiled. “Thank you.”
Holding me close, Connor whispered, “Are you going to be all right? I know the first kill is never easy.”
“He would have killed us if he could have.”
“Still doesn’t make it easy.”
“Sorry I kicked you.”
“I’m not. I couldn’t have held him off much longer.”
I nestled my face into the curve of his shoulder. “I want to go home.”
My mother hadn’t yet left so Connor and I found her. The three of us hiked to her car. When Connor and I started to get in the back she said, “Hey, I’m not a chauffeur. You drive me.” She tossed him the keys.
She sat in the back while I sat in the passenger seat. I think she forced that arrangement so Connor and I wouldn’t be snuggling in the backseat. Mom was okay making out with a Spaniard when she was seventeen, but she didn’t want her daughter doing anything of the sort.
Still, Connor held my hand, his thumb sometimes circling my palm, and I wondered what he was thinking during those moments. I still didn’t know what I was going to do about us. But I was too exhausted to think clearly. I figured he was as well.
When we got to the house, Connor pulled into the drive. I tried to get out of the car, but it was like my body didn’t want to work. It had grown heavy, weighted down. Or maybe it was just so incredibly tired that it could no longer send messages to my brain.
“Brittany?” Mom prodded.
“I’m fine.” An easy enough lie to pull off since Connor had come around, opened the door for me, took my hand, and pulled me out.
I’d forgotten that he was raised in a traditional, well-mannered family that did things like that. I didn’t know what I was thinking to fall for him. We had nothing in common.
With his arm behind me, he practically propelled me up the walk to the door. Mom opened it, then turned around and held up her hand like a traffic cop. “Five minutes.”
She closed the door, leaving us on the dark porch. The light suddenly came on.
“Has she always been like that?” Connor asked.
“There’s never been a guy in my life before. She’s probably making up for lost chaperone time or something. She’ll settle down.” I had to shove out each word.
He trailed his fingers along my cheek. “Call me if you need me.”
He bent his head and kissed me so gently that I almost didn’t feel it. Then he opened the door and pushed me inside. “Tell your mom she owes me some rollover minutes.”
I released a light laugh as he pulled the door closed. I stood there for the longest time, envisioning him walking home. He didn’t live that far. How many times in high school had I detoured by his house after school hoping to catch a glimpse of him?
I might have stayed there all night if Mom hadn’t come over and put her arms around me.
“Come on. I prepared you a bubble bath.”
“Will you burn Monique’s clothes?” I asked as she led me toward the bathroom. “I never want to see them again.”
“Consider it done.”
As I got undressed, I noticed that I’d collected a few more bruises. I had a couple of scrapes but nothing that would scar. The scratches I received when Mason raked his claws over my arm were another matter. They might scar.
When I sank into the hot water, I thought I’d found heaven. I didn’t remember anything feeling so good—except lying against Connor. Even on a concrete floor, curled up against him was wonderful.
There was a knock on the door. “Brittany, can I come in?”
“Sure, Mom.”
She handed me a glass of white wine.
“I’m not twenty-one,” I reminded her.
“Sometimes, my dear, you’re older than your birth certificate claims.”
I took a sip. It was sweet and smooth going down my throat. It sent a warm lethargy through my veins.
Mom knelt beside the tub. “Relax now. I’m going to wash your hair.”
“Mom, you haven’t washed my hair since I was about six.”
“I still remember how.”
She poured water over my hair, added shampoo, and began to massage my scalp. I thought I might just sink below the water and sleep forever.
“So,” she began. “You and Connor.”
That was subtle.
“Maybe. I don’t know, Mom.”
“I like him.”
I smiled. “You mean I got the guy thing right on the first try?”
“It happens.”
“Was my dad your first?”
“Mm-huh.”
“You’ve never seen him again?”
“In my dreams. Every night.”
“Is that enough, Mom?”
“For me. But I wish more than that for you.”
I wished more than that for me, too.
After my bath, my hair and skin practically squeaked. I applied some antibiotic cream to the scratches on my arm and bandaged it up. I slipped on soft cotton shorts and a tank, said good night to Mom at my bedroom door—unable to remember the last time we’d actually taken a moment to say it—then crawled into my bed. My body sank into the mattress.
I tried to close my mind but the events of the past several days were running through it like a slide show. I’d see Connor fighting the cougar, the shock on his face when he learned the truth about me, Mason holding up the syringe…
The stake. The way it had felt going through his chest—
I wanted to concentrate on the good moments: Connor kissing me, holding me, defending me…
But the uglier images kept shutting them out. My chest grew tight and I felt a building up of tears behind my eyes. I felt as though I was strangling.
I heard a knock on my window. Glancing over, I could see a shadow. I scrambled out of bed and pulled back the curtain. Connor was balanced on a tree branch. I opened the window. “What are you doing?”
He crawled in through the window. “I’ve slept with you so many nights that now I can’t sleep without you.”
“Seriously.”
“I am serious.” He touched my cheek. “I just thought you might need holding tonight.”
Tears flooded my eyes. I shook my head. “I’m not going to cry, I’m not going to cry, I’m not—”
He lifted me in his arms and carried me to the bed. “It’s all right to cry, Brit. It’s been a hell of a few days.”
He laid me on the bed, slipped in beside me, and took me in his arms. The tears wouldn’t stop, which really made me mad because they were making my nose go all stuffy and I was finding it more difficult to inhale his scent.
“You smell so good,” I said.
“I showered. Best shower I’ve ever had.”
I slid my hand up into his hair. The ends were still wet and the strands curled around my fingers.
“I’m so glad it’s all over,” I whispered.
“Me, too. Cry all you want, Brit. It’ll be our secret.”
While he rubbed my back, I cried long and hard. Loud sobs were muffled as I buried my face against his chest. All the fear, the terror, the grief from the past few days just built up and flowed out. The times when I’d pretended to be brave had been the hardest of all. The times when I’d tried not to let Connor see how terrified I was of what they might do to him. Or of what he’d think when he learned the truth about me.
I cried until his shirt was damp and my eyes were swollen.
I thought I was still weeping when I fell asleep.
The knock on the door woke me.
“Okay, you two, breakfast is ready.”
I gasped. I was still in Connor’s arms. How had—
“Don’t be so surprised, baby. I have a keen sense of smell.”
I cringed. I knew she’d called me baby just to irritate me.
Hearing her footsteps on the stairs, I dared to tilt my head back. Connor smiled down on me.
“Sleeping with a babe and breakfast. What a deal.”
I nipped his chin. “Thanks for last night.”
“I’ve been there, Brittany. My first kill was a bear. God, he was magnificent, but he was attacking a camper.” I could see in his eyes the sadness he was feeling with the memory. “He’d just kinda gone crazy. He wouldn’t run off.”
I knew humans probably couldn’t understand the grief Shifters felt over the death of an animal, but they were part animal as well, and they grieved at any loss of life.
“Does it get easier?” I asked.
“No, but I don’t think I’d want it to. If killing came easily then I’d be like the men my father prosecutes.”
I touched his cheek. I almost told him again that I loved him, but I wondered if repeating—confirming—my feelings would make it harder when the time came for us to separate. Instead I kissed him.
Then we went down to the kitchen.
“Better not have been anything other than sleep going on in that room last night,” Mom said as we joined her at the table.
“Mom!”
“There wasn’t,” Connor assured her.
With a nod, she passed him the biscuits. I couldn’t remember the last time my mom cooked breakfast. We both usually just took care of ourselves.
“You don’t have to make things up to me, Mom.”
“I always cook when we have company. Don’t expect this tomorrow.”
“The pancakes are delicious, Ms. Reed,” Connor said.
I narrowed my eyes at him and mouthed, “Suck-up.” He winked at me.
“Thank you, Connor. So what are your intentions regarding my daughter?”
“Mom! God. That is so…a hundred years ago. People don’t ask that anymore.”
“Maybe they should.”
Connor laughed. He was having entirely too much fun. He started to say something, but the doorbell rang.
“I’ll get it,” Mom said, dropping her napkin on the chair and heading for the door.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, with a roll of my eyes.
“Don’t worry about it.” He tapped his fork against his plate. “So what do you want my intentions toward you to be?”
“Connor, I—”
Mom walked in holding a black envelope. She was so pale that I thought maybe she’d left all her blood at the front door.
“Mom?”
She jumped, as though startled. “It’s for you.”
“Me?” I took it from her. My name was written in elegant gold script. I turned it over. It wasn’t an envelope. It was a piece of paper with all four corners folded into the center and held in place with a wax seal of a snarling wolf. I opened it carefully and read what was written inside. Suddenly it was like all the air had been sucked out of the room. I grew dizzy.
“Brittany?” Connor said, covering my hand with his.
I looked at him, then at Mom, then back at him. “It’s from the Council of Elders. It’s a summons. Tomorrow they’re holding a tribunal to determine my status as a Dark Guardian.”
“They could have at least given her a few days to recover from the hell we went through,” Connor said to his father. His father was a lawyer. I knew Connor planned to follow in his footsteps.
Now, though, he was pacing in his father’s study. I’d never seen so many books in my life—except in a library.
But I was beginning to get accustomed to Connor’s anger where injustice was concerned.
His father was sitting behind his desk. He looked so incredibly distinguished. I wondered if Connor would resemble him as he got older. “The elders don’t usually put off the unpleasant.”
“You can represent her,” Connor said.
“Lawyers aren’t allowed inside.”
“So what—she has to face them alone?”
His father tapped an expensive-looking gold pen on his desk. “The tribunal will involve the Council of Elders and the Dark Guardians. They’ll listen to the evidence and make a determination.”
Connor looked at me where I was sitting in a chair by the window and smiled. “Then you’ve got nothing to worry about. If the Guardians—”
“Connor, your decision can’t be based on emotion. It has to be made after listening to the facts and determining what is best for the pack. As a matter of fact, son”—he lifted a black envelope similar to what I’d gotten—“you’re not to have any contact with her until after the tribunal. If you’d been home this morning, this would have already been delivered to you and you’d understand your responsibilities.”
Averting his eyes, Connor crossed his arms over his chest. “Until I open it, I don’t know exactly what it says.”
“Be careful, son. If you go against the elders’ wishes, they’ll ban you from the tribunal and then you’ll be facing one of your own. They don’t take well to insubordination. The Dark Guardians may be running around protecting us, but the elders control things and have the final say in all matters.”
With my knees shaking, I got up, walked over to his father, and held out my hand. “May I have it?”
He arched a sandy blond brow at me but handed it over.
I took it to Connor. “There is nothing I’ve ever wanted more than I wanted to be a Dark Guardian.” Except you. But it wouldn’t be fair to him to tell him that. Not now. Not with what we were about to face—what we had to face separately. “You can’t throw that away. Besides, I want you there tomorrow.”
I could tell he was shocked by my words.
“I can make it through this thing if I can look over and see you. I draw strength from your presence. And if they determine that I can’t be a Dark Guardian—and quite honestly I’d vote against me—I’ll survive. So think about your vote. Your dad’s right—it shouldn’t be based on emotion. The pack comes first.” I tucked the envelope behind his crossed arms.
As I walked out of the room, he didn’t say a word. And I knew he’d be there tomorrow, doing his duty as a Dark Guardian, determining my fate.