The Becoming Trilogy Box Set (Books 1-3) (69 page)

Knutr broke the silence when
it threatened to suffocate them. ‘You think she wants your cock swinging in her
face, Savage?’ he said. ‘Put these on.’

She hadn’t noticed Knutr
shifting. Somebody had the forethought to bring a bag of clothes and her uncle
mimicked Connal’s treatment of her, hurling dark denim at his head. Ash shot
him a grateful smile and he winked, lips spread in crazed amusement.

Glad someone is having fun,
she thought.

Connal’s growls ratcheted up
a notch as he aimed dagger glares at Knutr and dragged the jeans up his thighs.
They stuck to him like they’d been painted on, his legs thick with muscle and
testing the denim’s seams. Obviously, the jeans were for someone with less
bulk. Ash was not enjoying his discomfort. Nope. Not even a little bit. When
the zipper strained to a close, she rounded on him, chin tipped up. They had a
conversation to continue.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘what do
you have to say to me?’

‘You have a choice, Ash
,’ Connal said.
‘
You don’t have to go back.’ He still wouldn’t meet her
frown, but
he
took a step forwards. His hands were out, like he was
stopping himself from reaching for her and couldn’t bring himself to completely
pull back. ‘If you don’t want to, that is.’ His eyes strayed to MacTire, drawn
back to her when she pointedly shifted her weight.

She was trapped in the middle
of confusion and hope, not quite daring to believe him. Her fingers toyed
nervously with a curl. 'I don't,' she whispered.

He shook his head, light,
absent the dreads. 'You don't?'

'I mean ... no, I want to
stay. Here.' With you. She couldn't say it but there was a catch in her throat
that said it all. Her soul was latching onto his words. She didn’t have to go
back. She could be with him, or at least in the same city as him, maybe see him
sometimes. Ash wasn’t deluding herself that this meant they could start back up
where they’d left off.

'I ...' Connal was tongue-tied
as he took another step forward. He tugged the silver ring from his little
finger and taking her hand in his own, it slipped onto her ring finger with the
fit of long familiarity. Such a fluid move, it took a second for her brain to
catch up and realise why the ring fit perfectly. When it did, her knees shook
as the silver reconnected with her heartstrings. Her mother. She had the last
part of her mother back and Connal had given it to her.

‘I ...’ Oh great, tongue-tied
is contagious, she thought. Flustered, questions bounded on the tip of Ash’s
tongue. How did he get it? Why was he giving it to her? To name a few. If he
had been on one knee, it would have made more sense. ‘Ummm ...’ Bad thought
direction, Ash. Say something. She withdrew her hand, allowing her fingers to
drag along his and thumbing the silver band. She was breathless. ‘My mother’s
ring. Where did you find it?’

Connal took a deep breath and
when he hazarded a glance at her, she pinned it. She would not let him look
away this time. Muscles tensed across his shoulders, bracing. ‘I took it from
your room. I’m sorry. I needed something meaningful to you.’

Ash’s face was written in
confusion.

‘The Morrígan, your
grandmother, has agreed to offer you protection from the curse. As long as you
wear this ring, you’ll be free to live as you choose ... or to return to Fomor,
if that’s what you want.’

‘She’s not coming back to
Fomor!’ Fite’s snarl jolted them back to the realisation that they were not in
their own world. They actually shared it with a bunch of injured and dead
wolves. The silver-haired warrior was struggling against Mac.

The King cocked his arm back
and landed a punch on Fite’s jaw. The crack rang painfully loud around the
room. ‘Not. Your. Decision,’ Mac said.

Fite glowered, rigid and unwavering.
‘Finish it then, my Lord.’

Ash could see Mac gearing up
to hit him again.

Channelling a rumble of her
beast’s authority, she ordered them
.
‘Stop. Please stop.’ She made
herself meet Fite’s glare, directing some of her words to him. ‘It’s ok. I won’t
go back. I’ll stay. I want to stay here.’

Mac’s face shuttered, but he
wasn’t quick enough to hide the injury her words had caused. If she hadn’t been
focussed on him, she wouldn’t have seen the pain. Something in her chest
clenched and she had to shake herself. His face was blank as he backed off
Fite, mechanical where there had been emotion, he lowered his fist.

Ash was feeling too much to
arrange a facade; every thought was on her face. She looked back to Connal, her
soul crawling into her eyes. ‘What about you? Are you safe?’

‘Don’t worry about me,’ he
said. His fingers touched the chain stretched tight around his thick neck,
delicate and ... hers! The pendant was hers. But why was he wearing it? Ash’s
hand subconsciously stroked the coin dangling from her wrist. He was grim and
surly and he wouldn’t look her in the eye, but he’d given her a ring and he was
wearing her necklace. Her heart did a backflip, and she steeled her spine. She
couldn’t dare to hope.

B
ruised and aching from the fight, the wolves traipsed
single file through the vault door into Connal’s home in the basement of the
DeMorgan house. A low whistle of appreciation came from the back of the line as
they took in the high ceilings and old-world industrial feel of the space. If
anyone had told him just days ago he'd be holding open-house to this shower of
bastards, Connal would have had them measured for a hug-me jacket and a padded
cell up at the funny farm.

My enemy’s enemy is my
friend,
he told himself.

Dublin's streets were heaving
with the army of thralls that descended on Form every full moon. Much as it
galled him, Connal had to acknowledge that sending a pack of half-naked,
bleeding wolves out into the fray would be lunacy. The
thegn
evacuation
MacTire was arranging via cell-phone couldn’t come fast enough.

They were quite the band of
merry men, shirtless and barefoot in their borrowed jeans, Ash clutching the
dusty tapestry around her breasts like a sarong. Fite, Tyr and the other rebels
were herded into Connal’s wolf-cage at gun-point. The silver-haired warrior
with the
Fu Manchu
mustache sneered at him through the bars as Connal
secured the lock. Fite’s reluctant submission remained conditional on Ash not
returning with them to Fomor after the full moon. Connal grunted a laugh. If
only the guy knew what he was asking.

The Morrígan had granted
Connal a stay of just one lunar cycle in which to complete the deed. After
that, all bets were off.

He exhaled, eyes straying to
the crossbow that the straggly-haired one, Knutr, was laying down on the
kitchen table alongside the other weapons. He hadn’t had to ask them to disarm
on entering his home, they’d done it out of respect. Connal strode over to the
table and his hand brushed the weapons, hovering over Mac’s handgun.
So many
ways to
end
a life.
Ash's voice filtered into hearing-range and he tuned into the conversation.

‘What will you do to them?’
she asked.

‘A night in the lock-up
should cool their mutinous asses.’ MacTire looked so relaxed in her company,
and she in his, when she didn’t know Connal was watching.

‘But the full moon ends at
dawn,’ she frowned, ‘they’ll die.’

The sleazy bastard leaned in
close to Ash’s ear and whispered.
‘I have every intention of releasing them before then,
not that they need to know that. Nothing like a brush with your own mortality
to crystallize your priorities.’

Connal stared daggers at
their backs as MacTire tucked a stray lock of hair behind Ash’s ear, his
thoughts running to strangling the son of a bitch with his own blond ponytail.
How
about that for a brush with mortality, asshole?

‘That’s twice you’ve saved my
life, Mac,’ Ash said, ‘I hope one day to return the favour.’

‘I watched you fight, you
know,’ MacTire replied, ‘you were incredible.’

The smile she gifted him had
a growl bubbling up in Connal’s throat. Like he needed more ammunition, he
could kill him just for having seen her naked.

She was sleeping in his
bed,
the devil stage-whispered in his
mind
.

‘Will you be safe?’ Ash
asked. ‘Going back there?’

‘Do not concern yourself with
my safety, Ashling. I’ve been wrangling these unruly beasts for centuries.’ He
grinned, smug. ‘A taste of humble pie will soon deflate their egos.’

Obnoxious, cocky bastard,
Connal thought
. I’ll ram your humble pie so far up
your ass you’ll be picking it out of your teeth for weeks.

Connal turned away, unable to
listen to more. Everywhere he turned, the King’s men were lounging, cleaning
their wounds and manhandling his stuff. Christ. He'd never get the stench of
them out of his furniture.

‘Thank you for letting us
into your home.’ Connal turned back to see MacTire striding towards him. ‘It
means a lot, given everything ...’ the King stalled, leaving an awkward moment
of silence. ‘We will not abuse the hospitality. Will we, men?’ MacTire kicked
Brandr’s legs off Connal’s coffee table and walked to the kitchen area to smack
the refrigerator door shut on Knutr’s face.

Connal entertained the
fantasy of trapping the lot of them
inside
, shutting the door and just
waiting for them all to die. Like a bug bomb for Fomorians. The clean-up would
be a killer though. Covering the distance to the fireside bookshelves, he
snatched a bottle of twelve-year-old Redbreast from the paws of another wolf.
The guy put his hands up and backed away, offering an apologetic smile. Connal
glared back and stalked to his bedroom in search of peace. He sat on the bed
and necked the bottle, running a hand over his shorn head. The havoc out there
wasn’t a patch on the chaotic state of his mind.

‘Are you just going to pretend
I don’t exist?’

Connal’s troubled eyes cast
up to see Ash standing before him.

‘I didn’t hear you come in,’
he said. Dropping his gaze, he drank deep from the bottle, wiping his mouth on
the back of his hand.

She wasn’t going away.

‘Neither of us is getting any
older, you know,’ Ash sighed, ‘and eternity seems a long time to be walking on
eggshells.’

Eyes glued to the floor, he
couldn’t bring himself to look at her, let alone answer.

‘Am I so repulsive to you?’
she demanded.

Connal felt a sickening tug
in his gut. The Morrígan had used those exact words, before she'd forced him
...

‘Is that why you made me
cover up? Does the new me disgust you?’ She sounded sad.

‘No. God, Ash,’ fisting what
was left of his hair, he dragged his eyes up to hers, ‘I couldn’t stand for
them to see you naked. You are beautiful, Ash. The most beautiful thing I have
ever laid eyes on,’ his hands fell limp across his knees ‘and I want to do
violent things to any other man who so much as looks at you.'

‘Then why won’t you look at
me?’

God, that tremor in her voice
was going to break him.

‘I don’t want to admit that
you’re better off with
him
.’

‘I don’t want
him
.’

'I've seen you with him, out
there,' he said.

'Yes. Because he's the only
person willing to talk to me. The rest of them want me dead, and you? Ever
since the Temple, you look at me like I'm day-old dogshit on the sole of your
shoe.'

‘I’m no good for you, Ash. I
have no future. I'm damned, and I won't drag you down with me.’

‘You are not damned Connal.'
She dropped down and placed her hands on his knees, appealing to his averted
gaze. 'You gave your life for me. You came back for me. I don't know what you
had to do to get this ring, to buy my freedom, but I know it cost you.'