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“There are rat shifters. They aren’t part of supernatural society, by their own choice. It helps that they don’t scent as their animal counterparts when in human form.” He tilted his head. “Same goes when in animal form, we can’t scent that they’re a shifter when in animal form, either.”
“Butyoucan tell, somehow?”
“I love your mind. So fucking smart. Yes, their brains light up for me — whether in human or animal form, I know what they are. I long ago sought out and befriended the Rat King.” He motioned to a thick envelope on his desk. “That was delivered to Queenie while I was down for the day.”
He’d already glanced through it — detailed schedules of how the guards worked, as well as comprehensive blueprints of all floors, with any cameras, motion detectors, and sound detectors noted — and how the rats suggested a skilled vampire could sneak his way in.
Also, several transcripts of conversations that confirmed Morella wasn’t going to rest until Gavin’s head was separated from his body.
Lauren opened the envelope and scanned the pages. She was a quick study, so it didn’t take her long to see what she was looking at. “A thorough spy network. What did you do to gain this kind of alliance?”
And here was another case where he didn’t want Lauren to understand what he’d done, but he wasn’t going to lie to her.
“It isn’t something I’m proud of. I’ve managed to gain the loyalty of every rat king for centuries. They’re much like the Amakhosi — long lived but not immortal. So long as they can keep from being killed, they stick around. The last lived nearly a thousand years. The most recent is in his fifties.”
“You don’t want to tell me what you did?”
Okay, so maybe he didn’talwayslike the fact she could read him so well. “In his twenties, he was infatuated with a supermodel. I went into her head and put triggers in so she’d fall in love with him when she first saw him, and then I arranged for an invite to a party that allowed me to bring a friend. Once they were an item, he asked me to turn her into his sex slave, so she’d want to please him sexually every waking moment. When he tired of her after fifteen years, he wanted an A-list actress. I made the former supermodel fall out of love with him so the divorce was more convenient, and then made the mega-star actress three decades younger than him fall madly in love with him. He hasn’t asked me to turn her into a sex slave, and they are still happily married.”
She walked the three booklets of spy information back to the desk, slid them all back in the envelope, and settled it exactly as it had been. Her scent told him she was horrified, but there was more to it — unfortunately, there was so much conflict, he couldn’t narrow it down.
Lauren kept her back to him nearly two minutes before she finally turned and met his gaze. “On the one hand, I’m mortified, but on the other hand? I understand the trust you put in me by admitting this kind of thing. You aren’t hiding who you are from me, and you’re giving me information that could be dangerous to you, if it got out. I want to beat some sense into you, but I also want to hold you and show you how much I love you.”
She looked at the floor a few seconds. When she looked up, the power of her gaze made his cold, vampire heart hurt in his chest, but he remained seated on the sofa, even though his instincts were to stand. He wasn’t going to have to defend himself against Lauren.He wasn’t.
So he sat where he was and waited for her to either walk out or come to him.
And when she walked to him, sat on his lap, and let him fold his arms around her small body, his heart settled in his chest.
“I’m going to learn not to ask questions I probably don’t want to hear the answer to,” she told him, “but it might take me a few years to figure those questions out. Meanwhile, I’ll try not to be angry with the answers. I hate that you did it, but I also get it. The price for having that kind of spy network in your pocket is always going to be steep.”
Gavin pulled her to him, the heat of her body against the chill of his, her cheek resting on his chest as if it belonged there, and he just held her. “In all my long years, never did I imagine how this kind of attachment, this kind of love, could feel. I’ve watched others attach themselves to another, and while I grasped the importance of the connection enough to use it as a bargaining chip, I never truly comprehended the depth of…” He wasn’t sure how to finish the sentence. It wasn’t merely feelings, it was the fact that he would doanythingto keep her safe. He’d kill millions to keep this one tiny little human safe, if that’s what it took.
Chapter 23
Lauren let Gavin hold her until he didn’t need to anymore. This ancient vampire who knew everything, and who wielded more power and strength than anyone imagined — and yet, emotionally, he was a novice. When she finally felt his body relax, as if he had what he needed from the embrace, she sat up and cradled his cheeks in her hands.
“I need you to promise me a few things.”
“I’ve already promised to be honest with you in all that I can.”
“And I appreciate that, but I need you to promise you won’t close yourself off because the emotions become too much. Talk to someone — Kendra, Zander, my mom, me. Deal with your emotions, even when they threaten to swamp you.”
“I can’t imagine trying to shut you out, tiny human. I won’t promise you I will speak with someone else, but remind me that you asked me to promise, and I will at least speak with you about it.”
That was probably as good as she’d get, so she’d call it a win. “This next one is just as big, and maybe I’m overthinking things, or promoting myself higher than I really am in your life, but I have to say it: Please don’t put yourself at risk because you’re worried about how I’ll judge your actions.”
Lauren didn’t think he’d understood her first request — he would eventually, but he didn’t yet. However, he fully understood what she was asking this time.
“I can’t give you this one. On the one hand, I would kill millions of people if that’s what it took to keep you alive. On the other hand, I now find myself putting actions into the terms of your morals, and how you’d view something. However, you are ultimately practical, and you understand the natural and supernatural world works on a survival-of-the-fittest basis, so it isn’t like weighing decisions based on the input from an ordinary human.”
“Apparently, I’m not completely human anymore.”
He shook his head. “Legally speaking, that isn’t exactly accurate. The Concilio has a small category for magical humans, and your biological family fits into this category. They considered placing your mother into this classification, back when they were trying to figure out what to do with her, but she was using raw magic and not something as the result of a spell, so she didn’t qualify.”
“So, someone in my family put a spell on our DNA, way back when? That’s why I can carry riders?”
“That’s the generally accepted belief. It isn’t like the shapeshifters, where nearly every coupling between shifter and human results in a child who can shift.”
