Her breasts flattened against his hard chest. She could smell the heavy oily reek of the rogue’s blood on him, and his own scent, a manly and rich aroma that made her lower body throb powerfully.
His tongue thrust into her mouth and hers met it. The kiss lengthened and deepened. The only sound was the sound of their breathing and the sighs that broke from them. They might have stayed that way forever. Cara wanted to, anyway, but a voice cut across their clinch and shattered its spell.
“Cara, what the hell are you doing?”
Sebastian stepped back, but he didn’t let her go. His arms wound around her and he nestled her into his side in a move so protective that her throat closed and her body sagged into the hard curve of his. It felt so right there, she felt like she had been made to fit into that space.
The only thing wrong was Ion, who was standing on the sidewalk glaring at her. His legs were spread, hands on his hips and anger visible on his face. His voice was filled with rage. “Your father was worried.”
“Ion, can you please back off?”
Cara felt Sebastian tense. She thought it was because Ion was acting like he was her boyfriend, which he absolutely wasn’t. She had no way of knowing that she had just given herself away when she named the young man glaring at her.
Ion. It was a Tribe name! Could Cara be Tribe?
He practically shoved her away from him. Cara stumbled and almost lost her balance. Ion reached for her and caught her, his face puckering, but Sebastian was gone.
CHAPTER 4
“The rogue is dead.”
A few people flinched at the words. A woman with bright red hair and eyes green as new grass turned to Sebastian, anger written on her pale face as she cried, “His name was Liam, dammit!”
“You know the rules, Moira.” It was Sebastian’s father, Brand, who spoke. “Once they go rogue, they are no longer allowed human names. Or our pity.”
Sebastian was weary. He’d walked away from Cara so fast, she hadn’t even seen him go, and neither had Ion. But he hadn’t been content to leave it alone. He’d followed the two of them, clinging to shadows and stalking their trail silently as they’d walked back to the old mansion they lived in.
The bikes in the driveway and the low stone wall with silver and glass fired into its stones had confirmed his suspicions. Cara was Tribe! He’d kissed a Tribe woman, had wanted a Tribe woman, and what was more, he had helped a Tribe woman to kill one of his own!
Okay, so Liam had gone rogue and had been sentenced to death. Either way, he would have died this night.
Sebastian’s keen hearing had picked up Cara and Ion’s conversation were saying as they walked into the house, at least the parts of it that were in English. Cara seemed to prefer that to her native Romani, and she had given Ion an earful.
She had told him bluntly that he was not her boyfriend and that he didn’t have any business butting into her business. That had resulted in a torrent of Romani from Ion. Most of the Fallen had spent years trying to learn that complex language, but given that it changed constantly and used so many root words from so many different countries, it was almost impossible. Sebastian had been able to make out a few phrases, and none of them had made him feel any better.
It seemed Cara was Queen Carida’s direct descendant. That meant she was direct blood of the woman who had first cursed the Fallen, had sent them into the woods and wilderness and set them chasing after the moon.
It also seemed that she was somehow promised to Ion. The fact that she didn’t want to be meant little. Sebastian knew all about oaths; they never took into account the feelings of those who had to live under them many centuries after the original pact-makers were gone.
That was just one more thing he and Cara had in common. He blinked, realizing that Brand had spoken to him and he had not answered. “I’m sorry, Father. I was lost in my thoughts.”
Brand’s eyes were dark and serious. “So I see. Have you seen any sign of the Tribe while you were out?”
“They’re using a motorcycle club as a disguise, we all know that.” There — he hadn’t exactly lied. They all knew that the club that called itself Tribe did indeed have true Tribe at its core.
“It’s time to end this.” It was Gregory, a hothead who was always chomping at the bit to start a fight.
“Sit down, Gregory,” Brand said mildly. “The men you took out tonight were all mortal. We wound up having to kill men for no reason, and that was part of what caused Liam to turn rogue.”
Unlike Tribe, the Fallen had to take on mortal mates, for the most part, in order to keep the bloodlines clean. Also unlike the Tribe, they had to reveal their natures to their mortal mates. They could not hide it. Nor could mortal blood dilute the strength of their own, another thing that the Tribe could not say.