The Moonlight Mistress (27 page)

She had a clear idea that Miss Claes wasn’t entirely happy with what they’d found in the facility. Anger and anxiety both seemed to boil off the wolf and into the stuffy air. Without really intending it, Lucilla’s footsteps sped up. Within a few moments, she was nearly running to keep up with the wolf’s steady lope. At times, she lost sight of the blond brush of tail and knew which direction the wolf had passed only by the fresh scratches on the flooring, made by claws skidding around a corner.

Surely she would know if something had gone wrong. She would have heard guns, shouts—

Growls.

Many growls, more than Miss Claes could produce alone. Lucilla hesitated only a moment before shifting her rucksack onto the floor. Bracing her back against a dirt wall, she extracted two bottles, one for each hand. If she threw them with enough force, they would break. Pulse pounding, she edged around the corner.

The door to Kauz’s office stood open, and guarding the door were four wolves, fully as large as Miss Claes, their pelages dark and unkempt over cruelly tight collars, their lips threateningly curled. Two faced outward, and two inward. Lucilla lifted her arm, then lowered it. Miss Claes was too close. Lucilla wouldn’t risk harming her and perhaps damaging her ability to fight. She eased to the side, hoping to remain unnoticed as well as see inside the office. When she did, her heart began to race and the blood sang in her ears. Kauz was there, his back to what must have been a hidden door, for she could think of no other way he might have bypassed Ashby, who blocked the open door into the corridor.

Kauz held a shotgun to Pascal’s shoulder, the sort used for
hunting birds, but with the end of the barrel crudely sawn off. One twitch of his bony finger to the trigger could easily blow Pascal’s head from his shoulders, or rip open his jugular, or pulp a mass of flesh including major blood vessels and nerves. Clear images of what would remain after such a close shotgun blast flashed through her head like lantern slides. Only a lack of air caused by horror kept her from screaming aloud.

“Who is there?” Kauz said in German.

Lucilla drew a steadying breath. “Miss Daglish,” she said.

“Are you the Frenchman’s whore, or the wolf’s?”

“Neither,” she said. “Who are these wolves?”

“My children,” he said with patent falseness.

Ashby growled, “They’re not yours.”

“On the contrary, creature. I have raised them to be mine. You will see, when they tear you limb from limb. But not the bitch. I have need of her. My lads are lacking a mate, you see.”

“I’ll shoot them first,” Ashby said.

“You won’t, you know,” Kauz said. “You forget, creature, that I have observed you carefully. You will not slaughter your own kind.” He raised his voice, commanding, “Kurt! Immanuel! A step closer.”

Ashby did not retreat when the wolves paced closer. Lucilla weighed the bottles of acid in her hand, wondering if she could be accurate enough to break the bottles on the door frame itself. Though now, she would only damage two of the enemy wolves.

Pascal said, “If you kill me, Kauz, these others will kill you. I imagine you wish to live, to see the end of your experiments.”

Kauz said, “The creature will not be able to shoot me, for Kurt and Immanuel will take him down like a deer, and I will be free to leave here. Emil and Friedrich will easily defeat your bitch, and the whore is of no consequence.”

“Would you like to eat one of these bottles?” Lucilla inquired. She wondered if she could fit one between Kauz’s jaws.

Kauz ignored her. “Kill him! You know what will happen if you don’t!”

Lucilla couldn’t take her eyes off Pascal. His expression burned with rage and frustration. His pistol still rested at his hip, but both of his hands were full of notebooks.

A frenzy of growls yanked her gaze to a tangle of bodies on the floor: two, no, three of Kauz’s wolves, and Ashby, whose naked flesh flashed as he attempted to get out of his clothing and change form.

Miss Claes grappled with the fourth wolf and, a moment later, pinned him to the floor, her teeth flashing at his throat in warning. The wolf fell limp, and she hurdled his body, toward Kauz.

The shotgun roared and Lucilla screamed.

She ran forward, her legs tangling with the fourth wolf, who had bounded to his feet and blocked her advance. She staggered, grabbed for the wall and fell. “No!” Pascal shouted.

Lucilla scrambled to her knees and saw Pascal, sprawled on the floor, his hand lifted, seemingly unhurt. Her breath exploded outward and, unbidden, tears of relief flooded her cheeks.

Tanneken crouched over Kauz’s fallen form, her teeth buried in the shredded remains of his throat, a geyser of blood spattering her face.

Ashby lay naked on the floor in a pool of blood, one leg twisted unnaturally beneath him, and three wolves slowly shrinking back from his weak but steady cursing.

The fourth wolf licked Lucilla’s arm and then, before her eyes, shifted into the form of a barely adolescent boy, wearing a collar.

THE HOTEL’S LOBBY WAS COLD AS THE GRAVE AND was giving him the shakes. Gabriel wrapped his arms around himself and shifted from foot to foot. Hailey, damn her, was sprawled at her ease in a once-plush red armchair and flipping through an abandoned fashion magazine, studying the drawings.

“No word yet,” Crispin said, rehanging the telephone receiver and stepping out of the booth. He pulled the folding glass doors shut behind him. “Mrs. Vlyminck said to call again in a few hours. She doubted she would have news before suppertime, and she informed me there were more important matters afoot than Major Fournier’s little mission.”

“If Noel’s gotten himself killed, I’ll fucking kill him again,” Gabriel said under his breath. He winced away from the memory that he had in fact killed someone else, several someones, only hours before.

“Upstairs,” Hailey suggested.

“A good plan,” Crispin said. “I don’t know what I did without a batman. Come along, Meyer.”

On the stairs, Gabriel said, “Wouldn’t the two of you rather go out? We could see the sights.”

“Sleeting,” Hailey reminded him.

“I’m for another bath,” Crispin said. “It’s too bad I can’t wash enough to last me through the next few months on the front.”

Gabriel’s mind presented him with the image of Crispin’s sturdy, nude body, slick with soap, bubbles clinging enticingly to the curls on his chest. He remembered the tight clench of Crispin’s arse on his cock. His body’s surge of desire resonated with his desperate fear for Noel’s safety and his usual post-battle shakiness. He had to stop climbing, and press his hands against the flocked wallpaper to prevent himself from seizing Crispin then and there. “Good idea,” he said, then had to swallow, his throat felt so thick.

Hailey pushed past him, and he closed his eyes at her accidental brush against his chest. He wouldn’t mind her soft warmth curled around him, either. He wanted to burrow deep in her heat and sweet womanly smell.

He wanted both of them pressed to his bare skin, their mouths and hands roaming over him until he forgot even his own name.

He was a cad and a lecher and half a dozen other shameful things. Ashby had been with two women at one time, he knew, but this was different. Neither one of his companions had invited him to do anything like what he was imagining. Well, Crispin likely would, once he’d had his bath, but Hailey—he’d not pleased Hailey, by treating her too much as a woman and not a soldier. And he hadn’t mentioned their tryst to Crispin, and it would likely horrify him; it would likely horrify him even more if he knew Hailey was a woman.

If Hailey wasn’t interested, that would be all right. He supposed. She could stay alone in her room, and—

“You coming?” she asked.

Hailey and Crispin both were standing in the corridor, while he still stood a couple of stairs below them. He moved toward them, mentally shaking himself. “I need a drink,” he said, striving for lightness.

“Could do with one,” Hailey said, peering at him from beneath the brim of her cap.

“Brandy,” Crispin said with satisfaction.

The room he shared with Crispin felt cozy and safe. The three of them took off their boots, sat on the rug and drank the brandy from coffee cups. Gabriel edged closer to the radiator and felt his inner trembling diminish with the warmth of it, and of the brandy, and of Crispin’s shoulder so near his own. Though he’d only drunk two swallows of the alcohol, he must have drifted, for the next he knew, Hailey was shaking him by the knee. “Sir?” she asked.

He set down his cup before he could spill it. “Not tonight with all that rot,” he said. “Just my name, if you can do that for me.”

Crispin eased closer but didn’t embrace him as Gabriel wished he would. Of course he wouldn’t do such a thing in front of anyone else. Gabriel shouldn’t be melancholy about it. It wasn’t as if this room wasn’t rife with secrets. His entire life had been like that. First his heritage, which he’d tried to conceal until he learned he couldn’t; then Ashby’s inhuman abilities; then their sexual relationship; and finally, the fact that as many women as he desired, there were just as many men. He had been hiding that knowledge even from himself. If he hadn’t been struck here and now with both desires at once, he might be hiding that knowledge from himself still.

Crispin said, “Do you want us to leave? So you can get some sleep?”

“I’ve a deck of cards in my room,” Hailey remarked.

Don’t leave me
. The words didn’t make it past his throat. Instead, Gabriel grabbed Crispin’s wrist, and Hailey’s, as well.

Crispin turned his hand over and tangled his fingers with Gabriel’s. His smile was crooked. “Ashby will be fine,” he said. “He’s gotten himself out of worse scrapes than this, hasn’t he? Remember when Evans found that grenade that hadn’t gone off, and—”

Gabriel was shaking his head. “I wasn’t thinking of him,” he admitted. “I was thinking of myself.”

Hailey gently slipped her wrist free of Gabriel’s grip and poured a little more brandy into his cup. “You’re fine, sir.”

“No. No, not really.”
I’m not normal
. Though if he thought about it a little more, Crispin wasn’t normal, either, nor Hailey. Isobel. Even now, knowing what he did, he could scarcely put her true name together in his mind with the person he knew. Perhaps for that reason alone they belonged together. Perhaps for that reason, they would not reject him. He said, “Will you stay here with me? Both of you?”

“Long as you like,” Hailey said. She gave him a second, sharp look. “Sir, did you mean—”

Gabriel flinched, unsure if her tone was meant to be censorious. He shouldn’t have suggested it. He wasn’t asking only for sex. If she accepted him, one way or another, Crispin would also know her secret.

Crispin let go of Gabriel’s hand. “What did you two get up to?” he asked suspiciously. “Hailey, I never would have guessed it of you. And you, Gabriel—he’s under your command—”

“It was only the once,” she said. “I asked him. When we thought Ashby was dead. And it’s not like you think, Daglish.”

“I think I’ve been an idiot,” he said.

Gabriel grabbed his shoulder and kissed him, rather uncomfortably because his spectacles dug into his face. Crispin made a sound in his throat, and Gabriel kissed him again, just under his jawline, until he felt Crispin’s hands gripping his shoulders. Only then did he pull back. “What do you think now?”

Crispin looked befuddled.

Hailey scooted closer and sat up on her knees. “Daglish,” she said in her soft, husky voice. “I like you, and I want it to be all right between us.”

“It’s fine,” he said. He looked at Gabriel. “You didn’t make me any promises, not really. Nor did I. I was only—I haven’t had the best luck with, with…”

“Lovers,” Hailey supplied.

Gabriel said, “Is it all right with both of you? If we—” He swallowed the pleading words he wanted to say.

Hailey turned to Crispin and said, “I’ve never done it before, with two other people. But I think I’d like to.”

Crispin looked indecisive, but said, “I’ll give it a try.”

Hailey touched his hand. “One more thing.”

“It’s all right, Hailey,” Crispin said gently.

“No—you might not like this.” She looked down at her lap, then into his face. “I’m a woman, Daglish. My real name’s Isobel, a friend just called me
Bobs
and
Bob
as a joke. I wear men’s clothes so I can be in the army, and—well, everything else you know about me is the truth. Except I don’t have a cock. Meyer might not think it matters, but I guess it matters to you.”

“You’re not joking.”

“No.”

“Definitely not,” Gabriel said, finding his voice.

Slowly, Crispin grinned. “I’ll be buggered.”

Hailey grinned back. “I’d give it a try, but I’d need one of those wooden cocks first.”

“Maybe some other time,” Crispin said. “It’s odd but, you know, you don’t seem like a woman to me.”

“That’s the idea.”

“No, you—” Crispin grinned again, then sobered. “It’s still all right with you? I mean, with me being—”

Hailey smiled, a gentler smile than Gabriel was used to. Then she leaned forward, braced her hand on Crispin’s shoulder and gently kissed him on the mouth. “That’s not so bad, is it?”

When she drew back, Crispin was smiling sweetly, too, a smile that pierced Gabriel to the heart. “Hmm. That felt all right, but I’m not sure yet. Maybe you could—”

Gabriel had begun to feel left out, and the longer he sat alone, the more he craved contact. “There’s a nice warm bed right here,” he said.

Crispin and Hailey—Isobel—exchanged a look. Each pushed one of his shoulders. Startled, he didn’t resist, and landed on his back on the coverlet. Isobel—no, Bob—said, “We should help him get his clothes off. Daglish, you distract him.”

Crispin stripped off his uniform tunic and tossed it on the chair. Loosening his tie, he crawled onto the bed, then bent over Gabriel, removed his spectacles and kissed him deeply, wet and hungry and tasting of brandy.

Distantly, Gabriel felt Bob’s fingers at his waist, unbuttoning his braces from his trousers. He jerked when her fingers brushed his cock while unfastening his fly. Crispin pinned his shoulders and kissed him again before moving on to biting his neck.

He tried to help Bob by lifting up, but didn’t manage very well because his arms had tightly wrapped around Crispin’s torso and he couldn’t concentrate on anything but broad, sleek muscles shifting beneath his hands. He would have pulled himself inside of Crispin’s strong body if he could. As soon as his trousers and drawers were off, he hooked one bare leg over Crispin’s and tumbled him onto his side.

Crispin’s shirt was still tucked in; Gabriel couldn’t get his hand onto skin that way. Frustrated, he growled, and Crispin rolled him onto his back. “The tie’s not de rigueur,” he commented, working at the knot, while Gabriel traced fingers over his belly; the muscles trembled, just a little, which mollified him.

Bob reached around Crispin and deftly undid his tie, as well, whipping it off with a flourish. Gabriel watched her fingers travel down Crispin’s chest, swiftly unbuttoning, until her hands collided with his at Crispin’s waist.

He grabbed her fingers and gently squeezed. “Who gets to undress you?”

“Oh, we’ll manage,” she said. She moved their joined hands down, over the bulge in Crispin’s trousers. Crispin gasped and closed his eyes.

“You’ll manage all sorts of things if you keep that up,” he said breathlessly.

Gabriel gave Bob’s hands, and Crispin’s cock, a hard squeeze, craving that pressure all over his own body. Inside his body. He looked up into Crispin’s face. The skin around his mouth was reddened from Gabriel’s mustache. “Are you willing? To try all sorts of things?”

“What sorts of things?” Crispin asked.

“I know you like being fucked,” Gabriel said. “Would you be willing to fuck me?”

“I’ve never done it,” Crispin said in a rush, then looked down and returned to unbuttoning Gabriel’s shirt.

Bob had Crispin’s braces off his shoulders. Gabriel slipped his hands beneath the open lapels of Crispin’s shirt and soothingly rubbed his chest. When Bob finished unbuttoning Crispin’s fly, he slid his hands lower and rubbed there, too. “Do you want to?”

“I might hurt you,” he said softly, still focused on Gabriel’s shirt, though his hands had stopped moving.

“I’ll let you know,” Gabriel said. “Will you? I want both of you.”

The tone of his voice must have given him away, because Crispin leaned down and kissed him sweetly. “If that’s what you want. The tin’s not empty.” He looked over his shoulder. “You’ve got too many clothes on, Bob.”

Gabriel agreed. She hadn’t even removed her tunic yet.

Bob stripped efficiently, at least as far down as her drawers and chest wrappings. Then she stopped, Crispin’s fingers just brushing her arm. He said, “You should come up here with us.”

For the first time since Gabriel had known her, she looked uncertain. “You want to help me get this off?” she asked.

After a glance at Gabriel, Crispin sat on the edge of the bed. “Come here.” He set to work. Bob watched his hands, her own loose at her sides.

Gabriel took the opportunity to sit up, strip his shirt over his head, and reach to the head of the bed where he found the tin of salve. He sat behind Crispin and put his arms around him, resting his chin on Crispin’s shoulder, watching him unwrap Bob’s chest.

When the bindings were gone, she rubbed her nipples with her palms. “Bit sore,” she confessed.

Crispin touched the red marks above and below, but shied away from her breasts. His hands went to her waist. “These, too?”

“Go on,” she said. After Crispin had shoved her drawers down, she stepped tidily out of them, and forward. “You still all right, Daglish?”

“It’s Crispin,” he remarked absently, studying her with interest. “May I touch—”

“You don’t have to,” she said. “I guess Meyer’ll take care of that.”

“No, I want to, if you don’t mind.”

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

Gabriel said, “I
will
want my turn later.” He turned his head and kissed Crispin’s neck, then used his chin to dig into his shoulder while he passed his hands over the soft fur of Crispin’s chest. From the side of his vision, he saw Crispin’s hands tentatively cupping Bob’s breasts and testing their weight in his hands. The sight aroused him. The allure of the forbidden? The piquancy of trying something for the first time? Or—he flushed, thinking this was probably true, though embarrassing—did he just like to watch?

“They’re soft like…” don’t know what.” Crispin rubbed his palms over her nipples. “Does that feel good? I’m not hurting you, am I?” After a moment, he grinned. “No, I guess I’m not hurting you.”

She grinned back. “You’ve got the hang of it already.” She rested one hand on his curls. “Maybe a bit harder. Or you could suck on them. If you wanted.”

“I’ll be careful,” Crispin said earnestly. Suppressing laughter, Gabriel nuzzled the back of his neck while Crispin did just that, his head bumping into Bob’s hands, her fingers stroking
through his hair as well as Crispin’s. After a while, Crispin drew back and touched Bob’s flushed cheek. “You do like that. It doesn’t matter that it’s me.”