Betrothed to the Moon Read online

  A gorgeous, beat-to-hell, buck-naked man.

  Serena had never seen a naked man before. She blushed when she thought about her own nakedness, particularly when she let herself remember certain vulnerable moments back in the church… In her time with the House of Victory, sexual activity was forbidden to its members unless expressly requested and given to an Elder. Elders didn’t have to be old, but they did have to be men, and they tended to be born into the group. Serena had hoped and prayed that Shaun would one day be her husband, and no other man had ever turned her head… But if this one had showed up to a service, you can bet she would have looked.

  Thick, chocolate hair covered his sleek head, and large, almond shaped eyes graced his face. His lips crested in a perfect pout, full and ripe. A dark five o’clock shadow covered his cheeks, but she could see his cheekbones were razor sharp. His sculpted chest was covered in scratches, and along the lines of his delineated abdominal muscles Serena could see many bruises. His hip bones curved down to point at the elicit member sitting in another thatch of chocolate hair. Serena watched as he took a deep breath, his brow furrowed in pain, and wondered if he was asleep.

  He must be; she was shining a light on his face.

  Why was he down here?

  “Hey,” she whispered, afraid to disturb him. Serena got onto her knees and scooted over to the cellar door, then leaned in again to see if he moved. He was still there, frowning with his eyes closed, clenching his hands until his knuckles were white. He looked like he was in really bad shape. “Hello?” Serena shined the light on his face, and called to him in a slightly louder voice. “Sir?”

  His eyes popped open. They were deep, dark brown, warm and bright. And then, as she watched, the pupils inside of them sharply contracted into tiny spheres… And his face began to… Change.

  To shift.

  “Go--” His voice was strangled sounding, rough and husky. As Serena moved backwards to get a grip on the door, a ripping sound echoed through the chamber below her. His voice abruptly slid into a gasping howl, and then she heard claws on the concrete floor.

  He was coming towards her.

  Fast.

  Serena slammed the cellar door shut, watching the heavy lock click into place, and fell back against the wall. She felt like her heart was going to beat out of her chest.

  What the heck just happened?

  Chapter Four

  Oh my god… Just the smell of her… Jared sat on the stairs, his unfamiliar body straining to maintain an upright position. He was in so much pain, he didn’t fully understand how he had been able to move, let alone chase her up the stairs. Jared shuddered as he remembered the look on the beautiful young woman’s face, fear and revulsion distorting her lovely features. He understood. He couldn’t stand himself, either.

  Jared used his powerful new sense of smell to find her. She was seated away from the door, leaning against the wall, just over… Here. If he listened very carefully, he could just barely hear her heart-beat. It was racing. A wave of shame crested over him as he realized he had probably just given her the scare of her life.

  In spite of himself, Jared howled.

  He wanted to creep away, to let himself die in the corner of the dusty cellar. There was no place or time in the world when that shouldn’t be what happened to him--he was a monster, now, and furthermore, he deserved it.

  Jared Morgan, heir apparent to Morgan Industries. Spoiled playboy, heart-breaker, and news maker. His father told him years ago this was how it would end: you’re going to take a look at yourself, and you’re not going to like what you see. It must have been obvious to everyone, most of all the string of women that allowed him into their hearts--and their beds--only to discover he wasn’t going to invest in anything. Ever. Jared always kept his most important assets to himself--his promises about the future among them. The future of Morgan Industries was infinite; the company was destined to continue making and merging fortunes long after everyone who ran it now was dead… Like his father.

  Good old Dad, Jared thought. I wish you had lived just a little bit longer. I wish I could tell you how sorry I am.

  But his father had died with this--his biggest secret by far--shielded from everyone. When he knew how sick he was, he called Jared to his side in the hospital, but it was already too late. He was too weak to speak, or write, and instead Jared had simply watched him struggle to convey something. Anything. But even if he had been able to explain… Would Jared really have understood?

  Years before, his father told him: when I die, you will become my heir in all ways. But there was no way to know that all ways included this.

  He was living it, and he still didn’t understand.

  Surely, his father wasn’t also a monster… But Jared remembered the desperate look in his father’s eyes, and those words from long ago, and just knew. This wasn’t an accident. It was some horrible genetic curse, something he couldn’t escape.

  Unless he died, too.

  If I die here, alone, and don’t have any children… This dies with me, Jared thought, suddenly determined. I can save that poor woman…

  She’ll just turn my body over to that bastard, and no one else ever has to feel this way.

  Jared slumped on the stairs, a high pitched whine escaping his mouth. He could smell her, still; she was sitting there, leaning against the wall, still terrified. It had been at least twenty minutes, but he frightened her so badly she didn’t move. He was probably lucky he hadn’t given her a heart attack.

  Wait--he could hear her starting to creep across the floor, her light tread indicating she was moving back towards the door of the cellar. He waited, listening. She was very close to the edge, the scent of her breath trickling down beneath the wooden floorboards. She smelled like sizzling, caramelized sugar, hot and sweet to the taste.

  “Hi there,” she whispered, her voice as soft as her scent. “I’m sorry--you scared me.”

  To his surprise--and humiliation--Jared heard a thumping sound, and realized it was him.

  He was wagging his tail.

  Chapter Five

  Oh my god, Serena thought. I must be losing my mind.

  But she couldn’t forget that handsome face. Somewhere inside of this...

  Wolf?

  That was the only creature she could reconcile with the noises, the fur, the claws… Was there a gosh-darn werewolf in this cottage?

  How do I get myself in these situations, she wondered. All I wanted was to be alone, to find a new mission in my life… To find out who I really am. Is that so hard?

  Apparently it was.

  Serena listened to the sounds coming through the cellar door and knew that for now, at least, the thing below her was not human. Or, the human inside of it was trapped inside of the… Wow. Confusing.

  She looked up at the darkening sky and decided to close the front door. If there was a wolf in here, at least she didn’t need to worry about any other predators coming by. But there was still the mystery of what it was doing here in the first place.

  A werewolf? Here?

  Why?

  Serena leaned down and spoke into the cracks in the floor once more. “I’m sorry. I’m going to keep the door closed until I know you’re human again, okay?” Nothing. The wolf didn’t make a noise, not a whine, not a growl. “I’ll take that as a yes,” Serena said softly, sitting back down against the wall. This time, she heard a thump that told her the wolf was now lying down on the steps, its head just beneath the flat, locked door. “I’m so sorry to keep that closed,” she said, shaking her head at herself--was she really apologizing to a wolf? “You just… You scared me.”

  This time, the wolf did whine.

  It sounded strangely apologetic.

  “It’s okay--I bet you weren’t planning on anyone moving in, huh?” Serena shrugged and looked up at the rugged ceiling. “I saw the ad for this place and just… It seemed so perfect. I couldn’t let it go.”

  A rhythmic thumping noise seemed to come from under the floor.
Serena wondered what it could be, and then realized the wolf was actually wagging its tail. In spite of herself, she laughed.

  A wolf? Wagging its tail?

  “I guess you understand,” she said, and then leaned down to see if she could get a glimpse of the wolf through the floorboards. “It’s right where I wanted to be--on the edge of the world. All by myself, to think about things.” She could just barely see one bright blue eye, staring back up at her. “I guess you were looking for the same thing.”

  Another series of thumps, and a whine.

  She laughed again. “Well, maybe we did alright. We are at the edge of the world, and we’re mostly alone. There’s a pretty solid block of pine between us anyway.”

  This time there was only a whine.

  Serena felt her heart twinge. This is not a dog, she reminded herself. This is not a childhood friend who’s looking for a lap to sit in and a treat. This is a wolf. “I’m really sorry,” Serena said one more time. “I hate locking you down there. The minute… The second you’re a person again, we’ll unlock it, okay?”

  Nothing. Maybe she’d upset it.

  Serena stood up, brushing her long hair behind her shoulders. Maybe she should unlock it, and then climb up on her loft and take the ladder with her… But a strange man is not a whole lot safer than a strange wolf, she reminded herself. Maybe she should just let the whole thing settle, and when she headed into town tomorrow she could tell the realtor--

  --The lock started to rattle. Serena froze, her breath caught in her chest. The creaking sound scalded her to her marrow, terror ripping away all thought. Before she could move a muscle, the cellar door flew off its hinges, arcing through the air as dust flew everywhere, rippling through the air like a shockwave.

  He was there—on the edge of the cellar stairs, panting, crouched the man with the bright eyes. Everything seemed like it was moving in slow motion; Serena felt her breath return and gasped, her lungs reaching desperately for the air her fear deprived them. The man’s electric gaze stopped shifting relentlessly around the dust-choked room and suddenly locked on her.

  Should she scream?

  Should she run?

  And just like that, he collapsed. His naked body, sleek with muscle and bristling with bruises and cuts, crumpled to the floor.

  So instead of running through the room, out the door, and straight towards her car… Serena ran towards him.

  Chapter Six

  “Just rest,” the voice said. He felt warm breath tickle his ear, and smelled that almost intoxicating sweet smell. “Oh!” He’d startled the voice, somehow, but he wasn’t sure what he’d done… Besides burst through the floor and pass out in a heap. Great entrance, Jared admonished himself. He kept his eyes closed and enjoyed the sweet scent attached to the lovely voice, which he had to assume were also connected to the gentle hands bathing him.

  He didn’t think for a moment it might be invasive or wrong to receive such attention; he didn’t even think of himself as vulnerable, although he was naked, wounded, and at the mercy of a stranger. The touch was pleasing, and Jared was not a man to deny himself pleasure. He never had been; it was his greatest failing. He could tell he was in a bath, his grandmother’s giant washtub, most likely, which had been the only place he hadn’t fought like a wildcat as a child when it came time to rinse off. You could never feel claustrophobic in this tub. It was big enough for a bear… Or Jared. As a child it felt as big as a swimming pool, but as a man it was just his size. Jared was 6’4, 190 pounds, and in excellent shape. He liked to pick up women when they didn’t know he was also a billionaire; it was better when they just thought he was devilishly handsome, charming, and—due to his size—well hung.

  He still struggled with the word ‘handsome,’ if he was honest--if that was the right word at all. His mother told him once that he would’ve made a beautiful girl, and after he was done laughing at her words he had to admit… She made him feel a little insecure about his long eyelashes, his full mouth. Insecurity only fueled his devotion to his work-out routine even more, though, and when a gorgeous lady returned his smiles he knew she wasn’t thinking about how feminine his eyelashes were. Not these days, anyway.

  Jared frowned, his eyes still closed. He needed to stop going over everything that had already happened, and focus on the present. How did he make it to the washtub? He must have been conscious enough to walk over here. There was no way the soft, sweet scented presence was strong enough to carry him. Her small, delicate hands crept gingerly around his shoulders, gently washing off the muck from the cellar. Jared let her touch him all over. He hoped she liked what she saw… And then remembered his entrance, and knew he probably didn’t have a chance of getting lucky. He was fortunate there wasn’t a phone line to the cottage, or the police would’ve picked him up for sure.

  Not to mention his step-father, who must have known something was wrong with the family he married into… Not that he would’ve expected werewolf as the defect in the gene pool.

  But for now, at this very moment, he was definitely safe. Jared realized he must be smiling when the hands stilled on his chest. He decided to admit he was awake and took a peek.

  As his eyes registered the light, he only wished he’d done it sooner.

  “So you’re feeling better, I take it?” The soft voice, he saw, definitely belonged to a soft woman… No, not exactly. She had her firm, plump lips set in a very deliberate way… As if she was a little annoyed that he was pretending to sleep, but only a very little. In fact, he can tell she thinks it’s kind of funny. And her eyes were certainly soft--gentle, deep brown orbs that swallowed his gaze without trying. As soft and sweet a gaze as her voice. Her face was delicately boned, her hair wind-swept mahogany colored waves, her body curved with perfect slopes. She. Was. Gorgeous. “Oh!” And making that surprised noise again… Ah.

  Jared tried to sit up in order to hide his erection, but the pain in his ribs stabbed through his body so quickly it did the deed even faster. “Fancy meeting you here,” he tried to joke, but his voice sounded strange--threaded with agony, and deeper with disuse. How long had he been hiding in the cellar?

  “Don’t try to talk,” she said, and gently pushed him back. He rested against the tub and relaxed, trying not to feel guilty for frightening her… And disgusting her. She must want to puke her guts out, knowing what he was and seeing that he desired her. How terrible. And yet, she was being so kind…

  “Thank you,” he rasped, but all she did was nod her head. Her lovely hair swished around her shoulders, and it was everything Jared could do not to reach out to touch it. Her full figure was more and more obvious as she leaned over the tub, gently rubbing him down with the wash cloth. Jared clamped his eyes shut to avoid getting aroused, but it was impossible. He just hoped it wasn’t quite as obvious this time.

  Was this his fate? Jared had spent his whole life trying to look and act like the ultimate man, taking care of business and pleasure as if they were one and the same. More than one woman had called him an alpha male. They never could’ve known how right they were.

  I’m a fucking dog, Jared thought, and bit his lip. Holy shit. This must be what they’re talking about when they say karma’s a bitch.

  I should never have been so arrogant. I should’ve been kinder. Jared had always been honest, even when it was painful, but he wasn’t always compassionate. He knew his place in the world, and it was at the top. Always had been...but now, it never could be.

  How could a monster run the world’s biggest company?

  Especially when it was hunted?

  Chapter Seven

  Serena tried to ignore the tingling sensation inside of her. The man she was bathing was undoubtedly the sexiest, most amazing… She couldn’t believe how quickly her body forgot about Shaun--about everything--but the feel of him beneath her fingertips. This is exactly what the morality of the House of Victory preached against. She had heard other women describe men like this sometimes, using words like ‘sexy’ and ‘God’s gift,’
but she didn’t really understand what they meant. She’d never felt anything like this before; the moment she saw those beautiful, dark eyes, Serena knew she was a goner.

  But it didn’t matter. He was also hurt, very badly, and she needed to help him out and make sure he didn’t turn back into a wolf. That wouldn’t be a great strategy for finding herself, she was sure. She thought about what her former room-mates would’ve said if they saw her bathing a naked man, and almost laughed it off. She didn’t care. They were all hypocrites of the worst kind, according to her therapist. If they were real friends, Serena knew they would be here with her now, helping her unpack.

  For the first time, she realized she was glad they weren’t.

  This way she had him all to herself.

  Even though he was terrifying when he was a wolf, he was simply beautiful when he was a man. Serena had never really thought of a man as beautiful before. It just wasn’t a word that would occur to her in that context. But this man… His eyes were almost feline in shape, the length and color of his dark lashes so rich any supermodel would envy them. Even with scratches and bruises covering every inch of his body, he was gorgeous. His muscles jumped when she touched them, and she watched as a ripple effect took over his torso. That must be it, she realized. He was some kind of model. Probably famous.

  Why had he trapped himself in the cellar?

  …And how did he turn into a wolf?

  “How did you get here?” She asked, trying not to startle him. “You must have been in that cellar a pretty long time.” She knew he was awake, even though his eyes were closed; she tried to ignore the lower half of his body, knowing it would just make her gasp again. Serena had never seen manhood bare before, and it made the color rise in her cheeks. He was so big. She never imagined that something so massive could fit inside… She realized she was blushing again and hoped his eyes were closed.