Marked by Moonlight (5 page)

Gideon eased down on the couch and tossed his keys on the coffee table, uncomfortable and doing his best to hide it. Until now, Gideon had never kept anything from Cooper. They had no secrets. Never had. Cooper was like a big brother. Always around to bully and kick him in the ass when he needed it. Sometimes even when he didn't.

“How can you watch this crap?” Gideon grunted as he yanked a pillow from behind his back to lounge more comfortably. He had to rely on the image of relaxation since his gut was knotted with tension.

“Ah, it's not crap. It's life, my friend.” For all of Cooper's jovial air, his eyes were hard and shrewd as they turned on Gideon. “You can learn a lot from watching these shows. They show humanity at its worst. See that fella there ignoring his responsibility?” He waved a hand in the direction of the television. “That's too often the case. Men just don't come through and fulfill their obligations.”

Funny, Cooper wasn't looking at the screen as he said this. He looked straight at Gideon. Clearly, he wasn't talking about society. Gideon had to force himself not to fidget. Slow, even breaths.

A long moment passed. They stared at one another. Cooper finally cut to the point of his visit. “Where you been? I haven't heard from you since Friday night's call.”

“Busy.”

“Yeah? Doing what? 'Cause it sure as hell isn't what you're supposed to be doing. I called all weekend. I had some tips on a new joint I needed you to check out. Where've ya been?”

Gideon averted his eyes from Cooper's piercing gaze. Damn. He shouldn't have looked away.

Gideon covered the slip by snagging the remote and clicking on the channel guide. “Just busy.”

Cooper shook his head from side to side. “You wanted this, remember? I warned you. About the demands, always being on call, always available. But you wanted in—”

“Hell, I've been at it for almost fifteen years. I'm no rookie,” he snapped. No. Not a rookie. Maybe just burned out? What other explanation could there be for why he wanted to protect Claire Morgan when it was his job to destroy her? He shook off the thought and continued, “I had some deliveries for my grandmother. Not to mention a few orders to finish up,” he lied smoothly, nodding toward the door leading to the garage where he did his carpentry work.

Cooper snorted and tossed a handful of Cheetos in his mouth, his jaw flexing as he chewed. “What? Slaying lycans doesn't pay the bills?”

“I need something legit to show the IRS.” Thinking the interrogation over, Gideon clicked the channel to ESPN.

“Saw the Dodge parked out back,” Cooper commented mildly, referring to the old pickup Gideon used to haul furniture. “I didn't think you could cart armoires, chairs, and the like in the back of that Jeep. Guess you weren't running deliveries today, huh?”

Gideon smiled easily despite being caught in his own lie. A mistake he wouldn't make again. He might owe Cooper a lot, even his life, but that didn't include a play by play of his every move.

“Fine,” Cooper grunted. “Keep your secrets. Just hope you're not getting involved with some chick. You know this lifestyle isn't conducive to that sort of thing. Told you when you got in you could never lead a normal life. No wife. No kids.” He leaned forward in the La-Z-Boy as if shortening the distance between them could better convey his next words. He stabbed the palm of his hand several times with his finger. “NODEAL is your life.”

Gideon understood perfectly. He always had. “I know.” He smiled without humor. “Love 'em and leave 'em. I learned the code from you. You drilled it into me. How could I forget?”

“That's right.” Cooper nodded, still looking unconvinced as he settled back in the chair. “Let's talk shop. The body you called in the other night has been identified as one Leonardo Alvarez. Age seventeen. Born in Houston and birth certificate looks legit. Of course, no record of him in the files,” he said.

NODEAL's confidential database was used by agents throughout the world for the cataloging of all known lycans, living and deceased. It was no surprise to Gideon that the kid wasn't documented. Gideon already knew he was newly infected.

Leonardo Alvarez. Lenny, Gideon silently mused, experiencing a strange flickering of sorrow for the kid whose last thoughts had been not for himself but his teacher. “He's probably too new to have made it into the database,” Gideon murmured.

“What happened Friday? Anything unusual?” Cooper eyed him speculatively. “I sent Foster to run detail and he said everything looked clean. Aside from it being such a young kid. Easy kill?”

“Yeah,” Gideon muttered. “No sweat.”

Nodding, Cooper asked, “Any leads?”

He hesitated before sealing his act of deception with an indisputable lie. “No.” There. He'd done it. Without even a stutter. No going back now. “He operated alone.”

“What?” Cooper's brows dipped into a frown. “No buddies?”

Lycans operated in packs—at least two or more. Never, or rarely, individually. That's what made hunting them so dangerous and why inexperienced agents were assigned to a team until deemed fit to hunt alone. Gideon had completed his team training quickly. In fact, he held the record for quickest promotion to IAS—individual agent status. But then, he had something other trainees didn't. A grudge.

“That's right. Solo.”

“Unusual.”

“I know,” Gideon retorted. He wasn't some grunt, new to the ranks. He didn't need Cooper questioning his every answer. Even if they were lies.

Cooper rubbed his bristly chin. “What's your take on it?” he quizzed in his best mentor voice.

“He could have been accidentally infected,” Gideon offered, one possibility that couldn't be overlooked, even if unlikely. Lycans didn't run around accidentally infecting people. They fed. And when they fed, they gorged until their victims were dead. Recruitment into their packs was very deliberate, and they didn't abandon their inductees.

“Or…” Gideon's voice hung in the air for a long moment.

“Or?” Cooper prodded.

“Or there's a new player in town,” Gideon finished. “One who doesn't follow pack tradition.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

The two men exchanged grim looks. That was NODEAL's worst nightmare. A lycan that infected indiscriminately could be a plague on the city. Or the world. Both men turned and stared unseeing at the television, each absorbing the implication of such a possibility.

Sighing, Cooper stood and brushed orange Cheeto dust from his hands. “I expect you to be available this weekend and taking calls.”

Gideon nodded, rolling his eyes. Who needed a wife when you had a NODEAL director breathing down your neck?

For a split second, the by-the-book agent in him considered coming clean and telling Cooper about the teacher, but he quickly squashed that idea. Hell, Cooper would probably put him on suspension. Then he'd track Claire down and destroy her himself. Gideon's personal history with Cooper wouldn't get in the way. Neither would sentimentality. Nor Gideon's vague instinct that Claire Morgan was worth saving. Cooper was hard as nails. From that first meeting in his parents' hallway, his mother's corpse at their feet, that much had been clear. And only became clearer in the following years as Cooper took him under his wing and taught him the trade. Gideon had done his best to model himself after Cooper. A hard man driven by one purpose: to hunt and destroy lycans.

Apparently, Gideon wasn't as tough as he thought.

He owed Cooper his life—his and his sister's. No argument there. He also owed him the truth about Claire.

Unfortunately, it was the one thing he couldn't give him. Not yet.

 

“You look…different.”

Claire couldn't help smiling at Maggie's pause as they exited the school together. By the time their conference period rolled around, they desperately needed a little adult R & R. The bagel shop around the corner provided the perfect escape.

Only eleven in the morning and heat already cloaked the city. The smell of baked asphalt, thick and pungent, clogged her pores.

“Different good or different bad?”

“Oh, good! Different good,” Maggie assured, a hint of devilry in her smile. “I never knew you had breasts.”

Claire chuckled, allowing the tension to ebb from her shoulders. The run-in with Gideon had left her in a foul mood. As a result she lacked her usual patience and had decided to assign book work for her afternoon classes in order to spare them. To top it off, Jill Tanners, Lenny's counselor, was too busy to see her. Claire knew when she was being avoided, but she had no intention of letting Tanners off the hook. It was her job to follow up on Lenny, and Claire intended to pester her until she did.

Her laughter died an abrupt death in her throat the instant she saw
him
. The tension returned, stiffening every muscle as her feet dragged to a stop.

“You've got to be kidding,” she muttered under her breath, her heart lurching wildly against her chest.

Maggie pulled up beside her. Claire felt her curious stare scanning the side of her face.

“What is it?” she asked.

Claire couldn't speak. Her attention focused on the maroon CJ-7 Jeep parked in the principal's spot—on the man inside. The Jeep was a far cry from Principal Henderson's Volvo. As was the stone-faced, hard-bodied man behind the wheel.

In the midmorning sunlight, Gideon March sat there like he had every right to park in the reserved space. Big as day and hardly inconspicuous in a vehicle that lacked doors and a roof. Not that his six-feet-plus frame was easy to conceal. A long, lean, denim-clad leg protruded from the Jeep, his Red Wing boot propped on the door frame as he watched her.

What if he got out of the Jeep?

What if he started spouting that ridiculous werewolf nonsense again?

What if—

“Who is
that
?” Maggie whispered in hushed, reverent tones.

Claire shook her head dumbly, her stare never wavering from him. A pair of sunglasses obscured his eyes, but she could feel them burning into her.

“Do you know him?” Maggie pressed.

Claire tore her gaze free, focusing on her car and the prospect of escape. Refuge.

“No.” Claire resumed walking, forcing herself not to panic and run.

“Well, honey, I think he knows you. Or the way he's looking, he wants to.”

Claire's gaze skittered back to him. Sunlight glinted off his dark blond hair. The nerves along her spine tingled. And not entirely in fear.

“We don't know each other,” she insisted, her voice firm.

“Uh-huh. Sure.” Maggie smirked at her from over the roof of the car as Claire fumbled for the right key. “Forget about Cyril. You got a hunka hunka burning man over there ogling you.”

Claire slid inside the sanctuary of her car, feeling slightly safer now that she could no longer see him or feel his intense gaze. Once Maggie shut her door, Claire hit the lock button. A hysterical laugh bubbled up from the back of her throat. That wouldn't stop him. Not if he wanted to get to her. He had no problem getting into her apartment, after all.

“Now it makes sense.” Maggie gave a small, knowing laugh.

Claire started the car and backed out, trying not to notice how her hands shook on the steering wheel. “What does?”

A car horn blared and she slammed on the brakes. Both women lurched against their seat belts.

“Claire!” Maggie shouted, hands slapping the dashboard.

Heart hammering, Claire's gaze flew to the rearview mirror at the car she had almost hit. She waved apologetically at the woman glaring at her through the windshield.

“Jesus,” Maggie muttered as the other car drove off in an angry zip. “Now it
really
makes sense.”

Once Claire's heart had resumed a steady beat and they had escaped the parking lot, she was calm enough to ask, “What makes sense?”

“The clothes, the contacts, the makeup, your asking for the name of my hairdresser.” She counted off on her fingers. “Oh, and the two-car collision we nearly had because you've got your head up your ass.”

Claire sniffed, not appreciating Maggie's description. “What are you talking about?”

Maggie nodded thoughtfully, looking so world-wise as she flipped down the visor and checked her heavily applied makeup. “You're gettin'
some
.”

Claire could only shoot a puzzled sideways glance at her friend, expecting her to finish the rest of her sentence.

Getting some of what?

Maggie must have sensed her confusion. “God, you're dense. You know.” She slapped Claire's arm good-naturedly.
“Some,”
she emphasized in heavy, exaggerated tones, waving her hands widely in front of her.

Understanding dawned, and Claire choked, “I am not!”