him out of his musings. “I’ve got to hand it to you.” Khan, the band’s lead singer, gestured around the room, encompassing the group of designer-clad guests. “You sure know how to throw a dull party.”
Ged laughed. “Tonight is about money and influence, not about getting wasted and behaving outrageously. Make sure Torque knows that before he sets fire to the drapes, will you?”
“I guess that means swinging from the chandeliers is forbidden?” Khan was a weretiger. Intuition wasn’t his strong point, but the two men had been friends for a long time. His eyes scanned Ged’s face for a moment. “Everything okay with you?”
How the hell was he supposed to answer that question? If he told Khan the truth, his exuberant friend was likely to insist they set off right now on a quest to find the mystery woman. Because he was blissfully happy in his own marriage, Khan would seek the same thing for Ged.
Ged didn’t want to be forced to make excuses or lie. He knew his friends sometimes speculated about his true identity. He was the man who had rescued them all from danger or captivity, the person who had brought this unique group together. They owed him an allegiance that went beyond loyalty, but he had never disclosed the details of his background to them. How could he? Sharing the details of his past would be on the same level of madness as trying to find himself a mate.
“I’m fine.” He tilted his empty champagne glass toward Khan. “Do you think there’s any chance we might find some brandy in this place?”
* * *
To Lidi’s surprise, the crowd began to disperse as soon as the band was inside the theater. She turned to her companion, whose name was Allie. “Shouldn’t we wait for them to come out again?”
Allie gave her a pitying look. “Rookie mistake. They’ve played nice and given the paparazzi what they wanted. It’s possible they’ll come out this way and sign a few autographs, but it’s more likely they’ll leave by a rear door and go straight to the after-party.”
Lidi experienced a moment of panic. She couldn’t have come this far only to fail now. Clearly she needed to stick with Allie, who was suitably dressed for the weather with an embroidered scarf wrapped around her neck and long boots encasing her legs. The other woman seemed to know what she was doing and was willing to share her information.
“What do we do now?”
“The party is being held at the Palais Hôtel, where the band are staying—”
Lidi brightened up. This was more like it. “How do we get inside?”
“We don’t.” Don’t? Clearly Allie didn’t know who she was talking to. Telling Lidi what she couldn’t do was an instant challenge. “Oh, don’t get me wrong, some of these women will try it, but it’s a waste of time. Security will have them out of there so fast their feet won’t hit the ground. That’s if the hotel management don’t call the police and let them spend a night in the cells for trespassing.”
Lidi allowed herself to be led along the street with the rest of the crowd. She took a moment to appreciate Allie’s unusual looks. Lidi came from a land where most people had the classic brown hair and golden eyes of the Callistoyan werebear, a close relative of the Siberian brown bear. With her silver-blond hair, pale skin and light gray eyes, Allie was striking.
“So what are we doing exactly? Trying to get another glimpse of them?” Lidi hadn’t risked life and limb and traveled all this way just to look at Gerald Tavisha.
Allie gave her a sidelong glance. “What else were you hoping for? Did you think one of the guys was going to look your way and fall instantly in love?”
There didn’t seem to be an answer to that. Because although it wasn’t what she had expected to happen, the insta-love that Allie was joking about was exactly what had happened. However, maybe now she had been removed from the center of the furnace, love was too strong. She couldn’t seriously have fallen in love with a man she hadn’t even spoken to. Desire was probably a more apt description for what she was feeling. Good, old-fashioned lust.
The initial wild exhilaration had subsided. Thank heaven. There was no way she could have endured that level of panting eagerness for long. Even so, her whole body was quivering. It was like the aftermath of her most strenuous workout, with an additional heat zinging through her bloodstream. Every impulse was urging her to return to that theater and find her mate.
Lidi knew what arousal felt like. She was an adult shifter with a full range of both human and bear emotions. Although human and shifter time worked differently, thirteen years ago, her country had been thrown into unimaginable turmoil and she had sworn to devote her life to fighting to restore its equilibrium. Unusually for a bear shifter, Lidi’s human emotions were dominant. It was an inconvenience she had sworn to overcome. She was a warrior with no time to waste on feelings.
That was what made her reaction to Ged so difficult to understand. He was the man she had come to find. She needed him. As she accompanied Allie along the seafront promenade, Lidi bit back a laugh. Oh, yes. She needed him; that had become glaringly obvious. She only had to think about the instant connection between them to experience a thigh-clenching response.
She had to overcome these troublesome cravings and focus on the true reason she was here. Lidi always battled to maintain command over her feelings as well as her muscles. All those years of directing her energy into maintaining a mind and body that were at peak fitness had to be put to good use now. For some reason, her reaction to the man at the theater had been extreme. Maybe it was the stories she had heard about his bravery. Possibly it was the fact that he was the true ruler of her beleaguered nation. A legendary hero and a man of mystery.
Lidi had spent years training her body. It was hard, strong and fast, and it served her well. As for her emotions...well, she was having to work a little harder than usual to get them under control. It was an obstacle she hadn’t anticipated, but she had never backed down from a fight. She wasn’t about to start now.
They reached the Palais Hôtel, a dazzling white structure that faced the glittering waters of the Mediterranean. The imposing building consisted of a central block with two attached wings forming a U shape. Pretty wrought iron balconies were decorated with blue-and-white-striped parasols and lipstick-red geraniums.
As they were ushered behind yet more barriers, Lidi surveyed the hotel thoughtfully.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Allie sighed. “One night in a top-floor suite costs more than I earn in a year.”
“Is that where the band will stay?” Lidi shielded her eyes against the sun with one hand, viewing the rooms directly beneath the terracotta roof tiles.
“They always have the best rooms, and in this hotel, that means the fifth floor.” Allie regarded her warily. “Don’t even think about trying to get in there.” There it was again. That word. Don’t. “The place is wall-to-wall celebrities this weekend. You won’t get a foot inside the gardens before you’re noticed. And while Beast’s security team are okay, you don’t want to take your chances with some of the others. Vicious thugs all of them.”
Allie’s words might almost have been issued as a dare to Lidi, who was focused on the edifice across the promenade and in particular on those balconies.
Many people believed that bears couldn’t climb. Some people had died while clinging to that hope. Lidi, growing up in the shadow of the Callistoya mountains, had spent her childhood scrambling
