"There will always be someone more powerful than you," Liam said.
True enough.
"Though age does help," he admitted.
I snuggled into the pillow as he drew a caress along my collarbone, waking appetites I thought had been sated.
"So was Connor always so—" I wiggled my fingers.
Liam cocked an eyebrow at me. "And what is that supposed to represent."
I wiggled my fingers at him again. "You know, woo woo. Spooky? Magicy? Odd?"
He nodded slowly with an expression that made it clear he was simply humoring me.
I dropped my hand, running my fingers along the arm he had across my stomach.
"To answer your question, yes, Connor has always been a little woo woo." Liam hid his smile against my shoulder at the use of the term.
"You're related," I guessed.
It wasn't much of a guess. Anyone with eyes could see the resemblance.
Liam didn't speak for a long moment, drawing an absent-minded pattern across my chest and the upper swell of my breasts.
"Yes." He dropped a kiss onto the stretch of skin he'd been tormenting. "He's my nephew."
I waited.
Liam didn't often talk about his past, and what I knew of him was mostly from second hand sources.
I probably could have pried for more, but doing so would have made me uncomfortable. We all had things that we didn't like to talk about. There was a regret and sadness in him that said Liam probably had more than most. Living for centuries would do that to a person.
He'd either share or he wouldn't. The choice was his.
"My sister's son," Liam finally said.
"What was her name?"
"Nora," Liam said with pain in his voice. Even after all this time it was clear he missed her. "Connor is like her. Special. Woo woo, in your words. She could sense when someone wasn't what they seemed. In today's era, you would have called her a sensitive."
It made a lot of sense, considering what I knew of Connor. Sensitives were rare even today. They were attuned to the supernatural, able to tell when someone wasn't entirely human. Most of them didn't know what they were since their abilities manifested in unease or dislike when they brushed up against our world.
A part of me thought one of the reasons my relationship with my mother was so strained was because she might be a sensitive. She seemed to know something was different about me, no matter how many explanations or well-crafted lies were thrown her way.
Liam's face was contemplative as he propped his head on his hands, his gaze unfocused. "The children in our family have always been different."
I took that to mean himself as well.
"Brax called you the Wolf of Galway."
Liam nodded. "That was a long time ago. I was a powerful warrior in a time predisposed to violence. Life favored the strong and merciless. To protect my people, I had to become a monster long before I ever took my first sip of blood."
He dropped a kiss onto the spot where he'd marked me with his fangs earlier. It throbbed as if in greeting.
"My reputation as a nightmare in battle was what drew my sire to me," he said. "He and his human blood companion came to stay. At the time, the boy was much younger, still only a child, which allowed my sire to pose as his father and join our band as a warrior."
I listened without speaking as Liam told me the story of his past.
