Page 5 of Edge of Oblivion (Night Prowler 2)
The viscount began again in a more conciliatory tone.
“There’s absolutely nothing to guarantee this female,” he gestured toward Morgan with a curl of his lip, “who’s proven herself a danger to the tribe by the worst possible act of treason, will do as you say. She’ll simply vanish, never to be seen again. Or worse, she will find them. And reveal everything.”
Morgan chanced a glance at him from beneath her lashes.
From his position seated straight-backed and dour near the head of the table, he shook his head.
Two bright blotches of red stained his cheeks, a fine sheen of perspiration covered his brow, his hands curled around the arms of his chair so hard his fingers had turned white. She almost felt sorry for him.
Almost.
“No, she won’t.” Jenna turned her head and gazed across the room at her with luminous eyes of yellow-green, cool and assessing. “Will you, Morgan?”
Wordless, trying not to shake or blink or otherwise reveal the snarling terror monster in her gut, Morgan shook her head no.
Jenna turned back to the viscount and granted him a satisfied smile.
No one said anything for one long, frozen moment. Then a voice chimed up from the middle of the table, stronger than she would have given him credit for.
“I think it’s a good plan.”
Nathaniel, newly christened member of the Assembly, looked nervously around with a flop of dark hair falling over one eye. Morgan leaned against the overstuffed back of her rose chintz chair and exhaled a long, silent breath through her nose. Quiet, she willed, staring hard at him. Please be quiet, or it’s off with your head, you fool!
He was sweet and young, and she didn’t want to see him do anything stupid and get hurt, especially on her account. For not the first time, she wished her Gift of Suggestion could be used across empty space and was not limited to touch.
“Agreed,” said Leander, to the obvious shock of everyone at the table except the Queen, who sat beside him, relaxed and elegant with one finely arched brow slightly raised, as if to say to the rest of them, Go ahead, I dare you.
“But, but—” the viscount sputtered, livid. He jerked out of his chair. “It’s impossible! There is no guarantee—” Another man stood, Grayson Sutherland, stocky and well-regarded. “The risk is too great, lord.
Even you must see—”
“Yes, yes,” someone else was saying loudly, “the risks far outweigh any advantage we could hope to obtain—”
“—she wouldn’t just return—”
“—it’s outrageous to think—”
“—she cannot be trusted!—”
“—the danger to us—”
“—think of the consequences—” They were all on their feet now, arguing and shouting over one another, all except the Queen and her Alpha, who remained apart and silent, and Morgan, alone at the end of the table, shivering in her chair. Though it was warm enough in the room, she was cold, ice-cold, a freeze that went bone-
deep. Grave-deep. She wondered if she’d ever feel warm again.
Leander stood abruptly from his chair, a lithe unfolding of limbs that was at once elegant and unquestionably menacing. “Silence,” he commanded through clenched teeth, and, just as abruptly, there was.
White-lipped and petrified, Morgan smiled. If she had ever questioned the Earl of Sommerley’s authority or his complete control and power over the tribe, his ability to send a group of sixteen savage, bloodthirsty males sinking back into their seats in silent, pale-knuckled fury with just a single word proved it beyond doubt. He was Alpha for good reason.
He stared around the table, and one by one every man in the Assembly glanced away.
“I will speak with my wife,” he went on in that low, steely tone, “alone.”
The men shared sour glances; grumbles of assent were heard. They climbed one by one to their feet, and chairs were scraped back over the marble floor with grating screeches that set Morgan’s pulse skittering and her teeth on edge. Someone came up beside her, gently touched her bare arm. She glanced up to find Nathaniel gazing down at her, smiling hesitantly, that lock of hair falling over one eye, stubbornly refusing to stay in place.
“Miss Morgan, I’ll just take you back down to your—”
“No touching! ” hissed Viscount Weymouth, coming up behind him. He wrenched Nathaniel’s hand free of her arm, and Nathaniel blanched and stepped back, wide-eyed. “Do you want her to strike you senseless, boy? Make you her puppet with no more than this?”
