Stephanie Julian - Shades of Moonlight

Race’s voice held a note of amusement that made her turn to look at him again. His expression had lightened some and that gorgeous mouth curved in a slight smile.

She smiled back as she lifted her hands to sign. “Want to be rid of me already?”

His eyes narrowed for a brief moment before he reached for her hand again and tightened his grip on her. “No.”

Waiting for him to elaborate, she held her breath, but he had nothing more to say, which was par for the course with Race.

She released his hand so she could sign again then couldn’t think of how to say what she wanted to say in sign language simple enough for him to understand.

Instead he grabbed her hand and pulled her along again. “Talk later. Walk now.”

She wanted to argue. So she did. With one hand, she told him exactly how frustrated she was with him and knew he didn’t understand more than a few words.

But his lips did that slight twist again that let her know he was amused.

“I’m pretty sure you just ripped into me but for once I’m happy I can’t understand you.”

She threw her free hand up in the air in exasperation and rolled her eyes but he just kept moving forward, that half-smile still tugging at his lips.

Mara couldn’t quite contain her own smile. For the first time in what felt like forever, she thought maybe, just maybe , things had started to turn her way.

Cole Luporeale stared out the window of his office, watching the snow blanket the forest.

He registered the beauty of the white-tipped pines and pristine carpet covering the forest floor but his brain kept working the problem he’d been considering for the past few months.

What should he do?

Yes, there was so much more to the question. What should he do about Cat? What should he do about the Mal ? What should he do about the coming war? The war only he seemed to know was coming.

A war that had the potential to further fracture the Etruscan races until they ceased to exist altogether.

And allowed the Mal to spread unchecked.

“Cole. You have a minute?”

Turning from the window, he made sure he had his game face on. He wasn’t sure it would help. Sometimes he thought Dorian Pelligrini could actually read his mind.

It didn’t help that his praetorian had been with him since he’d been nineteen. Now Cole was legatus of the lucani legion. He’d inherited the title of king from his father and he’d managed to keep the lucani from splintering into several pieces over the last two years.

But even though he was thirty, she could still make him feel like a stupid kid with nothing more on his brain than sex and drinking.

Vaffanculo , he really wished that was all he had on the brain.

“What’s up, Dorian?”

She stopped just inside the door. She wouldn’t come any closer unless he specifically invited her to.

“I heard about Mara. When are they going to try to break the rest of the spell?”

“Sounds like you’re worried about her?”

Dorian shrugged and Cole hid a grin. Anyone who met Mara was taken in by her sweetness. Apparently Dorian had had the same reaction.

“The girl didn’t deserve what those bastards did to her.”

“No, she didn’t. And I don’t know when they’re going to attempt to break the rest. Margie said the first part knocked them all on their asses. They want to regroup before they try the second. Come in and sit, Dori. You’re making my neck hurt.”

She shook her head. “No time. Have you forgotten? You’ve got a meeting in five minutes.”

Holding back a sigh, he nodded. “I haven’t forgotten. Is she here yet?”

“No. But you know she’ll be on time.”

He nodded. The Goddess Turan was never late. And every time she showed up, she left him with more questions than he’d had before she showed up. “And one of these days maybe she’ll actually tell me why she comes to talk.”

Dorian leaned against the doorjamb, dark-brown eyes staring at him with single-minded focus. “Maybe she likes the company.”

Her deadpan delivery made him grin and brought out an answering smile on her beautiful face. Years ago, he’d accepted the fact that Dorian was one of the most beautiful women he’d ever met, smart and sexy with a dry wit not many people realized she had. He’d never been attracted to her sexually but he often wondered if she ever thought about sleeping with him.

Hell, they spent most of their time together, which meant if he went on a date—which he did occasionally—she went as well.

Which made him wonder if she had dates of her own.

What would she do if he flat-out asked her to sleep with him?

Probably lay him out flat with a left hook. He’d seen her take down bigger men.

“Cole? Is everything okay? You haven’t seemed yourself lately.”

He didn’t feel like himself lately. He felt out of it, a beat off. Ever since he’d returned from New Orleans a year ago, where he’d held his first congress , a meeting of the North American lucani packs.

That meeting hadn’t gone as planned. He’d nearly lost his sister Arabella and his best friend Steven Castiglione there.

And this past year had been…eventful, to say the least.

They’d gained a new goddess and added several members to their extended family. Some of whom had Mal ties.

That should’ve worried the hell out of him. But Grace had proven her loyalty to the lucani . And her daughter and son and their cousin Mara were innocent pawns in Mal games and Cole would never turn them out.

Hell, his best friend Steven had been born Mal and he’d more than proven his loyalty to Cole and Arabella.

“Times are changing.”

Dorian’s eyes narrowed in concern but her tone was droll. “Are you going to sing now? At least give me fair warning so I can leave before my ears bleed.”

Cole shook his head, frustration and fear bubbling in his gut. Neither of which he ever showed outside this office. “Aren’t you worried about what’s coming?”

Dorian took a deep breath and released it on a sigh. “Of course. But that just means we have to be ready for anything. So that’s what we do.”

If only it were that easy. Because the person who needed to be sure the lucani knew what to be ready for was him. And he couldn’t fail. The fate of an entire race depended on him.

“Cole. You’re over-thinking.”

“No, this time I don’t think I am.”

Dorian rolled her eyes. She actually fucking rolled her eyes at him. “Fine. You want to mope for a few minutes, have at it. But just remember. You’re not dealing with a bunch of pansy-assed humans. We’re also wolves. We’ve got fangs and claws and we know how to use them. If people forget that sometimes, that’s their problem.”

“ Vaffanculo , you sound like you wish we were back in the forests spending most of our time in our pelts.”

Coming from Dorian, that was a shock. She was one of the most human lucani he knew. Even in her pelt, she retained a sense of humanity.

“That’s not what I’m saying at all. And you should know that. What I am saying is that maybe some of our people have forgotten what it means to be lucani . What it means to be Etruscan.”

“You think I don’t know that? I deal with it on a daily basis. More and more lucani are moving out of the dens and into the cities. Taking drugs to suppress their change. Our birthrate has been declining for centuries.” And even more frightening, at least two teenage lucani who he knew of had not been able to call their wolves.

It was almost as if the lucani were losing their identity.