Forever Claimed

Luc, staring at the two women, sighed. “C’est la guerre.”

Chloe sat working at her desk. Luc appeared lost in somber thought. Dani was left to dart looks at them between staring down at her hands, which clenched and unclenched as emotions roiled through her like racing white water.

The vampires were going to war. For her kind that ought to be cause for jubilation, except she knew who would get caught in the middle: humans. While she was not fully human herself, she was human enough. She had lived among humans long enough to be horrified at that and ashamed that her own pack would probably stand aside and let it happen.

Lycanthropes didn’t involve themselves in the affairs of humans or nonhumans if they could avoid it. They preferred a solitary existence among their own kind, to live free and to be safe. Their lives were, for the most part, contented if not always happy. Their own little world.

But tonight had altered her view. Just a little. It didn’t feel like an earthquake yet, but some inner voice warned her that it could become one.

She looked up again and found Chloe studying her.

Chloe spoke. “So you’re a werewolf?”

“Not really.” Her shame, her sorrow, but true.

“You can’t shape-shift?”

“No.”

Chloe shook her head. “Well, I’m glad you can’t. But you probably aren’t.”

“I hate it.”

“I guess I would, too, if I were you. But you weren’t exiled?”

“No.” Dani didn’t want to talk about it. Didn’t want to touch on the grief and longing that had made her leave of her own accord to try to live life as a normal. She ached to run with her pack, yet she couldn’t. She couldn’t live with the daily reminder that she was different, or with the feeling that she was a burden and not an equal. No one had encouraged her to leave, not a single one. She simply couldn’t take being the only normal in the pack.

Much as she disliked Luc, she couldn’t deny she was exactly what he had called her: a broken wolf.

She sighed and looked at the clock, counting the hours until dawn. Since it was winter, dawn remained far away.

“So you live here now?” Chloe asked. “What do you do?”

“I work in university administration and take classes when I can.”

“What kind of classes?”

Considering the horror Chloe had initially expressed over Dani’s lycanthropy, her questions now seemed surprisingly friendly. “Whatever I need. I’m just starting, but I think I’d like to be a nurse.”

Luc made a sound and she reluctantly looked at him.

“Another altruist.”

“What’s wrong with that?” she demanded.

“I don’t recall saying anything was wrong with it,” he retorted. “Your tone.”

“A thousand pardons, ma chère dame.”

“Don’t mind him,” Chloe said. “He’s always a pain. Between being a former French aristocrat and losing his mate last year, he’s a little insane. We make excuses for him.”

Luc barely blinked, but to Dani he seemed to tense. Dani didn’t think poking a vampire was exactly smart, but Chloe apparently thought she was perfectly safe.

More food for thought, thoughts that crashed hard against her belief that all vampires were bloodsucking monsters.

“What were you, Luc?” Chloe asked. “A duke or something?”

Luc waved a hand and for a few seconds it appeared he wouldn’t answer. “You are full of questions, Chloe.”

“I’m curious, since I’m stuck with you.”

“I was the Marquis de St. Just.”

“A real honest-to-gosh marquis.” Chloe’s voice dripped sarcasm. “I’m impressed.”

“Don’t be, ma petite. All it brought me was a dank prison cell and the promise of a ride on the tumbrel to the guillotine.”

Astonishment filled Dani. He was that old? But Chloe had a different reaction, and dropped her sarcasm entirely.

“Is that why you became a vampire?”

“It was the only way to survive. Enough. I don’t care to discuss my past, s’il vous plaît.”

Chloe put her chin in her hand. “It’s going to be a long night if both of you keep imitating clams.”

Surprisingly, Dani felt a little bubble of laughter rising. She tried to quell it but failed, and a giggle escaped her. A reaction to all the stress of the night, she thought, but Chloe was certainly a piece of work.

Chloe grinned at her. “Neither of you exactly looks like a clam.” She paused. “Here’s the thing. I know something about vampires, having worked for Jude for years. But I really don’t know anything about werewolves, and I’m curious. As for you, Luc, a little illumination would go a long way. You owe me for having kidnapped me.”

“As I recall, that was one of my stupider moments and you made me regret my idiocy almost from the first second.”

“He kidnapped you,” Dani said, aghast.

“For all of ten minutes,” Chloe admitted. “He needed an entrée with a friend of Jude’s and he’d already ticked the guy off. So I was his key.” She shrugged. “I was mad at the time because once he carried me off to Creed’s, I didn’t have my car. I had to wait hours to catch the bus.”

Dani listened in astonishment. What upset Chloe was waiting to take the bus? Not being kidnapped?

“Of course, I didn’t like being kidnapped for general reasons. Like not having a say about where I was going or when.” She frowned at Luc.

“I apologized. Would you like another one?”

Chloe waved her hand. “I doubt it would be sincere now.” She sighed, then looked at the clock herself. “Just tell me, St. Just. How bad could it get?”

“You saw the condition Dani was in. Multiply that by dozens a night. All of it to force a confrontation with Jude. They plan a reign of terror, because that is what they will enjoy. Jude is just an excuse for it.”

Chloe’s frown looked frightened. “Will others come to help him?”

“I don’t know. Creed perhaps.”

“But he can’t stand against a whole bunch of vampires. Not alone.”

“I did not say he would be alone. But how many come to help and when, I cannot say. The minute these vampires begin their spree, this city will become unsafe for both our kinds. Some may choose to wait for another time and place to rid us of these rogues. I simply don’t know.”

“Couldn’t Jude just leave? Why don’t they just come here and confront him?”

“I told you, they want their amusement. And they know Jude well enough. He won’t leave because he won’t want a single human to suffer because of him. If he turned his back on this city, they might still do as they plan, and possibly more of it. This is a start, Chloe. These rogues want to satisfy their lusts unfettered. So far they have never gotten together in a large group, and thus we have been able to control them. It was always one or two at a time, and if they would not agree to follow the rule, then we would get rid of them.”

He closed his eyes a moment. “There are places where they rule. Few and far between, but not places I would choose to dwell. Not all the monster stories you hear are folklore and legend.”

“I kind of figured that out when I met you.”

Luc didn’t respond to the insult. “You see,” he said quietly, “as technology and communications improve, they must hide farther and farther away, going to places where the people are regarded as so primitive that no one believes the stories. Places where deaths and maulings can be blamed on other animals. But now they want a modern city.”

“They won’t succeed.”

His eyes snapped open. “Tell me, Chloe, how the news will report tonight’s murders tomorrow night. They will at first assume there is a madman. As the killings mount, they will consider a gang of some sort. How long do you think it will be before any humans start speaking openly of vampires? But Jude will know. And Jude will try to stop them. That’s what they want. And once they’ve removed Jude, they can hold the city in thrall with terror and take their victims by will. Because so few of you can resist our enticements. You are drawn to us, you obey us, you want us.”

Chloe looked glum. Dani felt again that icy trickle along her spine. The image he painted revolted and terrified her.

“Merde!” He rose to his feet and started pacing, moving so quickly he was almost impossible to see.

“Quit it,” Chloe said. “You’re making me dizzy.”

“Then close your eyes.” But he slowed down.

“What about you?” Chloe asked. “Are you going to help Jude?”

“Right now I am finding it difficult to be in this room. I am the fox guarding the henhouse.”

Dani drew her legs beneath her, ready to leap from the couch. “Can you control yourself, fox?”

Swiftly he crossed to her and bent over her. He closed his golden eyes and drew a deep breath. She knew he was smelling her. Helplessly, she shrank back.

“You smell like a banquet,” he said. “You arouse my hunger, even though I’m not hungry. Take heed.”

Then, before she knew he had moved, he was back in his chair. “Yes,” he said flatly, “I can control myself. But it does not make me less dangerous.”

That was a mixed-up statement, she thought as she started breathing again. He could control himself but he was still dangerous?

She fell silent, thinking that never before had she felt so caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.

Chapter 3

Luc St. Just had grown used to loathing himself. He’d certainly done enough of it since Natasha’s passing. But now he almost revolted himself because the little wolf not only roused his hunger, but she awoke his sexual desires, as well.

He didn’t want to desire anyone ever again. And he certainly didn’t want to desire a mutant lycanthrope. While he said he didn’t care one way or another about them, the truth was the whole notion of shape-shifting disturbed him. He might be an abomination but at least he was the same thing all the time. Besides, whatever form they took, they were still dogs. Something atavistic in him rebelled at being attracted to one.

Trouble was, she smelled human. She did smell like a banquet to him, a banquet he too often denied himself since Natasha because he had refused to become intimate with anyone ever again.

But this woman had awakened nearly somnolent urges in him. He couldn’t quite ignore the way his pulse accelerated, the way she called to his hunger, the way she made him want to act like one of those rogues out there.

Well, not like one of them, certainly. No, he would woo and seduce her, and teach her delights unlike any she had ever imagined.

And her eyes … Those blue-gray eyes of hers were hypnotic. He wanted to keep looking into them, yet feared their call.

It would be so easy to give in. All that held him back was Chloe’s presence and Jude’s admonition. Otherwise he would reach for her, touch her, taste her, and by the time he was done, she would no longer think vampires were monsters. Oh, no.

He caught himself, reminding himself of his promises not to get involved again, however briefly. Then it struck him that the way she called to him gave her more power than it gave him.

The irony was not lost on him.

But it also gave him a jolt. Not once in over two hundred years had he ever considered that his desires could enslave him. Yet here he was, with a powerful thirst for a female, one that was in danger of overcoming his sense.

The hunger was part of him, deep, persuasive, pervasive, unlike any hunger or want he had known as a human. During the Reign of Terror, when he had been changed, he had been like most new vampires: famished and out of control. Only, in his case, surrounded by so much bloodshed, no one had tried to stop him.

But eventually calm had returned to the world, and with it a need for caution. One night he had arisen from the sleep of death to realize that if he didn’t want to be forever on the move every few days or weeks, he needed to find a better way.

As a result he had lived successfully in Paris for at least half his life, alternating every decade or so with some other city.

But now he realized something else. Jude’s determination to enforce the rule had another purpose than protecting vampires from discovery or humans from predation. It also ensured that a vampire was not a slave to his innate needs.

That modicum of self-restraint was all that separated a vampire from becoming a true monster. It provided their only claim to being truly civilized.

Luc had always held himself to be utterly civilized. It disturbed him to think he might not be even yet.

He forced himself to look at Dani while quashing his own urges. What he saw was a frightened young woman who had been through hell tonight. Considering the attack she had suffered, it was amazing she wasn’t falling to pieces.

But then the hunger rose again and he had to look away. Chloe, surprisingly, didn’t tempt him at all.

What was going on? In the past all humans had struck him as equally edible. It was, after all, only their blood he wanted, and very little of it, actually. Some were certainly more attractive than others and made better playmates, but this response was different.

He didn’t like it.

He desperately wanted to walk away now, to escape from the enticing scent that filled this room, but he couldn’t. Jude’s office provided a likely target if the rogues decided on a frontal assault.

Some remnant of honor and integrity held him rooted.

Just then, reaction hit Dani. The air was suddenly tinged with terror—another enticing scent to his kind—and he looked at her. She had begun to shake, and her eyes were almost wild.

“Chloe,” he said. “Get a blanket or something. She’s feeling the shock.”

Chloe leaped up and headed to a small room. When she opened the door he could see a bed and some other creature comforts. She returned swiftly with a thick down-filled duvet and draped it over Dani.

“You’re safe now,” Chloe murmured. “It’s all over.”

Perhaps, but she hadn’t processed it yet. Luc watched as her head swiveled, then shook back and forth as if she were denying something.

“I can’t … I can’t breathe.”

“Yes, you can,” Luc said. “Force yourself. Deep, slow breaths.”

Dani tried, and after a few minutes her breathing achieved a more normal pattern. Then tears rolled down her cheeks.

“Do you know what they did to me?” she said. “Do you have any idea what it was like to be attacked that way? There were four of them. Four. I couldn’t fight them off. Why would they do that to anyone?”

“Because they’re sick and twisted,” Chloe answered sharply. “Reason enough. At least you survived. An ordinary human would have died.”

Dani didn’t seem to hear. “They were so strong. How could anything be that strong? They didn’t need four of them. One could have done it. But they all took part and laughed.”

Luc swore and sprang to his feet. He began to pace at a furious speed, not caring if he made Chloe dizzy, or if they couldn’t see him at all. He tried to exist above it all, but the simple fact was sometimes his own kind sickened him. Some vestige of his human existence, he supposed.

Regardless, right now he wanted to rip the heads off a few vampires.

He stopped pacing and looked at her. “Did you hear any names? See anything that would help me identify them?”

“I don’t think so. Why?”

“Because I’d like to visit the wrath of hell on them.”

Her eyes widened again, and he could see she didn’t doubt him one bit.

“There are four of them,” she whispered.

“Three now, remember. I executed one of them when he came back for you, and frankly, I would like to do the same to all the rest. If you remember anything, tell me.” It was not a request.

She gave a tiny nod. He could see the shock on her face, her difficulty in believing he had killed one of his own kind to protect her. Of course she would find that hard to believe.

“I saw what they did to you,” he said. “I saw it when I found you. I know what they are and they deserve punishment. I’d have hunted them then, but I couldn’t leave you. So I will hunt them tomorrow night. Or the next night. But I will hunt them and find them.”

A little shudder passed through her.

“That’s what they intend for others in this city,” Luc went on. “It cannot be allowed.”

“My, my,” said Chloe. “Luc the Avenger. Who would have thought?”

“You don’t know me,” he said shortly.

He wasn’t sure he knew himself anymore. Since Natasha’s death he had changed, and now it was as if a veil lifted and he truly saw what he had become. Jude was right: he was wallowing.

How revolting.

He sank back into the chair, although he felt like going out to run as fast as the wind, climb walls and execute vampires. He could barely restrain himself.

But restraint was essential, he reminded himself. Restraint because he had to guard these women, restraint because if he let his self-control crack even one bit he might do exactly the wrong thing, like pounce on Dani.

God, why did she call to him so?

Chloe sat beside her, rubbing her shoulder, passing her tissues, occasionally hugging her while she cried.

There was a time he would have done that, but not since his change. Now it was too dangerous.

Just what the devil had he become in order to save himself from the guillotine?

Dani calmed down eventually. Crying had exhausted her. But the earthquake she had sensed in the offing had arrived.

She was afraid. How could she look at a vampire as a savior? But she did, and it filled her with fear.

She’d never been afraid like this in her life. Her pack had always protected her. Now she was alone—like most humans, she admitted—and she had fears such as she had never known before. Fear of the night. Fear of being attacked. Fear that her life could be ripped from her by these rogues gearing up for war.

War against a single vampire. Four of them had attacked her, and however strong vampires might be, she was quite certain that one couldn’t stand against three or possibly more. Maybe Luc would help them, but even then the odds didn’t look good.

She reminded herself that she wasn’t really involved. She’d just been in the wrong place at the wrong time. It might have happened to anyone who had been in the park at that time. Apparently from the way Terri had hurried out, it may have happened to any number of others already.

But the earth-shattering thing was that it had happened to her. What’s more, now that she understood what was going on, she knew that it could happen again.

Maybe she should catch the first morning bus home and just get out of here. Go back to the safety of the pack.

But then another thought occurred to her. Would her pack even be safe if the rogue vampires took over? It didn’t look like an immediate threat, but somewhere in the future it could become one. Because despite Luc’s announced indifference to her kind, she knew all vampires didn’t feel the same.

Her kind? Oh, God, she wasn’t her pack’s kind. That much was obvious. She belonged nowhere at all.

Finally she looked at Chloe and admitted the most obvious thing. “I’m afraid to go home now.”

“You’re safe in the daylight.”

“I know. But what about when it becomes dark again?”

Chloe said nothing.

“Here is not a safe place,” Luc said heavily. “As well guarded as Jude keeps it, it’s not totally impermeable to vampires. Little is.”

“The protection was mainly designed to keep humans out while he sleeps,” Chloe said.

“Exactly.”

Chloe looked at Dani. “What are we going to do for you?”

“Most especially if they somehow find out that she survived the attack.”

Dani’s mouth dried. Her palms grew damp and she wiped them on the too-tight borrowed jeans. “How would they learn that?”

Luc shrugged. “Perhaps they will find the one I killed before dawn removes his carcass. Perhaps because your body is gone? Because you are not listed among the victims of tonight’s mayhem in tomorrow night’s news?”

“Why would they care?”

“The entire point of this little war they want to start is that none of them likes to be thwarted.”

Dani’s heart skipped at least two beats, then settled into an edgy rhythm. From the way Luc’s eyes narrowed, she suspected he could hear it. Hell, he could probably smell the fear clinging to her. She would have been able to had it not been her own.

“You’re getting a lot of shocks tonight, aren’t you?” Chloe said. “First the attack, then being rescued by a vampire and learning that not all of them are vicious killers. Well, it would set anyone back on their heels. And I’m afraid, too, though not as afraid as you because I haven’t been attacked.”

“We need to find a safe place for her,” Luc said. “Daylight hours take care of themselves, but then there’s the rest of the time.”

“I often leave work after dark,” Dani said. Because it was winter, she now left her office at dusk or later. Even thinking about stepping out into the night made her mouth go dry now.

“Then we have to find a way to protect you”.

“We?” Chloe said. “When did you become we?”

“I think I have joined the fight.”

“Oh, great. Can you promise not to go haywire again?”

“Most certainly.” His eyes narrowed and a faint smile came to his mouth. And all of a sudden he appeared more attractive than Dani would have believed possible. His blond hair gleamed, his face relaxed, and she wished he were not a vampire. “I think,” he said, “that I have found reason to live again.”

“Great,” Chloe said. “I’m sure the world will rejoice. And I just love those odds. Two vampires against a horde.”

Dani giggled again, maybe because she was nervous. “It does sound like the Alamo.”

“Perhaps,” Luc agreed. “But sometimes we have no choice. They will be maddened by their blood lust. So, it seems, we will be smarter, yes?” His gaze settled on Dani. “But first we must protect our little wolf.”

“Please don’t call me that.”

Luc’s brow lifted. “Why not?”

“Because I’m not … because I can’t …” She looked down and covered her face with a corner of the comforter.

“Je suis désolé,” Luc said, actually sounding sincere. “I’m sorry. I did not know I touched on a nerve.”

Chloe spoke. “So you didn’t leave entirely of your own volition?”

Dani’s head shot up and she looked at Chloe. “I did. It was my choice. I didn’t fit and I couldn’t stand it anymore.”

“I know that feeling well,” Luc said quietly.

“All too well.”

Dani searched his face and for the first time in her life it occurred to her that bloodsuckers might have real feelings beyond satisfying their blood lusts. That they might actually think and feel like the humans they had once been. Some of them, anyway.

She told herself she didn’t want his sympathy, certainly not the sympathy of one of his kind. Yet her throat tightened, anyway. She had no one anymore, no one. She had left her family behind and had barely started to make friends. Certainly not friends with whom she could trust her true story. So she skimmed the surface, pretending to be just like everyone else when she was not.

Now her story had come out in the unlikeliest company possible, and she found sympathy in the gaze of one her pack would call their mortal enemy.

How was she supposed to deal with this?

From earliest childhood she had been taught to use her nose above every other sense. She had been trained to identify things as good or bad by those scents, and the scent of vampire had been drilled into her as a threat. Even a whiff of it could cause her to shudder.

Tonight she had been attacked by bloodsuckers, their stench overpowering. Because she could not change, she hadn’t been able to outrun them or fight them off.

But now she had to deal with the fact that one of that kind had saved her, and another was keeping her safe in his office … and the smell was all around her, and it was not bad.