Authors: Cleo Peitsche
Victoria turned and looked behind her, and a moment later, Arnie came out, head bowed. Arnie, who was more like her willing slave than an employee.
Two witnesses.
Shit.
He stared straight ahead and waited.
Kendra, a small, gray-haired shifter, consulted a
paper and began speaking. “This pre-trial is to gather information about the deeds and state of mind of the accused, Koenraad Van Buren. Because the accused is known to the judges, and because of his relationship to the Council, we request that every question be answered so as to save time. If at any point the judges decide the accusation is misguided, we will end the questioning immediately. This
pre-trail may serve as a trial proper, with binding sentencing.” She looked up from the paper. “Do you understand what I just said?”
This wasn’t how pre-trials usually began. He should have been told what he was being accused of, for starters.
Koenraad decided not to answer. Kendra sighed.
The judges took turns asking other bizarre questions.
Did he understand shifter laws?
Had he been
feeling unwell? Stressed? Out of control?
Was there anything he wanted to get off his chest? To that he wanted to say,
No, but there’s some
one
I want to get off my back.
He didn’t understand the reason for all the psychological questions, but he didn’t answer any of them.
Darius seemed detached from the proceedings. He repeatedly passed when it was his turn to ask a question, and he mostly
avoided looking at Koenraad. It was like the crafty old shifter felt guilty, but guilt wasn’t in Darius’s repertoire.
Finally Darius posed a question. “Did you kill a human at—”
“No,” Koenraad said, shocked out of his silence. He’d already started speaking, so he continued. “I have never killed or attacked a human.” His mind raced.
Killed
. This wasn’t about the transfusion at all. But he knew
he hadn’t killed anyone, so why was he here?
Darius tapped a finger on the table and pursed his lips. “We have witnesses who will testify that you killed the human female who was your lover these last few days.”
Koenraad stared right at Victoria. “Your witness is either insane or a liar.”
Arnie ducked his red head.
Victoria stood slowly. “You know what you told me and I saw the evidence. Your
pool was full of her blood.”
He said nothing. What jumped out at him, though, was that she’d said “was.” She knew the pool had been cleaned. She hadn’t found anything, but she’d probably thought about the amount of blood and had concluded that Monroe was dead.
“Oh, Koenraad,” Victoria said. “I know you swore me to secrecy, but I couldn’t allow the poor woman’s murder to go unavenged.”
“The
second witness,” Kendra said.
Arnie stood. “I was in the area, and I overheard it when he confessed to Victoria that he’d murdered the woman.” He sat.
“We saw the body,” Victoria said. “It was awful.”
Arnie stood again. “We saw the body.” He didn’t sit so much as collapse.
Murmuring came from the audience. Koenraad wondered if they were happy with the show. Because that’s what it was. A show.
A sham.
“Questions from the audience?” Kendra asked.
“I have one.” A slightly breathless Spencer sat at the edge of the top row. He must have come in while Koenraad was glaring at Victoria.
“Recognizing your right,” Kendra said.
“If you didn’t kill her, where is she now?”
“I don’t know,” Koenraad told his friend.
“Surely you must have an idea. I know you broke up, but she’s gorgeous. The
kind of woman I’ve been looking for. I really wouldn’t mind finding her.”
Stunned, Koenraad stared at his friend. “What?”
Victoria sighed loudly. “Aren’t spectators limited to one question per member?”
The rule was seldom enforced, but it was on the books. It could go either way. When Kendra nodded, Koenraad knew it was over. For whatever reason, they already believed he was guilty.
Spencer
caught his eye, and suddenly Koenraad realized he was being given a chance to ensure Monroe’s safety.
“I’ll answer the question. I don’t know where she is. Personally, I’m a big believer in free love. My partners can go wherever they like.”
Victoria scoffed, and Darius shot her a warning look. Spencer, however, nodded once, and Koenraad felt weight lifting from his shoulders. Spencer now knew
Monroe was aboard
Free Luv
. Unless someone had disabled the GPS, he’d be able to easily follow the yacht and make sure she arrived safely.
Spencer would make sure that Monroe stayed out of this. He would keep their secret.
Chapter 17
The boat’s main room, or whatever special nautical name it had, felt claustrophobic, and it reeked of sweat and dirty luggage, and—dare she say it?—stale sex.
Monroe shoved her way through the suitcases and out the door, panic mounting in her chest. She had to get back to Tureygua.
Nearly everyone who had come in the minivans was crowded on the boat’s deck. Many of them
were smoking, and they’d clearly found the booze cabinet. She carefully wove through them, not wanting to accidentally knock someone into the water.
She rapped on the glass, and Thomas turned. He was so not the ex-boyfriend she wanted to see at the helm.
“I don’t want to go to Aruba,” she said. “I can’t go. Turn around.”
One of the smokers booed her, and she flipped him the bird. It was her
right as a New Yorker.
“What do you mean?” Thomas yelled back.
“Turn this boat around.”
“It’s hard to hear you. Join me on the bridge.”
She went in and tried not to think about when she’d been in this exact spot with Koenraad. “If you won’t turn around, then stop the boat,” she demanded. “Give me a life raft and a plastic spoon, and I’ll paddle back.” She would have leaned over him to turn
off the engine herself, but she didn’t want to accidentally blow them all up.
“I mean it, Thomas! Stop the boat!”
He shut off the engine. The boat didn’t stop, but at least it wasn’t still racing forward, farther and farther from Tureygua.
“This is crazy,” he muttered. “You want to go back for him? Look at this boat! The man who owns this gets no points for respect for women. That’s the kind
of guy you want to be with?”
She’d been pretty scandalized by the boat when she’d first seen it, but it irked her that Thomas was passing judgement on Koenraad. “For your information, he has nothing but respect for women. He’s a good man and a good friend, and he gets a million points, so put that in your calculator.”
“Or maybe you’re just seeing what you want to see and ignoring the truth.”
“Like I did when we were together?”
Tara tore in like a hurricane. “I’m going to throw that lying piece of shit overboard, so help me god,” she panted. Her eyes were wild.
“Fuck you!” Lee screamed. He was swaying on the deck, an open bottle of vodka in one hand. “It’s not easy being married to the ice queen, and you said I could fuck someone else.”
Tara’s hands balled into fists. “Are you shitting
me? I said it once because I was frustrated, but you know I didn’t mean it. You weren’t supposed to go waving your dipstick around.”
“What am I, a mind reader?”
Monroe grabbed Tara’s arms before she could yank out the steering wheel and beat Lee with it. She was so embarrassed for her friend.
“Thank you, Monroe,” Lee said. “I’m glad you’re able to be an adult.”
“Shut up, Lee,” Monroe snapped.
To Tara she said, “Are you ok?”
Tara was sucking in little gulps of air, and her eyes were bloodshot and glassy. “I’m fine,” she said. “I’m so happy to be rid of him.”
“Yeah, you look happy,” Thomas said quietly, but not quietly enough.
“Why are you being a jerk?” Monroe asked. “I’m starting to think you can’t help it.”
“Says the woman who’s screwing the owner of this masterpiece.” He thumped
the console once, angrily, to indicate
Free Luv
. “The guy’s probably on steroids, and I bet he inherited his money.”
“I’m sorry, but didn’t your father and grandfather both go to Harvard?”
“They did,” he said, looking pleased she’d remembered. “Good taste is genetic. You can’t buy it.”
She didn’t even try to suppress her eye roll.
The sound of an approaching boat had Monroe scanning the dark
water. “Flash your lights at them or something,” she said.
“They can see us.” But Thomas sounded the horn.
To Monroe’s horror, the horn was an audio remix of a couple engaged in groaning sex.
Thomas gave her a long, hard stare. “You want a good man? Well, here I am, Monroe. Being a good man. Trying to give you a second chance despite your stunningly irresponsible behavior.”
“But I don’t
want a second chance!”
“She doesn’t,” Tara said.
“Hello
Free Luv
! Having trouble?” a voice called out.
Spencer?
Monroe thought. It really sounded like him. What was Spencer doing all the way out here?
Thomas stared evenly at Monroe, then turned to the window. “Don’t suppose you’ve got room for two passengers who need to return to Tureygua?” he yelled back.
“Two?” Tara asked, clearly shocked.
“You and Lee fighting are making me crazy, and anyway I’m not sending Monroe off alone with a stranger.”
Monroe started to point out that the man on the smaller boat wasn’t a stranger, but she decided against it. Annoying as it was to admit, she agreed with Thomas. Tara and Lee bickering nonstop was nerve-wracking, and it would only get worse without her there to mediate.
“We’ll get you off
the island soon,” she promised Tara.
“But he’ll steal my DVDs!”
“I don’t want your stupid romantic comedies,” Lee hollered.
Yeah, Monroe wasn’t leaving Tara behind.
She waited until the boats were pulling apart from each other before asking Spencer the question that was foremost on her mind. “What are you doing here?”
He grinned. “Koenraad wanted to be sure you got home safely. I’d planned
to beg you… I mean
convince
you with logic and reason to come back to Tureygua.”
“Why?”
“Yeah, why?” Tara chimed in. She was staring at Spencer with a hungry expression. Monroe looked between the two and wondered if she should have left Tara behind after all.
Spencer pretended to be busy with boat stuff. Obviously he didn’t want to give the reason in front of Tara, so Monroe took that to mean
it had something to do with shifters.
“I get it,” she said. “He misses me.”
“He
needs
you,” Spencer said. He gave her a meaningful look, and Monroe stared at her best friend, hoping to convey
I need you to get lost for five minutes
without having to come out and say it.
No dice. A goofy grin illuminated Tara’s face as she continued to ogle Spencer. She was clearly besotted, and come to think
of it, Monroe hadn’t ever seen her act like this around Lee.
After they’d docked, Spencer drove them to a modest but elegant house on the outskirts of the town. Monroe was surprised because she knew Spencer lived outside of Boston, and the Caribbean lab he managed for Koenraad was on the mainland. But she supposed he’d grown up here, and he had plenty of money, so why not have yet another house?
“Wait here,” he told her, and he opened the back door to offer Tara a hand out.
Monroe watched as the two disappeared through the front door, then lights came on.
A few moments later, Spencer was back, and his demeanor had completely changed. He’d been charming, full of witty banter, during the trip back. It must have been a front because now he was all business.
He pulled out of the driveway.
“Do you have feelings for Koenraad?” he asked.
Monroe sighed. “It’s beyond complicated with us.”
Spencer narrowed his eyes. “Let me put it like this. Would you like to keep him alive?”
She tilted her head, trying to figure out where this was coming from. “Yes. Of course. Where are you taking me?”
“Even if it meant a…” He squinted up and tilted his head back and forth, searching for words.
“Just spit it out.”
“A statistically negligible risk to your own safety?”
“Of course.” Monroe didn’t have to think about it. “He’s risked a lot for me. If he ever needs me, I’m there, but I doubt there’s anything I can do that he can’t do himself.”
And do better
, she thought.
“I should have asked this first, but why didn’t he claim you?”
Monroe felt her face heating. “He was going to,” she
said. “But then…” Something told her not to mention Brady’s attack. She didn’t know anything about shifter rules, but Brady was surely in a lot of trouble. Maybe Koenraad was trying to deal with it quietly. In that light, it was harder to hate Koenraad for keeping it from her. Brady’s temper tantrums might have lethal consequences, but he was still a child. What a parental nightmare.
But that
didn’t mean she was letting Koenraad off the hook.
“This is important, Monroe. Why didn’t he do it?”
“It’s my fault. I wanted to see him as a shark, and when he transformed, I panicked a bit. He said we didn’t know each other well enough, that it was too fast.”
Spencer nodded as he chewed on that. “Good,” he said. “That’s good. Apparently he’s been paying some attention to what I’ve been telling
him. Yes, it’s too fast. But I like you for him, Monroe. I don’t know how much he’s told you, but he had a tragedy a few years ago, and it about killed him. Before you showed up, I really wondered if he was going to live the rest of his life as a humorless grouch. Around you, he’s a different person. Truthfully, I think he needs you, and not just for tonight. The question is, does he make your
life better? You don’t have to answer that, but it’s something to consider as the next few weeks unfold.”