Bittersweet Blood (The Order #1)

“Soon.”


She stared at him through narrowed eyes. “You slept next to me. You watched me in the shower.”

Christian growled again behind her, and Jamie threw up his hands defensively. “Hey, I was a cat. It did absolutely nothing for me.”

Tara stood up, her legs trembling slightly. Her cat was actually a man. Or was it the other way round? Was Jamie actually a cat? All this time, and she’d had absolutely no idea. Well, you wouldn’t, would you?

Moving away, she stared out the window at the dark city below. Were there no real, honest to goodness human beings in the world? Maybe the whole notion of normality was a complete impossibility. Maybe normality didn’t exist.

When she turned back to them, Christian had moved away from the sofa. He was half-sitting, half-leaning against the desk, arms crossed over his chest. Jamie was still seated; he kept casting quick glances at the vampire.

Tara crossed back and stood looking down at him. “So what are you exactly?”

“I’m a shapeshifter.”

“What does that mean? You can shift into anything?”

“No, not anything.”

“Have you always been a shapeshifter?”

He nodded.

She remembered the man in the pub telling her that her mother had a cat. A big gray cat. “You knew my mother, didn’t you?”

He nodded again. All the time, the answers to all her questions had been there, right at her side. Tara sank down onto the sofa. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I told you why, at first I promised, and then you wanted so much to be normal.”

“You must have known that wasn’t going to happen.”

“It might have, if you hadn’t been so keen on breaking the rules. I did try to stop you.” He frowned. “I promised your mother I’d be your friend. She thought you’d be so alone, and she wanted you to have some chance at a normal existence.”

“So you’ve been watching out for me since I got to London?”

He nodded.

“That night you’d been fighting. Was that protecting me?”

“A demon. Luckily only one.”

“And later, in the bar—” She looked at him suspiciously. “Did you put something in my drink?”

“I drugged your wine.”

Christian chuckled. “You know,” he said. “I almost feel sorry for him.”

“How can you feel sorry for him? He drugged me.”

“‘What was I supposed to do?” Jamie asked. “Let you go on a drunken demon rampage through London? Have you ever seen a demon on an alcohol high?”

“Funny enough—no!”

“I have,” Christian said. “He did the right thing.”

“No he didn’t.” Tara almost shouted the words. “He should have told me. Explained.”

“Perhaps, but it’s too late now. Get over it.”

Jamie reached out a hand and touched her lightly. “I’m sorry. I did what I thought was best.”

“Don’t be too hard on him,” Christian said. “Shifters don’t think too well for themselves, and they don’t do conflict.”

Jamie shot him a look of dislike. “We’re not usually given much of a chance.”

“What do you mean?” Tara asked.

“Shifters are usually tied to one of the other supernatural races, demons or fae.”

“Or vampires,” Jamie said, and Tara could hear a faint thread of bitterness in his voice.

She looked at Christian. “Like when you mark a human, like what you wanted to do to me?”

He nodded. “Something like that. Except it tends to be hereditary with shifters, they belong from birth.”

They were silent for a moment. “Can you tell me about my mother?” she asked Jamie.

“Anything.”

“What was she like?

“Her name was Lillian. She was a fae princess, but different from most of the fae. She was sweet and good.”

“And Aunt Kathy. Do you know how they came to meet? What happened?”

“Your mother met Kathryn not long before you were born. Kathryn took her in when she was alone. They became good friends. When Kathryn was killed in a car accident your mother had her brought back.”

“The perfect guardian,” Christian said softly. “It might not have been much of a life, but it was surely better than the alternative. Or at least seemed better at the time. I wonder if she came to regret the decision.”

“No, she didn’t. She loved Tara.”

“I know that,” Tara said. “So you were with my mother before. Do you know what happened to her? Who my father was?”

Jamie flicked a glance at Christian then back to her. “No. She never spoke of him. Ever.”

Christian came to stand over him. “But you knew he was a demon, right?”

Jamie nodded. “I was there at the birth. It was pretty obvious Tara wasn’t human. Then there were the rules—the alcohol one was a dead giveaway.”

“What exactly does alcohol do to demons?” Tara asked.