flattened with anger. The next words came out hot and fast. “Silver bullets? Yeah. Thirty-eight hollow point ammo and hunting dogs. Way to make a guy feel special. I was lucky it wasn’t a direct hit.”
“What are you saying?” she asked in a small voice.
“I’ve been patrolling the grounds every night after dark. They knew I was coming. I ran to the one place I could think of where they would have to stop shooting.”
“Inside the palace.” She realized they were talking as if years hadn’t passed since their last conversation.
“Leaping through the window was not my best move, but I’d tried everything else and I’d been hit.” He ran a hand through his fair hair. “I appreciate that you stood up for me.”
“No problem.” She wasn’t sure what she expected, but appreciate felt lukewarm. Then again, she was talking to a werewolf ex-boyfriend who’d never been a stickler for etiquette. “Do you know what’s going on?”
“No.” His voice held a ring of bitter truth. “But it’s nasty.”
He touched his ribs, probing gently. His breath hissed inward, surprising her. Faran rarely showed pain or any kind of vulnerability, so it must have really hurt. Her hand rose, automatically reaching out to comfort him, but she dropped it before he noticed.
“I thought you healed when you changed form,” said Lexie.
“Wounds from silver are different.”
“Do you need a doctor?”
He gave her a narrow look, his expression changing as if he suddenly remembered how everything had ended between them. “In a human hospital? That would go well, don’t you think?”
She took a step back. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think.” Hollowness opened up in her, recalling everything that she’d lost when she’d slipped out of their apartment, leaving no more than a note behind.
His tone grew sharper. “What are you doing here, Lexie?”
“Chloe hired me as the wedding photographer.”
“I don’t mean that, I mean...” He gestured from her to him. “I mean why are you talking to me? I don’t exist for you.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” she shot back, irritation rushing in to salve her hurt. “If I close my eyes, you’ll disappear?”
His glare reminded her of why she had left him. Beneath his charming exterior was a predator. That beast was fully present now.
“But one day I did vanish, didn’t I?” The resentment was thick in his voice. “The day you learned what I really was, you just stopped seeing me. It didn’t matter if I was standing right in front of you.”
“That was years ago, Faran,” Lexie said, fresh shock rising in her. She’d expected time to blunt emotion, but clearly that hadn’t happened for either of them. “Why are you still so angry?”
He stood with one hand over his side and a stubborn glower on his face. “Why am I still angry?” he repeated softly. “Do you have to ask?”
She matched stubborn for stubborn. “Yes.”
He closed his eyes. “Lexie, what does happiness look like to you?”
The question caught her off guard. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Just answer me.”
“I’m an artist,” she said automatically. “Taking pictures is what makes me happy.”
He moved so fast she never saw it. All at once, his hands were on her arms, pulling her close until their bodies all but touched. Werewolves ran hot, their body temperatures a degree or two above humans’. A long line of heat vibrated between them, tantalizing Lexie through the silk of her tunic and slacks.
She didn’t like being trapped in his grip. It was far too unexpected and intimate for comfort, putting him in control in a way that sent every alarm bell ringing. She squirmed, but his fingers were like iron.
Faran looked down into her face, his human eyes as impassive as the wolf’s had been. She could almost touch his resentment. He wore it like a scar over the hurt she’d left behind. “This was all I wanted. To be close to you, even with you knowing what I am. I thought maybe you could eventually get past the wolf.”
Lexie’s hands found his chest. It was familiar territory, bringing back a flood of sensory reminders. Suddenly she felt flushed and aching with memory. Her first thought was to push him away, but the crack in his voice stopped her. Her heart was pounding so fast she felt breathless, her face nearly numb. “I’m sorry.”
Her hands slid down his shirt, feeling the quivering muscle beneath. He was holding himself in check so hard, it felt as if he might explode. Her fingers became clumsy, unequal to whatever it was she was trying to do. Comfort? Fend off? She’d lost all sense of direction.
And then her hand found hot, sticky wetness. She gasped. “Faran, you’re bleeding.”
He exhaled, his breath warm against her cheek. “That wasn’t what you said in my fantasy of this moment.”
“Faran...”
He pulled away, walking backward. Cold air flooded in to take his place. “Go home, Lexie. Get out of here. Whatever’s going on is just going to get worse. Believe it or not, I don’t want to see you hurt.”
Of course she believed him. Whatever else he was, Faran had never been cruel. “But aren’t you in danger?”
He stopped moving, his hand over his injury again. “That’s got nothing to do with you.”
Lexie couldn’t help feeling that he was very, very wrong. “What are you going to do?”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he turned and walked away. It was exactly what she’d done to him back in Paris.
It was what she wanted.
She was absolutely sure of it.
Almost.
“You’re lucky you left the scene when you did,” Sam said to Faran. “The discussion in the reception hall went from bad to worse.”
It was just before dawn and Faran was exhausted. Sam didn’t look much better. He had gone from the palace to a long meeting with the Company’s top brass and hadn’t even bothered to change out of his torn suit.
Now they were sitting in one of the break rooms at the Company’s headquarters, which was a compound hidden in the hills outside the capital city. It had been decorated by vampires, and looked like a cross between a country club and a crypt—all dark, heavy furniture and oxblood wallpaper.
“What did I miss?” Faran asked. “Please tell me Prince Kyle did more than send Gregori to bed without his supper.”
“Amelie
