Midnight Moonrising (Moonrising #2)(30)

Soft fingers touched his cheek and he jerked back in surprise, his eyes shooting open to reveal to Mena the hell she was putting him through. If she touched him again he would cave. Shit! What the hell was he thinking? He was already caving.


Alex backed away from her until the heel of his boot began to tilt over the first step. There were only five steps down to the sidewalk, and if he ran to his Jeep, he could be gone in less than a minute.

Those sultry lips of hers parted and he forced his foot to take that first step down.

"Alex—"

"I can't, Mena—"

"What can I say to get you to stay long enough to at least listen—?"

He closed his eyes and let his other boot fall to the next step. "There is nothing you can say. I'm going to give the case to Thompson first thing in the morning."

There was a heartbeat of silence, and then, "That's probably best."

"Yeah," Alex said as if trying to convince himself just as much as he was her.

He took another step down. Only two more to go. He was convinced once he got to the sidewalk he would have won; it would be easy after that, to walk away from her, stroll to his Jeep and drive out of her life forever. Damn it! He could already feel the insomnia seeping into his body. Maybe he could start a dark-circles trend: the less sleep you get and the shittier you look, the cooler you are. His boot somehow found the next to last step.

"May I hug you before you go?"

Jesus, woman, don't ask me that!

"This may be the last time I ever see you. I assume our lunch date for tomorrow is canceled now."

He meant to tell her this definitely would be the last time they ever saw one another and that the lunch date was indeed canceled, but as he looked back to where she stood on the porch, he sucked in a breath and stumbled down the remaining steps to the sidewalk. She was right in front of him.

His frame went completely rigid as her arms came up to wrap around his neck, and then the dam of emotions he'd been struggling to hold in broke free. He pulled her to him and hugged her fiercely.

"Mena, don't do this. I'll pass the case to Thompson and take a leave of absence. I'll take you somewhere until the killer is caught and put behind bars. Nobody will find you. I swear it," he said in a tortured whisper.

She pulled away and looked up at him. "I can't, Alex. I know you don't understand. It's okay that you don't. It is safer for you to be ignorant." Cupping his face in her hands, she smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Tell me goodbye, Alex. Give the case to someone else and never look back."

Goodbye? His heart raced and pounded beneath his breast, threatening to throw him into an anxiety attack. He couldn't tell her goodbye. Ripping the beating muscle from his chest with his bare hands and handing it to her would have been easier than telling her goodbye.

"I can't," he choked out.

Mena nodded in understanding, and then she did something that instantly changed his mind about everything; she rose up on her toes and touched her lips to his.

The world stopped spinning.





Chapter 18



Phoenix





It was all he could do not to throw the door open and break that cop's neck. But that would solve only one problem and create a hundred more.

"I told you not to watch them, bloodsucker," Daryn snapped.

As Phoenix's head whipped around, he knew by the look on the young wolf's face that he was having just as much trouble knowing Mena was kissing the cop as he was.

"Shut up," Phoenix grumbled as he pushed the drapes aside to look through the window once again. He'd wanted to say more, but he was afraid Mena's pack didn't know the problem she was having with her wolf, and he didn't want to make her appear weak to them. He still had faith that he would be able to help her tame the wild beast. So, as far as they knew, it was Mena who was now kissing Rhodes, not her wolf doing the lip-locking.

"Leave him alone, brown-noser," Roel quipped, with an eye roll. "Mena is way out of your league, and frankly, we are all getting a little tired of watching you grovel at her feet. It's a sign of weakness. She will never pick you as her Beta. I hope you're not expecting her to. You might as well go ahead and drop out while you're behind."

"So, you agree that she is better off with a vampire and a human than one of her own?"

Roel shrugged as he plopped down on the couch with a beer in his hand. "You want my honest opinion? Yeah, I do. Phoenix is God only knows how many centuries old…"

Phoenix turned his head to give Roel a go to hell look, but he chuckled before looking back out the window.

"…and he's been the leader over his clan for over a century. Mena listens to him, and I don't think he would advise her to do anything except what is good for our pack and his clan. Marc would have never considered what she is doing, and that's why he is dead, because he sent us to kill one of Phoenix's vamps. He didn't care about us or making the pack better. He only cared about one thing, himself. I'm glad he's gone, and I'm glad his wife was the one to take him out. I think she deserves to be with whoever makes her happy, and if that means the guy is a vampire or a human or both… well," he shrugged, "I'll stand behind her in whatever decisions she makes."