Forgotten Read online

  Rone didn’t hesitate any longer. He turned and ran, sprinting with Kate cradled in his arms, as fast as he could go. Thanks to his Wulven speed and strength, that was pretty damn fast. The security guards behind him probably saw only a blur before he was gone from their line of sight. In just a few seconds more, he was out of the mall completely and back to the little Kindred shuttle which doubled as a car when he and Kate were on Earth.

  Gently he put her into the passenger seat and buckled her in, using the harness which he had modified specially to fit her small size. Then he got in the driver’s seat and gunned the engine.

  The mall wasn’t a safe place anymore—he had to get Kate out of here although where he should take her wasn’t exactly clear. Someplace he could talk to her and get his arm fixed up. It was really beginning to throb by now and he knew even with his healing abilities he needed to get it dressed and cleaned before the flesh and tendons could start to knit together again.

  I could take her to the Mother Ship but she might wake up along the way and begin to panic again. It would probably be even worse if he took her to The Finder, the ship they shared as their home, presently in orbit around Earth’s moon. If she woke up in unfamiliar surroundings and thought he was kidnapping her it wasn’t going to help her trust him.

  So then, where could he go? Rone didn’t know—he only knew they had to get out of here and fast—before the sirens he heard blaring in the distance caught up with them.

  * * * * *

  Kate woke up with a quiet humming sound in her ears and the feeling that she was moving. She looked down at herself and saw that she was wearing some kind of strap across her chest and lap—a seatbelt? Was she in a car?

  Looking to her right, she saw street lights and houses whizzing by in the deepening gloom. So she was in a car. But who was driving? She felt like she ought to know but she didn’t know why. There was a scent in the air that tickled her nose and filled her senses—a warm, masculine spice that was somehow familiar and yet unlike anything she’d ever smelled before. There was another smell too—a coppery odor that bothered her.

  Blood. It’s blood, she thought drowsily. But who was bleeding?

  She turned her head and saw that the huge Kindred was driving. Immediately the drowsiness vanished and her heart kicked into overdrive.

  “Who are you? Where are you taking me? Let me go!” she blurted, struggling to sit up straighter in the seat.

  He glanced at her, a worried look in his glowing blue eyes.

  “Thank the Goddess you’re awake. Do you feel all right?” he asked in that deep, growling voice.

  “I’ll be fine as soon as I get out of here.” She began fumbling with one hand for the release on the unfamiliar seat harness and feeling for the door handle with the other.

  “That won’t do you any good,” he said quietly. “The doors are voice locked to my voice only.”

  “What? Why? Let me out of here!”

  “I’m sorry, Lalli.” He shot her an apologetic look. “I can’t do that. I have to talk to you…try to make you remember.”

  “If you think I’m going to suddenly remember that we’re married you’re crazy,” Kate spat. “Now let me go you big asshole!”

  “Kate, please…” He pulled the car to the side of the road and turned to face her. “I can tell you’re frightened of me although I don’t know why—”

  “After what I saw you do with your eyes back at the store?” she interrupted him. “What the hell was that, anyway?”

  “A partial shift.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I saw that you were in danger and the Beast came out a little bit. I was feeling…very protective…very upset. It happens sometimes when I have strong emotions but I would never let it all the way out. Not around you, baby.”

  Kate shrank back in her seat, trying to get as far from him as possible.

  “So you admit you have a Beast inside you?”

  His eyes blazed. “Hell, yes I admit it! What good would it do to deny it? I know you can sense it—you have from the first minute I met you.”

  Kate stared at him in disbelief. She’d thought it was something he wasn’t aware of—or maybe a warning her Knowing was trying to give her that he was bad inside somehow. Sometimes it spoke in metaphorical terms but apparently in this case it was being literal. There really was another creature inside the huge Kindred and he acknowledged it.

  “Let me just show you something,” he said and started to reach inside his jacket pocket.

  Instinctively, Kate reached for her Glock—only to find it was gone.

  “It’s someplace safe,” he told her, plainly seeing her gesture. “You’ll get it back when I’m sure you won’t shoot me with it again.”

  “You were grabbing for me,” Kate reminded him tightly. “Of course I shot you.”

  “I was trying to keep you from going over that damn railing,” he growled, still digging in the inside pocket of his jacket. “Which you did anyway. And then you nearly shot me again.”

  “I didn’t though,” Kate pointed out, although she had no idea why she hadn’t. She’d had every intention of shooting the big Kindred point blank between the eyes but at the last minute, her hand had jerked and she’d targeted the robber instead. Why? She didn’t know. She had no answers when it came to this strange male who now had her in his power. She only knew that being near him made her heart pound and her breath come in short, panicky gasps.

  Grimly, she struggled to control the panic. He hasn’t killed me or hurt me yet, she reminded herself. He thinks I’m his wife. Maybe I can use that to lull him into trusting me. And as soon as he does I can get away. I can—

  “Look.” His deep voice cut into her frantic thoughts. Kate looked up to see he was holding a small, flat disk the size of a quarter in one broad palm.

  “What is it? Some kind of coin?” she asked blankly.

  “No—it’s us. Our memories, Lalli. Memories from the last three cycles.”

  He pressed something on the small disk with his thumb and it hummed to life. Suddenly a holographic image appeared above it—an image of a couple with their arms around each other looking into each other’s eyes.

  The male was huge—tall and broad shouldered and muscular. He was wearing a tux and gazing down lovingly at the red haired woman in his arms who was wearing a wedding dress. She was tiny and petite—her head barely came up past his elbow, yet he was holding her so gently and the look in his burning blue eyes was one of complete adoration. She was looking up at him, an expression of bliss shining in her pale green eyes. Clearly they were deeply in love.

  Kate stared at it, trying to make sense of what her eyes were telling her.

  “Oh my God,” she said at last. “That’s…me.”

  “It’s us,” the big Kindred corrected gently. “This was taken at our Joining Ceremony—on our Wedding Day as you humans call it.” He looked at her hopefully. “Does it help you remember anything? Anything at all?”

  “How did you do this?” Kate looked up at him mistrustfully. “How long have I been out? Did you somehow get me all dressed up in a wedding dress and drug me or—”

  “Of course not!” There was a growl of pure frustration in his deep voice. “Look.”

  He pressed the button on the small disk again and another picture appeared. It was the two of them once more, only this time wearing more casual clothing. They were standing in front of the Grand Canyon—or what looked like it anyway. The big Kindred was holding Kate on his back piggyback style and she was laughing happily and pointing over his broad shoulder at the canyon.

  “What’s that?” she said blankly. “The Grand Canyon? Because that’s what it looks like.”

  “We went there on our honeymoon,” he told her. “You agreed to come live with me and travel the universe as a tracking team. But first you said you wanted to see some of your own world you’d never had a chance to explore before.”

  Kate shook her head. “I’ve never been to the Grand Canyon in my lif