Steal the Moon (7 page)

I shivered despite the heat of the night. Dev’s clothes were as wet as mine, and his hair was slicked back. It looked so much longer when it was wet. It flowed down his back. My eyes weren’t completely focused, and I realized it must be a trick of the light because Dev’s hair was short. I’d been damn lucky he found me. I could easily have drowned.

“Thanks for the rescue, baby.” The words came out in a croak. I could taste the pool water and wondered if he’d had to give me mouth to mouth.

Dev touched my face, a gentle brush of his skin to mine before he lowered his head and kissed me again. It was odd. Perhaps it was the pain I felt, but I missed the passion that normally flared up between the two of us the minute he got his mouth on mine. I pulled him closer, trying to find that bond we had. It was a nice kiss, but it felt flat to me. Dev’s hands found my breasts, and he cupped them through my wet shirt but it felt more curious than passionate. I finally pulled away.

“Stop, Dev. What are you doing? I think I need to lie down.”

He grinned over me and put a finger to his lips. “Shhhh.” He winked and laid me back down on the deck. He was gone before I could push myself up.

The minute my head was down again, darkness threatened. The world went hazy once more and I lost some time. I had no idea how long I was there, lying by the pool, but a sound finally woke me again.

“Jesus, Zoey.” I heard Daniel curse from above. He leapt over the balcony and hit the deck with a resounding thud. “What the hell happened?”

I pushed the wet hair out of my face and glanced around, trying to see where Dev had gone. Why hadn’t he stayed with me? My head was so foggy. Daniel hauled me into his arms, his blue eyes glowing in the dark as he stretched his senses outward. He stilled, a sure sign that he was trying to catch a scent or a sound that would lead him to his prey. It wasn’t hard to figure out that he was looking for any evidence that Lucas Halfer had surfaced, but I knew he wouldn’t find any.

He shook his head. “I’m getting a bunch of small animals and Dev. When was Dev out here?”

I let Daniel cradle me, loving how safe I always felt in his arms. I tried to force myself to focus. “He saved me. There was this bird and then this chick with weird feet and she turned into a bat with a freaky tongue and then the bird had this mouth and it tried to eat me, but Michael Kors saved me.”

At least his well-designed black leather belt with metal grommets had been wide enough to protect my midsection. If I hadn’t had it on, the bird likely would have punctured my middle and I would have been a nighttime snack.

Daniel looked down at me like I was crazy. I probably sounded like I was. I was slurring my words slightly, and he was still out of focus. “How much did you drink tonight?”

“I am not wasted,” I protested, except that I was a little bit. The evening had been crappy, and Christine was always generous with the good vodka. But I was pretty sure my pounding head had to do with the fact that I’d bounced it off the side of the deck. “It happened and when the bat thingee dropped me, I fell in the pool. Dev must have pulled me out. When I woke up, he was holding me and trying to get into my pants.”

Daniel didn’t look convinced. “Dev’s been inside talking to Ingrid for the last thirty minutes. They’re going over the ceremony and all the things you have to do to prepare yourself. There’s a whole purification process.”

I shook my head to try to clear it. It didn’t work. It just throbbed more. “That’s not possible. I know what happened, Danny. Dev kissed me and felt me up and then he was gone.”

“What’s going on?” Dev walked through the French doors that led from the kitchen to the back porch. His clothes were dry, and I had to admit that maybe I’d hit my head harder than I thought I had. “Where the hell have you been, Zoey? I checked the bathroom and you weren’t there. Halfer is out there just waiting to get his claws into you. You had to know how disappearing would scare the crap out of us.”

“Apparently Zoey decided to take a little swim,” Daniel said with an obnoxious smile.

“I didn’t jump in the pool, Daniel Donovan.” He was treating me like an obnoxious kid, and I’d had about enough of it. I knew what I’d seen. “Put me down.”

He acquiesced, and I immediately felt my knees buckle. Daniel cursed and helped me back up. I watched as he and Dev shared a look.

Dev shook his head, his eyes deeply disappointed. “I’ll go tell everyone we’re heading out.”

“I’m not drunk,” I protested, but my skull felt like it was going to split open and I bit off a cry.

Dev held my head in his palms, gently inspecting my scalp. “She has a bump on her head.”

“I hit it when I fell in the pool,” I explained.

Dev’s eyes went wide as he thought about the implications. “You fell in the pool? You could have killed yourself. I realize we pushed you tonight, lover, but that’s not an excuse to get so drunk you can’t walk. I can’t believe I didn’t see this. She was all right earlier.”

Daniel’s mouth was grim. “This wouldn’t have happened if we’d brought Zack.”

“He has to have the night off sometime, Dan,” Dev replied.

“Screw Zack,” I said, needing to rebel. I could see exactly what was coming since neither one of them seemed willing to believe I wasn’t drunk off my ass. “What’s he going to do? Monitor my alcohol intake?”

Dev frowned. “If necessary, yes. At least he would have been here to catch you. I’ll start looking for some more muscle because she needs twenty-four-hour surveillance. Somebody should be with her even when she’s out with us.”

“But you were here, Dev.” I teared up because my head really hurt and I didn’t understand what was going on. It was all a jumble in my mind, and now they were talking about more restrictions. I couldn’t take it. “You saved me.”

Dev looked at Daniel for explanation. “She thinks the two of you got it on out here after she nearly drowned herself.”

Dev shook his head. “God, she’s out of it. I should never have come. I should have just let her have her way. It’s not like it worked anyway. Harry still hates me, and now he blames me for corrupting the both of you. What a clusterfuck.”

“Dev, I wanted you to come.” I tried to explain as I sought to make things stop spinning. “He’ll come around.”

“Not when he sees the condition I let you get into, sweetheart,” Dev said bitterly. “He’s going to think I’m turning you into an alcoholic.”

“Once and for all I am not drunk.” And that was the moment my gut decided to completely betray me. “Oh, god, I’m going to be sick.”

I pulled away from Daniel and managed to make it to the grass before emptying the contents of my stomach.

Dev was behind me, trying to hold my hair and making sure I didn’t fall over. When my insides stopped clenching, I sat back up. I was so miserable and it wasn’t all about the concussion I was pretty sure I had now. There was no way I was going to be able to make them believe me, and it really pissed me off. I was willing to ponder the idea that Dev had been a hallucination. The hit to my head was obviously more serious than I’d first thought. I must have managed to get myself out of the pool. But the weird bat and bird were no hallucinations. They’d been very real, and I needed to figure out what the hell had happened tonight. It looked like I was going to be doing the research on my own, though.

“Can you get up, sweetheart?” Dev asked. “Daniel’s gone to get a cool towel. We’re going to move you into the limo and then see how well vampire blood works on a hangover.”

“It’s not a fucking hangover.” I was forced to let him help me up because my legs weren’t exactly listening to commands. I would have to take that blood, too, because while I wasn’t certain it would help a hangover, I was pretty damn sure it would work on my concussion. My stubborn nature told me to tell the boys to screw themselves, but I didn’t want to end up in the hospital. At this point, they would take the concussion as a symptom and not the cause.

Dev sighed. “All right, sweetheart. We can call it anything you like.”

“Don’t you condescend to me, Dev,” I managed to get out. Daniel was back, and he pressed a cold rag to my forehead.

I found myself in the limo before I could say anything vaguely like good-bye. I was an embarrassment to be dealt with, and Dev was good at smoothing over a difficult situation. I was hustled out with all haste and scooped into the limo, still shivering in wet clothes.

The car pulled away as Daniel pulled his shirt over his head. Dev was attempting to get me out of the wet clothes, but I slapped his hands away.

“Zoey, don’t be difficult,” he said with a huff.

“I haven’t been difficult enough, Dev.” I’d been accommodating for months, never questioning them or asking to be let in on their plans. I’d allowed them to maneuver me to a place where I was nothing but ornamental. I had no one but myself to blame. “I’ll take the blood but these clothes stay on until I get home.”

“You’re going to be uncomfortable,” he pointed out as though that was the absolute worst thing a person could be.

“Maybe I’ve gotten too comfortable,” I muttered more to myself than anyone else.

Daniel tossed his shirt aside and leaned back. He pulled me into his lap, not complaining about the wet clothes. He quickly popped a claw out of his right hand, the change as elegant and quick as any alpha. He drew the claw across his chest in a short deep stroke. The blood welled up, and I put my mouth to it.

It tasted like a dark, slightly metallic chocolate, rich and thicker than a human’s. It healed and brought youth. It brought Daniel great pleasure. He held my head to his chest and encouraged me to drink my fill as I felt the pressure building in him. After a minute or two, I licked the wound. It closed quickly once I was no longer sucking at it.

Desire was plain in Daniel’s eyes, but I pushed away to the other side of the limo—the side the boys were not on. I knew what Daniel wanted. He wanted me to ride him hard and fast until he came. He wanted to feed and make me scream.

I wasn’t ready to do any of those things. My head was clear now and those pesky twitches were gone. My stomach felt infinitely better and a pleasant, healthy warmth was infusing my entire body. Unfortunately, now that I was able to think again, I was getting really angry. Had they told me the same story, I would have believed them until facts proved me otherwise. I would have given them the benefit of the doubt. I would have been out there trying to hunt down the things that had attacked my men.

“Thank you, Daniel.” The events of the night were weighing on me. They didn’t trust me. I didn’t really have a place in their lives besides the bedroom. “I feel better now.”

“Glad to help, Z.” His jaw clenched as he dealt with the sexual frustration. In the normal course of our lives, I would be riding him by now and Dev would be cheering me on, waiting for his turn.

I stared out the window as we moved back into the downtown area where Ether was located. I could feel the tension in the car, but I wasn’t ready to talk yet. Dev tried to initiate a conversation, but he fell back into silence when I said nothing and refused to look at either one of them.

We pulled into the parking garage, and the three of us walked silently to the elevator. One of the reasons Dev had decided Ether was the best place for us to live was the labyrinthine path we had to take to get up to the penthouse. We had to go all the way down to the club and then up to Dev’s office, which was protected. There was an elevator in the office that only went to the penthouse. It was controlled with a keycard and could be locked down. It was great for security purposes. It sucked because it meant I got to parade past much of the supernatural world looking like a drowned cat.

I crossed my arms over my chest because everyone could tell I was cold. Dev tried to give me his jacket, but I was stubborn enough to ignore it. He tried to argue but Daniel sent him one of those man-to-man looks and Dev backed off. We walked by the long line of patrons waiting to get in, and every one of them stared as we strode past.

When we entered the club, I realized there was one person who might be willing to help me. At the very least, he would tell me if what I’d seen had any possibility of being real. I looked around and quickly found the large male I was seeking. Albert, Dev’s butler and sort of personal assistant, was sitting at the bar talking to the bartender with a cup in front of him. No highball glasses for Albert. He was strictly a tea drinker. Albert was a seven-foot-tall, red-skinned half demon. Only his personality and his blue eyes were even vaguely human. He’d also forgotten more about the supernatural world than most people ever knew.

I started to walk off, but Dev’s hand came out, catching my arm and pulling me back.

“Where do you think you’re going, Zoey?” he asked in a voice that told me he’d had enough of my antics for one evening.

I pulled away from that warm, tingly feeling I always got when Dev touched me. I didn’t want to feel good right now. I wanted answers. “I’m going to talk to Albert about my hallucinations, Dev. I would like to know what it is my alcoholic’s brain managed to pull out of thin air. So back off.”

His jaw tightened, and a long sigh came out of his mouth as though he was struggling to keep his patience. “Zoey, you need to go upstairs and rest.”

His condescending tone pushed me over the edge. I might have been able to handle that from Daniel. Fighting had always been a part of our relationship, but it was new with Dev. The fact that Dev was beginning to see me as a problem to be handled really cut to the quick, and following true to form, I struck out as hard as I could.

“I’m not five, Dev,” I pointed out, hearing the cruelty in my voice but not quite able to stop it. “Contrary to what you might think, you don’t own me. We’re not even married. If providing for me means I suddenly have to obey you, then I can sure as hell provide for myself. I’m going to talk to Albert. If you think you can stop me, feel free to try, but you have to sleep sometime. You can let me get the information I need now or I can get it later when you least expect it.”

I saw the hurt register on his face before that careful mask fell into place. This was the king’s advisor, not my love. “Of course. Feel free to speak to Albert. As I am not your husband, I will leave your care to him. I’m going out for a while. I’ll sleep in the office tonight. I wouldn’t want to disrupt your marriage bed.”