10
Clyde waited impatiently for Terry to contact him so he could tell the warlock about the threat Jayden posed to the pack. He was hoping to convince Terry to return and help them root out the imposter. By the time he felt the gentle tingling at the base of his neck, it was long past midnight and Clyde was starting to get worried.
“Terry?” he asked, feeling both foolish and relieved.
“Who else would be talking to the back of your head?” asked his lover playfully.
“I was starting to worry,” said Clyde, ignoring the jibe. “What have you been doing?”
“I found my coven,” began Terry excitedly. “It’s probably no more than a hundred miles from your town.”
“My town?” asked Clyde sharply. “Don’t you live here anymore?”
“Don’t be like that,” said Terry patiently. “I just meant we’re only about a hundred miles apart right now. And I picked up a vampire.”
“Say that again. It sounded like you said you picked up a vampire.”
“I did. I’ll tell you about him later, but I have other news you need to hear.”
Terry’s voice had grown somber and Clyde had a bad feeling about what was coming. “Let me guess. You discovered you have a wife and six kids waiting for you at home.”
Terry’s responding laugh seemed forced. “Not exactly. I did find people who knew me though. A guy called Dimitri and his sister Jill. They live on a lake between two covens. I grew up in the village nearby, but I belong to that warlock coven.”
“Tell me more about Dimitri.”
Terry’s hesitation was all Clyde needed to hear. “Were you lovers?” he asked bluntly.
“Yes,” confessed Terry. “He says we’d been together since high school, but you need to believe me when I tell you I can hardly remember anything about him.”
“How did it feel when you saw him again?” Clyde was trying hard to control his voice, but Terry could feel the heat of his jealousy.
“I don’t know. I mean, he’s a really attractive guy but it’s not like I was dying to rekindle the flame or anything.”
“Were you still together when you died?”
“Clyde, aren’t there better questions you could be asking?” Terry pushed back against his rising anger. “Don’t you want to know what happened to me?”
“Actually, I don’t care about the past. To me, you sprang to life fully formed the night I dragged you from the fire. You’re the one who’s obsessed with finding out the truth, regardless of who gets hurt.”
“Nobody’s going to get hurt,” protested Terry. “I just wanted to know how Beatrice ended up getting her clutches into me.”
“You already knew that,” said Clyde, refusing to give an inch. “You knew you’d died and she found you. Why was it necessary to dig any further? And you still didn’t answer my question. Were you and Dimitri lovers when you died?”
“Yes, we were,” said Terry sharply. “What difference does it make?”
Clyde was silent for so long that Terry thought he’d lost the connection. “You said nobody was going to get hurt,” Clyde finally interjected, “but it’s not true, is it? If you and Dimitri were still together, he’s going to be devastated if you don’t stay with him. After all, he never gave you any reason to break up with him, did he?”
“I don’t know,” said Terry, “I guess not.”
“And if you stay with him, you’ll break my heart. But that’s the price you pay for hunting in someone else’s back yard.”
“What are you saying?” asked Terry furiously. “I should get back with a guy I hardly know and dump the man I love because I never should have been with him in the first place?”
“We have a code,” said Clyde softly. “We don’t poach on another wolf’s territory. If, as you say, you had been with this man for many years, promises were surely made. Your honor is all you have left when the world strips away your ambitions. You cannot break your word to a lover who gave you no cause for betrayal.”
“That’s a load of shit,” said Terry hotly. “You can’t betray someone you don’t even remember, and all I have is his word for it anyway. For all I know, he was a one- night stand in the back of his mother’s station wagon.”
“If you really believed that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” said Clyde dismissively. “If you loved him once, you will love him again. I won’t spend the rest of my life wondering whether you’re thinking about someone else.”
Terry felt a rage wash over him at Clyde’s stubbornness, and the fragile connection between them snapped in two. He pounded his fists in fury against the wheel of the truck, waking Sebastian who had been dozing peacefully in the passenger seat.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “You having a bad dream?”
“I wish,” said Terry angrily. “At least those are over in the morning.”
*
Clyde felt Terry slip away and tried desperately to pull him back. No amount of feverish concentration, however, could re-open the link. Howling in frustration, Clyde beat his head against wall of his office, opening a hole into the main part of the store. He’d been an idiot to believe that loving Terry would ever bring him anything but pain. He wasn’t his to have, and no longer his to hold.
Clyde’s blood ran cold as he realized he hadn’t told Terry about Jayden. Now, it was too late to bring him home.