Soulless

CHAPTER TWELVE Nothing but Werewolf

The werewolf charged.

Miss Tarabotti, whose eyes were not yet accustomed to the darkness of the cell, perceived the monster as nothing more than a bulky blur of darkness heading at supernatural speed in her direction. She dove awkwardly to one side, only just fast enough. Her corset stays creaked in a most alarming manner as she tried desperately to twist out of the way. She stumbled upon landing, nearly falling to her knees.

The wolf hit the closed door hard, behind where she had just stood, and slid to the floor in an ungainly heap of long legs and sweeping tail.

Alexia backed away, hands up before her chest in an instinctive, and entirely useless, defensive position. She was not ashamed to admit she was deathly frightened. The werewolf was huge, and she was becoming convinced that what preternaturals could do would not be fast enough to cancel out what he might be able to do first.

The wolf resumed an upright position, shaking himself like a wet dog. He had a long glossy pelt, silky in texture and of some changeable color difficult to determine in the shadowy room. He crouched down to charge again, powerful muscles quivering, saliva leaking out one side of his mouth in silver rivulets.

He leaped forward in another burst of speed and then twisted before he struck, yanking himself back mid jump.

He could have killed her easily that time. There was no doubt in Alexia's head that his fangs were coming straight for her jugular. Her initial dodge had been pure luck. She was nowhere near fit enough to go up against a regular wolf, let alone a supernatural one. True, she was an inveterate walker and had a decent seat for the hunt, but no one would ever make the mistake of calling Miss Tarabotti a sportswoman.

In an apparent state of confusion, the great beast circled to one side of the cell, then the other, weaving about Alexia and sniffing the air. He gave an odd, frustrated little whine and backed slowly away from her, swaying his bushy head back and forth in profound mental distress. The yellow of his eyes glowed faintly in the dark room. Alexia thought that their expression was one of worry more than hunger.

Miss Tarabotti watched in amazement as for several minutes the werewolf continued his internal struggle, pacing back and forth. Her respite did not last long, however. It soon became clear that despite whatever held him back, the urge to attack was overpowering. The wolf's mouth opened in a snarl of bloodlust, and he coiled his muscles to spring at her once more.

This time, Alexia was pretty darn certain she would not escape unscathed. She had never before seen so many sharp teeth in one place.

The werewolf attacked.

Miss Tarabotti could make out his form more clearly now, her eyes having adjusted fully to the gloom. Yet all she could really process mentally was a great shaggy mass of killing frenzy plunging toward her throat. She wanted desperately to run, but there was nowhere for her to go.

Keeping her wits about her, Alexia stepped toward the charging monster and a little to one side. In the same movement, she tilted sideways as much as her corset would allow and crashed against the beast's ribs, knocking him out of his leap. He was a big wolf, but Alexia Tarabotti was no lightweight either, and she managed to broadside him just enough to throw him off kilter. They fell to the ground together in a coil of skirts and bustle wires and fur and fangs.

Alexia twined her arms, her legs—as much as her underpinnings would allow—and anything else she could manage about the wolf's huge furry body and held on as tightly as humanly possible.

With a profound sense of relief, she felt his fur disappear and his bones re-form under her fingers. The sound of muscle, sinew, and cartilage breaking was truly gruesome, like a cow being butchered, but the feel of it was even worse. The sensation of fur disappearing at her touch, crawling away from any point of contact with her body, and the bones, liquidlike, changing their very nature under his flesh, was one that would haunt her for months. But, eventually, she held only warm human skin and solid lean muscles.

Miss Tarabotti took a long, deep, shaky breath and from the smell alone had no doubt at all whom it was she held. For the scent was all open grassy fields and night air. Involuntarily, her hands moved against his skin in relief. Then, of course, she realized something else.

“Why, Lord Maccon, you are stark naked!” Alexia said. She was appalled beyond all reason by this last in the long string of indignities she had had to suffer in the space of one torturous evening.

The Earl of Woolsey was indeed completely nude. He did not seem particularly perturbed by this fact, but Miss Tarabotti felt the sudden need to close her eyes tight and think about asparagus or something equally mundane. Coiled about him as she was, her chin wedged over one of his massive shoulders, she was being forced to look down directly at a nicely round, but embarrassing bare, moon. And not the kind that caused werewolves to change either. Although it did seem to be changing aspects of her own anatomy that she would rather not think about. It was all a very heady—or bottomy?—experience.

But, Alexia reasoned, at least he is no longer trying to kill me.

“Well, Miss Tarabotti,” admitted the earl, “nakedness happens, I am ashamed to say, particularly to us were-wolves. To compound the offense, I must ask you most cordially not to let go.” Lord Maccon was panting, and his voice sounded funny, all low and gruff and hesitant.

With her chest pressed hard against his, Alexia could feel the rapid beat of his overtaxed heart. A strange series of questions ran through her head. Was his exertion the result of the attack or the change? What happened if he changed into wolf form in full evening dress? Would the clothes rip? That was sure to be inconveniently expensive! How come it was socially acceptable for werewolves in the wolf state to run around completely starkers, but not anyone else?

Instead she asked, “Are you cold?”

Lord Maccon laughed. “Practical as always, Miss Tarabotti. It is a little chilly in here, but I am well enough for the moment. “

Alexia looked at his long, powerful, but bare, legs dubiously. “I suppose I could loan you my underskirt. “

The earl snorted. “I hardly think that would look very dignified.”

Miss Tarabotti reared back so she could look him in the face for the first time. “I meant to drape over you like a blanket, not to wear, you ridiculous man!” She was blushing heatedly, but with her dark skin, she knew it was not noticeable. “Besides, remaining exposed is hardly a dignified condition either.”

“Aye, I see. Thank you for the thought, but...” Lord Maccon trailed off, becoming distracted by something far more interesting. “Uh, where exactly are we?”

“We are guests of the Hypocras Club. That new scientific establishment that opened recently right next door to the Snodgroves' town residence.” She did not even pause to let him interject but hurried agitatedly on. Partly because she wanted to relay everything she could before she forgot something vital and partly because their intimate proximity was making her nervous. “It is the scientists here who are behind the supernatural disappearances,” she said, “as I am certain you are now well aware. You yourself have become one of those very vanishing acts. They have quite the arrangement here. We are currently in underground facilities reached only by something called an ascension chamber. And there are rooms upon rooms of exotic steam and electric current machinery on the other side of the foyer. They have got Lord Akeldama hooked up to something called an exsanguination machine, and I heard the most horrible screams. I think it was him. Conall”—this was said most earnestly—“I believe that they may be torturing him to death.”

Miss Tarabotti's big dark eyes welled with tears.

Lord Maccon had never before seen her cry. It did the most remarkable thing to his own emotions. He became irrationally angry that anything might make his stalwart Alexia sad. He wanted to kill someone, and this time it was not at all tied into being a werewolf. It couldn't be, as, held tightly in her arms, he was as human as possible.

Alexia paused to take a breath, and Lord Maccon said, in an attempt to distract her from her unhappiness and himself from homicidal thoughts, “Aye, this is all very informative, but why are you here?”

“Oh, they put me in with you to check the authenticity of my abilities as a preternatural,” she answered, as though this fact were perfectly obvious. “They have your BUR files on me, the ones that were stolen, and they wanted to see if the reports were true.”

Lord Maccon looked ashamed. “Sorry about that. I still do not know how they got through my security. But what I meant was, how did you get here, to the club?”

She tried to find the least embarrassing place to rest her hands. Finally she decided the middle of his back was safest. She was seized with a most irrational desire to rub her fingertips up and down the indentation of his spine. She resisted and said, “Technically, I believe they were after Lord Akeldama, something about his being very old. Apparently this is an important factor in their experimentation. I was having dinner with him. I told you I was going to, remember? They chloroformed his entire residence and brought me along because I was with him. They only realized who I was when Mr. MacDougall came into my cell and saw me. He used my name, and the other man, he is called Siemons, remembered it from your paperwork. Oh! And you should know, they have an automaton.” She tensed at the memory of that awful waxy thing.

Lord Maccon rubbed his big hands over her back in an absentminded soothing motion. Miss Tarabotti took it as an excuse to loosen her own grasp a mite. The temptation to begin her own rubbing was almost overwhelming.

He interpreted her relaxed hold the wrong way. “No, do not let go,” he said, shifting his grip to pull her, if possible, even more intimately against his naked body. Then he answered her statement. “We had surmised that it was an automaton. Though I have never before encountered one filled with blood. It must be some newfangled construction. It may even be on a clockwork frame. I tell you, science can do amazing things these days.” He shook his head. His hair brushed against Alexia's cheek. There was an edge of admiration mingled with the disgust in his voice.

“You knew it was an automaton, and you did not tell me?” Miss Tarabotti was most disgruntled, partly because she had not been informed and partly because Lord Maccon's hair was so very silky. So was his skin, for that matter. Alexia wished she had gloves on, for she had given up and was now running her fingers in circles against his back.

“I hardly see how your knowing might have improved matters. I am certain you would have continued to engage in your customary reckless behavior,” said Lord Maccon rudely, not at all perturbed by her caress. In fact, though they were arguing, he had taken to nuzzling her neck between phrases.

“Ah-ha, I like that,” replied Alexia. “I might remind you that you, too, have now been captured. Was that not a consequence of your reckless behavior?”

Lord Maccon looked worried. “Quite the opposite, actually. It was the consequence of too predictable nonreckless behavior patterns. They knew exactly where to find me and at what time I would return home on full-moon night. They used chloroform on the whole pack. Blast them! This Hypocras Club must hold a controlling interest in a chloroform company, given the sheer amount of the chemical that they seem to have access to.” He cocked his head, listening. “From the number of howls, it sounds like they brought the entire pack in. I do hope the clavigers escaped.”

“The scientists do not seem interested in drones or clavigers,” said Miss Tarabotti reassuringly, “only fully supernatural and preternatural types. They seem to believe they must protect the commonwealth against some mysterious threat posed by yourself and others of your set. In order to do this, they are trying to understand the supernatural, to which end they have been conducting all sorts of horrendous experiments.”

Lord Maccon stopped nuzzling, lifted his head, and growled, “They are Templars?”

“Nothing so church-bound as that,” Miss Tarabotti said. “Purely scientific investigators, simply warped, so far as I can tell. And obsessed with octopuses.” She looked sad, knowing the answer before she asked the next question. “Do you think the Royal Society is involved?”

Lord Maccon shrugged.

Alexia could feel the movement all up and down her body, even through her layers of clothing.

“I rather believe they must be,” he said. “Though I suspect we would find that difficult to prove. There must have been others as well; the quality of the machinery and supplies alone would seem to indicate some considerable monetary investment on the part of several unknown benefactors. It is not entirely a surprise to us, you realize? After all, normal humans are right to suspect a supernatural agenda. We are basically immortal; our goals are likely to be a little different from those of ordinary people, sometimes even at odds. When all is said and done, daylight folk are still food.”

Alexia stopped petting him and narrowed her eyes in mock suspicion. “Am I allied with the wrong side in this little war?”

In reality, she did not have much doubt. After all, she had never heard cries of pain and torture coming from the BUR offices. Even Countess Nadasdy and her hive seemed more civilized than Mr. Siemons and his machines.

“That depends.” Lord Maccon lay passive in her arms. On full-moon night in human form, he was dependent upon her ability and her whim for his sanity. It did not sit well with an Alpha. All the choices were hers, including this one. “Have you decided which you prefer?”

“They did ask for my cooperation,” she informed him coyly. Miss Tarabotti was enjoying having the upper hand over Lord Maccon.

The earl looked worried. “And?”

Alexia had never even contemplated Mr. Siemons's offer as a real possibility. Yet Lord Maccon was looking at her as though she had actually had a choice. How could she explain to the earl that, quite apart from anything else—including their constant arguments—he had her complete loyalty? She could not—not without having to admit, to herself or him, why that might be the case.

“Let us simply say,” she said at last, “that I prefer your methods.”

Lord Maccon went perfectly still. A gleam entered his beautiful tawny eyes. “Is that so? Which ones?” Miss Tarabotti pinched him for such blatant innuendo. It did not matter where she pinched, as the earl was a bare canvas of pinchability.

“Ow!” said the Alpha, looking pained. “What was that for?”

“May I remind you we are in grave danger? I have managed to acquire for us, at most, an hour of grace time.”

“How on earth did you finagle that?” he asked, rubbing the place she had just pinched.

Alexia smiled. “Luckily, your files on me did not report everything. I simply told Mr. Siemons my preternatural powers took an hour to activate.”

“And they threw you into this cell with me anyway?” Lord Maccon was not pleased in the least by this bit of information.

“Did I not just say that I preferred your methods? Now you know why.” Alexia twitched uncomfortably. She was getting a cramp in one of her shoulders. Lord Maccon's torso was rather too large to have one's arms wrapped around for an extended period of time, especially when one was lying on a hard wooden floor. Not that she was about to complain, mind you.

Her evident discomfort made the earl ask, in all seriousness, “I did not hurt you, did I?”

Miss Tarabotti cocked her head to one side and raised an eyebrow at him. “I mean, when I attacked you just now, in wolf form? We werewolves do not remember much that happens during the full moon, you see. It is all embarrassingly instinctual,” he admitted.

Miss Tarabotti patted him reassuringly. “I think you realized, almost despite yourself, that it was me you nearly killed.”

“I smelled you,” he admitted gruffly. “It sparked off a whole different set of instincts. I do remember being very confused, but not much else.”

“What kind of different instincts?” Miss Tarabotti asked archly. She knew she was treading dangerous ground, but for some reason she could not resist encouraging him. She wanted to hear him say it. She wondered at what time she had become such a hardened flirt. Well, she reasoned, one must get something from one’s mother’s side of the family.

“Mmm. The reproductive variety.” The earl began to nibble her neck with wholly concentrated interest.

Miss Tarabotti's innards turned toward a feel of mashed potatoes. Fighting her own urge to nibble back, she pinched him again, harder this time.

“Ow! Stop that!” He left off nibbling and glared at her. It was a funny thing to see such an expression of wounded dignity on the face of such an enormous and highly dangerous man—even if he was naked.

Alexia said practically, “We have no time for such monkeyshines. We must determine a way out of this predicament. We have to rescue Lord Akeldama, and we absolutely must close this wretched club down. Your amorous intentions are not currently part of the agenda.”

“Is there a way they might become so, in the not-too-distant future?” Lord Maccon asked meekly, shifting against her in a manner that ensured she realized the nibbling had affected his outsides just as much as her insides. Alexia was partly shocked, partly intrigued by the idea that as he was naked, she might actually get to see what he looked like. She had seen sketches of the nude male, of course, for purely technical purposes. She was given to wonder if werewolves were anatomically bigger in certain areas. Of course, she was touching Lord Maccon, so such supernatural traits ought rightly to be canceled out, but in the interest of scientific curiosity, she shifted her lower body away from him a handbreadth and peeked downward. She was thwarted by the material of her own skirt wadded between them.

Taking her movement as withdrawal rather than curiosity, the earl pulled her back against him possessively. He slid one leg between her two, trying to shift multiple skirts and petticoats out of his way.

Miss Tarabotti sighed in long-suffering style.

He returned to nibbling and then nipping and kissing softly up and down the entire column of her throat. This was causing most distractingly invigorating frissons of sensation up and down her sides, over her ribs, and toward her nether regions. It was almost uncomfortable, as though her skin itched from underneath.

Also, due to his unclothed state. Alexia was learning ever more about the veracity of some of those sketches. Still, her father's books had not entirely done the situation justice. Lord Maccon slid one hand up into her hair.

So much for tying it back, thought Alexia as he loosed it from her hard-won ribbon. The earl tugged at the black tresses, pulling her head back so as to more fully expose her neck to his lips and teeth.

Miss Tarabotti decided that there was something excruciatingly erotic about being fully dressed with a large naked man pressed against her from breast to foot.

Since she had not been able to see for herself exactly what the earl's frontal area looked like, Alexia decided to try the next best thing and began to work her hand around to touch. She was not entirely sure this was the kind of action a young lady undertook in such situations, but then again, most young ladies did not get themselves into them to start with. In for a penny, in for a pound, she decided. Miss Tarabotti always was one to seize the moment. So she seized.

Lord Maccon, and the certain portion of his anatomy now firmly in her grasp, jerked violently.

Miss Tarabotti let go. “Oops,” she said. “Should I not have?” She trailed off, humiliated.

He hastened to reassure her. “Oh no, you most certainly should. It was simply unexpected.” He pressed up against her receptively.

Embarrassed but more curious than anything else, purely scientifically, mind you, Alexia continued her explorations, a little more tenderly this time. His skin in that area was very soft, and there was hair nested at the base. He produced the most delicious noises under her tentative touch. She became increasingly intrigued but was also getting more and more concerned with the logistics of any further proceedings.

“Um, Lord Maccon?” she said finally in a cautious whisper.

The earl laughed. “No choice at this point, Alexia; you simply must call me Conall.”

She swallowed. He could feel the movement under his lips.

“Conall, aren't we getting a tad carried away given the circumstances?”

The earl pulled her head back so he could look her directly in the eyes. “What are you blathering on about now, you impossible female?” His tawny eyes were glazed with passion, and he was breathing hard. Alexia was shocked to discover her own breathing was far from relaxed.

She scrunched up her forehead, trying to find the right words. “Well, should we not be abed for this kind of sport? Plus, they are scheduled to return at any moment.”

“They? Who?” He was clearly falling behind the conversation.

“The scientists.”

Lord Maccon gave a strangled laugh. “Aye, yes. And we wouldn't want them to learn too much about interspecies relations, now, would we?” He reached down with a free hand and pulled hers away from its questing.

Miss Tarabotti was faintly disappointed. Until he raised it to his lips and kissed it. “I do not mean to rush into these things. Alexia. You are inexplicably tempting.”

She nodded, bumping his head slightly. “The feeling is mutual, my lord. Not to mention unexpected.”

He seemed to take that as encouragement and rolled so that she was beneath him, and he loomed above her. He was now lying between her legs, component parts flush against hers.

Alexia squeaked at the sudden shift in positions. She was not certain whether she should be grateful or upset that women's fashion demanded so many copious layers of fabric, as this was now all that prevented more intimate contact and, she was pretty certain, sexual congress.

“Lord Maccon...,” she said in her best, most severe, spinster voice.

“Conall,” he interrupted. He leaned back, and his hands began journeying over her chest.

“Conall! Now is not the time!”

He ignored her and asked, “How do I undo this blasted dress?”

Alexia's ivory taffeta gown was held together by a row of tiny mother-of-pearl buttons up the length of its back. Although she did not answer him, the earl eventually discovered this fact and began undoing them with a rapidity that bespoke consummate skill in the art of undoing ladies' clothing. Miss Tarabotti would have been disgruntled, except that she figured it was best if one of them knew what they were on about in the matter of fornication. And she could hardly expect a gentleman of over two hundred years or so to have remained celibate.

In no time at all, he had dexterously undone enough of the buttons to pull down the neckline of her dress and expose the tops of her breasts where they rose above her corset. He bent and began kissing them, only to stop, rear back very suddenly, and say in a voice harsh with suppressed need, “What in tarnation is that?”

Alexia lifted herself onto her elbows and looked down, trying to see what it was that had stopped the annoying but unfortunately delightful ravishment of her personage. However, given the nature of her copious endowments in the bosom department, she could not make out what it was about her corset that had so taken his attention.

Lord Maccon picked up the shard of mirror wrapped in a handkerchief and showed it to her.

“Oh, I forgot about that. I pinched it from the dressing room when the scientists left me alone for a moment. Thought it might come in handy.”

Lord Maccon gave her a long, thoughtful, only mildly amorous look. “Very resourceful, my dear. It is at times like this when I really wish you could be on the BUR roster.”

She looked up into his face, embarrassed more by the compliment and the endearment than she had been by their previous physical proceedings. “So, what is the plan?”

“We are not going to develop a plan,” he growled, placing the mirror carefully down on the floor next to them, out of view of the doorway.

Alexia grinned at such foolish protectiveness. “Do not be ridiculous. You can hardly hope to accomplish anything more this night without my help. It is full moon, remember?”

Lord Maccon, who had, outrageously, forgotten the moon, had a momentary shock of terror that, in his absentmindedness, he might lose proximity with her. Alexia's preternatural abilities were the only thing currently keeping him sane. He quickly canvassed to make certain they were in firm physical contact. His body reminded him that, yes, firm was the operative word.

He tried to keep his head focused on their future non-amorous actions. “Well, in that case, you are to remain tangential as much as possible. None of those fire-eating antics you are so fond of. In order to get us out of here, I may have to use violence. In which case, you will need to hold on to me tightly and stay well out of the way. Do you ken?”

Alexia was going to get defensive and angry and explain quite severely that she was practical enough to avoid fisticuffs, especially when she had no brass parasol to protect herself with, but instead she said, “Did you just ask if I kenned?” She could not help grinning.

Lord Maccon looked ashamed of the verbal slip and muttered something about Scotland under his breath.

“You did! I was just kenned!” Miss Tarabotti's grin widened. She could not restrain herself; she did so like it when the earl's Highland lilt came out. It was currently her second favorite thing he did with his tongue. She leaned up on her elbows and kissed him softly on the cheek. Almost despite himself, Lord Maccon moved his own mouth toward her lips and turned it into a far deeper kiss.

When Alexia finally dropped back, they were both panting again.

“This has got to stop,” she insisted. “We are in danger, remember? You know, ruination and tragedy? Calamity just beyond that door.” She pointed behind him. “Any moment now, evil scientists may come charging in.”

“All the more reason to grasp the opportunity,” he insisted, leaning in and pressing his lower body against her.

Miss Tarabotti pressed against his torso defensively with both hands, trying to stop him from kissing her again. She cursed fate that had set life up so that when she finally did get to touch Lord Maccon's bare chest, there was no time to appreciate it.

He nibbled her earlobe. “Just think of this as a sort of wedding-night prelude.”

Alexia was not certain which part of that particular statement gave the most offense—the fact that he assumed there would be a wedding night or the fact that he assumed it would take place on the hard floor of a barren room.

“Really, Lord Maccon!” she said, pushing harder.

“Oh dear, back to that, are we?”

“Where do you keep getting this idea that we should marry?”

Lord Maccon rolled his tawny eyes and gestured expressively to his naked flesh. “I assure you, Miss Tarabotti, I do not do these kinds of things with a woman of your caliber without contemplating marriage in the very near future. I may be a werewolf and Scottish, but despite what you may have read about both, we are not cads!”

“I do not want to force you into anything,” Alexia insisted.

Keeping hold of her with one hand, the Alpha rolled off her prone body and sat back. Although he kept in contact to keep himself from changing, most of him was now separated from Alexia.

Miss Tarabotti's eyes, having entirely adjusted to the dim interior of the room, received a full-frontal view. Those sketches in her papa's books had been far more restrained than she realized.

“Really, we must discuss this silly notion of yours,” he said with a sigh.

“What?” she croaked, goggling at him.

“That you will not marry me.”

“Must we discuss it here and now?” she said, not realizing what she was saying. “And why is it silly?”

“Well, at least we have some privacy.” He shrugged. The movement shifted all the muscles of his chest and stomach.

“Uh... uh....” stuttered Miss Tarabotti, “couldn't it wait until I am home and you are, uh, clothed?”

Lord Maccon realized he had the advantage over Alexia; he was not about to sacrifice it. “Why, you think your family will allow us some privacy? My pack certainly will not. They have been eager to meet you ever since I came home covered in your scent. Not to mention Lyall and his gossiping.”

“Professor Lyall gossips?” Alexia tore her eyes away from his body to look up into his face.

“Like an old churchyard biddy.”

“And what exactly has he told them?”

“That the pack is getting an Alpha female. I am not giving up, you realize?” He said it with deadly calm.

“But I thought it was my move? Isn't that the way this works?” Miss Tarabotti was confused.

Lord Maccon's grin was all wolf. “Up to a certain point. Let us simply say you have made your preferences known.”

“I thought you found me utterly impossible.”

He grinned cheerfully. “Most assuredly.”

Alexia's stomach flipped over, and she was seized with the sudden impulse to tackle him and rub up against him. Lord Maccon naked was one thing; naked and smiling that gently crooked smile of his— devastating.

“I thought I was too bossy,” she said.

“And I shall provide you with an entire pack to boss around. They could use the discipline. I have been getting lax in my old age.”

Miss Tarabotti highly doubted that. “I thought you found my family impossible.”

“I shall not be marrying them,” he began, inching back in toward her, sensing a weakness in her resolve.

Miss Tarabotti was not certain his return was a good thing. True, that most disturbing view was blurring as he moved toward her, but he had that look on his face that said the kissing would start up again presently. She wondered exactly how she had managed to get herself into such an untenable position.

“But I am tall, and brown, and have a large nose, and large everything else.” She gestured ineffectually at her hips and chest.

“Mmm,” said the earl, agreeing with her entirely, “you most certainly do.” He found it interesting she did not mention those things that had worried him from the start: his age (advanced) and her state (preternatural). But he was not about to assist in her protestations by giving her more ammunition in objecting to his suit. They could talk about his own concerns later—preferably after they were married; that is, he grimaced mentally, if they managed to survive their current predicament and make it to the altar.

Finally, Alexia came round and about to the thing that really troubled her. She looked down at her free hand as though finding its palm fascinating. “You do not love me.”

“Ah,” said the Alpha, looking pleased at this, “says who? You never asked me. Should it not be my opinion you take into account?”

“Well,” sputtered Miss Tarabotti, at a loss for words. “Well, I never.”

“So?” He raised an eyebrow.

Alexia bit her lip, white teeth gnawing at the full swollen flesh. Finally, she lifted trembling lashes and cast a very worried glance up at him, now too close to her once more.

Naturally, because fortune is a fickle beast, it was precisely at that moment that the door to their cell opened.

Standing in the doorway was a backlit figure, clapping slowly but with evident approval.