“Cassidy… Holt,” he said. “You’re alive.”
Two
Braden had known he was being followed ever since he’d walked into Lower Belgrave Street.
He’d identified his stalker as female by her scent, and that she was loup-garou the moment he touched her. That in itself was a miracle—had he still believed in miracles. He’d been certain he knew every man or woman of the blood in England, and most beyond this island’s shores.
But never in his wildest imaginings—had he allowed himself such frivolities—would he have guessed whom he held in his arms.
Cassidy Holt… Edith’s daughter, granddaughter of his great uncle William Forster… was alive.
He flashed back to that day eight years ago when Tiberius Forster, on his dying breath, had charged his grandson and heir with the task of finding the lost Forster branch in America and restoring it to the Cause. Braden had been little more than a callow boy then, madly in love with his young bride and preoccupied with new responsibilities as earl and master of the Cause. But he had done his duty. He’d sent agents to America to trace the wandering path of William Forster’s daughter, Edith, and her human mate—pursued them all the way to California.
Where the trail ended in death. Edith Holt’s death, and the apparent disappearance of her husband and their two half-human children. Braden had accepted and dismissed his agents’ reports without question, for of what importance was the fate of distant, mixed-blood relations when the rest of the world lay in the palm of his hand, the perfect mate shared his bed, and the Cause was his to shape and bring to triumph?
Only later, much later, had he realized what had been lost when he’d failed to continue the search—after he had paid the price of his arrogance, and learned just how little he did control. After he understood, personally and bitterly, how precious and rare good loup-garou blood could be. Because of him, twice over, the Cause had been irrevocably damaged.
Yet a miracle had occurred here tonight on his very doorstep. He had not looked for it. He had not earned it. One of Edith Holt’s vanished offspring had come to London like a promise of redemption. Come directly to him.
A handful of years ago he might have laughed for sheer amazement. He didn’t laugh now. He absorbed the reality of the girl’s presence, felt shock settle into a grim and sardonic sense of triumph.
Do you see, Grandfather? he asked silently, though he had no more faith that the old tyrant could hear him than he believed in genuine miracles.
The girl in his hold was very still. He could feel her stare, as physical a sensation as the electric tension that sparked through her body and into his.
“You’re like my mother,” she said. Her voice was low and husky, accented with the distinct American drawl, but it held all the breathless excitement of a child’s. “You’re loup-garou.”
Hope traced a long-unused path in his heart, and he pushed it aside. “Of course,” he said impatiently. “How did you find me?”
“I… I caught your scent, at the hotel near the train station. I followed you.”
He remembered when he’d passed by Victoria Station an hour ago, snatching a few moments for a private walk before confronting Rowena at the Leebrooks’.
Was it possible? Could this girls blood be so strong, her gifts so pure that she could distinguish the unfamiliar scent of a fellow loup-garou from the morass of stink and stench that was London?
But London was also all eyes and ears, and he had no intention of carrying on this singular conversation in public. He tugged on her arm, pulling her toward the house. “Come. You may explain the rest inside…”
She was tall, though not as tall as he, and surprisingly strong when she dug in her heels and refused to move another step.
“But I don’t even know your name!”
He half stumbled on the lowest step of the staircase and swung to face her. She had recognized what he was, but hadn’t known who she followed? Without questioning the impulse, he reached out to touch her face again, felt her flinch and then accept his exploration as she had before.