The Dark-Hunters (195 page)

As soon as Urian and Phoebe left, Chris headed off to bed.

Cassandra and Wulf were alone.

“You think Kat’s okay?” Wulf asked as he picked up Chris’s glass and closed the chips.

“I’m sure she is. She’ll probably be back soon.” Cassandra gathered her sister’s letters for the baby and tucked them inside the box.

“After that book she bought, I shudder to think what your sister wrote in her letters.”

“Hmmm,” Cassandra said, glancing back at the box. “Maybe I should read them first…”

“Well, if they point to me as a horned demon, I would appreciate it.”

Cassandra dropped her gaze down to his lap and to the bulge that was already there. “I don’t know about that. From my experience you are a horny demon.”

He arched a brow. “Am I?”

“Uh-huh. Horny to the extreme.”

He laughed, then kissed her slowly, hotly. “You taste like lemon,” he whispered against her lips.

Cassandra licked her lips as she remembered putting lemon juice on her fish.

Wulf tasted of decadence, wild, fierce decadence, and he made her heart race.

“Oh, oh, wait, I’m going blind!”

Wulf pulled back at the sound of Kat’s voice.

Cassandra looked over her shoulder to see her friend standing in the open doorway.

Kat shut the door behind her. “Thank goodness no one’s naked.”

“Three more seconds and we would have been,” Wulf teased.

“Ew!” Kat cringed. “More information than I needed.”

She walked over to sit across from them. Her joking aside, Kat’s features looked pinched.

Wulf was a bit disgruntled by her intrusion.

Cassandra pulled back from him and turned around to face Kat. “Something wrong?”

“Just a bit. Stryker isn’t happy about your vanishing. The Destroyer was also pissed at me. A lot. Luckily, she hasn’t rescinded the no-touch law where I’m concerned. It gives us some leeway, but I’m not sure how long Stryker will abide by it.”

“Will you have any warning if they do rescind it?” Wulf asked.

“I don’t know.”

“What happened with Urian?” Cassandra asked. “Did they find out about his helping us?”

“No, I don’t think so. But I’ll tell you what. I’m afraid of what Stryker might do to him if he ever learned Urian was helping us. He wants you and the baby dead in the worst way.”

Cassandra swallowed at that, then changed the subject. “So what did you two do?”

“I dropped Urian off at his house and left him there so that no one would know I was helping him. If anyone saw me near him, they’d be suspicious immediately. We haven’t exactly been friends over the centuries. Hell, we haven’t even been cordial.”

“Why?” Cassandra asked. “He seems nice enough. A bit standoffish, but I can’t really blame him for that.”

“Trust me, hon, he’s a different Urian here. He’s not the same guy I’ve known for eleven thousand years. The Urian I’ve known wouldn’t hesitate to kill anyone or anything at his father’s command. I’ve seen him snap the neck of any Daimon who crossed them and you don’t want to know what he does to Were-Hunters who betray them.”

Wulf reached for his drink on the coffee table. “The Spathis are the reason Dark-Hunters never come out of bolt-holes, aren’t they?”

She nodded. “The bolt-hole drops you front and center into the main banquet hall of Kalosis. Right in the heart of their city. Dark-Hunters are killed instantly. Weres are given a chance. They can swear allegiance to the Destroyer and be spared or they die.”

“And Daimons?”

“Are welcomed so long as they train with the Spathis and uphold their warrior’s code. The instant they show weakness, they die too.”

Wulf let out a slow breath. “Hell of a place you come from, Kat.”

“That’s not my place. I come from Olympus.”

“Then how did you get involved with the Destroyer?”

Cassandra was curious about that too.

Kat was sheepish. “I really can’t go there.”

“Why not?” Cassandra asked.

Kat shrugged. “It’s something no one talks about, least of all me.”

Well, that was just irritating and told her nothing. But then Cassandra had other things on her mind. “Do you think Stryker will be able to find us here?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. Stryker has a lot of spies in the Apollite and Were communities. It’s how he found us before. Apparently one of the Weres at the Inferno works with him and contacted them as soon as we came in the door.”

Wulf indicated the door that led out into the city. “So any one of the people out there could betray us?”

“I won’t lie and say no. It is possible.”

Cassandra swallowed as fear invaded her heart. “Is there any place safe?”

“At this time. No.”

Chapter 13

Cassandra was getting ready for bed. Wulf was still outside with Kat, brainstorming escape plans in case they needed a quick exit from Elysia.

Personally, Cassandra was tired of running. Tired of being hunted.

Look on the bright side, it will all end on your birthday.

Somehow that thought was less than comforting to her. Sighing, she ran her hand through the letters in her memory box. Cassandra paused as she noticed a piece of sealed gray vellum paper that was different from the cream ones she used.

She hadn’t added that one. Wulf’s fears about what her sister might write made her more than curious.

A frown creasing her brow, she pulled the letter out and looked it over. She pried the seal up so as not to hurt it, then opened it.

Her heart stopped as she read the masculine, flowing script.

Dear son,

I would call you by name, but I’m waiting for your mother to decide. I only hope she is joking when she calls you Albert Dalbert.

Cassandra paused to laugh at that. It was a joke between them, at least most of the time.

Sobering, she read on.

For weeks now I have watched your mother zealously gather her tokens for this box. She’s so afraid of you not knowing anything about her, and it bothers me greatly that you’ll never know her strength firsthand. I’m sure by the time you read this, you’ll know everything I do about her.

But you’ll never know her for yourself and that pains me most of all. I wish you could see the look on her face whenever she talks to you. The sadness she tries so hard to hide. Every time I see it, it cuts through me.

She loves you so much. You’re all she talks about. I have so many orders from her for you. I’m not allowed to make you crazy the way I do your Uncle Chris. I’m not allowed to call the doctors every time you sneeze and you are to be allowed to tussle with your friends without me having a conniption that someone might bruise you.

Nor am I to bully you about getting married or having kids. Ever.

Most of all, you are allowed to pick out your own car at sixteen. I’m not supposed to put you in a tank. We’ll see about that one. I refused to promise her this last item until I know more about you. Not to mention, I’ve seen how other people drive on the roads. So if you have a tank, sorry. There’s only so much changing a man my age can do.

I don’t know what our futures will hold. I only hope that when all is said and done, you are more like your mother than you are like me. She’s a good woman. A kind woman. Full of love and compassion even though her life has been hard and full of grief. She bears her scars with a grace, dignity, and humor that I lack.

Most of all, she has courage the likes of which I haven’t witnessed in centuries. I hope with every part of me that you inherit all her best traits and none of my bad ones.

I don’t really know what more to say. I just thought you should have something of me in here too.

Love,

Your father

Tears rolled down her cheeks as she read his words. “Oh, Wulf,” she breathed, her heart breaking at the things he would never admit to aloud. It was so strange to see herself through his eyes. She never thought of herself as particularly brave. Never thought of herself as strong.

Not until the night she had met a dark champion.

As Cassandra folded up the note and resealed it, she realized something.

She loved Wulf. Desperately.

She wasn’t sure when it had happened. It might have been the first time he took her into his arms. Or it might have been when he reluctantly welcomed her into his home.

No, she realized, it was none of those times. She had fallen in love with him the first time he had touched her belly with his strong, capable hand and called her baby his.

Dark-Hunter or not, he was a good, wonderful man for an ancient barbarian.

The door opened.

“Are you all right?” Wulf rushed forward to the bed.

“I’m fine,” she said, clearing her throat. “It’s these stupid pregnancy hormones. I cry at the drop of a hat. Ugh!”

He wiped her tears away from her cheeks. “It’s okay. I understand. I’ve been around plenty of pregnant women in my day.”

“Your Squires?”

He nodded. “I’ve even delivered a few of their babies.”

“Really?”

“Oh, yeah. You have to love the days before modern roads and hospitals when I was up to my elbows in placenta.”

She laughed, but then she always did around him. He had an incredible knack for making her feel better.

Wulf helped her put everything away. “You should probably go on to sleep. You didn’t rest well last night.”

“I know. I’m going, I promise.”

He tucked her into bed after she had changed into her nightgown, then turned the lights off and left her alone. Cassandra lay in the dark, her thoughts wandering.

Closing her eyes, she imagined her and Wulf in his house, with a passel of children running around them.

Funny how she had never dared dream for a single child and now she wanted more time to have as many as possible.

For him.

For her.

But then, all of her people wished for more time on this earth. Her mother, even her sister.

You could go Daimon too.

Maybe, but then the man she loved would be honor bound to kill her.

No, she couldn’t do that to either one of them. Like all the Apollites here, she would meet her death with the dignity Wulf had written of.

And he would be left behind to weep for her …

Cassandra winced at that. How she wished she dared run so that he would never see her die. Never know when she passed away. It was so cruel to him.

But it was too late for that. There was no way to escape him while she needed his protection. All she could do was try to keep him from loving her as much as she loved him.

*   *   *

For the next three days, Cassandra had the distinct feeling that something was up. Whenever she drew near Wulf and Kat when they were together, they would immediately become quiet and act nervous.

Chris had taken up with a group of young female Apollites that Phoebe had introduced him to when she’d taken him shopping to buy electronics that would keep him from being bored. The Apollite girls thought his dark coloring was “exotic” and they adored the fact that he was so into computers and technology.

“I have died and gone to Valhalla!” Chris had exclaimed the night he met them. “These women appreciate a man with a brain and they don’t care that I don’t tan. None of their people do either. It’s great!”

“They’re Apollites, Chris,” Wulf had warned him.

“Yeah, so? You got an Apollite babe. I want one too. Or two or three or four of them. This is so cool.”

Wulf had shaken his head and left Chris to them with one last warning. “If they make a move on your neck, run.”

By day five, Cassandra was really starting to worry. Wulf had been nervous since the moment she woke up. What’s more, he and Kat had been gone for hours the night before and neither one of them would tell her what they’d been up to.

He reminded her of a skittish colt.

“Is there something I need to know?” Cassandra asked after she cornered him in the living room.

“I’m going to go find Phoebe or something,” Kat said, shooting for the door.

She made a hasty exit.

“There’s just something, I…” Wulf paused.

Cassandra waited.

“Well?” she prompted.

“Wait here.” He left her to go to Chris’s room.

A few minutes later, he came back with an old Viking sword. She remembered having seen it in a special glass case in his cellar. The two of them must have gone back to his place last night to retrieve it. But why they would take such a chance, she couldn’t imagine.

Holding the sword in his hands between them, Wulf took a deep breath. “This isn’t something I’ve thought about doing in more than twelve hundred years and I’m trying to remember everything, so give me a second.”

She didn’t like the sound of that. She drew her brows into a deep vee. “What are you going to do? Cut my head off?”

He gave her a peeved stare. “No, not hardly.”

She watched as he took two gold bands out of his pocket and placed them on the blade. Then he presented them to her.

“Cassandra Elaine Peters, I would like to marry you.”

She was dumbstruck by his proposal. The thought of marriage had never even entered her mind. “What?”

His dark eyes burned into hers. “I know our son had a strange conception, and will most definitely have an odd life, but I want him to be born the old-fashioned way—to married parents.”

Cassandra covered her face with her hands as tears welled. “What is it about you that you make me cry all the time? I swear, I never wept until the day I met you.”

He looked as if she had struck him.

“I don’t mean it in a bad way, Wulf. You just do things that touch me so deeply in my heart that it makes me cry.”