Marked by Moonlight (25 page)

“You infected Lenny.”

He sighed heavily. “Yes. That was an accident, I'm afraid. I never meant for him to get away.”

Fury and hate filled her. “He was my student,” she growled.

Cyril walked down the rest of the steps, ignoring her words. “I'm quite selective, you know. I haven't initiated a new member to the pack in years.” He said this with pride, like a father preening over his family. “But I've given you a lot of thought, Claire. You're not the type I would normally choose to join our ranks—”

“Then why did you ask me out?”

He laughed lightly. “Not to recruit you. I wanted information. More than I could get in a file. Kids like Lenny adore you. You're the mother they don't have.” He smirked. “And you so love them. Don't you remember that night we went out? What we talked about?”

She searched her memory. They'd talked shop, of course. Work. Common ground. Claire thought he had shared her interest in reaching the more unfortunate students, but apparently he had just been pumping her for information. Regret washed over her. She had talked about Lenny. About his situation at home, about his neglectful and disinterested foster parents. She had told him how special Lenny was to her—that she had managed to reach him.

“You used me to get him to him, you bastard!”

Smiling, he nodded. “Indeed. I used you to get to all of them.”

She folded Nina's trembling hand in her own, taking comfort as much as she gave it. “Why are we here?”

“As I've said, I've given it a great deal of thought and what's done is done. You're one of us now. I've decided to keep you.” He nodded decisively. “It will amuse me to watch your development. You were so skittish before, such a mouse.” His gaze raked her appraisingly. “Already you've changed. For the better.”

“I won't join your pack.”

“You don't have a choice.” He motioned to Nina, who watched them with wide, haunted eyes. “That's what this little pigeon is for.”

She glanced to Nina, then back to him.

“You'll stay down here until tomorrow. Until moonrise.” He nodded at Nina. “And she's going to keep you company.”

Claire's eyes shifted to Nina in horror. Nina blinked, bewildered, confused, evidently failing to grasp Cyril's implication. But Claire understood perfectly.

He pointed at two jugs of water near the foot of the stairs. “So you don't dehydrate. Be sure to give the girl some. We don't want her to perish before you get the chance for a fresh meal.” His lips curved in a mocking smile. “You should be starving by tomorrow night.”

“Please, you can't do this.” She looked over her shoulder at Nina, her face frighteningly pale beneath her caramel-toned skin. “Anyone else. Not her.”

He looked amused. “Ah, you will be a delight to train. I'm anxious to see how long it takes you to lose this…sensitivity after you've had a taste.”

Turning, he started back up the steps. Claire flew after him, her feet a blur beneath her. Snarling, she launched herself at him, legs wrapping around his waist, fingers clawing down the sides of his face.

He plucked her from him as if she were weightless. Hard fingers closed around her face, lifting her off her feet. “Careful now, Claire. You're no match for me.”

“I'll kill you,” she hissed.

Laughing, he flung her down. She hit the concrete floor. Hard. He called down to Nina. “You don't happen to be a virgin, do you?” He shook his head in mock disgust when Nina failed to answer. Clucking lightly, he addressed Claire again. “These girls today just don't know how to hang on to their virtue. I can't tell you how long it's been since I tasted a good virgin. The blood is always—” He pinched the air as if seeking the right words. “Sweeter.”

The bile rose in the back of her throat.

Still laughing, he ascended the stairs. The door clicked shut behind him, the sound magnifying in her ears.

“Miss Morgan?”

Claire looked down at her student, the silent plea clear as day in those espresso-colored eyes.

Nina stumbled for words, her brow creased in worry. “You're not really going to kill me, are you?”

Don't be fooled by appearances; sometimes the scrawniest dogs are the most dangerous.

—Man's Best Friend:
An Essential Guide to Dogs

G
un ready, Gideon yanked open his door and took aim. “Where is she?” he asked with deadly calm, his barrel a mere inch from those silver eyes. He looked away for the briefest second to scan the street. Tom, who had diligently dogged Gideon's trail, was nowhere in sight.
Guess Cooper called off his watchdog.
Or Tom got lazy and went on a food run.

His gaze flicked back to Darius, the very bastard he had spent endless agonizing days hunting. The lycan didn't appear the least bit ruffled to have a gun in his face. He lifted a dark brow and asked mildly, “She's not with you, then, I presume?”

Desperate for answers, Gideon flung his elbow against Darius's throat and pinned him to a porch pillar. He pressed the gun to the center of his head. “If you touched her—”

Darius's lips curved in clear amusement. “I didn't hurt her, if that's what you're worried about. Or didn't she assure you of that herself?”

“Why would she be with me? You took her.”

“I let her go. Days ago.”

“You let her go?” Gideon's finger loosened on the trigger and he eased his arm from the lycan's throat, shocked and a little skeptical at this unexpected news. “Why?”

“Because that's what she wanted.” Darius shrugged lightly, as if even he couldn't make sense of it.

“She didn't want to go with you in the first place,” Gideon reminded him, finding it hard to believe that this lycan would take Claire's wishes into consideration.

“Yes,” he agreed, angling his head. “But I thought I could persuade her to stay with me. We lycans are social creatures, you know. We enjoy companionship. I thought Claire would come around.”

“What about your pack?” Gideon sneered. “They're not company enough?”

“I don't have a pack.”

At this Gideon could only stare. Every lycan had a pack.

“No pack. I had hoped Claire could be my pack,” he said in a soft voice. “She's all I need.”

Gideon aimed the gun again, beyond tempted to blow this lycan away. “Sorry, she's not yours.”

“So I learned.” Once again, Darius appeared unperturbed. “Appears she's not so easily persuaded. Someone got to her before me.” His gaze cut to Gideon meaningfully, making it clear to whom he referred.

Darius sidestepped Gideon and entered the house. “Despite my best efforts to convince her otherwise, she thinks you can save her.” He smiled that cold smile again. “But we both know differently. Don't we?”

Gideon was still grappling with the news that this lycan had freed Claire. Where was she? Why hadn't she come to him?

“You let her go?” Gideon demanded, rotating where he stood, his gun following the lycan strolling through his living room.

“You sound suspicious. Bad experience with others of my kind, I presume.” Darius stopped, hands clasped behind his back, and rocked on his heels, saying, “Is that why you became an agent?”

Gideon stiffened. He wasn't about to share his personal history with this bastard. It made no difference that he was steadily breaking every preconceived notion he had about lycans—Gideon still didn't trust him.

“Ah, sore subject, I see. Would it do any good to tell you that I too share your dislike for my kind? My intentions toward Claire are honorable.”

Gideon snorted. “Right. That's why you flung her screaming over your shoulder and abducted her.”

Darius's silver eyes narrowed. “
I
offer her life. What do you offer her? A one-night stand and a silver bullet?” The criticism in his voice cut like a whip.

“Shut the hell up.” The bitter taste of rage flooded his mouth. His finger curled around the trigger, so tempted. “I'm trying to help her.”

“I'm sure you are.” Darius nodded his dark head, but his voice sounded less than convinced. “All you agents have the same solution for the world's lycan problem. Destroy. Kill. It never crossed your mind that there may be a better way to help Claire?”

Gideon pounded his fist on chest. “I'm trying to help her find—”

“Yes, but you're going to kill if you don't. Correct?”

Gideon opened his mouth several times, finding himself at a complete loss. In all honesty, he couldn't answer that question any longer. He had vowed no one would end her life save him, but when it came down to it, could he even do it?

Then it hit him that he didn't owe an explanation to this lycan. “This is between me and Claire.”

“I don't think you want her to die,” Darius announced, his look thoughtful. “What if I told you there's a way to protect her soul and let her live as a lycan?”

Gideon stepped closer, Darius's words fanning the flame of hope sheltered deep in his heart. Then common sense prevailed and he muttered, “That's impossible.”

“Such a pessimist.” Darius clicked his tongue, looking disappointed as he headed for the door. “It seems Claire misplaced her faith in you, otherwise you'd at least hear me out. No matter. I'll find her without you. I promised her my protection, told her I'd come for her today.”

Anger unfurled low in Gideon's belly. What exactly went on between Claire and this lycan to make her trust him? “Why would she trust you?” he demanded, refusing to believe that she would turn to a lycan for help over him.

“We have an understanding.”

Gideon had no reason to feel betrayed. He and Claire had exchanged no words of love, made no promises. He shouldn't feel betrayed that she accepted the help of another, of a lycan—but he did.

“What kind of understanding?” he growled.

“Whether you believe it or not, I'm not your typical lycan.”

Gideon had no trouble believing that. So far this lycan had displayed behavior far from customary. The fact that Gideon was talking to him and Darius had not tried to rip out his throat said a lot.

Darius went on, “I lock myself up during every full moon so that I won't feed.”

“Right,” Gideon snorted. He didn't know what was more unbelievable. That Darius claimed to lock himself in a room or that he didn't
want
to feed. Once a lycan fed and tasted human blood he lost all conscience. The beast ruled him. “No room can hold a lycan in the throes of blood hunger.”

“I've built one that can. A tank couldn't crash through these walls. It's impenetrable.”

Gideon stared at him. It couldn't be that easy to save Claire. Could it? True, he had never thought how one might save someone from shifting. Before Claire, he had never wanted to.

“Don't believe me.” Darius shrugged. “Claire does, and I promised to keep her safe.”

Darius's words ripped through him like a bullet, reminding him that where he had failed, this lycan had managed to deliver.

Then he remembered one important fact. “Locked up with you is safe?”

“The rest of the world is safe from us, yes.”

“But she's not safe from
you
.” Gideon was no fool. He knew what would happen between them in that room once they shifted, and he couldn't stomach the thought.

“She is what she is. As am I.” He waved a hand at Gideon. “She doesn't belong with you.”

“But she belongs with
you
?”

“I'm a lycan. She's a lycan. You are not. Think about it. I'm offering her a chance, a way out without risk to others or her soul.”

Gideon struggled against Darius's offer, wanting to deny it, wanting to reject it as a possibility, knowing that releasing Claire meant giving her up—that she would belong to Darius. He couldn't deny his feelings for her any longer. He loved her. He wanted her to live. Even if it meant living without him. Even if it meant giving her to this lycan.

He lowered the gun until it hung loosely from his fingers.

“All right. Let's find her.”

 

“Gideon.” Kathleen Morgan sounded frantic over the phone line. “I'm so glad you called. Have you seen Claire? We haven't seen or heard from her since she left here.”

The knot in his gut tightened, twisting. “When was that?”

“Tuesday afternoon.”

“Did she say where she was going when she left there?”

“She needed to clear out her room at work,” Mrs. Morgan explained. “The school is using it for summer school classes. And a teacher needed to talk to her about a student.”

His fingers tightened about the phone. “Did she mention the student's name?”

“Lenny, I think.”

Of course Claire would have gone to hear what the teacher had to say. “Don't worry. We'll find her.”

Less than an hour later he walked the halls of Roosevelt High School with Darius at his side. A handful of faculty still roamed the building, but it had the air of an abandoned ship. Most doors lining the halls were closed, the panels of glass next to them revealing darkened caves within. Summer vacation was well under way. He stopped a lone student, a boy lugging a saxophone case, and got directions to Claire's room.

Her classroom was unlocked. He flipped on the lights, blinking against the sudden fluorescent glare. The room was empty save for the uniform rows of desks. One box sat on her desk and several more littered the floor.

“She never finished,” Darius announced, peering into a box.

Gideon's gaze swept over the room. “She was interrupted,” he surmised aloud.

Darius lifted a backpack off the top of a desk with two fingers. A Hello Kitty mirror hung off the backpack's zipper. “Hers?”

“No,” he answered, pulling her chair out from her desk, discovering her purse discreetly stashed on the cushioned seat. “She wouldn't have left her purse.”

“Now what?” Darius asked.

“Let's check the office downstairs. Maybe someone talked to her. Saw something.”

Darius pushed himself off a file cabinet and followed. As they neared the front office, they passed dozens of large photos displaying championship football teams, drill teams, and other school clubs.

“Hey, hold on a minute.”

Gideon stopped again and looked impatiently over his shoulder at Darius. “What?”

Darius stared intently into one of the large frames. “You ever see this guy before?”

Gideon moved beside Darius to stare at a district championship photograph of the school orchestra.

Darius tapped the glass above Cyril's face. “Know him?”

“I've met him. Claire introduced me. Cyril Jenkins.”

“He's a lycan.”

Gideon looked back and forth between Darius and the photograph, his chest constricting, suddenly painfully tight. “It's just a photograph. How can you tell?”

“I know him.” Darius's expression grew strained. “It's been a while, and his name wasn't Cyril then, but I would never forget his face.”

Gideon could only stare at the bland, unassuming features of Cyril Jenkins and fight back the urge to fling back his head and howl in rage. He'd met the man and had never even suspected. All this time the alpha they sought had been under their noses. And now he had Claire.

“You couldn't have known. He's very old—wise enough to know how to disguise himself from agents.”

Claire had dated him—sat across from him at a restaurant. Worked with him every day. The thought made his fists clench tighter. Apparently his hunch that the geeky band director had been interested in Claire wasn't far off. Damn straight he was interested in her. She was a member of his pack.

“There's your alpha,” Darius pronounced, reading Gideon's mind. “At least we know who has Claire now.”

“Yeah, but not where,” Gideon clarified, looking toward the office and nodding at the secretary talking on the phone behind her desk. “Think she can be persuaded to give us his address?”

“Never question a lycan's ability to enthrall.” With a tiny salute, Darius pushed through the glass door.

Gideon paced outside the office, trying to keep his thoughts from Claire and what Cyril could be doing to her. Those thoughts would drive him mad and make him useless. Darius soon emerged, a slip of paper in hand. “Got it.”

Gideon nodded, grim determination filling him.
Claire, baby, I'm coming.