Chosen by Sin (32 page)

Would she?

His niggling doubt was enough to make him to glower at her. “Nothing to
say about Cy?”

She threw back the sheet and pulled on her clothes. He wanted to weep
at the sight of all that pale flesh being covered up. But her “He’s like a
brother to me,” comment made him snort at her naiveté.

“Believe me, the feelings he has for you are far from brotherly.”

Something flickered across her face. Something that made him curse and
pounce on it. “You knew? Yet you let him wander around, giving him free rein?”

“Don’t be absurd, Dex. Cy’s expressed interest before but that doesn’t
mean I’m going to banish him from my life. Especially because we both know why
he’d be prone to have a crush on me. He knows loving a Draci can have certain
consequences, so why not turn his attention to a vampire female who he believed
to be sterile?”

He supposed that made sense. But there was something about the way
she’d looked just now, something that told him Cy hadn’t been the only one to
suffer from a crush. “So you were never tempted to make your relationship with
him into something more intimate?”

“I didn’t say that.” She put her hands on her hips. “But if I was
briefly tempted, I didn’t act on it. I could have, of course. I wasn’t in a
relationship at the time.”

“You damn well are now,” he roared, causing her to stare at him in
amazement.

“I know that, Dex. Believe me, it’s a little hard to ignore given the
baby growing inside me.” Her expression softened as she approached. When she
stood before him, she lifted both hands to frame his face as she often did.
“And I’ve never been happier,” she said softly. “You have no reason to be
jealous. I haven’t had sex with anyone—haven’t even thought about having
sex with anyone—since the day I met you.”

The relief he felt was instantaneous. Because of her confession,
however, he couldn’t help thinking that, unlike her, he’d had sex with another
female after he’d met her, and he’d
thought
about having sex with Lucy again even after he’d had Jes. Granted, Lucy had
declined but— Jes must have seen uneasiness in his expression because she
dropped her hands and narrowed her eyes.

“Let me ask you this, Dex. After we had sex in L.A., have you wanted to
have sex with any other female?”

He stared dumbly at her, like a damn animal caught in a hunter’s
crosshairs. Dimly, he wondered if his mouth was opening and closing like a
caught trout struggling to breathe.

“Still helping Lucy out?” she asked lightly, even though he saw the
hurt she was feeling.

He lifted his hand but she flinched away from him, so he let it drop to
his side.

He had two choices—let the guilt swallow him or defend himself.
Apparently some of his survival instincts had managed to stick around because
he said, “I didn’t sleep with Lucy after we were together. I mean, I offered
but she said no and—”

Jes paled and clutched at her stomach, as if she suddenly felt nauseas.
Goddess help me, he thought, but he knew that wasn’t going to happen. Like
always, Dex needed to get himself out of this mess.

“What I mean is, she’s decided to deal with the heat on her own. I
thought you knew about Lucy and the bargain we’d struck. It’s not like—”

“What?” she sneered, obviously ready to throw down the gauntlet. “It’s
not like you enjoyed it? Come on, you really expect me to believe that? Lucy’s
beautiful!”

He could hardly deny that so he did the smartest thing he could think
of—nothing. Until, despite himself, he smiled. He couldn’t help it. He
didn’t enjoy hurting her, but he’d been the one acting like a jealous ass; to
know she wasn’t immune to the same irrational feelings heartened him. It made
him feel more confident about the feelings they had for one another.

“You think this is funny?” she hissed in disbelief.

“What? Of course not.” Dex wiped the smile off his face, but obviously
not fast enough for her. “Look, Lucy really likes you,” he began, trying to
appease her.

“And I really like Lucy,” she emphasized. “I know she only turned to
you out of desperation, nothing more.”

“So what’s the problem then?”

“Nothing.” She stomped her foot.

“Then come here and give me a hug,” he challenged. Looking at her all
flushed and squinty-eyed, with her newly plump breasts quivering and her belly
sticking out made him hot and hard. Was this their first fight? Because he’d
never had make-up sex before. From what he’d heard, it could be damn good…

She smiled sweetly at him. “Sorry, but I’ve got a date with some
shampoo and a carton of ice cream.” She whirled around, stomped into the
bathroom, and slammed the door. He heard the lock being thrown into place.
“Hurry up and find Cy or you’re going to be late for that meeting,” she called.

It took Dex a moment before he could react. All he managed to say was a
soft, “Shit.” But when he left, he left with another smile on his face.

***

PARIS, FRANCE

Several hours
later, Dex was back at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Paris. This time,
there were pockets of tourists outside, but he and Cy followed Jes’s
instructions until they found a secret door near the bronze statue of Michael
and the serpent. They traveled down a dark corridor until they came to a small
room lit with primitive torches on the wall. Waiting for them were the three
diregeants
he’d spoken to just before Trosseau had gone apeshit
and attacked him. He wasn’t inclined to believe the trio didn’t know anything
about that.

“Well, would you look at this,” Dex drawled. “If it isn’t the
shape-shifter equivalent of Larry, Moe, and Curly.”

Next to him, Cy elbowed him in the side.

“What?” Dex
asked innocently.

“We’re not surprised to hear you being so cavalier, Mr. Hunt,” the
shape-shifter spokesperson, still positioned between the other two, said. “A
shame, really, given that Trosseau sacrificed his life as a result of trying to
help you.”

“Trosseau tried to kill me,” Dex responded. “At least, someone made
damn sure it looked like that. I’m thinking it was a
diabol
. But you wouldn’t know anything about that, would
you?”

“It could very well have been a
diabol
. We never denied knowledge of the trouble brewing. Only that we needed
help from outsiders.”

“And you’ve changed your mind about wanting help from this outsider
because…?”

The shape-shifters smiled eerily in that synchronized way they had.

Next to him, Cy winced. “This is damn freaky,” he whispered.

Dex grunted. “Stick around. I think it’s going to get freakier.”

“Despite our warnings that you leave, you didn’t. You’ve been asking
questions about shape-shifter murders. You even contacted a mage in the
Montpeyroux Village and asked her to perform a protective spell for you. Why?”

Dex managed to hide his surprise at their mentioning the mage.
“Apparently, you already know. Why don’t you tell me?”

“You’ve been
targeted by a
diabol
. And you’re afraid
it will harm those close to you.”

“That’s right,” he said. “I want to prevent that. I want to prevent the
loss of further life in general. Despite what you think of me, I don’t enjoy
needless killing or suffering.”

The center shape-shifter inclined his head. “So your liaison has said.
We just weren’t sure whether to believe it.”

He assumed they were talking about Jes. Then again, she’d denied having
any connections to the shape-shifters. How had she set up this meeting then?
She’d mentioned an Otherborn Ambassador before. Could she have meant Bodin?

Dex felt his eyes widen. “Who convinced you to meet with me?” he asked.

Please don’t let it have been him, Dex thought. Not the same werewolf
who’d saved Jes, making her believe he was some kind of supporter of Otherborn
rights. But despite Dex’s horror, he knew it was a very real possibility. If
Jes’s goal was to help him, she would do whatever she thought was necessary,
even if it meant relying on someone he hated. As much as he didn’t want to
admit it, he couldn’t really blame her. A part of him admired her ruthlessness.

“Answer me,” he prodded the shape-shifters.

“It doesn’t matter, Mr. Hunt. We’ve had our eye on you. Now that we’ve
run out of time, we have no other choice but to accept the help you’ve
offered.”

“What do you mean, you’ve run out of time?

“We’ve suffered a revolution of sorts. Many shape-shifters are tired of
trying to make progress the civilized way. They’re fed up with being treated as
parasites undeserving of even the government’s most basic protection.”

“How can they be fed up when European shape-shifters haven’t even
exposed their existence to the government?”

“U.S. shape-shifters have asked for help from shape-shifters
world-wide. They are no longer willing to rely on peaceful negotiation and some
are willing to take their chances by joining forces with another oppressed
group.”

“Oppressed
group? Tell me you’re not referring to
diabols
as an underrepresented minority.”

“The
diabols
you speak of are demons, cast into hell, persecuted
for their past mistakes. They long for a second chance at life, and that’s
exactly what our rebel shape-shifters want as well. In a few days, the solstice
gates will open and for one hour conditions will be such that shape-shifters
all over the world can work together to create a bridge. One large enough to
carry every
diabol
in hell into
the living world.”

As he listened, Dex shivered, not so much because of the
shape-shifter’s words but because of the expression on his face. They’d already
given up, he realized. They held no hope that they’d be able to stop the mass
bridging they were talking about. Or that Dex and the U.S. government would
either.

“If a few shape-shifters can work together to create the bridge, why
can’t the rest of you work together to destroy it?”

“We’ve tried on a smaller scale, but not every shape-shifter knows how
the bridge is made. It’s taught to us by the evil ones. Obviously, unless we
open ourselves to communication with them, a dangerous prospect indeed, we
can’t know how to counter what they’ve started. Not effectively enough to
change things.”

“But if we can stop it…if this solstice gate closes…”

“Then the
threat of mass bridging is significantly reduced. Shape-shifters can, of
course, continue to bridge
diabol
s in
small numbers, but those are intermittent situations we’re more equipped to
handle. As we have been.”

“Of course. So how can I stop the bridging? Or even better, how can I
close this solstice gate?”

“
Obserwować Demonie Krawcy
.
It means ‘watch the demon tailors.’ The phrase is part of your heritage as a
were. At least, it would have been if you’d been raised by your pack as was
right.”

Dex didn’t
bother asking how the shape-shifter knew he hadn’t been raised by his pack.
“That phrase. It’s the same thing you said before, at the church. And the mage
I spoke to, she called shape-shifters working in league with
diabol
s ‘demon tailors.’ How do weres watch them?”

“No one outside the pack knows. It has something to do with protecting
the sanctity of the solstice gates. With being able to travel through them.”

“That’s not a whole lot of help,” Dex snapped.

“Which is why we told you to seek out your own in the States.”

“My werewolf grandfather. You were talking about him?”

“A were with knowledge of your pack’s inherent power. That is all that
matters.”

“Great. I’ll just find a werewolf, ask him, and I’m sure he’ll spill
all his secrets to me.”

“Now you know why we hold little hope of stopping these sad events, Mr.
Hunt. But we thank you for meeting with us.”

He’d been dismissed. And he supposed there was really no reason for him
to stay. He had the information he needed. He just didn’t know what the hell to
do with it. “Thank you,” he said gruffly, and he could tell he’d surprised the
shape-shifters. “For finally trusting outsiders. I don’t know what difference I
can make, but I’ll do everything I can to help.”

Turning, he bumped into Cy, who was looking at him with a flat,
unreadable expression.

“Mr. Hunt.”

The voice that spoke was one he’d never heard before. He turned back to
the shape-shifters, surprised when it was the one on the right, and not the
center, that addressed him.

“You’re different than you were when you first got here,” Righty said.

Dex was too shocked by the seemingly innocuous comment to respond at
first.

Cy slapped a hand on Dex’s shoulder. “Dex here’s now expecting a baby,
and you know how that affects a male. He’s over the moon with happiness.”

Dex glowered at the dragon-shifter even as he knocked Cy’s hand off
him. “Shut up, Cy,” he said, not liking the taunting tone the dragon-shifter
had used.

He also didn’t like the way Righty reacted to Cy’s words.

Eyes wide, Righty asked “A child? You? But aren’t you staying in
Paladine Abbey? With the pretty vampire doctor?”

An expression of unease washed over Cy’s face as he realized how much
he’d revealed. Dex barely managed not to hit him.

“The vampire is helping my cause,” he said, “but we’re not lovers. She
doesn’t mean anything to me. The female I’ve impregnated is back in the
States.”

“That’s good,”
the center shape-shifter said. “Because vampires have a natural resistance to
possession by
diabols
and other spirits.
That’s not true when the vampire is pregnant or otherwise weakened.”

“I’ll remember that,” Dex said, pretending the shape-shifter’s words
hadn’t scared the shit out of him. But Dex knew Righty hadn’t been fooled.