The Last Guardian Rises (The Last Keeper's Daughter) (35 page)

Krieger’s eyes clouded with desire.

“Please,” she begged, running her hands over his chest and down to his need, and felt a small victory when he groaned with pleasure.

“No,” he ground out through gritted teeth. “You need to rest.”

“I’m not tired.” She slipped into bed and beckoned him to follow.

“Don’t tempt me.”

“I need you,” she purred.

“You’re a siren.”

She’d never seen him look so torn, but he followed her into bed anyway and she took his hand and slipped it between her thighs. “I’ll let you know if it is too much.”

“I can’t lose you again.” He slipped his finger inside her.

“You won’t, you won’t.” It was her turn to moan.

Hunter

He stood on his own porch, staring at his front door with the folder crushed under his arm.

“
You have to tell her
,” Merlin’s voice urged him forward
.

His hand was on the knob when Meirta opened the door and looked quizzically at him. “What are you doing?” She had on one of his old shirts and nothing else, except for a pair of thick wool socks.

“It’s been a hard day.” He faked a smile and walked inside. She’d been cooking; he could smell meatloaf, his favorite. “What have you done?” he teased. She hated meatloaf and only made it when there was something she was hesitant to tell him.

“Have you been drinking?”

“A few, with Lucien.”

She bit her lip and spun around, the shirttail lifting enough to give him a tantalizing glimpse of the tops her thighs. “It’s just meatloaf, can’t I pamper my future husband?” she tossed over her shoulder and disappeared into the kitchen. Meirta had agreed to marry him and they’d put a contract on an estate in Delaplane.

When he walked into the kitchen he saw she’d set the table with candles.

Don’t get distracted
, Merlin’s voice nudged.

“What’s the occasion?” Hunter sat and placed the folder beside the placemat. Meirta leaned against the counter. “Don’t data mine my mind right now.”

Her lip twitched. “I’m not.” She looked at the folder. “Is something wrong with the closing? My parents are coming over for the wedding.” Her brow creased. “Do we need to postpone the wedding?”

Hunter would never have thought she’d be so nervous about a small wedding, but she was and it made him love her even more.

“Tell me,” she urged.

“No.” He rose and went to her, cradling her face in his hands. “We’re set to close next week and move in the next day. You don’t need to worry about that.” He thought he tasted chocolate on her lips.

“Whew, you had me worried.” She backed away and went to the fridge. “Go on, sit down, it’s almost ready.” She produced a bottle of his favorite wine.

“Why do I feel like I’m being buttered up?”

“Cause you’re a suspicious man, Mr. Hunter.”

“Yes, I am, Mrs. Hunter.”

“Not yet,” she said removing the cork, pouring and handing him a generous glass of wine.

“Aren’t you having any?”

“No, not right now.” She pointed to the folder. “Since when do you bring your work home?”

Hunter exhaled a long breath and his shoulders slumped with fatigue. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

Her lip twitched up again. “Fair enough, I need to tell you something, too.” She batted her eyelashes at him. “You first.”

The wine tasted cool and crisp as it slipped down his throat. It surprised him he could even taste it given how many drinks he’d had with Lucien, and he knew he shouldn’t drink anymore, but the sad fact was he needed courage, even if it came in liquid form. For now he was in hell thinking of hurting Meirta with the knowledge he’d uncovered. When they’d first met, Meirta had explained that her parents were human. The alarm bells had gone off when she’d told him that, but he’d been new to the Other world and hadn’t pushed her about it. “I told you before about the orphanage.”

“Yes.” Her green eyes widened.

Just tell her
, Merlin barked.

“About the babies separated from their mothers.” Hunter hated this. “You were one of the babies,” he blurted out. “I’ve suspected it for some time, but I wasn’t sure until tonight.” He pushed the folder towards her.

“No.” She pushed it back. “No, my parents would have told me.” She grabbed a napkin and wrung it between her hands.

“I wouldn’t have told you, but…” Hunter felt small under her withering gaze. You would have found out, he finished the sentence in his thoughts. “I’m sure they have no memory of adopting you. It was most likely tranced from them.” He tried to take her hand. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

“What?” She bolted up and started pacing around the room, reached for an empty wine glass, stopped, and started pacing again. “It would mean everything if I weren’t who I thought I was. If my parents were tranced into taking me. Maybe they didn’t even want me.”

“Sit, please, sit,” he urged. “Didn’t you ever wonder how an Other was born to human parents?”

She didn’t sit, but grabbed the folder and yanked it open, reading the contents as she paced.

“My mother is the woman coming to my wedding.” She squared her shoulders and stood rigid and stoic in her shock until he thought he’d need to help her sit down. “The Elder would have known. If this were true, he would have told me.”

Had he? Hunter was inclined to say, no, but realized she wasn’t truly seeking an answer from him.

Meirta’s eyes scanned through the document again. “She died.”

“They all died,” Hunter said, automatically.

She swayed on her feet and reached for the counter. “It’s not true.”

He jumped up afraid she’d fall but she waved him away. “She was from Scotland,” he said. “There aren’t many details. If you want I can look for surviving members of her family.”

“She was fifteen.” Meirta threw her head back, sighed, and stared at the ceiling. “Why would anyone do such a thing?”

Because they could, was the only answer he had.

“She was only a child.”

“I know.” He went to her, taking the crumbled folder from her fist, not caring that she tried to push him away, and wrapped his arms around her.

“My father?” She laid her head on his shoulder.

“I don’t know. He was an Other.” He didn’t need to be a mind reader to know what she was thinking. “The files are very meticulous, he wasn’t—”

“
Him
,” she finished.

“Correct.” Hunter walked her back to the kitchen table and sat down, placing her in his lap. He didn’t want to talk with her now, or ever again, about the atrocities the Brotherhood had committed. All this death had brought them down. There was redemption in that.

“They called me their little miracle baby.” Her voice broke slightly and she cleared her throat. “They met late in life, Mom had me—” She stopped short and he could see the pain in her eyes. “The file could be wrong.”

The meticulous record keeping of the Brotherhood was as comprehensive as the Germans during World War II. Their need for order had been their downfall after the war and during the Nuremberg Trials.

“I want you to burn it. I never want to see it or talk about this again.”

He knew she meant the folder, but did she truly mean that? “Alright,” he said. “They love you. I love you. This doesn’t change the important things.”

“Did you foresee this?”

“No,” he spoke honestly. “I’m a fledgling Merlin. I won’t have that ability for many years.” Never, he hoped. “Are you all right?”

“No, but I will be.”

The oven timer beeped and she tried to get up, but he stopped her, saying, “I’ll get it, just sit.” She didn’t argue. He moved her over to a chair and grabbed the oven mitts. “It smells good.”

“I got the recipe from Mom,” she said quietly.

He opened the cabinet and pulled out two plates, scooping out a portion on each and placing them on the table. “Here,” he said, moving to fill her glass, but she covered it. Odd, he thought, she loves this wine. But she was just upset – who wouldn’t be? “Do you want to talk about it more?”

“No.” She poked the fork into her meatloaf. “I need to think about this.”

She was a very private person, even with him. He would wait until she was ready to talk. “You know I love you.”

“I love you more.”

“I love you most,” he finished. “What did you want to tell me?” Her eyes widened with alarm. “What is it?” His heart beat hard against his chest like he was running uphill.

“I have something for you.” Tentatively, she pulled a card from her shirt pocket and cupped it in her hand like a baby bird. “It’s probably not the best time to tell you.” She held her hand out for him to take it. “Open it.”

Don’t do anything stupid
, Merlin chimed in.

It was a greeting card with a picture on the front of a cartoon elephant holding a basket. He opened it to find a picture taped where the message would be. “What’s this?” He looked at the small black and white photo the size of a Polaroid.

Merlin answered his question.
It’s your son
.

“Baby,” was all he could manage. Meirta sat very still, watching him. Thoughts raced through his head.
I’m too old to be a father
. She was always so insistent about birth control. “How did this happen?” he heard himself say.

“The pill isn’t one hundred percent.” She bit her lip, waiting. “Are you mad?”

That cut through the fog. “Mad,” he exhaled the word. “No,
no
, just… when?” He reached over and grabbed her hand.

“Late April.”

I’m going to be a father
.

Lucien

“A
gain,” Lucien instructed.

Lily’s eyes narrowed in concentration and she nodded.

He moved behind her and wrapped his arms around her. “You’re attacked. What do you do?”

“Relax, let the attacker think I’m docile, then hit at a soft spot.”

“Go ahead, you won’t hurt me.”

She quickly kicked his knee. If he were human she might have dislocated it. When he pitched forward she slipped out of his arms.

“Good, very good.”

She looked like a tiny avenging angel with the wooden dagger covered in silver Krieger had made for her strapped around her thigh. Since her return, he’d insisted that she have it with her always.

“Only if they aren’t an Other or vampire.” She picked up a towel off the matt.

“You have the element of surprise on your side.” He raked his hair back. “It’s always good to be prepared.” He was lying. She was a petite woman and anything that could get through her guards would have a huge weight advantage and supernatural skills. “Punching bag?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Can we take a break?”

“Stretch while you rest.” He gave her some space but kept close. Lucien thought this was the first time since her return that the king had let her out of his sight. Not that they weren’t being watched. He knew Krieger was viewing them remotely via the cameras surrounding the room. Would he be any different if she were his?
No,
I’d probably be more possessive and force my blood down her throat whether she wanted it or not.

“Things are so different on the mountain now. So many Others have left.” She reached out and touched her toes.

“They are relocating.”

“Don’t.” She crossed her legs like in meditation. “They’re fleeing to get away from the king. I’m not blind or deaf; even I’ve heard the rumors.”

“You don’t know what it was like when you disappeared.”

“Tell me what happened to Liam.”

“What do you mean?”

“He was sparring with Krieger. I saw the marks on his back before he remembered and put his shirt back on. Those scars weren’t there before I left.”

“Ask Liam.”

“I did and he wouldn’t answer me. That’s why I’m asking you.” She got up and shoved her finger into his chest. “The vantors kneel to Krieger now. I see fear in their eyes that was never there before. The Others who are left don’t come out at night.”

He grabbed her hand. “I am loyal to the king.”

“The king needs my help.” She jerked her hand free. “I need to know.”

He chose his words carefully. “Liam and the vantors pledged their lives against your safety.”
Tell her enough so she stops asking questions.
“Liam took the punishment when you sneaked off the mountain that day.”

“The day I went to lunch with Jo and Martha?”

“Yes, he took the lashes instead of Rohm.”

“But it was my fault, not his.” She stumbled back from him. “What did he do to them after I disappeared?”

There was no way he’d tell her that. “You don’t want to know.”

“Liam couldn’t have done anything to stop it.”

“He realized that, eventually.” She too had changed. There was a faint luminous quality about her, like she carried a light within her body which seeped out to tint her skin. “Do you truly want to help this situation?”

She closed her eyes. “I do.”

“Bond with him again. You owe him that.” She was the king’s consort but refused to take his blood. What did that say to the subjects of Krieger’s kingdom? What reason could Lily have for refusing Krieger?

“I can’t,” she said, straightening her shoulders and squaring her hips to him like she was preparing for an attack.

“You’ve never been cruel, but you’re driving him to madness. He needs you to be his true Sanguis Ancilla again.”

“You don’t understand.” She took in a lungful of air and slowly exhaled. “The bond didn’t keep me from being taken.”

No, it did not. He’d said all he would on the subject. “In London, when you got the nosebleed.” She blushed, a deep rose color, probably remembering their kiss.
Don’t think of that
. “And at the council meeting. You levitated.”

“Ah.” She blinked a few times and tucked a curl that had escaped her ponytail behind her ear.

“It’s an ability that might keep you from being taken again.” The king had tasked him with giving her self-defense instruction. It seemed logical to him that she should try to recreate that experience.

She focused on her feet, tracing a pattern with the toe of her shoe. “I don’t know how I did that.”