Marked by the Moon

22

Alex’s amusement with Julian’s obvious discomfort at the sexual activity of his “grandson” faded with Ella’s words.

“Why?” she blurted.

Julian gave her another dirty look—he was getting very good at them—then glanced back at the Frenchwoman. “Why now?” he amended.

“Jorund’s fading,” she said simply.

Julian let his gaze wander over the old man. “He seems to be doing all right to me.”

Jorund’s lips twitched, but he didn’t take the bait.

“Julian,” Ella snapped, her impatience evident in her Frenchifying of his name. “If you do not do it, I will.”

“Told you they all weren’t as beta as you thought,” Alex murmured, which earned her another evil glare from the wolf-god.

Alex was beginning to wonder about Ella. Although in the robe, she could see the woman’s neck for the first time and it was unscarred, she’d never gotten a decent peek at Ella’s ears since she always wore her hair down.

Alex would not have considered the Frenchwoman a good candidate for rogue werewolf killer of the month —until she’d trotted out of the snowstorm right after the rogue had trotted into it. What better way to remove suspicion than to appear as if you hadn’t just disappeared?

Ella had obviously been sneaking away and coming here for a long time. The Inuit would think nothing of her hanging around, and she could therefore eat whomever she liked and lope off with no one the wiser.

Except if she was an evil killing machine, why hadn’t she started evilly killing before now?

Julian pushed back his chair and stood, towering over them all. “We have rules about new wolves.”

Ella glanced pointedly at Alex. “You mean like asking them if they want to become one?”

“I told you that was going to bite you on the butt,” Alex muttered. “So to speak.”

Ella’s comment reminded Alex that the Frenchwoman knew who she really was. Sure, Ella had taken Alex’s side; she’d called her “poor thing,” but if she was a rogue werewolf, lying was the least of her sins. Wouldn’t a rogue be first in line to kill the person most qualified to kill them?

“If Jorund wanted to become a werewolf, why didn’t he do it before he was eight thousand years old?” Julian asked.

“I wasn’t…certain.” The old man sighed. “I’m still not.”

“Then I can’t turn you. You have to be sure.”

“Alex wasn’t,” Ella said flatly.

“Dammit, Ella,” Julian erupted. “That was different.”

“I agree. This is about love. That was about hate.”

Alex winced, even though she was right.

Julian pressed his lips together. The table began to shimmy as if there were an earthquake, though nothing else in the house moved.

“I told you not to upset him,” Jorund said.

Ella kept her gaze on Julian’s face. “I’m not afraid of him.”

The wine in Alex’s glass began to bubble and boil. She stood up, moved back. “Maybe you should be.”

Suddenly the table stilled, the wine calmed, and Julian sat back down. “Is it because of the initial kill?”

The old man shrugged. “I don’t like the idea of taking a life to ensure my immortality.” He lifted one hand as Ella leaned forward to speak. “But I also believe that there are some humans who should be removed from this earth. I’m just not sure we should be choosing who they are.”

“We aren’t,” Julian said. “I am.”

Jorund’s lips twitched. But he didn’t comment.

Julian’s gaze narrowed. “What else?”

“It’s not that I don’t want to be with her forever.” Jorund lifted his gaze to Ella’s, and his eyes reflected his devotion. “But I can’t leave my people now.”

“Because of the rogue?” Julian asked, and Jorund nodded.

“He’ll take care of it,” Ella said.

“I promised to protect my people,” the old man said. “How would it look if I suddenly became the creature that was killing them?”

Ella stood, throwing up her hands and making a very French sound of aggravation deep in her throat. “You would not be that creature. You would be you. You would never hurt a living soul now, and therefore you would not hurt a living soul after.”

“So you say,” Jorund returned.

“Once you die,” Ella murmured, “it is too late.”

The Inuit ignored her. “If my people are safe, then I can be sure.”

“Okay,” Julian said. “Okay.”

Julian released the throttle of the snowmobile and coasted to a stop in front of Ella’s. Alex climbed off immediately.

They’d been silent all the way back. He didn’t know about her, but he’d been fighting the response he seemed unable to stifle whenever she was near. She touched him, even without meaning to, and he was lost.

Alex rubbed her hands against her pants as if she was trying to rub the sting from her palms. He knew the feeling.

Julian lifted his chin to indicate the dark and quiet house. “Will you be all right?”

“Why? You think Ella tried to kill me?”

“No.” He frowned. “Do you?”

She spread her hands. “Someone did. Right now, the only one off the hook for it is you.”

“And George.”

“And George,” she agreed.

“If Ella wanted you dead,” Julian began, “she could have killed you in your bed.”

“A little obvious.”

“I doubt anyone would have been calling for her blood once she told them who you really were. In fact, if she wanted you dead, all she would have had to do was tell the truth, then stand back and watch.”

“Maybe it wasn’t Ella.” Alex smiled. “I’m glad.”

“Someone tried to kill you, Alex.”

She shrugged. “I’m used to it.”

Her nonchalant attitude about that situation made Julian twitchy, anxious. He wanted to stay and protect her. But he knew what would happen if he did.

“No one should want to kill you at all,” he said.

“Don’t you?” she asked, then she strode up the steps and into the house.

Julian was left staring after her, wondering when in hell the answer had become no.

He parked the snowmobile at the back of Ella’s house, covered it with a tarp, then went searching for his brother.

Dawn was fast approaching. Cade would either be hard at work in the lab or—

Julian frowned and glanced into the night. Out there somewhere, like the others.

If he was honest, any one of his people could have taken those shots at Alex. But why would they? The only ones who knew who she really was, what she’d done, were Julian and Ella. And probably Jorund now, too.

They’d already established that Ella didn’t need to shoot Alex. There were easier, less dangerous ways to get rid of her.

Besides, Ella thought Alex was the victim. She’d be more likely to take a shot at Julian.

Jorund hadn’t done it. He’d been channeling Hugh Hefner at the time.

Julian hadn’t done it, so—

He opened the door to the lab and stepped inside, pausing to rub at his eyes. None of this made any sort of sense.

Julian glanced into Cade’s room. He wasn’t in bed.

He wasn’t in the lab, either, and he wasn’t in the bathroom that Julian checked on his way out.

Julian stood in the yard between his building and his brother’s, watching the moon die. Then he walked to Ella’s, and he sat on the porch until the murky light of the sun tinted the sky and his werewolves began to trickle into town.

“I’ve been looking for you.”

Julian blinked. Where had his brother come from?

Cade was dressed. So either he hadn’t been out running, or he’d already gone home to change.

“She kick you out?” Cade jerked his head at the house.

“Ella?”

Cade rolled his eyes. “Ella’s taken.”

Was Julian the only one who hadn’t known about Ella and Jorund? What else was going on in his village that he didn’t know about?

“I was looking for you, too.” Julian stood. “Where’d you go?”

“There’s something you need to see.”

Julian opened his mouth to point out that Cade hadn’t answered the question, then paused. His brother was—

Julian wasn’t sure. He’d never seen that expression on Cade’s face. He didn’t like it.

“Okay.” He stood. “Show me.”

“Back at the lab.” Cade glanced at Ella’s house. “You’d better bring her along too.”

Alex had known the exact moment Julian arrived. The connection between them appeared to be getting worse.

She’d been in bed, sound asleep; then suddenly she was wide awake and smelling him. She’d trailed through the house, gone to the window, then lost several minutes watching the silver rays of the moon play over his face.

How could she have smelled him? The doors and windows were tightly shut against the bitter cold. Yet his distinct scent of fresh snow on evergreens was everywhere. It had followed her back to sleep, playing across her dreams, making her yearn.

When the sun’s muted rays had just begun to lighten the Arctic skies, his voice had drawn her awake. She’d thrown on more of Ella’s clothes—she still hadn’t managed to buy any of her own—and gone to ask him in for coffee. She opened the door just as he was lifting his hand to knock.

“Morning.”

“Uh,” he returned.

“Morning!” Cade stood at the bottom of the steps.

“Come on in,” she said. “You want coffee?”

But as she turned, Julian caught her hand. Suddenly Alex couldn’t breathe. Her fingers clenched around his; she stared into his face. He didn’t appear to be breathing, either.

“Are you going to bring her along or aren’t you?” Cade asked.

He sounded like a petulant little brother, and Alex laughed, which allowed her to breathe again.

“Where are we going?”

“The lab.” Julian was staring at her as if she’d just sprouted horns; then he dropped her hand and spun away.

Why did she feel as if she’d done something wrong?

She glanced at Cade, who shrugged as Julian pushed past and left them behind. “You need more blood?” she asked.

His face took on a strange expression, and suddenly Alex was worried. What had he found in the last batch?

She put on her boots and followed. Julian stalked ahead, refusing to look back. He knew they were coming.

Alex felt a strange urge to hurry after him, almost as if he’d ordered her to, except he hadn’t.

She’d been doing so well ignoring his alpha orders. The more she did so, the easier it got. But this morning she felt connected to him in a way she never had before. Was it because Julian had saved her life last night? And was he behaving strangely because he was sorry that he had?

He entered the building ahead of them, not pausing to hold the door, instead letting it slap closed. Annoyance flared, and Alex relished it. When she was annoyed with him, she wasn’t in lust with him.

Much.

Julian waited in the main room. His hair was a mess and the dark circles under his eyes made him seem very pale. He still wore the same clothes George had given him last night.

“You never went to bed,” she said.

He flicked her a glance before switching his gaze to Cade. “Show us what was so important.”

Cade beckoned them to join him at one of the high-topped tables where he had several petri dishes spread out. “I was trying to discover why Alex could touch the others without the serum, and I got nowhere. So I thought about the other—” He glanced up and caught Julian’s scowl. “—problem,” he finished.

“You mean the one where he pukes if he gets too far away from me?”

“Uh, yeah,” Cade said. “That problem I thought I wouldn’t mention since it makes the alpha a little—” He wiggled his hands next to his head.

“Ape-shit?” Alex murmured.

Cade choked. Barlow growled. Alex grinned. When she poked him with the proverbial stick she felt so much more like herself.

“What did you find?” Julian demanded.

“I…Well, it’s…” Cade took a deep breath, let it out, then reached for two clean petri dishes. “I’d better show you.”

He set the glass circlets next to each other, then went to the refrigerator in the corner and returned with two test tubes of blood. Alex read her name on one and Barlow’s on the other.

Her chest hurt, and she realized she was holding her breath. She wasn’t going to like this.

Cade set the tubes in a stand, uncorked them, then took an eyedropper in each hand and filled it with blood. He dripped a few drops of hers into the petri dish on the right; then he met her gaze and Julian’s. “Ready?”

Neither of them answered.

Cade sighed and squeezed the rubber on the other eyedropper. A bead of Julian’s blood seemed to fall in slow motion toward the petri dish on the left. Alex had enough time to wonder what experiment Cade could possibly have done with their blood in different dishes; then the drop hit the glass.

And immediately leaped into the other one.

Utter silence reigned. Alex glanced at the left dish. Not a mark on it. The right dish held a tiny puddle of blood, all the drops merged into one.

Maybe she’d been mistaken. Maybe Cade had dropped Julian’s blood into the right petri dish and not the left at all. Her eyes deceiving her made a lot more sense than blood hopping through the air.

“Do it again,” Julian said.

Cade nodded and pressed his first finger and his thumb together around the rubber bulb. This time, two drops of blood fell.

And two drops of blood arced from one petri dish to another.

“That’s impossible,” Alex said.

“I thought so, too,” Cade replied. “Until it happened.”

“What does it mean?” Barlow asked.

“I’m not sure. But—”

“You’d damn straight better find out,” Barlow snapped.

Cade’s eyes narrowed. “What do you think I’ve been doing?”

“Not confiding in me, obviously.”

“You weren’t here,” Cade ground out. “Or if you were, you weren’t answering your door.”

“Why didn’t you walk right in? It’s always open.”

“After the two of you were doing your mating dance in the center square, then making out in the front window? I draw the line at walking in on that.”

At least their plan had worked. Everyone thought they’d been horizontal bopping all night.

Except for the rogue. Who’d somehow known they’d be in Awanitok.

“One problem at a time,” she murmured.

Cade and Julian ignored her. They were too busy staring into each other’s eyes like alpha wolves ready to fight.

“Hey!” She grabbed their shoulders. They both jerked away and snarled at her. She let them go, holding her hands up in surrender. “We all want the same thing.” She pointed to the petri dish. “An explanation for that.”

Julian rubbed a hand over his face. He seemed so tired. Cade went back to the table and pulled out two more clean glass dishes.

“I got to thinking that I’d never compared anyone’s blood before I compared yours. And that maybe this reaction was common.” He lifted one shoulder. “Maybe it has to do with the fact that Julian made us all.”

“That would make sense,” Alex agreed.

“You’d think.” Cade went to the refrigerator and brought back several more test tubes filled with blood. He dropped the blood of someone named Barclay into the right dish and Julian’s into the left.

Nothing happened.

“Faet!” Julian said without any real heat.

“Yeah,” Alex agreed.

Cade looked at them both and lifted a brow before he reached for two more dishes and shoved the others out of the way. He dropped the blood of another werewolf onto the right and the blood from a completely different test tube than Julian’s into the left.

The one on the left boogied through the air and splashed on top of the quivering drop on the right, turning the two separate droplets into a puddle of one. Cade lifted the two mystery donors and turned the labels front and center.

“I thought you’d want to talk to them yourself,” he said.

“You thought right,” Julian agreed.