Ghost Moon (19 page)

Questions burned behind her lips. She wanted to understandhim, connect with him on every possible level. And she didn’t know what to ask him first. He had been a ghost, and that had given him special powers. Had he lost them when he had become a man? She suspected that was probably true, but she also thought he might not want to talk about that.

So she started with something easy. “How old were you when you . . . ?”

“Twenty-six.”

“You were young.”

He tipped his head to the side. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-six.”

He laughed. “An old lady!”

They smiled into each other’s eyes, but she knew they had to think about practical problems.

“We have to find out who tried to kill . . . you. I mean the man they buried in the woods.”

His voice took on a confidence that surprised her. “It’s not me. Not now.”

“They won’t know the difference.” She felt her lower lip tremble, but she managed to say, “You look like him.”

“Not for long.”

“What do you mean?”

“My hair should be dark. And my eyes. Maybe they will change.”

She stared up at him. “How?”

“I don’t know! Maybe the real me will show through.”

She heard the doubt in his voice. He wanted it to be true. But it might not be possible. Maybe it was just some fantasy he’d conjured up to make himself feel better.

“But we don’t have to stay around here waiting for them. We can get away from this part of the country. Move to a place where they won’t find us.”

She licked her lips. “There’s a lot you have to think about, wherever you live.”

“Like what?”

“How did you make a living . . . before . . . you died?”

“I drove a truck. And I fixed things for people. Radios. Washing machines. Cars. I was good at understanding how things worked.”

“All of that’s different now. Trucks are huge. And a lot of machines have computers. Even cars have them.”

“What are they?”

She flapped her hand. “I don’t know this place so well, either.There are different kinds of computers. But the ones in machines . . . I guess you’d say they . . . know how to carry out complex processes.”

“Well, some things have to be the same about driving a truck.” His eyes took on a faraway look. “The freedom. The open road. Seeing different parts of the country. Meeting people.”

“Meeting women?” she said before she realized she might be getting herself into trouble.

He gave her a direct look. “Yeah. But that was just fooling around.” He stroked his hand over her naked shoulder, then down to the top of her breasts. “What we have . . . this is what was meant to be.”

She responded immediately to the intimate touch. “Yes.”

He started speaking again, a satisfied look on his face. “And I know how to make extra money. A lot more than for repair work. There are places you go, where they have boxingmatches; you see if you can beat the town bully.”

She winced. “You were a real tough guy.”

“I liked it that way.”

“None of those boxers were very old, were they?”

“No. But I’m still young enough to do it. You win a big purse, and it can be enough to buy a house.”

She doubted it. Not today. And she didn’t know if he was young enough for that kind of punishment. Caleb Marshall had died when he was twenty-six, but his present body was older. She wasn’t sure how much older, but she’d put him in his early thirties if she had to make a guess.

He was still speaking. “The men in my family get the rough stuff out of their system, then they . . . settle down.”

He was saying he wanted to stay with her. She wanted that, too, but she was still thinking of all the problems they faced—and he faced.

“You can get a better job and earn more money if you have an education,” she murmured.

“That was never important to me! I didn’t want a job that tied me down.”

“Okay,” she answered, knowing that his values were still those of a young man with no responsibilities. A young man from an age when life wasn’t so complicated. He was thinkinghe could disappear into some distant part of the country. But with the Web or with private detectives, the killers might be able to find him, no matter where he went.

“It’s not that easy to hide. You need a new identity. A driver’s license. A birth certificate. A Social Security number. You have to have them today. If you don’t have the real thing, you have to buy fake ones. And you need help to get them.”

She felt him stiffen. He tipped her head up and looked down into her eyes. “What kind of help?”

She had only one answer to give him. “The Marshalls will help us. You’re one of them.”

She watched his expression turn savage, and a dart of fear zinged through her.

When he spoke, his voice was like ground glass. “I am not
one of them,
as you put it. I am the head of my own pack.”

“Things have changed.”

“The men in my family do not change. They have been the same for hundreds of years. They are strong and independent.And when they invade each other’s territories, they fight. That is the way things work.”

“Not now!”

“If you think that, you believe in fairy tales,” he ground out.

“But . . .”

He cut her off with a look and words that hit her like a bitinglash from a slaver’s whip. “Do not argue with me. There is no way in hell that I would ever go to any of those bastards for help.”

“You don’t understand.”

“You are the one who doesn’t understand.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Quinn struggled not
to let her emotions show. Not long ago, Caleb had swept her into a whirlwind of sensuality.And afterward he had told her they belonged together.She had felt it, too. Not just because of the fantastic sex. She had known a special connection was growing betweenthe two of them.

Suddenly, she felt like a cold breeze had blown across her skin.

Caleb’s eyes were fierce, and she wanted to look away, but she kept her gaze steady. “We should get dressed.”

“You understand?” he asked.

“Yes.” It wasn’t a lie. She understood too well. He was a man from another age, when the rules of life had been different.He was from a time when men were in charge and women fell into line with their plans—the way they did in Sun Acres. And like the men of her universe, he also thought in terms of settling disputes with violence.

Why should she be surprised? He’d been killed in a fight with another werewolf.

But if Caleb wanted to fit into life in twenty-first-century America, he had a lot to learn. The question was, would he let her help him learn it? And could she convince him they needed Logan’s help?

She saw him make an effort to relax his features. He turned his head toward the window, and she followed his gaze. It was getting dark, and she was afraid he was going out. She was more afraid she knew where he was headed.

To Logan’s house. And not to make a friendly call on his cousins.

She felt torn in two.

She wanted what she and Caleb were building together. Or was that just a false promise? Because she had wanted a man. Was the new reality no better than trying to forge a relationshipwith a ghost?

She couldn’t answer those questions. Not yet. But she knew she had to keep Caleb from hurting Logan. Or Rinna. Or worse.

They were her friends, and she had to protect them. Withoutmaking Caleb turn on her.

She bent to pick up her T-shirt and pull it over her head. Then she picked up her jeans and climbed into them. Caleb was also pulling on his pants.

Struggling to keep her voice even, she said, “You need to learn more about the way the world works now—if you want to fit in here.”

She could see he was also making an effort to sound reasonableafter his angry outburst. “I know. I saw some magazinesand newspapers in the living room. I can study those.”

“There’s a quicker way. You remember movie theaters?”

“Yes.”

“They have something like that in people’s houses now. The screen is smaller, but you can watch a lot of different programs.”

She led him down the hall to the living room and pointed to the flat-screen television on the wall over the fireplace, then to the sofa. “Sit down, and I’ll show you how to use it.”

The remote was lying on the coffee table. She clicked the power button and waited until the television warmed up, then clicked to the cable channel where Logan got CNN. It was the same here.

Caleb’s eyes widened as he watched the picture spring to life. They were talking about New York traffic, and she could see him gaping at the scene behind the reporter standing on the sidewalk.

“It’s like
that
now?” he asked, his voice filled with awe.

“Not everywhere. That’s a big city. One of the biggest in the world.”

“Yeah.”

“You can watch other channels. A couple of hundred,” she said, pressing the up arrow and watching a soccer game replace the newscast.

Hoping she was concealing her own tension, she sat down beside him and handed him the remote.

“Play around with it,” she suggested. “There are stories, like the movies you used to see. Some of them were originallymade for the movie theater. Other ones were made for televison. And in between scenes, they have commercials, like ads in magazines where they try to sell you things. You can also see a lot of ‘reality’ shows where people talk about their problems—or decorate their houses. There are shows that teach you how to cook. Or how to landscape your yard. There’s news on all day. They repeat it over and over.”

He began changing channels, stopping at each one to take a peek, until a car racetrack caught his attention, and he watched the vehicles whizzing around the course.

“They go damn fast.”

“Yes.”

She kept her gaze on the screen, but her mind was furiouslyworking. She had always had some talent to influence another person’s decisions. She had done it back when she and Zarah had both been slaves.

She called up that power now, focusing all her inner concentrationon sending a silent message to Caleb. If she could keep him from going to Logan’s house tonight, she could wait until he was asleep, then slip out of the house and warn them. Not just warn them. She could ask for their help. Maybe Logan’s cousin, Ross, could reason with Caleb. Or maybe they could show him how they worked together.

She repeated some variation of those words over and over, and after a few minutes she felt Caleb relax beside her. When his eyelids drooped, she smiled.

She hadn’t been sure it would work. But it looked like the tactic had been successful. And after he was asleep, she could go out and find a telephone.

He gestured toward the television set. “This is interesting, but it’s making me tired. Maybe I should go to bed early.”

“Do you want something to eat first?”

“Not now.”

She clicked the remote, and they stood, their bodies pressed side to side. He slung his arm around her as they made their way down the hall to the bedroom where she’d slept earlier. Beside the bed, he turned her toward him and gave her a long, intimate kiss.

Lifting his mouth a fraction, he murmured, “I can’t get enough of you.”

“I can’t either.”

It was true. She might be worried about what he was goingto do, but when he began to kiss her and touch her, she couldn’t help responding. It was as though the sexual pull between them took over her body and mind.

“Quinn. Quinn.”

This time they undressed each other slowly, kissing new territory as they uncovered each other’s bodies.

After the wild encounter on the kitchen table, they made a silent agreement that there was no need to hurry.

They stood swaying beside the bed until both of them were too aroused to stay on their feet. Caleb brought her down to the surface of the bed, and they kept up the slow pace until she knew she had to take it to the next level. Circlinghis cock with her fist, she began to stroke him.

“No fair!” He made a strangled sound and pulled her on top of him, letting her take charge. She brought him inside her and teased him with slow strokes, until he forced the issue by pressing against her clit.

She exploded in a starburst of pleasure, watching his face as he followed her over the edge. Then she collapsed on top of him, too worn out to move.

He stroked his hand through her damp hair. “That was so good.”

She was getting used to the new way he looked. She wanted to know if he was getting used to the body, but she didn’t want to ask any disturbing questions.

Instead, she turned her head to sweep her tongue against his salty shoulder. “Yes.”

They lay joined for a long time, kissing and stroking each other tenderly until his penis finally slipped out of her. She was sure she had diverted him from doing anything dangerousthat evening. And she rolled off of him and made a wobblytrip to the bathroom before turning off the light.

When she snuggled down beside him, he held her close. She tried to stay awake so that she could slip out of the house later. But he had worn her out, and she told herself it would be all right to sleep for a few hours.

COLONEL
Jim Bowie stepped into the darkness and drank in the clean country air. His shoulders squared and his arms swinging easily at his sides, he began walking around the militia compound, his eyes roving over his empire with satisfaction.It was the perfect base of operation. Close enough to D.C. so he could get in quickly to carry out his mission. And far enough away so that he was just one of the big landowners out here in the boonies.