She blew out a breath. “I never saw her again. Heartbroken, I tried to understand what I’d done to drive her off. At the next full moon, grief turned to betrayal. She’d bitten me and run, leaving me to shift into a beast. Into this monster. So, I was different and alone all over again. Thankfully, László found me running in a panic in the hills. He brought me into the pack. Strange as it was, I’d found a home again. Acceptance.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Shifting all on your own, with no idea of what’s going on, is terrifying. I’m glad he found you.”
She nodded, lost in thought. “But you, even though you have packs the world over that would honor you and your abilities, you have these powerful friends who feel indebted to you, you still choose a leech as your mate.” She couldn’t get past that.
I looked at my wedding ring again and a calm came over me. “Clive is wily and patient. He watched over me for years, giving me little pushes, helping me to stand on my own two feet again, training me to defend myself. If I hadn’t wanted him, he would have accepted that, but he still would have looked out for me while helping me defend myself. Regardless of how I felt about him, he needed to make sure I was never hurt again.”
She studied my ring as I had. “And how long did he wait for you to heal?”
“Seven years,” I said.
“I would have waited centuries for you.” Clive descended the steps silently, stopping beside me and wrapping his arm around my waist. “That’s quite a drop,” he said, looking over the balustrade. “Fifty feet would do more than break your leg.”
Eleven
Robin Hood & Little John
“I’m perfectly safe and have excellent balance. Viktoria, this is my husband Clive. Clive, Viktoria of the Buda Pack.”
Clive nodded. “It’s good to meet you. The other members of your pack aren’t pleased to have us in your territory. Do you feel the same?”
Viktoria stared at him a moment, braced for attack, and then slowly relaxed her stance. “About bloodsuckers? Yes. You?” She glanced at me again. “Probably. László is Alpha, though. We protect the people of Budapest, and vampires are a plague.” She stared at him as though challenging him to disagree.
“We can be,” he said. “It is our eternal shame.”
She kept her eye on him, wary. I may have told her all sorts of lovely things about him, but vampires caused her lover’s death and that wasn’t something one made peace with easily.
He nudged me toward him, off the wall, glancing at the bag in my hand. “Good. You found a butcher. I’m afraid we need to get back now.” He looked at Viktoria. “It was good to meet you.”
“Can you give me your number?” I asked. “When I know anything for certain, I’ll contact you.”
She thought about it a moment and then took out her phone. Once we’d exchanged numbers, Clive gave me his back again. I climbed on and he gave Viktoria a shallow bow. “Good evening.”
He moved so fast, I couldn’t track it, though I knew he’d leapt over the wall and raced into the night.
Show-off.
Not at all. I didn’t want her to follow us and by our leaping from a fifty-foot wall, she couldn’t. If any pack members were watching, they’d know it was impossible for her to follow us.
I kept my head down and my eyes closed. The speed and movement made me seasick. Is it any wonder I love you?
Only to the rest of the world. Hang on tight. We’re going over the fence again.
A moment later, he was sliding across the marble entry floor like he was wearing socks on a freshly polished floor.
A Renfield closed the door. “The gathering will begin in twenty-three minutes.”
Clive helped me down and then took my hand. “Noted. But as we’re not clocking in for work, I don’t believe we need to be quite so precise with our arrival.”
We made a point of walking leisurely back to our room, me swinging my bag of meat sticks. It was a message to the minion that we didn’t take orders from him.
I like the shorts. Your legs are warm from the sun.
I feel uncomfortable when I think about it, or when that Renfield looked at my legs, but for most of the day, I forgot about them.
Progress. Hopefully, you didn’t burn.
I looked down as I walked. I don’t think so. I need to tell you about a teenaged girl they found in a park, bled dry with bite marks in her neck…
