“Oh, stop!” She tossed the table linen at him, which he ducked with a laugh. “I am going with you,” she said when he straightened.
He laughed again, and not without a little humor. “You see, lass, there is where you are wrong. You”—he pointed a long finger at her scowling face—“are going to be nice and safe at home with Talent keeping guard.”
She grabbed the finger and hauled his hand, and thus him, close. “I do believe you must be suffering some malady of the mind if you think that will come to pass.”
“Daisy…”
“I am not without resources, Ian.”
Her curt response gave him pause. “What are you saying?”
Daisy took a breath. “I have a power as well.”
Oddly, he didn’t look as shocked as she expected, but rather relieved. “Were you planning to tell me anytime soon?”
“I’m telling you now. I found out the night you let your despicable brother tear you to shreds. And”—she braced herself—“it involves dirt.”
“Dirt,” he repeated.
She wrinkled her nose. “Bother. I hate dirt.”
When he lifted his brows in exaggerated query, she sighed. “You see, I can move the earth, make it quake, part, surge, and so forth. I can control the plants, trees.”
He closed his eyes. “I did not dream those lycans being speared by tree roots, did I? Or the flowers in the garden.”
“I fear not.”
Azure blue eyes opened. “Daisy-girl, I cannot tell you how much it pleases me to hear that you can defend yourself when threatened.” His fingers, still caught in her grip, threaded through hers and Daisy felt the warmth of his affection. Something in her relaxed.
The grip on her fingers tightened, and he jerked her against him. “But if ye think that such revelations will cause me to take leave of my senses and put you in the direct path of danger, then ye’ve gone as daft as a wee loon.”
It appeared that Daisy had not gone “as daft as a wee loon.”
Ian’s colorful phrasing aside, she could not fully justify coming along with him. One fool breaking into Buckingham Palace was enough. She wouldn’t distract him by waiting outside, a sitting target for whoever happened along. So here she was, cosseted away like a bloody child with Talent to nanny her while Ian ran off with Mary Chase.
Smothering another curse, she glared into the crackling fire burning merrily away in the small upstairs library hearth. Beside her, Talent brooded for reasons of his own. When she could no longer take his burning stare, she turned to glare back at him. “It was his idea for you to watch me, not mine, so kindly stop looking at me in that manner.”
“Of course it was his idea.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Before you came along, he relied on me for important tasks. Now I’m stuck watching over one of his women.”
One of his women.
The little rat. Talent thought he knew how to get to her, did he?
“Is that why you do not like me?” She gave Talent a thin smile. “I know you don’t. You have made that quite clear.”
Talent smirked. “I wasn’t going to deny it.” He leaned forward suddenly, and his broad cheekbones flushed. “I don’t like you because you make him weak. You distract him.”
“Well, I’m here, aren’t I?” Daisy’s words came out in a hiss. “While he’s off with that GIM.”
She expected Talent to jump on her weakness but he looked equally disgruntled. “She’s an unnatural piece, that one.” Quickly he crossed himself.
“Does everyone revile the poor GIMs?” Daisy asked, a little shocked by his vehemence.
His lip curled. “Poor GIMs? They’re body thieves. Unholy. The dogs of our world. And untrustworthy.”
“Northrup trusts her. It should be good enough for you.” And for me, she thought with a qualm.
“He’s a fool around women,” Talent said with a sneer. “Loves them too much.”
Daisy’s nails tapped along the arm of her chair as she studied the young man. He wasn’t particularly handsome, not in the traditional sense of the word. Though hard, his features were even and well-formed. She suspected that when he smiled, he would be devastating in his own way. And he was not a boy, no matter how often Ian treated him as such. Talent continued to frown into the fire.
“Are you in love with Northrup?” she asked.
He jumped within his seat, his mouth hanging open. “You are barmy.”
She offered a smile. “Stranger things have happened. And you do go on rather like a jealous lover.”
“Good God,” he snarled before leaping up to pace. “In love with him?” Talent spun on his heel and glared down at her. “He is like a father to me. Do you understand? I’ve been with him for years. Years, I’ve witnessed his loneliness. And now you come along, and he’s out of his head.”
Daisy’s fists clenched. “Yet you begrudge his happiness with me?”
“Because he will not survive it when you leave,” Talent shouted. “He was better off closed up. Better off not feeling.”
She did not know what happened to the man to make him have such a dim view of life, but she understood his fear. Feeling too much was a dangerous endeavor. It was on the tip of her tongue to shout at him that she would never leave Ian. Doing so would be like ripping out her own heart. But that would make her a liar. Try as she might to forget what she knew, the truth could not be ignored. It burrowed into her heart and made her feel ill, and so very frightened that she wanted to curl up and hide. Daisy sighed and sank back deeper into her seat. “You’re right.”
Whatever cutting retort Talent had been about to utter died a quick death in the face of her confession. “What are you going on about now?”
Daisy’s bottom lip trembled, and she ducked her head, cursing herself for crying now, and in front of him of all people. “I shouldn’t have let it go so far,” she whispered. “I am not for him.”
She might have laughed at the way Talent’s head cocked to the side, his expression utterly confounded. But she couldn’t. Not when her heart was breaking. Damn it, but Ian had been right; distraction worked for only so long.
“You…” Talent ground his teeth before continuing, “You make him happy.”
It was an admission dragged out with the greatest reluctance. Of that Daisy was sure. She did laugh then, but without any humor. “Yes. And he makes me so very happy, too.” She sniffled as she went as leaky as a blasted kitchen tap. With a sound of disgust, Talent handed her his kerchief.
“Thank you,” she said. “You know, I never used to cry. It seems all I’m capable of now.”
“If you make him happy, and he makes you happy,” Talent said, “then why should you care a whit what I say?”
She looked up at him through her watery gaze. “Admitting that you aren’t all-knowing now, are you?” When he glared, she smiled. “I am human, Jack.” Tears welled up again and she blinked hard. “I’m going to die.” She swallowed hard. “Eventually, I will die, and he will remain.”
He opened his mouth to protest when a sharp noise from below brought him up short. He stilled and held up his hand as if to bid her quiet while he listened. The sound came again, of breaking glass. His green eyes gleamed with determination as he looked at her. “Stay here.”
Daisy lurched to her feet, her heart pounding a wild rhythm. Before he could move away, she caught his arm. “Don’t go down there.”
Talent looked at her hand upon his arm and then up at her with pointed annoyance. “Are you joking? Of course I’m going. It’s my duty.”
Daisy didn’t let go. Talent might be abrasive and pompous half of the time, but she couldn’t see him hurt. “It might be the werewolf.”
“I bloody hope so. I’ve been itching to get my hands on that bastard.” He tugged at her grip. “Let it go, will you?”
“No.” She clutched him harder. “Ian said you weren’t a lycan. How do you even expect to fight it?”
Talent snorted. “Now you ask me?”
“I trust Northrup’s judgment,” she said. “But you have no idea how strong that thing is.”
He laughed with equal parts mirth and outrage. “Hell, woman, I am a shifter.”
She had no idea what a shifter was, but it did not sound very impressive. “A shifter is what exactly?”
“Bloody… A shifter is its own beast. I can shift into any living thing.” An evil smile spread over his face, and then the air about him shimmered and his body distorted. It was a quick thing, a blur of movement.
Daisy gave a cry of shock and nearly fell on the floor.
Talent laughed. “What? Don’t like what you see?”
She gaped back at herself. He’d turned into her! Her face, her figure dressed in Talent’s clothes looking back at her.
“Good God,” she sputtered. A thought occurred to her, and she yelped. “You were that blasted crow who followed me!”
The air around him stirred as he shifted back. “Quick one, aren’t you?” He leaned in, and all the humor leached out of his expression. “I can turn into anything,” he said with emphasis. “Even another werewolf.”
When Daisy blinked back at him, too dumbfounded to speak, Talent laughed, heartily. She’d been correct. He was devastating when he truly smiled. “Haven’t you learned, woman? You’ve fallen off the map. Here there be monsters.”
Another crash stopped him cold. With a firm hand, he guided her to the chair and sat her down as if she were a child. “Now let me go handle this one.”
Chapter Thirty-six
In the course of a life as long as Ian’s, a man learned to be grateful for small mercies. Therefore, he was extremely grateful that the Queen eschewed living in Buckingham Palace. Breaking into the monarch’s property was damning enough without having to worry about running into her person. Since she was not currently in residence, nor had been for some time, minimal security was in place. Two guards patrolled the insides, bored men who played of brag while passing a flask of gin between them. They were currently sleeping off the effect of the laudanum Mary Chase had snuck into their gin. Even so, Ian’s footsteps made not a sound as he walked down the dank, dark corridors in the upper hall. Must thickened the air, cobwebs and dust gathering in corners. A rather sad state for the magnificent structure.
He hadn’t come empty-handed. Armed with two silver hunting knives and a loaded dart gun, Ian intended to put the were down in a humane fashion and walk out with his own head intact. It was one thing to attack the were while defending another, but he would not dishonor them both by doing so if the thing were caged.
A ways in front of him, Mary Chase’s specter floated along, her form pearly white and translucent. She retained her shape and was able to give the appearance of walking when she was so inclined, but more often it was easier and faster for a GIM in spirit form to drift.
But the longer they roamed the massive palace, the more agitated he grew. Not a soul stirred, nor was there any sign of a werewolf having inhabited the place. The hairs lifted along the back of his neck. Ian’s pace quickened, his jaw growing so tight that it throbbed. When they’d come full circle yet again, he stalked toward Mary Chase’s ghostly form.
“There is nothing here!” he hissed. “Not a bloody thing.”
She frowned, the skirts of her diaphanous dress wavering in a phantom breeze. “We are too late.”
Ian punched the wall, not giving a damn that he’d torn through the damask. “There was never a were in this place.” He punched the wall again, and the picture frames rattled.
“Sire…”
“Do not call me that!” Ian raked his hand through his hair and felt the sting of his claws. Why lure him out here? To get him away from Daisy? Ian went cold for one tense moment. But his heart eased. Talent would protect Daisy.
Even so, Ian itched to return home. “They’ve laid a trap and we’ve fallen right into it.”
Hovering beside him, Mary’s spectral form frowned just before her eyes went wide with fright. Her thin, ghostly voice whispered “No,” and then she disappeared.
Ian’s hand reached out in a reflexive attempt to pull her back when Conall’s voice rang out from beyond the palace walls. “Ho-there, brother. I’ve got your little puppet by the neck. Come out and play nice, will you? Or shall I pull on her strings?”
Ian’s blood went hot as he ground his teeth.
“Come along then,” called Conall. “There’s a good bitch.”
Conall, Lyall, and six of their guard stood in a semicircle on the Queen’s back lawn. Pale moonbeams highlighted his brother’s face and made it appear narrower. Otherwise, it was like looking in a bloody mirror. Ian knew then that part of him would die along with Conall this night.
Mary Chase stood placid and unmoving, as though Conall’s large hand was not curled around her neck and squeezing tightly.
“Let her go.” Ian set down his weapons. “She’s got nothing to do with what’s between us.”
“Your little spy?” Conall shook Mary hard. Her hair tumbled over her face but she did not move. “Making bargains with the devil’s minions now, are we?” Sneering, he tossed her away from him, and she fell to the ground with a thud. “Go,” he said to Mary, “before I change my mind and rip your clockwork heart out.”
She sprinted away without a word.