Page 32 of Bad Moon Rising
The ring on his right hand. It had the FenCor seal. Ballsy of him to wear it so openly. FenCor was an international consortium of business magnates and heads of state who accumulated power. They often masterminded international conflicts in ways that benefitted their business interests, be they oil or water or natural gas or land. Their members were brutal and greedy—the worst examples of humanity. Roman tried to steer clear of them, but looked like he couldn’t. He wasn’t sure how deep the king was in this. Maybe he was entry level and unaware of the depth of the organization’s corruption.
FenCor owned the monarch, and probably many more in the government. Did FenCor know about Roman and his brothers?
Roman said, “I was working on something more important, an actual threat to the country before you called me in. I can’t believe you recalled me to hunt down one lone woman. This is a waste of my time.”
Gerard said, “We suspect she might go after His Majesty next.”
“Why?”
The monarch’s eyes flickered toward Gerard and back to the fire.
Roman dropped his voice to mesmerizing. “Tell me what’s really going on. Is this about FenCor?”
“Of course not.” Liar. The king wouldn’t look at him.
Using voice persuasion hadn’t worked. He almost smacked his forehead over his stupidity. The curse made the monarch immune to lycan voice coercion. “Uh-huh. FenCor is a human business and not mine. If it doesn’t fuck with me, then I won’t fuck with it. But let me make myself clear in this. I don’t answer to them. If this is about that group, then I highly suggest you ask them to use one of their contractors to take care of your problem. They don’t want to mess with me or any of my brothers. I sure as hell hope they’re not going to try harnessing any of the extreme supernatural terrors we work to contain. Those are terrifying powers they can’t control. No one other than gods can control them.”
“There are no such thing as gods,” the king scoffed.
Roman laughed. “Tell that to the archangel that helped me fight a demon a few months ago.”
The king’s eye roll communicated he thought that total bullshit. “I’m ordering you to take care of her. She’s a threat to me.”
A direct order he couldn’t countermand.Please, let it not be Nova.If it was, he needed to convince these two she wasn’t a threat. Or was she?Patience. See what information they have.
Roman said, “You’re supposed to send me out to stop a voodoo priestess from calling forth Satan’s demons to enslave humanity, or to keep a mad scientist from making test-tube babies between vampires and goblins. Did I volunteer to do that kind of wacked shit? No. Your mother forced us into it. Based on the curse, which is the only thing keeping me here, I’m not obliged to kill a non-hostile non-human, or a human.”
The monarch shot to his feet. “She’s a threat. You will execute her.”
Roman rose. “I haven’t heard a single solid reason why she poses a risk to you.”
“She’s the kind of problem you’re here to take care of.” Gerard’s tone came out diplomatic and his eyes pleading Roman to behave himself.
“Find her and eliminate her.” The king stalked out with Gerard hot on his heels.
Chapter Eight
“What do you know about the target?”
Roman paced into Gerard’s office two levels up. His nose reeled at the stench of coffee mixed with a lemon-scented air freshener plug-in.
Gerard handed him a file.
One glance at the manila folder and his heart shredded his rib cage.
Roman flipped open the manila folder.
Nova’s black-and-white headshot sat there on the page.
Fuck, fuck, fuckity…fuck. He wouldn’t kill her. Couldn’t.
Fire burned up his arm from the curse band like a blowtorch on his skin. He froze to avoid any outward display of pain to Gerard.
He had no choice but to follow orders. The curse wouldn’t allow otherwise in the end. He’d tried to fight it before, which had been painful for days until he proved to the Crown that the target was innocent and had the order rescinded.
He had to prove she was innocent and not a threat to the king. Only in doing so did he have a chance to get them to rescind the order.
He promised to erase the mage’s kiss and hadn’t done so yet. That was a promise he would fulfill.
