Keri Arthur - Moon Sworn

“Well, he obviously wasn’t innocent, then.”

“No. There’s a kill order out on him, but given he’s a bird-shifter, he could have well and truly flown the coop by now.”

It wouldn’t help him in the long run. Kill orders were issued Australia wide. Sooner or later, the Directorate would get its man.

Liander wandered out of the bedroom he shared with Rhoan, bleary-eyed and looking more than a little worse for wear. I raised my eyebrows. “Big night last night, I’m gathering?”

“Yeah.” He rubbed a hand through his tousled silver hair, messing it up even more. “Got that special effects contract I was talking about, and we celebrated big.”

“Congrats.” I pulled mugs out of the cupboard then went to the fridge to get the milk. “But I hope you realize you can’t be out boozing all night when we become parents?”

Liander leaned a shoulder against the door frame and gave me the biggest smile imaginable. “That has such a good sound, doesn’t it? Us as parents. Who’d have thought?”

Certainly not me—not with Liander as the father, anyway. I’d known for a while that my own vampire genes and the drugs forced on me by a mad former lover had made me incapable of bearing children, but there’d always been that slither of hope that at least part of the dream would be achievable. That I would still find a way to have children with the man I loved.

That hope was gone, buried along with Kye.

But with Liander and Rhoan’s relationship stabilizing and deepening, they’d both developed a hankering to become dads. Liander’s sister had volunteered to become a surrogate, and I’d had eggs frozen before my body had totally betrayed me—and my eggs were as close as my twin was ever going to get to having children of his own, since he’d gone sterile long before me.

Of course, Liander had dreams of a big family, with at least a dozen little Jenson-Moores running around. I wasn’t so sure I could handle that many kids, as much as I’d always dreamed of a big family myself. And the sudden reluctance might have something to do with little Risa—who’d been the sweetest thing going—suddenly hitting the terrible twos and becoming a demon child.

“You’d better hope she has twins, because after seven of her own, she may not want to go through the whole process again for us.”

Liander snorted. “Trust me, Emalee loves being pregnant. She’s already said she’s up for a second round of surrogacy.”

She might be saying that now, but she hadn’t yet gone full term and made it through the birth. None of us knew what effect the drugs I had been given might have had on my eggs. Or whether those changes would affect Emalee herself. This could still go horribly wrong, as so many other things in my life had. Which was why the doctors were monitoring Emalee carefully.

But I kept my doubts and fears to myself, not wanting to dampen Liander’s infectious happiness.

“Oh, that reminds me,” Liander added, accepting his coffee with a smile. “Emalee has her first ultrasound on Thursday. She wants to know if we’re all coming.”

“Too bloody right,” Rhoan said, handing Liander a croissant before squeezing past him to grab his coffee. He glanced at me. “I’ve already told Jack we aren’t available that afternoon, no matter what happens or how many crazies appear.”

I raised my eyebrows. “But you were supposed to be undercover. How were you going to get around that?”

“Given that’s no longer a problem, it doesn’t really matter, does it?” He gave me a grin, then took another croissant out of the bag. “I’m betting we have a boy—mainly because I don’t think the world could stand two Riley Jensons.”

I snorted softly. “Better another me than another you .”

“It can’t be the image of either of you, because thankfully it will have my genes in the mix. Which ultimately means it will at least be sensible,” Liander commented. “And I don’t care if it’s a he or she, as long as it’s healthy.”

“Amen to that.” I leaned past him to grab a croissant for myself, then spotted Quinn coming through the door.

“Hey, handsome. About time you got home.”

He gave me a grin and snagged one of the towels from the clean laundry basket that was perpetually sitting in the living room. A fine sheen of sweat clung to his face and darkened his blue T-shirt, molding it to his lean, muscular body. Hollywood would have everyone believe that vampires had no need for bodily functions, but that was nonsense. They might not eat the same way as the rest of us did, but they still had to drink to survive, and what went in had to come out in one form or another. And while they didn’t sweat that much, it happened.

Quinn had recently added long-distance running to his fitness regime. He was getting fit for the baby, apparently—which said a whole lot more about his anticipation of the impending birth than my staid old vampire’s often blasé attitude would have us believe.

Liander shifted to give him room to pass, then flared his nostrils. “You know, it’s damned unfair that he smells so good after running fifty kilometers.”

“It was only twenty-five today,” Quinn corrected, then grabbed my hand and tugged me into his arms, kissing me quickly but thoroughly. “Because I have an appointment with a real estate agent at nine.”

“You’re determined to get us all out of this apartment, aren’t you?” Rhoan said.

“Neither Liander nor I is used to living in a hovel, and we need some breathing space. And babies do tend to bring their own mountains of mess. We’ll all end up feeling trapped before you know it.”

“It isn’t that bad,” Rhoan protested.

“I agree,” I said, a grin twitching my lips. “There’s actually plenty of space. You just need to clean it up better.”

“It’s not Liander and me that make the mess, so why should we be the ones cleaning?” he retorted dryly, then kissed my nose. “I’ll hire a housekeeper once we move, though I think she’ll face an impossible task.”

He had that right. I wrapped my arms loosely around his waist and breathed in the scent of him. Liander was right—he smelled delicious even when he was sweating. “So, where’s this latest house situated?”

“It’s not a house. It’s a three-story brick warehouse in Abbotsford, situated right next to the banks of the Yarra River, with Dickinson Reserve and Studley Parks on the other side. Each couple could have one floor, and the general living area could be in the middle. It even has a fenced parking lot that can be converted into a safe playground for little werewolves to play.”

“Sounds ideal,” Rhoan commented. “Between that and Riley’s land in Macedon, we have the perfect mix of city pad and country retreat.”

“Let’s make sure the place actually matches the real estate blurb before we start making plans,” Quinn said, then reached past me to grab a mug, his damp body pressing against mine and fueling the already-stirring embers of desire.

But with it came an odd wave of reassurance. Not everything in my life had gone so horribly wrong. Quinn was here, still standing by my side through all the tears and the heartbreak and the more than occasional bad mood.

He loved me and he wouldn’t go away—he’d told me that so often in the last few months that it had almost become a joke between us.

He was also damn hard to kill, because he wasn’t just a vampire but an Aedh—a being who could became shadow and mist, and for whom there were few physical threats. Which didn’t mean he couldn’t be killed—he certainly could when in flesh form—but he was harder to kill than your average vampire, and for that, I was mighty grateful. I’d lost my soul mate. I didn’t think I could live through losing my heart’s desire, as well.