Hunter's Moon (16 page)

Kieran just stared helplessly. “What? Why?”

Kris shrugged with a pensive expression. “Because he believed I’d be safer without him, and because I’m so young and I had dreams of how I wanted my life to go.” Chuckling, he shook his head in disbelief. “I was so naïve back then.”

“Those sound like valid reasons to me.”

Kris laughed merrily. “Oh, yeah, sure. They’re good reasons—but for Rafe they were excuses. He was afraid and conflicted. He wanted to share his life with me, but he tried to sacrifice our future happiness in exchange for my life.”

“What happened?”

Kris smiled wickedly. “I fear I might have… seduced him. He desired me, and I him, so I took a risk and embraced him and what we could have. And then he bit me.”

Swallowing hard, Kieran stuttered, “So, are you a, uh, a wolf now?”

Kris turned to Kieran wide-eyed. “No! It was a mating bite, not… a transforming bite. They are different, you know.”

Kieran let out a tiny sound somewhere between a sneer and a scoff. “No, I didn’t know that. How could I possibly? I don’t have a clue about what wolves do with their lives, their mates, or anything.” All of a sudden, he replayed the last bit again and faced Kris with an inquisitive look. “Gabe told me mating and sex have nothing to do with each other.”

Now it was Kris’s turn to look puzzled. “What? Well… I suppose that’s sort of true. I mean there’s sex and then there’s mating. But Rafe and me… we mated during sex.” Leaning closer, he smiled compassionately. “The bite hurts, of course. I mean Rafe was more wolf than man when he… you know. But it lasted a split second, and then….” Kieran watched his expression closely and intently, and found a deep well of satisfaction there he couldn’t wrap his brain around. “Then it was bliss.” Not knowing what to say to such a statement, Kieran waited. Kris let out a contented sigh, but his tone became earnest. “You see, before me and Rafe got together I had two fears. That I’d have no more freedom of choice and no more sense of self, the first because it was an arranged marriage and the second because of the potency of the mating bond.”

Kieran’s brow furrowed. “And…?”

Kris smiled a little. “None of my freedoms have been infringed. The pack does worry about me when I’m not on the ranch, but that’s just their way. I’m free to make my own decisions, same as always. As for my personal identity…. I didn’t lose myself in the heated frenzy of mating, as I had anticipated, but in fact through Rafe and my love for him, I found who I was. The real me beyond the childish, selfish dreams I had before. Rafe made me grow up into a mature, better man. We don’t always see eye to eye and we have our rows, but we’re working things through, like all couples. He has his life on the ranch, and I still have my own dreams to fulfill, independent of him.”

“So… if you could do it all over again, you’d still make the same choice?”

“To be with Rafe? Yes, absolutely.” Kris bumped his shoulder on Kieran’s arm. “It’s not always sunshine and roses, but I do love him. I didn’t always love him. There was a time when I hated him for putting me into a position where I felt trapped. But Rafe is sweet and kind and loving, and he would never hurt me.” Slowly Kris grew serious. “What is it that troubles you about Gabe?”

Kieran had known their talk would veer into this direction sooner or later, but now that the moment was upon him, he felt like running. Yet he stayed put on the park bench. “Before you knew of Rafe, before you met him—were you, um, gay?” Kieran felt his cheeks burn with embarrassment at asking such a personal question of a person he had met less than ten minutes ago.

Snorting, Kris nodded, looking baffled and amused. “Of course. Aren’t you?”

“No.”

“
Holy shit!
” burst out of Kris’s mouth so fast it practically merged with his breath, but then he slapped his hands crossed in front of his mouth. “Sorry.”

Kieran laughed and thumbed his chest. “I don’t mind. Fellow cussing enthusiast sitting right here.”

Blinking with his jaw down, Kris seemed lost. “Wow. That’s like… serious, and deep, and weird.”

Huffing a little, Kieran managed a small sound of concordance. “You’re telling me.”

“Oh, wow….” Kris braced his arms on his knees and stared at the pebble path looking dumbfounded. “Okay…. So, you’ve never done, um, anything with a guy?”

Kieran cleared his throat and felt his neck sweat. “While me and Gabe were on the run, we were staying at this shack in the woods and… one thing led to another.” Whispering, he added, “We sucked each other off. First time for me. With a guy, I mean. First everything. The kissing…. Jesus fucking Christ. I thought I’d go spectacularly insane.”

“Okay…,” Kris finally said, slowly, as if taking his time letting the information seep in before commenting. “Well, I guess my first, and most important, question is… did you like it?”

At that Kieran couldn’t help himself and started chortling breathlessly. “Jesus, how the hell should I know! Was it me who liked it—or me reacting to whatever love drug he oozes out of his pores at me?” His laughter died down, and his stance slumped in defeat. “I don’t know anything anymore.” Worrying his lower lip till it bled, he grudgingly admitted, “He lied to me. Just once as far as I know, but I don’t know if I can…. I mean we have zero common interests. He’s a cowboy in the middle of fucking nowhere, and I’m a freelance mercenary who hunts his kind for a living.”

“You what?” Kris sat up straighter, confusion and growing rage on his beautiful face, and Kieran hated having put those feelings there.

He sighed resigned. “It doesn’t matter anymore. It’s in the past. And I couldn’t do it anymore anyway, even if I wanted to. It’s all gone to hell.”

“How could you—” Kris started, and his righteous indignation Kieran did deserve.

“That’s enough, Kris.”

Gabriel’s smooth voice cut through Kieran’s consciousness and tingled through his system, like a spark shower. The man had somehow inched closer without Kieran being any the wiser, and now the cowboy stood not ten feet away.

But Gabriel’s gaze was securely locked on Kris, dark and dangerous. “I’ll handle this, Kris. You go on home. Your mate wants you.”

Kris glanced between both men several times, clearly wavering between staying to chew Kieran a new one and leaving to reunite with his own mate. Then he sighed and placed his hand on Kieran’s arm. “I’m sorry if I was hard on you. God knows I didn’t fare much better when I was in your shoes.” With a small, bashful smile, he nudged Kieran in the arm with his own. “I’ll see you at the ranch, okay? And my door’s always open for you if you want to talk.”

The compassionate look on his face appeared sincere, and Kieran nodded silently. Kris got up and walked away, exchanging a quick hug with Gabriel on his way. Where Kris had sat, Gabriel now took his place, perched on the edge of the bench breathing for a long time, his hands clasped together.

“Nice kid,” Kieran said, referring to Kris, because it felt like a good dialog opener.

“Kris? Yeah, he is.” Gabriel looked past the lawn and over the road at the trimmed hedges on the other side of the street where residential buildings stood as lovely and picturesque as in postcards from the countryside. “In the spirit of not lying, I should probably tell you I overheard what you and he talked about.”

“With your wolf hearing?”

Gabriel hemmed. “At first. Then I got close enough for the normal way.”

“You can use your wolf senses even when you’re not a wolf?”

“They are engrained into the very core of our being, inseparable from who we are. It’s not like a button we can turn on and off. The actual wolf form, however, is different. That takes control and….” Suddenly Gabriel paused, a confused expression clouding his handsome face. “No, I didn’t come here to talk about that. I got distracted.” He glanced at Kieran who felt a strong pang of apprehension twist in his stomach. “I want to talk about you and me—and us.”

“Wait, just wait.” Kieran held out his right hand in a definite stop-right-there gesture. “Look, the truth is all you know about me really is what you’ve witnessed me doing in the weirdest fucking twenty-four hours of my life. None of that is indicative of who I am. What you saw and heard was me blocking out certain human responses in exchange for the thrill of the chase and for a quick buck.”

“I understand that, Kieran. Really I do.” Gabriel’s tender voice was fragile. “I know people are more than their jobs—even professions such as yours.”

“
Was
,” Kieran corrected, and there was no doubt in his tone. “The trouble is that since I met you, I’ve started to empathize with your position, waiting for me for so long, so that it’s hard for me to see beyond that, to see myself, you know?”

“Yes, I know.” The rueful voice was almost more than Kieran could bear, which was funny with his background in holding his own against anything.

“I’m military, for fuck’s sake,” Kieran growled to himself, chagrined. “I can stand my own ground. I can…. Ugh. Never mind. Forget that. This is getting stupid and repetitive.” Brushing his face with his hands, he felt tired and worn. “I checked your myth reference. Tantalus? Not your everyday kindred spirit. Look, the problem’s not the job I had, okay? If you can live with that crap, so can I. It’s not even about the… gay sex. I don’t want to back down on this thing between us, but I don’t know exactly how to move forward to the point I desperately want to reach. Does that make any sense?” Yes, he did have an idea forming in his head, but he was scared to pursue the train of thought to its inevitable conclusion—to becoming a couple with a
man
.

Nodding, Gabriel spoke softly, “I do get it, Kieran. And, if you permit me, I think I may have a solution for us.” Holding his breath in anxiety, Kieran waited to hear what the cowboy had to say. “We could go through with the mating. Not the sex. Just the mating ritual. Then your head will clear and you’ll be able to decide what you want to do.”

Kieran blinked hard. The implications of Gabriel’s suggestion did not go unnoticed by him. After all, Gabriel had said that if they mated and didn’t fuck, Gabriel would suffer more than if they did neither. Kieran was conflicted. He was pissed at Gabriel for suggesting he make a choice that would grant Kieran his sanity and levelheadedness, but leave Gabriel a miserable mess. And yet he was relieved because a part of him now treaded on the familiar territory of decision-making he had already traveled.

It was then that Gabriel’s gaze met Kieran’s eyes, and he smiled gently. “You need clarity. As a lycan, I have known all my life that I have one person out there who is meant only for me. I’ve grown accustomed to the idea. You have not. Mating will offer you lucidity of thought and emotion, and you can make an informed decision.”

“About whether or not to have sex with you?”

“That is only part of it, Kieran. I mean whether or not you wish to stay with me and try to forge a life together as friends, companions, partners, mates, and perhaps even lovers.”

Slightly exasperated, Kieran found Gabriel’s willingness to address their mutual issue very noble. But in essence what he was suggesting was for Kieran to build his life on the foundation of Gabriel’s everlasting misery—and Kieran couldn’t do that. But… what could he do? He knew sex wasn’t a Band-Aid, and sex alone wouldn’t fix anything wrong or broken between two people, but could he just up and change his whole sexual life because of one man? For now he had made his decision.

“Wanna know something funny? Even though you lied to me by an omission of the truth, I had already decided to mate with you before you got here.”

Gabriel’s stare was astonished. Kieran felt for him. The truth was he had come to that conclusion before he had spoken with Kris, before he had read about the suffering of Tantalus, even before their row up on the ridge at the ranch. Yes, he didn’t want to hurt Gabriel by denying him the physical connection lycans craved for with their mates, but he required this to fully understand what he was getting into. Since he was a kid, he had been all for the practical demonstration over other options, and in this instance theory just didn’t cut it.

Kieran had witnessed Gabriel kill a man for him. It had not been an aphrodisiac in any sense of the word, but he had not truly understood the lengths the man would go for him until right at that moment—that split second between Deck’s life and death.

Kieran sighed. “You’re taking an awful risk. I might never come to choose you, Gabe. Sexually and emotionally, I mean.”

Gabriel’s ruggedly handsome face paled and his eyes took on a haunted appearance. “But you said you didn’t mind the gay part, or let the mercenary thing—”

“I did say that,” Kieran admitted.

“You lied?” Gabriel appeared nonplussed.

“No.” Kieran took his cowboy’s hand and intertwined their fingers. Rough calluses in Gabriel’s hands were different from the scars of his own hand, and yet so alike. “I’m directionless. Being with you, or not being with you, can’t be my only….” Searching for words that failed him, Kieran struggled to get the right meaning across. “Forgetting for a moment the obstacles—my gay virginity, our half-truths, our separate lives—I need to make right with my past and with myself. I need something to strive for. A goal. A purpose. Something beyond… us.”

Slowly Gabriel nodded in concordance. “I see.” Relief gave his tentative smile a bright sunny quality Kieran didn’t mind seeing. “Every man must walk his own path. I just hope that when you figure out where that path leads you, you might consider letting me walk by your side. Just for the company, at least.”

Kieran smiled as a huge weight lifted off his back. “I’d like that.”

Chapter Nine

“Y
OU
won’t be wearing these clothes for long anyway, so who cares what you look like?” Again slapping Kieran’s hands out of the way, Kris straightened Kieran’s midnight-blue tie and mumbled something that sounded an awful lot like a litany of curse words.

Kieran swallowed. It had been a month since his shaky truce with Gabriel, and it was full moon again. The mating ritual was about to commence, and his knees felt rubbery and his chest tight and constricted. “It feels like a fucking noose around my neck.”