A Touch of Midnight (Midnight Breed 0.5)

"It's okay." She shook her head where it rested against his chest. "I learned from it. It made me more careful. More protective of myself, of my heart. And then you came along..."

She looked up into his eyes. "I've never imagined I could feel all the things I feel with you, Gideon. I never understood how lost I've felt--all my life--until I found you. I think it must've been fate that brought us together at the library a few nights ago."

A pang of guilt stabbed him at the mention of how they'd first met. Only he knew it hadn't been fate at all that sent him to her that night. He'd first sought her out as a warrior on a private mission to gather intel on the sword and whoever had it now.

That mission had soon changed, once he came to know Savannah. Once he came to care about her so swiftly, so deeply. He should have come clean about their initial meeting before now. He should have done it right then--would have--but before he could summon the first word, she covered his mouth in a tender kiss.

It was all he could do not to end her sweet kiss and blurt out the other damning words that were on the tip of his tongue: Be with me. Bond with me. Let me be your mate.

But it wasn't fair to ask so much of her, not when she was just entering his world and he still had unfinished business to attend.

He still had hidden enemies to eliminate. And he wouldn't assume for one moment that killing the Rogue who'd accosted her at South Station removed the whole of the threat that was stalking Savannah.

Recalling that encounter made him go tense and sober. She must have felt the change in him, for Savannah drew back from him now. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"Last night, at the bus terminal," he said. "Did you notice anyone following you? Watching you, before or after you arrived? I don't mean the Rogue that cornered you, but someone else. Someone who might have been aware that it was happening."

"No. Why?" Apprehension flickered in her searching gaze. "Do you think the Rogue was with others? Do you think I was targeted somehow?"

"I think it's a very real possibility, Savannah. I'm not willing to assume otherwise." Gideon didn't want to alarm her unnecessarily, but she also had to understand how dangerous the situation could be for her outside. "I think the Rogue was sent to find you for someone else."

More than likely, sent to silence her, a thought that made his blood go icy in his veins.

Savannah stared at him. "Because of what happened to Rachel and Professor Keaton? You mean, you think the one who attacked them is now after me? Why?"

"The sword, Savannah. What else did you see when you touched it?"

She shook her head. "I told you. I saw the Rogues who killed those two little boys. And I saw you, striking someone with the blade. You killed someone with it."

Gideon gave a grim nod. "In a duel, many years ago, yes. I killed the Breed male who made the sword. His name was Hugh Faulkner, a Gen One Breed and the best sword maker in London at the time. He was also a prick and a bastard, a deviant who took his pleasure in bloodshed. Particularly when it came to human women."

"What happened?"

"One night in London, Faulkner showed up at a Cheapside tavern with a human female under his arm. She was in bad shape, pale and unresponsive, nearly bled out." Gideon couldn't curb the disgust in his tone. There were laws among his race meant to protect humans from the worst abuses of Breed power, but there were also individuals among their kind like Faulkner, those who regarded themselves above any law.

"Few of the Breed males in the establishment would consider rising up against a Gen One, especially one as nasty as Faulkner. But I couldn't abide what he had done to the woman. Words were exchanged. The next thing I knew, Faulkner and I were outside in the darkness, engaged in a contest to the death over the fate of the woman." Gideon recalled it as if the confrontation had just happened yesterday, not some three-hundred years in the past. "I had earned some renown for my skill with a sword, more so than Faulkner, as it turned out. He lost his blade almost immediately and stumbled. It was a fatal misstep. I could've taken his head then and there, but in an act of mercy--stupidity, in hindsight--I stayed my hand."

"He cheated?" Savannah guessed.

Gideon gave a vague nod. "The minute I turned to walk away and retrieve his fallen blade, Faulkner began to rise up to come at me. I realized my mistake at once. I recovered quickly--and before Faulkner could get to his feet, I rounded back on him and cleaved him in half with his own damned sword."

Savannah sucked in a soft breath. "That's what I saw. You, killing him with the sword I touched."

"I won the contest and sent the human woman away to be looked after until she was well again," Gideon replied. "As for Faulkner's sword, I wish I'd left it where it lay that night, next to his corpse."

Understanding dawned in Savannah's tender eyes. "The twin boys I saw playing with the sword before they were attacked in the stable by Rogues..."

"My brothers," he confirmed. "Simon and Roderick."

"Gideon," she whispered solemnly. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"A long time ago," he said.

"But you still feel it. Don't you?"

He released a heavy sigh. "I was to blame for not protecting them. Our parents were dead. The boys were my responsibility. Several weeks after the confrontation with Faulkner, I was out carousing in the city. Simon and Roddy were young, not even ten years old, but old enough to hunt on their own as Breed youths. I took it for granted that they'd be safe enough on their own for a few hours that night."

Savannah reached over and pulled his fisted hand up to her lips, kissed the tightly clenched knuckles with sweet compassion. He relaxed his fingers to twine them with hers. "My brothers were the reason I came to Boston. I joined the Order t hunt Rogues, after killing the three who murdered the boys, as well as dozens more for good measure."