Moonshifted. Part 21

"Yes," I answered without thinking.

"Good. I can guard you at a restaurant just as easily as I can at your house. When will you be up?"

Keys found, I looked up. "That's cheating," I protested.

"Unless you wanted to cook for me. I don't mind eating in," he pressed with half a shrug. "It's the fights you know. Have to keep up my strength. I'll even take a shower."

"Wow. A shower. That's it. I'm in," I said, deadpan. He waited, grinning. I realized I wouldn't win if I didn't muster up more energy to fight-and I might just not mind losing, anyhow. "If I say I'll see you at seven, can I finally go home?"

"Sure thing."

"I'll see you at seven then, Lucas. Good-bye." I waited until he got into his car before I got into my own.

Lucas's truck followed me all the way home, and he didn't get out of it, good to his word. Any more people hanging out in my apartment, and I'd have to start charging rent.

Minnie greeted me at the door, and Gideon was still communing electronically with my wall. "You'd better not be stealing cable," I told him and went into the back.

A shower washed the last of the potentially imaginary vaporized puke smell out of my hair, I ate the very end of Christmas's leftover mashed potatoes, and I crawled into bed at a quarter to nine.

I think I slept like the dead. Not as dead as Veronica, but close. I woke at six P.M. to a dark house, and a snuggling happy cat. Out the window I saw a dark sky and falling snow.

One hour to kill before dinner. I wondered how tonight would go. Company I could talk to, that wasn't plugged into my wall or resting inside of my closet, might be nice, even if it was under duress.

It was in the silent dark when I was home alone, dealing with all my problems by myself, that I could admit that I missed Ti. He was the last man I'd dated. Zombie, really ... but he'd felt like a man. Like a grown-up. Someone I could count on and rely on, up until when he'd left me. He had reasons for going, and they'd sounded valid, but I couldn't rationalize away feeling left behind, especially when there was no guarantee he'd be coming back. There'd been a brief, so brief, window when I thought I wouldn't have to be alone again, and that made my current loneliness sharp, nestled against my breast like a viper.

I decided not to feel bad about going out on my not-a-date tonight. Instead of tricky potential feelings with Asher, Lucas would be a better, less entangled, way to feel in control. He was handsome, and hey, it wouldn't be the first time I'd gone out with a dog.

"What do you think about that, Minnie?" I asked, and reached over to knuckle her head.

My phone rang, and UNKNOWN NUMBER lit up its screen. A part of me got excited, and then another part of me squashed that part back into the box with the tight lid where it belonged.

"h.e.l.lo?"

"Edie Spence?"

It wasn't a voice I knew. Unknown really meant unknown. "Yes," I answered, swallowing down a small knot of disappointment in my throat, trying to pretend it'd never been there anyhow.

"Are you alone right now?"

"Is this a prank?"

"It's Viktor. Don't hang up." I waited on the other end of the line. "You have to listen to me-I'm not the one trying to kill you, I'm being set up. They just need an excuse to kill me, the same way they killed my father. Anything a member of the Deepest Snow pack has to tell you is a lie."

I sat quietly in bed. "How do you expect me to believe you?"

"How can I prove it?" Viktor gave a rueful laugh. "If I could, don't you think I would? But they've set me up-and there's orders now to slaughter me on sight. I don't have time or opportunity to come up with proof. I only know how they are, how they've been in the past. They murdered my father, and killed half my father's pack. They'll kill you too."

"Why would they need to kill me to get to you?"

"Either you're a convenient excuse to do away with me-or you have something they want."

"They're weres. We don't run in the same circles."

"Then whose circles do you run in?"

I pulled my phone away and frowned at it. Employed by vampires, indeed. "I thought vampires hated weres, and vice versa."

"Oh, we do. But seven years ago a vampire from House Grey met with my father, and after that he met Winter to talk about a truce. That truce was the last time he was seen alive. Winter killed him, and his own son too, to hide whatever my father learned. They said he'd killed Fenris and then fused our packs-they stole my birthright from me!"

I blinked, trying to understand-wondering if I should even try, since Viktor sounded increasingly wild as he went on.

"Why the h.e.l.l were you downtown yesterday?"

"I was following Jorgen. I'd like to slit his throat."

And he was supposed to be the good guy? Only in his own mind. "Viktor-" I said, and started pulling the phone away from my ear.

"Don't hang up on me! You're lucky! No one warned my father. He didn't know how ruthless they could be." Viktor snarled on the far end of the line, an animal sound. "There'll come a time, soon, when Deepest Snow will rue the day, I promise you. Next time you see one of them, tell them that."

He hung up on me, and my phone showed me the time. It was six fifteen, and I still had to get ready for a date.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR.

The first thing I did was text Sike. "Heard of House Grey?" I waited while brus.h.i.+ng my teeth and then gave up on a response.

Lucas knocked on my door precisely at seven P.M. I opened my door and sidled out so he couldn't see behind me.

"See? I showered." He looked like he'd tried far harder than I had, wearing a white dress s.h.i.+rt, black suit jacket, and skinny tie. Compared with him I was significantly underdressed. I had on jeans and a baggy sweater that hid my silver belt buckle underneath.

I looked him up and down. "Did I miss where you invited me to prom? Or were you going to tell me about the Book of Mormon?"

He winced, picking at a sleeve. "I haven't had much time to shop for new clothing since I got here, what with the fighting, the leading my new pack, the dealing with my family, and the guarding you. To be fair, someone else guarded you today while I slept, showered, and found this at the bottom of my suitcase. I think the last time I wore this was at a funeral. Which I realize is morbid, now that I've said it out loud." He took a step back, making room for me to walk forward. "Where are we going to eat?"

I would have punted the decision back to him, but he was new to town, and for someone who was allegedly full of lies and possibly wanted to kill me, he appeared really uncomfortable in his old suit. I took pity on him. "There's a burger place up a few exits, not too far. If you're not afraid of getting ketchup on your s.h.i.+rt, that is."

"Sounds fine to me."

I waited till we were buckled in and on the road to ask questions. "So tell me about Viktor."

Lucas shook his head. "We haven't caught him yet. We're still looking."

"Every s.h.i.+p but your four fastest," I murmured to myself. Not that I was sure I wanted Viktor to get caught. "What's his history?"

"His father's pack and my uncle's pack were in a territory war. Not as humans, but as wolves-every moon, vicious, vicious fights. They threatened to spill over into human time, and neither one of them would back down. My uncle Winter and Fenris Sr. called a truce, and Viktor's father went along with them into a room. Only Winter came out."

"Take the exit here. See the sign up there? That's where we're going." I pointed, and Lucas nodded as he hit his turn signal. "Do you think Winter was on the up-and-up?"

"Are you asking me if I think he killed his own son and lied about it to stay in power?"

"I suppose I am."

I could almost hear the gears turning in Lucas's mind before he next spoke. "It's what the gossips have always said. He was my father's brother. He must have at least considered it."

"That's harsh."

"You should meet my dad." Lucas's hands tightened around the steering wheel for a fraction of a second.

"Would you have done that, if you were him? If you needed to? To clear the field?"

Lucas's head pulled back like he'd been hit. "No. Or I want to say no now." He looked over at me. "Being pack leader-they say it changes you. But Winter's always been an angry man." Lucas snorted. "It's probably what's keeping him alive now, the two extra decades of hate."

The light changed; Lucas turned and went on. "I can't say what went on in that room. I know what happened afterward, though. Winter said Viktor's father attacked and killed Fenris Sr., and we had to believe him. We killed all their high-ranking wolves and a.s.similated the rest by force. Viktor was only ten. Younger than Fenris Jr. is now. It's why we let him live. A symbolic gesture toward peace-a fragile figurehead."

"Not so fragile anymore."

"No. Not if he's attacking you." The neon light of the burger joint was s.h.i.+ning down on us orange and friendly as we parked. A car with booming ba.s.s parked beside us, full of humans with normal lives. Lucas. .h.i.t his parking brake, then turned toward me. "You're not the only one with questions tonight, Edie."

"That's good." Between the two of us, I hoped we'd get some answers.

I hopped out of the cab and walked around to meet him. He held the door of the restaurant open for me, and the throng of kids home from college rushed the door. One of them forcibly b.u.mped into Lucas and didn't apologize. I watched him carefully for any signs of anger, but he merely seemed resigned.

"There are days when I wonder about my commitment to staying a member of society," he said as we entered together.

"Helen told me about that. Something about public roads and paying taxes?"

"Deepest Snow's philosophy. One of the reasons for friction between them and Viktor's pack. Winter had a point there. If you cut yourself off, you forget why you shouldn't kill everyone when you get the chance."

He let me lead into the restaurant, which I knew was seat-yourself. I angled us toward the back, booths far away from the college kids on furlough.

"You know, you're not any older than they are," I said, sliding to the inside of a booth.

"Only deep inside my heart."

At the front of the restaurant, the college kids started to make a ruckus. They squirmed around, changed seats, and threw things. I had no doubt they were already drunk and suspected they'd go on to drink more.

From the darkness of our booth, Lucas watched them with glittering eyes. I wondered if he was trapped inside his past, angry about not ever having the chance to openly misbehave-and then I realized it was different. Feral. Something I'd only seen illicitly when he was naked, at the fights. Like how Minnie was when she saw a flickering laser cat toy-ready to pounce.

He came back to attention at the table. "You were saying?"

"I wasn't." Suddenly Viktor didn't seem so crazy after all.

The waitress came by. We both ordered burgers, and when she left, he looked to me. "How did you know to ask for sanctuary?"

"The vampire I'm friends with suggested it."

"He couldn't guard you himself?"

"She," I corrected, "is a little indisposed. Plus, she'd be asleep during the day."

"Ah. Her being a woman ... makes more sense. I couldn't see a male vampire swallowing his pride. You say she's your friend?" His eyebrows rose at the term as the waitress came by with our drinks.

"We've been through a lot, she and I." I could tell him that we were friends, but I knew he wouldn't believe it. "Why do vampires and weres hate each other?"

"We used to be their favorite food. We'd last a lot longer than normal humans would, with less outlay of funds. It was easier for them to hide their habits using us, back in darker times, before Winter's roads and taxes. Another way that civilization has benefited the were." He tilted his beer toward me in a small toast. "So why are you her friend, and not a daytimer, or donor-or living in a small tight box?"

Without answering, I shrugged. He gave another look around. "You picked the right booth. This one has its back to the wall. Not another booth. And you can see both the kitchen and main entrances from here. Windows too. Good call. How did you know to pick this one?"

I frowned, unsure where he was going with his demonstration. "Because." Because I'd been in patients' rooms before where I needed a clear shot through to the door-even before working on Y4.

"I know why, even if you don't."

"Illuminate me, then."

"Because to me, and maybe to others, although hopefully you'll never know-you're prey. You've always felt it a bit. A little paranoid, a little overworried. Perhaps jealous of people with more freedom and less care. But that feeling inside you that you've carried your whole life-it's actually quite profound." Lucas slowly sank back into the booth and looked at me with his red-brown eyes. I wondered if it was the nearness of the full moon that made him seem relaxed, languorous. As a predator, he knew his time was near. "That sense of the world, and your place in it, that's what's currently keeping you afloat." He rested his forearms on the table, and his attention on me felt eerie. The waitress saved me, bringing out our plates of food.

"What's it like, being a werewolf?" I asked, trying to make easy conversation.

Lucas leaned back. "Depends a lot on what kind of were you are. Major weres like my family that can switch anytime are rare. Minor ones, with diluted blood, that only get pulled by the moon are more common. Bitten ones look like the weres from the movies, half man, half wolf, that sort of thing. Each has its pros and cons. We're all mortal without the moon in the sky-after that, it depends on how much were is in your blood."

"But you don't live forever."

"As my uncle is ill.u.s.trating." Lucas gave me another knowing look. "What's the connection between your people and him?"

"I don't know. And neither do they. But-just as your weres aren't all cohesive, neither are the vampires. I only have contact with the one, really."

"Is she important?"

I watched Lucas's face for any hint of lies. Did he really not know who Anna was? He was from out of town. "She's important to me," I hedged.

"Are you worried about hurting her, if you talk plainly?" he asked, and I nodded. He visibly relaxed. "That makes me feel better at least. I get family. It's like pack."

I shoved my fries around on my plate, feeling guilty about not sharing. But talking too much had never done me any favors. My phone rang, saving me from myself, and as rude as it was, I went to answer it. It was probably Sike. "h.e.l.lo?"

A groan answered me. "Who is this?" I asked, as Lucas perked up. "Gideon?"

The phone hung up. "A friend of yours?" Lucas guessed.

"More family. We have to go."