Change, Gilly? What was it like?”
“Wonderful,” she lied, remembering how Papa had destroyed her brief pleasure with his casual dismissal.
Hugh shuffled his feet. “Now that you’re grown up, you won’t play with me anymore.”
“Nonsense.” She slid off the bed and wrapped her arms around Hugh’s thin shoulders. “I’ll still be close by. Nothing will really be different.”
Hugh allowed her to hold him for a few seconds and then stiffened to indicate that he’d had enough coddling. He’s growing up, too, Gillian thought. But it would be easier for him when it was his time. He’d always been Papa’s favorite. That was a fact Gillian had accepted long ago.
Just as she had accepted that he must never know how badly their father made her feel.
She pushed Hugh’s brown hair away from his forehead. “It’s almost time for lessons,” she said. “Would you like to go outside and throw the ball for a little while?”
Hugh’s grin was answer enough. He ran to fetch the ball and raced ahead of her down the stairs, his small feet thudding loudly in the stillness. Papa might take him to task for his noise—if Papa were paying any attention. If Sir Averil Maitland was involved in his “business,” nothing else would matter.
Gillian descended the stairs and joined Hugh on the lawn, catching the ball and throwing it back with just enough force to satisfy a rapidly growing boy. She’d almost forgotten that she was to meet Ethan by the beck this evening after supper, when Papa was in the library with his books. Ethan was human; there were a lot of things he couldn’t understand. But she’d told him about loups-garous years ago, and he wasn’t afraid. He would listen patiently, the way he always did, and in the end she would feel just a little bit better.
Mrs. Beattie rang the nursery bell, and Hugh heaved a great sigh. It was time for lessons, and there would be no more play for the rest of the day. Nothing had really changed. Except that now Papa would begin thinking about a suitable mate for Gillian, a man of pure werewolf blood who would be the father of her pure werewolf children.
Gillian looked one last time toward the woods and reminded herself all over again that there was no such thing as freedom.
CHAPTER ONE
New York City, July, 1927
ROSS KAVANAGH contemplated the half-empty bottle of whiskey and wondered how much more it would take to get him stinking drunk.
It wasn’t the first time, and it wouldn’t be the last. He’d never been a drinker before they threw him off the force. There hadn’t seemed to be much point; even a man only one-quarter werewolf had a hard time becoming inebriated. And he’d been content with the world.
Content. Until everything had been taken away from him, he hadn’t really thought about what the word meant. He’d given up on anything beyond that a long time ago. It was enough to have the work, the company of the guys in the homicide squad, the knowledge that he’d kept a few criminals off the streets for one more day.
Now that was gone. And it wasn’t coming back.
He lifted the bottle and took another swig. The whiskey was bitter on his tongue. He finished the rest of the bottle without taking a breath and set it with exaggerated care down on the scarred coffee table.
Maybe he should put on a clean shirt and find himself another couple of bottles. Ed Bower kept every kind of liquor hidden behind his counter, available for anyone who knew what to ask for. Sure, Ed Bower was breaking the law. But what did the law matter now?
What did anything matter?
Ross scraped his hand across his unshaven face and got up from the sofa. He walked all too steadily into the bathroom and stared into the spotted mirror. His face looked ten years older than it had two weeks ago. Deep hollows crouched beneath his eyes, and his hair had gone gray at the temples. He wondered if Ma and Pa would even recognize him if he went home to Arizona.
But he wasn’t going home. That would mean he was licked, and he wasn’t that far gone.
Maybe tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow he would sober up and start looking for the guy who’d made a mockery of his life. The bum who had gotten away with murder.
Ross sagged over the sink, studying the brown stains in the cracked bowl. Clean up. Get dressed. Think about living again, even though no cop in the city would give him the time of day and the mobsters he’d fought for twelve years would laugh in his face.
Someone knocked on the door, pulling Ross out of his dark thoughts. Who the hell can that be? he thought. It wasn’t like he had a lot of civilian friends. As far as he knew, Griffin and Allie were still in Europe. They were the only ones he could imagine showing up at his apartment in the middle of the day.
Maybe it’s the chief coming to give me my job back. Maybe they found the guy.
He laughed at his own delusions. The person at the door knocked again. Kavanagh swallowed a stubborn surge of hope, threw on his shirt and went to the door.
The man on the landing was a stranger, his precisely cut suit perfectly pressed and his shoes polished to a high sheen. His face was chiseled and handsome; his hands were manicured and free of calluses. Ross sized him up in a second.
Money, Ross thought. Education. Maybe one of Griffin’s friends, though there was something about the guy’s face that set off alarm bells in Ross’s mind.
“Mr. Kavanagh?” the man said in a very proper upper-class English accent.
Ross met the man’s cool gaze. “That’s me,” he said.
“My name is Ethan Warbrick.” He didn’t offer his hand but looked over Ross’s shoulder as if he expected to be invited in. “I have a matter of some importance to discuss with you, Mr. Kavanagh.”
“What is it?”
“Something I would prefer not to discuss in the doorway.”
Ross stepped back, letting Warbrick into the apartment. The Englishman glanced around, his upper lip twitching. Ross didn’t offer him a seat.
“Okay,” Ross said, leaning casually against the nearest wall as if he didn’t give a damn. “What’s this about?”
Warbrick gave the room another once-over and seemed to decide he would rather continue standing. “I will come right to the point, Mr. Kavanagh. I’ve come to see you on behalf of a certain party in England with whom you were briefly acquainted during the War. She has asked me to locate you and warn you about a visit you may presently be receiving.”
The Englishman’s statement took a moment to penetrate, but when it did, Ross couldn’t believe it meant what he thought it did.
She. England. The War. Put those words together and they meant only one thing: Gillian Maitland. The girl he’d believed himself in love with twelve years ago. The one who’d left him standing on a London kerb feeling as if somebody had shot him through the heart.
“Sorry,” Ross said, returning to the door. “Not interested.”
