Mona Lisa Craving

FOURTEEN

THEY DID INDEED begin that very night, right after supper. Not in the clearing, which was deep in the woods, but on the lawn behind the house. Another smooth move on pretty boy Quentin’s part—choosing a spot where it would be easy for everyone to keep a discreet and not so discreet eye on them. Aquila and Tomas chose to do their watching from the kitchen window, which overlooked the back lawn, while Nolan and Hannah more tactfully sipped tea in the parlor, affording them a nice side view of things.

I was much more blatant about it. Come on, now. This was my baby brother. And not just him but Jamie, who had volunteered his help as the human Thaddeus could practice on. With Jamie’s Mixed Blood strength, he was essentially just that—only human strong. His sister, Tersa, had silently come outside with the rest of us to watch. The rest of us being Chami and me. Chami was ostensibly acting as my guard. His true charge, though, was Thaddeus.

Dontaine had gone out with his men to attend to their regular duties, though he had wanted to stay. I had seen it in his eyes, in the tightening of his jaw. But with Chami, Tomas, and Aquila watching over me, he’d had no reason to linger.

Quentin was a good teacher, keeping things low key and casual. He demonstrated the move first with his brother, Dante, who acted in the role of aggressor. A simple maneuver of blocking Dante’s slow punch, grabbing his wrist, and sweeping him over a fast, tripping foot, using his opponent’s own momentum to send him flying. Quentin and Dante went through the moves in slow motion two more times, calling out the steps—punch, block, grab, sweep, and trip. Like a dance.

Then Quentin had Thaddeus practice it on him.

“You don’t have to worry if your strength flares up with me,” Quentin told my brother. “Try to keep it at human level, though. I’ll let you know if you start using too much force.”

He put Thaddeus through the steps three more times until he was more comfortable with it, keeping the moves slow and deliberate.

“You learn the steps first,” Quentin said, “then you worry about speed and strength.” Though he did work on the latter. He didn’t automatically just go flying past Thaddeus when my brother pulled on his wrist. He made him exert enough strength to accomplish the maneuver on his own.

“Yes, like that,” Quentin praised, and Thaddeus’s face lit up with a wide smile. “You won’t need to use any more strength than that when someone’s really trying to hit you, putting the full force of their momentum behind their punch.”

After Thaddeus performed the steps consistently two more times, he paired him up with Jamie.

“Keep it nice and slow,” Quentin said, watching them both closely. “That’s it. Perfect.” And it was. Jamie swung at my brother, moving in slow motion. Thaddeus blocked and grabbed, and tripped him.

“I didn’t hurt you, Jamie, did I?” Thaddeus asked anxiously.

“Nah, you kidding? You could grab my wrist even tighter if you wanted to. The pull was good, though. I went sailing right by you.”

And so it went. Then it was Jamie’s turn.

The two boys joked with each other, their eyes lit up with excitement, eager to learn. They were clearly having a blast. The rest of us were much more relaxed, seeing how well Quentin had matters in control. He used Dante only in the initial demonstration; he had no actual contact with Thaddeus and Jamie. The slow, step-by-step instruction paid off when they moved on to the next phase.

“Now we’re going to practice it faster,” Quentin said to the boys’ cheers.

He illustrated the move at a more realistic speed with Dante. They were beautiful together, all effortless strength and lithe grace, executing the moves in perfect choreography. Two healthy young animals. One fair, the other dark. Both natural superior warriors by blood and birthright.

“And when you are comfortable with that, even faster, like this.” Quentin caught his brother’s punch with an easy block, a punch that came at him so swiftly it was just a fast blur. The next two movements flowed naturally—sweep and trip—and Dante went sailing past Quentin. He hit the ground in a smooth, tight roll and sprang to his feet.

“Hopefully the guy you take down will just hit the ground hard and lie there instead of doing what Dante just did,” Quentin said, grinning.

“Oh, man! Can you teach us how to do that next, the roll Dante just did?” Jamie asked, eyes shining.

“Sure.” Quentin smiled. He seemed to be enjoying himself as much as the boys. “That’s the next thing on the plate, how to fall correctly.”

Tersa stood quietly by my side throughout all this. Nothing to give away her thoughts while she was out here, watching. Just her actions themselves—that she was here.

“Tersa, would you like to learn this stuff also?” I asked her quietly.

A hard, uncertain silence met me, an answer in itself. Yes, she wanted to learn, but was wary about the physical contact required. She had an instinctive fear of men now. Most girls would after they had been violated by a man.

“You could practice the moves on me,” I offered.

All hesitance disappeared. “I would like that. Thank you, milady.”

She followed behind me shyly as I took her hand and stepped out toward the others.

“We’ve decided to join you,” I said.

Quentin smiled in welcome. It was Dante who unexpectedly protested. “Tersa is welcome. But I would ask that you just watch, milady.”

“Why?” I asked, ready to argue with Dante, thinking that he didn’t want Chami and the others to worry about my close proximity to him. I was wrong. That wasn’t the reason at all.

His pale blue eyes moved down to my midsection then back up, a tiny eye flicker indiscernible to the others. But its impact on me was as if a giant hand had reached out and smacked me. Made me remember: Oh yeah, I could be pregnant.

I might have even swayed, because his hand started to lift before he checked the movement. I stepped back abruptly, knowing my face was utterly pale. He’d almost touched me…a near disaster. It would have sent my men spilling out of the house. I almost laughed out loud at the thought: my men rushing to me, concerned about my safety, while Dante was worried about the very same thing—keeping me safe…because I might be carrying his child.

“Tersa,” I said when my voice was steady enough to speak. “Will you be okay practicing with your brother?”

She nodded. Glanced at Dante, back at me. “Thaddeus, too. I feel comfortable with him.”

I made my lips stretch out in a smile. “Good. It’s probably better if I just watch you guys then.”

My mind and heart were in a tumult as I walked back to Chami. With everything that had happened, I’d forgotten that Dante and I may have created life. A tenuous possibility, but one that still guided Dante’s action. Not just tonight, I suddenly realized, but also that of the two previous days: yesterday when he had revealed himself, trying that suicide stunt; and the first day, after we made love, when he’d seen my Goddess’s Tears and known who I was. Was that the reason he had not killed me then? Because of that one in a million chance I was pregnant by him?

Oh, Dante, I thought. What happens when my period comes as it undoubtedly will in a few weeks and we all know my womb is empty? Will you try to kill me then when that possibility of a child no longer holds back your hand?

As if sensing my thoughts, Dante glanced at me. Our eyes met across the distance separating us. But I didn’t know what was in his mind. What he thought, what he felt.

An explosion of movement from the forest’s edge caught my attention. Movement so fast I didn’t know what I was seeing for a split second. I felt another Monère’s presence but didn’t register whose it was. Only Tersa’s happy exclamation of “Wiley!” clued me in. The wild Mixed Blood barreled straight toward her, and she had no fear, just a welcoming smile.

I had only a moment to shout, “Don’t hurt him,” when he hit them. Or more specifically, hit Quentin. Wiley took Quentin down in a smashing tumble of grappling limbs and vicious snarls. The sharp scent of spilled blood suddenly permeated the air—a smell that filled me with fear, especially when I saw Dante’s face.

I’d never seen him look the way he did now. Even when he had been gripped by the madness of Lunara asseros, he wasn’t near as frightening. His eyes—those odd pale eyes—glowed with the heat of his rage…a murderous one. He reached for Wiley’s head, not to pull him off his brother, to stop the fight, but with the clear intent of killing him. To snap his neck.

I cried, “No, Dante!” He hesitated, giving me enough time to reach the tangled fighters. To grab a hold of Wiley and shout, “Stop, Wiley, stop!” as I dragged him off of Quentin, kicking and snarling. Then Tersa was there, and with her first word—his name—and her touch, Wiley grew calm. He allowed himself to be pulled away, and submitted to Tersa’s frantic patting search after pushing aside his bloody shirt.

“It’s not his blood,” Tersa said, looking up at me.

“No,” Dante said, wrath vibrating his words. “It’s my brother’s blood.”

I turned and saw that Quentin’s neck had been cut open. Dante’s hand was clamped tightly over the wound, but blood still seeped out from beneath his fingers.

“How did Wiley do that?” I asked.

“With the knife Quentin took away from him,” Dante snarled, his eyes flashing with such fury, I took a step back from him. “The knife my brother had in his hands but did not use against his attacker because you said not to hurt him. That is why Quentin is injured and why Wiley is not dead by his hand.”

Those eyes and the searing emotions contained within them were too intense for me. My gaze dropped from his, and I turned to find my chameleon suddenly there between Dante and I. “Chami, get the healer. Quickly, please.”

“No need,” Dante said, forestalling him. “She comes.”

Hannah rushed to Quentin’s side with Nolan beside her. The same heated emotion that gripped Dante seemed to grip Nolan also. The big warrior’s eyes flashed with rage over his son’s injury, making him a sudden fearsome threat. Something the rest of my men, who were pouring out of the house, obviously sensed as well.

Aquila and Tomas came up beside Chami, forming a solid barrier of flesh between me and the Morells, including Wiley and Tersa behind our protective wall. At the sight and scent of Nolan, Wiley began snarling again, reluctantly stopping only when Tersa hushed him. There was a tense, brittle silence with just the sound of harsh breathing. Then I felt the gentle thrum of Hannah’s power as she poured her energy into Quentin’s wound.

When his neck was healed, Quentin coughed, cleared his throat. “It’s all right,” he said. “Not the boy’s fault. Father and I trapped him, tied him up, and used him to lure Mona Lisa out of the house.”

It took me a second to realize that Quentin was explaining things to his brother. That he was soothing Dante, whom he had accurately pegged as the most volatile threat.

“He was watching us last night,” Quentin said, his eyes on Dante. “Thought he was getting used to us, that he was coming to accept our presence, but something set him off just now.”

“Me,” Tersa said. “I didn’t know Wiley was here watching us. I got too close to Quentin, and Wiley rushed to protect me from what he saw as a threat.”

“He wasn’t just protecting you,” Dante corrected coldly. “He was trying to kill my brother.”

“He doesn’t know better,” I said, pushing through my wall of men until I could see Dante. “Wiley grew up wild. He doesn’t speak, doesn’t understand what we’re saying. He only knew that your brother and your father had hurt him once, and that Tersa, the only person he loves and trusts in this world, was suddenly within Quentin’s reach.”

I walked to Quentin, to where he sat on the ground flanked by his father and mother, with Dante standing like a burning flame of retribution in front of them, protecting his family. I crossed that invisible line that had suddenly sprang up between us and the Morells, walked past Dante, and knelt in front of Quentin. I took his hand and felt the strength, the calluses already formed there.

“Thank you, Quentin, for not hurting Wiley. I’m sorry you were hurt because you held yourself back, but thank you for doing so.”

“No need to thank me.” Quentin glanced up at his brother. “I wouldn’t have wanted to hurt the kid anyway, Dante. Even if Mona Lisa hadn’t said anything. Can’t blame the kid for being angry at what Dad and I did to him. We were the bad guys here. The boy was trying to protect Tersa from what he saw as a threat to her.” His eyes asked his brother to let it go. He did.

By small degrees, the brittle tension left Dante. The hot burning rage faded, leaving behind a chilling frost in its place. Trust me on this, it was a definite improvement.

“That was a stupid thing you did, little brother,” Dante said, extending his hand down to Quentin, “allowing him to hurt you like that.”

“Hey, you’re only older by six lousy minutes,” Quentin protested. Taking Dante’s hand, he let him pull him up. We were all linked briefly for a moment—brother with brother, my hand still holding Quentin’s. Then our hands unclasped, and the three-way connection broke apart.

“My apologies,” I said formally.

“No apologies needed, milady,” Nolan said in his deep voice. “No one is at fault. Or perhaps it is more accurate to say everyone is at fault, therefore no one person is to blame. Bring Wiley here,” he instructed Tersa. “He needs to accept us.”

Agreeing with the wisdom of that, Tersa tugged Wiley forward. Wiley bared his yellow teeth at his former captors, but he didn’t try to break free of Tersa’s hold as he could so easily have done. Wiley’s three-quarters Monère heritage gave him almost full Monère strength. He was much stronger than Tersa, who was only half Monère.

“Step to the side, please, my Queen.” It was a bit jarring for me to hear those words—my Queen—coming from Dante’s mouth.

“What?”

“Step to the side,” Dante repeated, his face set in hard, uncompromising lines. “If the boy goes ballistic again, I do not want you standing next to him.”

I hesitated. If Wiley went wild again, I could help restrain him. Next to Tersa, Wiley tolerated me the most. He wouldn’t intentionally hurt me. But the cold, implacable look in Dante’s eyes, and that slight dipping gaze down to my waistline made me swallow back my protest and take several steps back from them. Dante retreated as I did, and Nolan nudged Hannah behind him. Behind her husband’s protective bulk, the healer rolled her eyes at me and smiled, a woman wise enough to yield to her man’s natural, protective urges without arguing. It was the type of wink given from one woman to other in the same situation. The thought froze the answering smile that formed on my lips. Did she see Dante as my man? Did I see him that way? And last but not least—did he see himself that way?

I was obeying him. Had yielded to him twice already. But what other choice did I have? All that he had asked was for me to stay safe. Until I knew if I was pregnant or not, I felt compelled to obey his wishes in this matter.

Crap. There had to be a faster way of determining whether I was pregnant, other than waiting three long weeks for my period.

Tersa’s voice drew me back to the present drama. She said Wiley’s name and touched his chest. Putting a hand on Quentin’s arm—something that made the feral Mixed Blood growl—she did the same with Quentin.

“Quentin. Friend. Quentin is my friend.” She repeated it with Nolan.

It was almost funny…if it wasn’t so darn scary…to see tiny Tersa, almost birdlike in her delicacy and size, standing so fearlessly between the three males, two of them much bigger than her, all of them far stronger. Fearless was not a word one usually used to describe Tersa, someone who quivered uncomfortably in the presence of men, but it fit her well now. Steely determination shone in her eyes, was heard in her voice. You will all be friends, the rigid posture of her spine shouted.

“Friend,” Quentin said with a faint smile. Moving slowly, his eyes fixed on Wiley, he picked up the small dagger lying in the grass at his feet. “Friend,” he repeated, and offered the blade, hilt-first, to Wiley.

I didn’t have to look at Dante to feel the sudden tension emanating off of him in waves. I held my breath—we all did—as Wiley cautiously took the knife from Quentin.

Tersa, wisely, immediately took the weapon from Wiley. His hand tensed briefly on the blade, then with a faint shudder, he yielded it up to Tersa without any further struggle.

“Say it, Wiley,” she said, gentle determination lacing her words. “Quentin—friend.”

Amazingly enough, he did. Wiley opened his mouth and said the first words I’d ever heard the wild boy speak. “Quentin. Friend.”

Tersa had him repeat it with Nolan. When he uttered the words, “Nolan, friend,” she smiled at him, blindingly bright, and it was like the sun suddenly breaking out behind dark and stormy clouds.

“Good, Wiley, good,” she murmured, and led the boy away.

“She’s beautiful when she smiles,” Quentin murmured, earning a scowl from her brother, Jamie, who had been standing quietly next to Chami.

“And very stubborn,” Jamie said, sticking out his chin. “Comes with our red Irish hair.”

“She’s incredibly brave,” Quentin said with admiration.

“Not anymore. Not since…” Jamie stopped. Sighed. “But she’s different when it comes to Wiley. She’ll do anything to protect him. Don’t hurt the boy.”

“I won’t,” Quentin promised, eyes solemn.

And like that, the little drama was over. Mine, however, was just beginning.