Blue Moon Rising (The Patroness) (8 page)

“Ow.” This time Kylian managed to get my cat off him in no time, and grabbed Malo by the soft fur of the neck, his eyes blue. “I’ve had enough. We’re going to settle this,” he announced. Before I knew what happened he nudged me aside and went into the nearest available room – my room. I heard the door close behind me. I turned around, looking at it dumbstruck.

Then I heard wild noises, meowing and hissing and I was wide awake
. W
ith my fist slamming against the door
I shouted,
“Hey, what the hell are you doing to my cat? You better not touch him or I’ll kill you.”

As an answer I got – nothing. Total silence. Shit, that bastard killed my cat.

Suddenly the door swung open again and I was face to face with the cat killer. “You asshole, where’s my cat? What did you do to him?”

I tried to get a look inside my room but Kylian filled out the doorframe very nicely – err, I meant, unfortunately.

“We just had a talk,” he replied calmly as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

“A talk?”

“Yes,” and at that he went back into the kitchen, with Malo following his every step like it was the most natural thing in the world. Oh God, the Killer had brainwashed my cat somehow.

I knew that morning had just seemed too good to be true. Pauline came to me then, handing me a cup of coffee. God bless her. “Thanks.” Kylian was about to say something, bu
t I held up my hand to stop him.
“Not yet, coffee first.”

He growled low in his throat. I bet he wasn’t denied that way very often, but I didn’t care, no one would ruin this sacred moment of my day. I needed to breathe coffee, to taste coffee. When I
was finished I looked up at him
but, of course, he stayed quiet now. “Did you fill them in?” I wanted to know.

He stood there
with
his arms crossed over his chest
and didn’t say a word. Stubborn as a mule.

I glanced at Viviane, who nodded, and then went over to sit on one of the high stools surrounding the kitchen counter. Her opinion meant a lot to me, so I inquired, “What do you think about all of this?”

She refilled my mug and sighed.
“Well, if it’s true and we have a traitor among us, then we have to keep in mind that it might be anybody. Even those nearest to us, those we trust. You should keep this a secret.”

Obviously Kylian found his voice again. “Grandpa thinks the same. We should maintain a low profile. And he has no idea what kind of animal or shapeshifter I could have smelled back in the al
ley.” He turned to Viviane then.
“Do you trust the Chef de la Meute?”

“Like I said before, it might be anybody. You can’t allow yourselves to think otherwise.” Her gaze settled on me. It hurt. That she would be able to suspect Michel of doing something like this. But it was the bitter truth, nothing more and not
hing less. I might not like it
but I had to accept it. Time to drop another bomb.

“The rogue took out two more last night. A man and a woman, thirty something. Caught him red-handed. We fought and I was able to hurt him. Smashed his nose in and made his navel a couple of inches larger. After cleaning the scene, I followed the blood trail. He was heading north when I lost it. The wounds had probably healed.”

Kylian straightened and stood very calm, his voice rather blank. “You went out on patrol after we split yesterday?”

I frowned and shrugged, having no idea what this was about. “Yes, why?”

He was too calm. I didn’t like it. “Why didn’t you tell me? You could have been hurt.”

With his mood I was glad my shirt covered my wounds. Then it hit me, he was caring for me. “It’s no big deal,” I told him. “I’m doing this every night, you know. Besides, you needed to get some sleep.”

He stepped closer, then stopped as if to rein himself in, but he
snapp
ed, “Bullshit. You won’t ever go out there alone. I’ll accompany you from now on.”

“What? But-”

“Maiwenn, stop provoking me,” he snarled.

And it dawned on me, he didn’t care, or at least not about my well-being but his male pride. I jumpe
d to my feet as angry as he was.
“Hey, cut the crap. I’m the Patroness of Paris and not one of your helpless, stupid, little subordinates. I’ve been doing this job since I was fourteen years old and was trained for it even a long time before that. And I think I’ve been rather good at it. I know what I’m doing, dammit.” Who did he think h
e was, waltzing in from America
and wanting to turn my life upside down. I was not some woman in distress, for God’s sake.

We were facing each other. The tension between us palpable.

“Up onto the roof, you two.” Viviane’s voice thundered through the silence.

That was all it took. In pajamas and bare feet and all I ran to the wrought iron, spiral staircase and up to the terrace with Kylian hot on my heels. Looking over my shoulder I saw his light blue eyes glowing. His movements were swift and predatory – graceful. I felt more and more like the little rabbit chased by a big, bad wolf. And I knew he felt the same, and that it would trigger his killer instinct. It was thrilling, and a bubble of laughter wanted to rise.

On the far side of the rooftop stood an old shed, which I used as a training room. I kicked the door open, dim light greeted me. But I was too far gone to care about something redundant as switching on the lights.

A sandbag dangled in the back of the room, other equipment covered the walls. Nothing mattered. I whirled around to face Kylian.

We moved in a circle, each of us sizing up the other. Then we lunged at each other, but I ducked at the last moment ramming my shoulder into his stomach, a hard wall of muscle. He grunted. We fought. No weapons, just him and me. We kicked and punched. Block, block, kick. My muscles were warming up and I smiled. This was
fun, though I knew he held back
because I was a female. His fault. I landed a good punch to his nose, so that blood spurted, and then whipped about,
launching a spinning hook kick. B
ut in an iron grip he got hold of my ankle. Shit, that was a first. He pulled, throwing me off balance and in a heartbeat I found myself flat on my back, trying to get some oxygen back into my lungs. The wooden floor was hard but cool under me.

“Gotcha!” he was standing over me, his mouth spread into a toothy grin.

In the blink of an eye I shot up, back in a crouching position and swept my leg in a wide circle so it collided with Kylian’s ankles. It hurt but he went down like a tree.

“Me, too,” I replied and slumped back onto the floor.

We lay there next to each other and smiled.

“What a nice warm-up.”

Warm-up, my ass. I could hear him panting.

He moved into a sitting position but I just stayed there on the cool floor.

“You’re wounded,” Kylian suddenly barked. A sheen of light blue rolled over his eyes and vanished, his animal side resurfacing for a moment. I sat up on my elbows and saw that my shirt had ridden up, revealing the bandaged scratch on my stomach.

“Why did you fight with me when you’re wounded?”

I fell back again a
nd sighed, struggling for words.
“Because you’ve to understand that I can take more than the usual human. I’ve been fighting all my life – mostly alone. Against vampires and shapeshifters or whatever
is
ripping u
p humans. I go out every night
whether I’m wounded or not. I learned to survive. I’m not a weak female to be protected with cotton.” I b
raced myself on my elbows again.
“And I’m not pack or something, so you aren’t my leader. We’re equals. You’re the pack’s assassin and I’m the Patroness of Paris. This is my city, and we help each other to solve a murder.”

When he stayed silent
as if thinking about what I just said, I laid back again.

“The rogue?” Kylian asked, his voice gentle, as he leaned forward to push up my shirt a little before softly touching my wound. His fingers, a light brush, made my skin tingle.

I got up briskly.
“Yeah, well. It’s a professional risk.” I tried to be my casual self and to change the subject. “We should get back downstairs. Or they’ll send out the search and rescue team, believing we’ve killed each other.”

Back outside Kylian stopped dead in his tracks, taking in the flowerbed that was my rooftop. Obviously he’d been too busy chasing me to notice any of it earlier. “Wow, you’ve got yourself an oasis up here.”

I smiled and looked at all the beautiful plants spreading out at our feet. The air was spicy, from rosemary, basil and chamomile, but also sweet from roses and lavender. Sunflowers and oxeye daisies had their bright faces turned towards the morning sun and in between them, without any sign of order, juicy red tomatoes
and chili peppers
shone invitingly. And that was only half of it. The whole garden was crossed by small, sometimes overgrown flagstone paths that all led to a terrace in the middle of the rooftop. An oasis, that was quite true.

“I like the flowers. Gardening relaxes me, but with my two jobs I’ve hardly enough time to take care of them. Viviane gives
me a hand as often as possible,
though I don’t like seeing her crouching in the mud. She’s young inside, but there are days when her old wounds get to her. Of course, now that Pauline has moved in I don’t have to worry about either anymore. Besides, the garden will help Pauline calm down her faery nature, so a life in the city will be bearable for her.”

We had started to walk through this green sea, enjoying the light and the sun and the scents. Kylian stopped, and I caught a waft of man and healthy sweat. I liked being with him, feeling his warmth beside me, but at the same time
he rattled me. Then he smiled
and those damn dimples showed up.

“Now I get why Pauline said destiny brought you two together. You complete one another. And the ointments you told me about? You said you make them yourself.”

I nodded.
“Not only are these plants beautiful and smell nice but they also can be very useful, for example in wound healing. Very helpful in my line of work, and with a little magic it works even better. Well, and as a witch I love making my own potions, balms and whatever I need.”

We went back to the winding staircase. Kylian leaned a little towards me and asked softly, “Did I hurt you earlier?”

My lips curved into a smile. “Don’t flatter yourself,” I replied and headed down the stairs. At the bottom I made a beeline for my room to get some clothes before I went into the bathroom. I stripped, pulled out the pin holding my hair up and stepped into the shower. The water ran warm over my skin and I thought of Kylian. I really needed to get my hormones under control. It had been – what? – over a year now. Oh, God. No wonder I couldn’t keep my calm around a splendid specimen like him. I
leaned my forehead
against the cool, tiled wall. Should I give in? Maybe it wouldn’t be that bad, that man had a reputation after all. And not a bad one. Besides, he would be back to the States after the situation here was taken care of anyway, so what could it hurt. I tried to ignore the whisper coming from my heart.

A few minutes later and still not wiser, I got out of the shower stall, brushed my teeth and pulled on my clothes. I went for faded jeans and a white peasant blouse since both were light and comfortable, strapped on my hip bag and Cutter’s harness and hid my other usual weapons.

At noon I was in my office. Kylian was with me. He’d insisted and after I’d noticed that not even Viviane nor Pauline were on my side, defending girl power, I kind of didn’t have a choice.

So now this handsome sonovabitch was prowling my office, inspecting everything.

“You know, I thought about our traitors.” He turned and came to sit on the edge of my desk.

Like earlier in the garden, I noticed his scent. He wore cologne, but the very subtle and not overwhelming kind given his sensitive shapeshifter nose. He, too, had gone for faded jeans today and a burgundy shirt that showed off his muscled chest and would probably rip if he flexed a bit. A sight for the gods – who obviously really liked to kick my ass.

I leaned back in my chair, to get a little away from him. “And?”

“We know that there are at least four persons involved, two humans and two unknown creatures. But I bet the one pulling the strings doesn’t like getting his hands dirty, they never do. So he needs men and magical creatures to come to him, so…”

“He has to win them over somehow,” I finished for him while my mind was already racing on, trying to think this through. “Some kind of recruiting. For that he would need a stage, to make propaganda, to lure them in.” I had an idea and grabbed the phone.

“What are you doing?”

“Well, what does it look like to you, Kylian?”

He growled low in his throat.

I rolled my eyes.
“I have an idea. Trust me.”

Mathieu answered after
a couple of rings,
“Salut, ça va?

“Oui, ecoute-moi, I need your help with a case.”