Moonshine by Rob Thurman Page B

children he'd been four ahead. Neat trick, eh? When the Auphe had kidnapped me at the age of fourteen, they'd taken me to a place where time ran differently than it did here. For Niko it seemed as if I were gone only a day, but I had come back approximately two years older. I'd also come back a raving lunatic, but that was beside the point. Niko dealt with it, just as he always had.
    One of my earliest memories as a kid was around the time I was four. I'd been sick. Who knows with what? It was mostly fuzzy, but I did remember vomiting miserably all over myself. And I remembered it had been Niko cleaning me up while Sophia drank whiskey in the next room. He would've been eight. And when I was well enough to eat again, it was Niko who fed me soup and crackers. It was Niko who walked me to school and picked me up afterward. Niko who bought me birthday presents, complete with a grocery store cupcake and candle. Promise wanted to know what he was like as a child?
    "He never was one," I said soberly.
    That was when Boaz walked through the door. I didn't need his description to know who he was. He strolled in like he owned the place… owned the world. He, like the higher wolves, was able to convert completely to human form. Whippet lean, he had his pale brown hair shaved close to his skull and a face carved from cold white marble. With eyes so black that they swallowed the light, he looked over the crowd with a curl of thin lips. Then motioning to the four wolves flanking him, he moved toward the back and disappeared through the only door. So much for ingratiating our way into a game.
    "Well, shit," I growled succinctly.
    "That does seem to sum it up." Promise rose and discarded her cape over her chair. "Give me a moment." With that, she then moved toward the one wolf left guarding the door.
    It was something to see, Promise at work. It brought home how much she truly cared for Niko. I had never seen her use on him what she laid on that poor goddamn wolf. It wasn't sex or even the hint of it, although it was erotic as hell. I'd compared her to royalty before and that was part of it. She was a goddess come to earth; at least she made you believe that. She didn't walk; she flowed. And when she smiled, she put the Mona Lisa to shame. Promise was a promise of more than you could ever imagine.
    Five rich husbands… it was a wonder she hadn't had a hundred.
    I whistled low under my breath. "Nik, she's going to eat you alive." That was all right. He was going to enjoy every minute of it.
    In less than five minutes she was back. Scooping up the pile of violet silk, she said lightly, "Come along, Caliban. We have an invitation to a very private and exclusive game."
    "Lucky us," I offered blandly. Carrying my beer, I followed in her wake.
    The room was the same as a thousand others like it. Spare, smoky, and marginally clean. The owner wasn't wasting any overhead prettying the place up—that was clear to see. Although the painting of dogs playing poker that hung crookedly on the wall was a weirdly appropriate touch. Maybe that sociopathic puck had a little of Goodfellow in him after all.
    As we stepped through the door, all eyes locked on Promise. The circle of black, brown, yellow, and pumpkin orange eyes held an identical emotion: awed lust. Then those eyes moved to me, but the looks I received were a helluva lot less complimentary. It was the same reaction I received from most nonhumans. There was the incredulous sniff, followed by expressions of sheer disgust and revulsion. This time, however, as the cherry on top, one of the wolves actually peed himself. Now, there was someone who'd obviously actually crossed paths with an Auphe at some point.
    To most, the Auphe were a legend. Real and true, but with such a dwindled population that chances were good you might luck out and never see one in your lifetime. It was the kind of luck to pray for. But Auphe had always been the top of the food chain, and wolves, full-blown egotistic predators