The Fallen One (Sons of the Dark Mother, Book One) (13 page)

She screamed at him, telling him
that he was betraying her family—that he was betraying their
friends—that he was betraying his own best friend.

But he didn’t care.
Her loving father didn’t care.
She hadn’t understood what the implications of
their words meant. She
hadn’t understood
what they meant
!

And then, when her parents had
disappeared… she’d buried all the memories.

She cried silent tears of grief.
Everything she believed was an illusion. Her quiet idyllic
childhood was an illusion. Her loving parents were also an
illusion.

She wanted to escape—and did
so—into sleep.

Justice got up from the bed and
covered her up. She had fallen into a fitful sleep. Tomorrow she
would have to receive the rest—as if she hadn’t had to receive
enough tonight. The knowledge that everything you thought you knew
had been a lie can test the depths of your abilities to stay
centered—even perhaps to stay sane.

But tomorrow she would also have to
accept the knowledge that her life, as she knew it, was forever and
irrevocably changed.

Chapter Twelve

The Killer

Justice had strong coffee, and
bacon
and eggs waiting for her by the time
she had pulled herself from her bed, showered, and made it into her
tiny kitchen.

She looked around. He had packed
things up in her room. He had done so down here too. She had the
uneasy feeling she hadn’t heard everything—
yet.

“
Am I going somewhere?”

He nodded, setting down his cup.
“You are going to take an indefinite leave of absence. And I know
you won’t put us both through the trauma of trying to hang onto
your life.” He frowned at her. “I’m sorry, Jes. You know this must
be.”

It was funny how bossy a man could
be when he was afraid that the woman he was so desperate to protect
was going to fight him every step of the way. She didn’t put him
through any more. “I know, Justice,” she whispered. “I’m stubborn,
not stupid. It would be stupid to paint myself as a target to this
enemy.”

He let out a visible sigh of
relief. He’d clearly thought she was going to make this
difficult.

“
Where will I go?”

“
To live with one of my
sisters.”

She nodded and almost grinned. He
had never before shown her so much of what he was thinking as he
was right now.

He smiled at her. “Okay. I’m
relieved. I’ve a feeling you can be very difficult to deal with if
you don’t agree to go along.”

“
You would be correct in that
assumption.” She took a sip of her coffee, and curled her lip. It
was stout. “But I have to have the opportunity to talk with my
partner.”

He nodded.

“
Will I get in on some of this
training?” She smiled. For once he was surprised. She was getting
better at this. “I assume the rest of my life will be spent in
dealing directly with our people—and the Crow elite. So—I ask
again—will I get in on some of this training?”

His gaze smoldered. She’d seen that
too late. In answer, he stood up and pulled her into his arms.
“Does this mean you have accepted the rest of your
future?”

She went up in flames. She hadn’t
missed the full implications of that question.

He kissed her then, and she was
helpless to stop him. She’d never felt anything like this—not
ever.

He pulled away with a groan. “We
have to get you out of here—and then….” He let his meaning sink
in—and the full realization of exactly what that would
entail.

She quickly took herself up to her
room. She threw herself across her bed in mortification. The
memories of last night flooded her—in spite of her grief, he’d
still caused the most intoxicating feelings of desire to burn
within her that she had ever known. How was that possible? How
could someone like him make her feel that way?

Could she ever share her life with
a murderer?

They put some of the things she
would need into his car. He assured her that he would have the rest
of her things packed and moved for her—including her own
car.

She hadn’t had time to think about
the ramifications of what all this was doing to her life—much less
adjust to the idea of it.

Her life, she suddenly realized,
was forever changed.

She was on the hit list of some of
the most dangerous tribes out there. It would be a miracle if she
survived, even with everything Justice was doing to protect
her.

It was an hour to his sister’s
house, and he obviously wasn’t wasting the time.

He glanced at her—she could feel he
had more to say. How much more could she take? She steeled herself.
She had to hear it—she had to know it all—know
everything.

“
Out with it,” she
said.

He turned onto the freeway and
worked his way into the lane he needed in the bumper-to-bumper
traffic. When they were heading in the right direction, he began.
“I have been hunting rogue vamps for many years,” he
revealed.

He didn’t look at her.

She shouldn’t have been, but she
couldn’t have been more surprised. She’d had him tagged for hunting
the occasional vamp—the ones who hunted humans—not necessarily
whole factions of rogue vamps. She wasn’t easily shocked and
usually easily rolled with the punches. But he had managed to
consistently shock her.

He kept looking forward, as if he
didn’t want to look at her when he said the rest. “I have created
something of a respect with the tribes.

Her mouth fell open. “How on Earth
did you do that?”

“
You don’t want to
know.”

She stared at him in amazement.
“There’s only one way you could gain such respect—and that is if
they
actually feared
you
!”

He did look at her now. “Yes. They
fear me. And because they fear me—you would be
protected—if….”

Yep. She had felt his meaning loud
and clear. “Oh, no! Hell, no!”

“
You are my mate,
Jes
!”

“
We don’t live by the archaic
traditions of our people!”

“
But we cannot deny the bond,
either!”

That shut her up. She turned her
attention to what was going on outside the car, because what was
going on inside the car had the power to send her up in flames just
by innuendo. How could she fight him off—if
she couldn’t even keep her body under
wraps
?

Her father had betrayed her. Her
mother had died because of this betrayal. Her future was gone. The
history of her people had betrayed her—she was now
hunted.

Now, she felt as if even her body
sought to betray her. And now Justice was claiming his right to
her—if for no other reason than to protect her.

Destiny sought to force her down a
path upon which she’d had no intention of going.

And she didn’t seem to have any
choice in the matter.

It wasn’t Justice. She just
couldn’t be bound to anyone that way. She didn’t want her entire
future—her entire life—every decision she ever made, tied up in
someone else. It felt—oppressive.

“
Is that how you see sharing your
life, Jes? As oppressive? What about sharing a common bond? What
about knowing you have someone to come home to, someone to share
everything with, even the bad, no matter what happens?”

She didn’t answer. She didn’t have
to. That sounded too good—much too good.

The moment she saw Mia, the two
women hugged fiercely, tears rolling down both of their faces.
Justice’s sisters had been Jes’s friends. They were like sisters to
her. But Mia had meant something special to Jes.

Mia had been beautiful as a
child—inside and out. She’d had dark, curly hair, and golden-green
eyes. Her skin had been the color of light cinnamon. But now she
was stunning. Her skin was like warm honey. Her hair had the same
warm highlights, spinning in thousands of tiny, tight ringlets. She
was generous and compassionate about Jes’s situation.

She lived in a beautiful, old brick
house on the north side of Chicago. Jes was shown to a beautiful
bedroom. She felt right at home, not the least uncomfortable, and
she wanted for nothing—except more time with Justice. Which
irritated her.

Mia’s name caused some tension in
Jes, though. She had stopped thinking about it long ago. It always
caused her stomach to clench whenever she heard it. It was as if it
rang a bell in her head—threatening to force her to remember…
something she would rather forget. Like the day she had met
Mira….

Perhaps that was it. Their names
were so similar.

Jes was given the opportunity to
talk with her partner—which hadn’t been easy. He hadn’t so readily
accepted her abrupt change in life plan—and who could blame him?
Suddenly, she was running off with people she hadn’t seen since she
was a child.

But he had been more alarmed by the
idea that so many bands of vamps and Jaguar People existed. And he
hadn’t liked the idea of something so powerful hunting
her.

He
had
asked if humans were ever
invited to train with the People—and Justice had actually said he
would look into it. Jes couldn’t believe he was actually
contemplating the idea, but perhaps it was smart. What better way
to keep an eye on a human who knew way too much for his own
good?

Not that most humans would believe
him if he chose to tell.

She was thrown into training. She
spent hours upon hours learning hand-to-hand combat moves she
hadn’t even known existed. She had already spent many hours
learning as much about hand-to-hand combat for her police training
as she could find. Chicago had offered even more diversity for
further training. And then, the People had their own version as
well, which she was now learning.

Justice rarely came around. She
tried not to think about what he might be doing; she didn’t like to
think about it, because she knew whatever it was—it was likely
dangerous, beyond anything she had ever experienced. Thinking about
it reminded her of a little newspaper—and a little tavern outside
Chicago. Thinking about it made her wonder what happened when he
answered those ads.

She had a feeling that something
else was behind his long absences, though. She had a feeling he was
giving her time and space, but she just didn’t see what he was
trying to accomplish by keeping them apart. How would she find any
answers with distance between them?

Justice was her mate.

If he was out fighting rogue
Crows—she wanted to fight beside him.

But what if he were fighting their
people? Worse yet, what if he was killing humans who got in the
way? She needed answers—and she wasn’t going to get any answers
with him staying away.

She threw herself into her
training—if only to keep her cop’s instincts from causing her to go
out looking for Justice and thereby making herself an easy target
for a rogue Crow and getting herself killed. She had heard that
they were exceedingly good at tracking their target—she didn’t want
to find out just how good they were. Right now, Justice had her
surrounded with Jaguar Warriors.

She didn’t want to think about how
a fourteen-year-old boy who had been forced to go into hiding had
managed to grow into a man and somehow amass a large army along the
way.

At any given time, she had counted
at least thirty in his army—and these were only the ones sent to
guard
her
. Seven
lived with his sister. She’d been at the other sisters’ houses, and
there were seven in each of their homes too. Any more would have
had people talking. These were enough. They were intimidating
men.

They never all left the house at
the same time. Four of them only went out at night. Three of them
only went out during the day. And they never left
together.

On either side of the sisters’
houses were other houses owned by the People. She knew this because
she had spotted more of the warriors coming in and out of those
homes. She knew because she knew the Jaguar People. She could smell
the blood of a human; she could smell her own people just the
same.

They were just as disciplined. She
would only see one leave the house on any given occasion. They
dressed like everyone else, and went out of their way to do things
like bring home a shopping bag or walk the dog, so as to appear
like they were doing all the same mundane things as any
human.

But they were not human, and they
each had one thing that made them stand out from their neighbors—a
watchful eye that never missed a thing.

One of them always appeared
whenever she went for a walk. She didn’t know how they were doing
it, but one of them always came out onto the steps, as if to tell
her they were aware of what she was doing—in case she got any ideas
of going off on her own.