Authors: Melissa Schroeder
“We need to kill the other Mades.” Malik said it with such a
cold certainty, Cordelia shivered.
“We might be able to save a few,” Nico said, but she heard
the doubt in his voice.
“I think they are too gone. And the ones he fed his blood
to…they will be ready to kill anyone in their way. We need to send out
assassins for them.”
Nico glanced down at her as if he didn’t want her to hear.
But it wasn’t like she didn’t know what was going on.
“You have to order it, Nico. You have no choice,” she
whispered. “Mades like Malik and Hurst…they will be vilified.”
“You will not do it,” Nico said.
Malik tore his gaze away from the window. “Worried about me,
old man?”
“No Mades should be looking. It will be too much to ask.”
Malik nodded and then lapsed into silence.
She wanted to ask more, and she wanted to yell at Nico, but
she apparently was more tired than she thought. The swaying carriage and the
warmth of Nico’s embrace surrounded her, and she drifted off to sleep.
All the lights were blazing when they finally pulled up to
the front of their townhouse. Nico saw the door to the house fling open and
servants and family came pouring out. So much for not attracting attention.
He waited while Malik opened the carriage door, then woke
Cordelia.
“Love, it’s time to wake up, we are home.”
She grumbled in her sleep and cuddled closer to him,
burrowing into his jacket. In that moment, he didn’t want to leave the
carriage. He wanted to hold her close, knowing that he had gotten to her in
time to save her. And he wanted to be alone with her.
Malik stuck his head through the doorway. “Come on, Nico.
Your mother is not in the best of moods, and she will start screeching soon if
you do not get Cordelia out of there and into the house.”
He sighed.
“Cordelia, wake up, love.”
Her eyelids fluttered, then eventually opened. Her eyes were
clouded, confused, then they cleared.
“Where are we?”
“Home. Let’s go.”
She nodded but before she slipped off his lap, he kissed
her. When he pulled back, she was smiling.
“What was that for?”
He was embarrassed by it. For the first time in his life, he
really did not know what to say to a woman. She had his heart in her hands and
she had no idea. If she had died tonight, he would have regretted not bonding
with her. He did not want to go on living without her.
He loved her more than life itself.
Nico shook his head and lifted her off his lap.
He stepped down first, then reached back into the carriage.
The moment her small hands touched his, he felt the connection. Nico pushed
back his emotions and helped her out of the carriage. They would have to wait
until later to talk and to do what he should have done long ago.
He smiled down at her as she looked up at him.
“Get ready,” he said.
“For what?”
But he didn’t have time to answer. She was surrounded by a
crowd, his family and he noted, hers as well. Diana and her father were in
attendance.
“Let’s go inside so we don’t make a scene,” he said.
He herded the group of servants and family into the house
and did his best to calm his needs. He would have her in bed soon enough.
*
*
*
*
Cordelia wanted to collapse she was so tired. It had been
over an hour since they had returned, but no one seemed inclined to leave her
alone. That is, except Malik, who gave her sister an odd look and then went to
do Nico’s bidding to set up the hunt to find the rest of the Mades.
“Cordelia, I would like to have a word with you in private.
With you and…” her sister trailed off and glanced over at their father.
“Laird MacDonald, please, my sister and I would like to have
a word with you.”
She said it rather loud, and she thought she heard Nico
laugh, but she ignored him. She wanted to get this over with. Her nerves had
been through so much today. She was not sure she was up to this.
MacDonald smiled and nodded. She rose from her chair and
felt several hands reach for her. “I do not need help,” she said rather
crossly. She sighed and looked around at the faces of the friends and family
who had gathered to support her. Most were filled with concern, except Nico,
who was smiling at her.
It was then that she realized that for the first time in a
long time, there was a community…a family that cared about her. They might not
be her blood, mostly, but they were her family now. All of them had been
worried, and Nico…he had come to save her as if he could not live without her.
Tears burned the back of her eyes. She blinked them away.
“Please, accept my apologies. I am rather tired.”
Most of them nodded their heads knowingly. She stepped up to
Nico’s side, since he had been standing behind her chair as if he were still
guarding her. She rose to her tiptoes, resting her hand on his shoulder to
steady herself.
“Thank you for saving me,” she whispered in his ear. “I love
you.”
He stilled and turned to look at her, his face with no
expression, but his eyes…they were dark, mysterious, and filled with some kind
of emotion she couldn’t discern. As always, everyone in the room seemed to melt
away as he continued to stare at her. He opened his mouth to speak, and she saw
that his feeding teeth had descended. At the moment, she wanted nothing more
than to go away, to be with him and no one else. But, MacDonald cleared his
throat.
She felt her face heat as Nico cast his gaze upwards then
back down to hers. He gave her a kiss on the nose. “After you are done talking
to them, we will go up to bed.”
If she had any doubts about what that meant, she only had to
look at him to know. She nodded then led her sister and her father out of the
room. They gathered in the front parlor. Diana shut the door behind her.
“Diana, what is it you needed?” she asked. She was trying
her best to be pleasant, but she was not in the mood for this. What she wanted
was to be with Nico, alone, and not come out for days.
Lord, she had turned into a loose woman.
“I wanted to talk to both of you because I think we need to
face our relationship,” Diana said.
MacDonald looked at both of them, his expression wary. “I
knew your mother.”
Diana smiled. “I remember your visits.”
For a second, he said nothing. He glanced at Cordelia. The
raw emotion on his face squeezed at her heart. There was no doubt in her mind.
He had loved their mother.
“Please, do not say I am wrong. You were there a lot when
father was gone.”
MacDonald winced at the word “father,” and Cordelia knew
everything she wanted to know. She did not have the patience to dance around
the truth.
“What Diana is trying to say is that she wants you to know
that we know you are my father and possibly hers.”
“Cordelia, really. Did I not teach you any manners at all?”
“Yes, but thankfully I married Nico, and now I don’t have to
have manners. He’s rude to everyone and that allows me to do the same.”
MacDonald still hadn’t said anything.
Diana and Cordelia shared a glance. Cordelia shrugged. Diana
approached him. “I must apologize for my sister. She really does have better
manners—”
“I adored her,” MacDonald said.
“Our mother?” Cordelia asked.
He nodded. “Aye. She was the most beautiful of women, inside
and out.”
“I remember you together, how happy she was,” Diana said.
“I-I loved your visits.”
He glanced at Cordelia and then Diana. “I wanted to take you
both away…along with your sisters. I wanted to bond with her.”
Diana looked confused at the language, and Cordelia shook
her head. “Diana doesn’t understand everything.”
MacDonald looked at Cordelia then nodded. “Understood.”
She breathed a sigh of relief. Cordelia wasn’t sure if she
would ever have to explain to her sister what they were, but she definitely did
not want to do it tonight.
“Why didn’t you?” Diana asked. Her voice was quiet and
filled with tears, but there were none on her face.
“I couldn’t. It killed me that she would not leave that
bastard, but she couldn’t, not legally, and there was your brother. But, it
seems he takes after his father too much.”
Both she and Diana nodded.
“I am going to stay in London a little longer. I would
appreciate getting to spend time with both of you.”
His eyes were shimmering with unshed tears, and she felt her
own spill over. “Yes.”
Diana bit her lip. Her own eyes appeared to be wet as well.
She nodded.
“Well,” he cleared his throat. “I need to talk to your
husband about what he needs from me.”
He stepped toward her then stopped. She could not let him
leave like that, with this distance between them. She walked to him. Without a
word, she put her arms around him. When she pulled back, Cordelia looked over
at Diana and was alarmed. The woman she had never really seen upset was now
crying openly.
“Diana?”
She shook her head, still unable to speak apparently. Then,
without a word, she threw herself into their father’s arms.
“I have missed you so much.”
He patted her back and looked at Cordelia. She smiled
through the tears.
Diana then pulled back. “I will be staying here to help
Cordelia and would love to…spend time with you.”
He nodded as a satisfied smile curved his lips. “Well, then.
I will call on you in a few days.”
He walked out of the room and the door shut with a click.
“Do you want to explain what happened tonight?” Diana asked.
Cordelia was so surprised by the question she almost answered. She wanted her
sister again, wanted the confidant she had when she had been a child.
“Never mind,” Diana said, shaking her head and sighing.
“No, I want to tell you, but…I am so tired, and Nico is not
going to be happy if I take much longer.”
Diana nodded. “I should have never left you.”
“What?”
“I should have come up with some kind of plan to get you out
of there.”
For what seemed like the hundredth time that night, she felt
her eyes fill up. She could not say anything. Instead, she rushed to her sister
and hugged her. The familiar scent of roses surrounded her. Memories of their
childhood flooded her senses.
“I missed you so, Diana.”
She hugged Cordelia tighter. “I missed you too.”
When she stepped back, Diana smiled, looking younger. “I
will let you go tonight, but I do want to talk to you.”
She opened her mouth to respond, but Nico strode in before
she could get any words out. He was frowning. He said nothing as he approached
her then picked her up.
“Nico!”
“Good night, Diana.”
Her sister laughed. “Good night, Nico.”
“Nico, really, must you act like that? Do you not have any
manners?”
“No.”
“That’s it.”
“Yes.”
She sighed and wanted to admonish him again, but since she
had just proudly told her sister she had no manners, she guessed she could not
truly complain.
When they reached their room, he waited for her to open the
door.
“Out,” Nico said to the maid waiting for her.
She flew out of the room in such a hurry, she was a blur.
“You could have just asked me to accompany you upstairs,
Nico. I would have come.”
He stopped in the middle of the room. He looked at her, his
eyes burning with need. “Did you mean it?”
“Yes, I would have come upstairs with you.”
He shook his head as his brows lowered. “No. What you said
before. Do you truly love me?”
She studied him. For a quick second, she saw something that
was close to vulnerability on his face.
“I would not have said it if I did not mean it.”
He kissed her then, ruthlessly, as if he was trying to pour
every feeling into it. When he drew back, they were both breathing heavily.
“I want to love you, to forget the world, but first we must
talk.”
Her body was already humming, her need for him growing with
each second that ticked by.
“Must we?”
He smiled slightly but he nodded. “There are things I must
tell you.”
She sighed as he placed her on the bed. “If you feel it is
necessary.”
With a stern expression on his face, Nico placed his hands
on his hips.
“I assume you know about bonding now.”
She nodded, the pleasant warmth he’d created with the kiss
draining out of her. She did not want to know why he could not bond with her.
She knew. She just did not want to hear why from him.
“When my sister-in-law was taken, Neal tortured her until
she died. My brother felt everything his wife did, then he died. It was
horrible.” He looked at her. “I did not want to think of dealing with that
myself. I could not see myself opening to someone as Demetrius did.”
She opened her mouth, but he set his finger against her
lips. “I did not understand until tonight.”
“Truly?” she asked. “It isn’t because I was abducted? Maybe
you are just feeling guilty.”
“It isn’t that, or the fact that you are carrying my child.”
“If you…what?”
He sighed. “You did not know? Saint said you might.”
“You mean your cousin knows I am…?” She waited for him to
nod. “How does he know?”
“He has the sight. He says you will someday, too.”
She opened her mouth then closed it.
“I am trying to tell you I love you, and I don’t want to
discuss what kind of abilities you are going to have,” he said in a shout.
“Seriously, Cordelia, do you do anything normally?”
“I find being normal boring.” She sighed, her heart
fluttering around the idea he had just shouted at her. “Do you truly love me?”