Ronan bumped Faelan with his shoulder and stepped up to shake Shay’s hand. “Glad you’re okay. We were worried.”
“Are you all part of this clan?” Shay asked.
“You told her?” Lachlan said. “Are you crazy? The Council’s gonna hang you this time.”
“I’ll deal with the Council,” Cody said, but his jaw tightened as he said it.
“We’re all from the same clan,” Ronan explained, “but we’re from Scotland, not far from where you live, I understand. I’m surprised we didn’t run into you over the years.”
She would have remembered if she had run into Ronan. “Guess that explains Faelan’s kilt,” Shay said. “It looks authentic.”
“It is authentic. Nineteenth century, him and the kilt. He’s my great-great-great-uncle, the Mighty Faelan. Bree found him in a time vault while she was searching for treasure. I think sometimes she wishes she hadn’t. I know I do.”
Faelan looked like he wanted to hit Ronan again. “If you don’t stop calling me that I’m going to stick you in a time vault,” he said, pulling off another slice of ham.
“Time vault? Are you saying he was born in the nineteenth century?” He couldn’t be.
“Aye,” Cody said, rubbing his neck. “He was born in 1833.”
“That’s impossible.”
“There are a lot of impossible things in this clan,” Bree said.
“More than demons and… what was it, a time vault?” Shay asked.
“You can’t imagine,” Bree said. “These time vaults imprison demons until Judgment. Time stops inside.”
Cody hadn’t told her that part. What else wasn’t he telling her?
“What happened to your neck?” Marcas asked Cody.
Cody touched a red mark just over his jugular vein. “Shay bit me.”
Everyone stared at her, cocked eyebrows leading to grins.
Shay’s face heated. “That’s what you get for handcuffing me to the bed.”
The grins grew wider, and Shay’s face hotter.
“Sorry,” Cody said looking at her lips. “Do you want something to eat?”
“Careful,” Ronan said. “She might take a chunk out of the other side.”
“No, thanks,” Shay said, spearing all the men with a glare.
“Good,” Lachlan said. “’Cause Faelan just took the rest of the food.”
“You wouldn’t believe how much that man can eat after being suspended in time for a hundred and fifty-one years,” Bree said. “Come on, let’s get away from all this testosterone before we choke.”
“Who brought the cat?” Lachlan asked, looking at the cat, who’d pushed through the cracked door.
“It showed up at Nina’s,” Cody said. “Probably belongs to the Petersons.”
Bree and Shay left the room. “Now,” Bree said, lifting one dark brow. “Why exactly did Cody handcuff you to the bed?”
***
Tristol hovered outside the window, watching Malek pace the floor, his ear to the phone. “When I get back from Scotland, you’d better have Shay and the book,” Malek hissed. He stopped, his face convulsing, but he controlled the shift. “She’s with Cody MacBain! He’s the one. Get her away from him. If she’s Edward Rodgers’s daughter, she and the warrior can’t be allowed to breed.”
Edward Rodgers? The shock of that name jerked Tristol upright from his hiding place. The woman who stole the book could be Edward’s daughter? Was this the real reason Malek wanted her? Did he know about the powerful emerald Edward Rodgers was supposed to possess? This shed new light on things, but he didn’t have time to investigate. The Dark One had summoned him again. It was getting tedious, continuing this thousand-year-old charade, when he needed to monitor his prisoner. Tristol found his lieutenant and issued new instructions. If this Shay woman was Edward’s daughter, she was more valuable than any stolen book.
Chapter 5
Shay woke to the smell of Cody and bacon. The bacon part she understood. The Cody part didn’t make sense. A suspicious dent was in the pillow next to hers. Had Cody slept there? She didn’t remember anything after that cup of tea he gave her. She sat up, and her head swam as if she had been drugged, or was it the dream of the glowing man again? No, this felt like drugs. Cody must have put something in her tea. She threw on her clothes, brushed her teeth, and stormed out of the room. He had put her in Ewan and Laura’s old bedroom, insisting she stay at his house where they could protect her. She found him in the kitchen with Faelan and Bree.
“You bastard! So you’ve gone from handcuffing me to the bed to drugging me?”
“You drugged her?” Bree asked.
Faelan’s eyebrows rose. “You handcuffed her to the bed? Damnation. I wish I’d thought of that.”
Bree pointed her finger at him. “Don’t even try it.”
Cody scowled. “It was just valerian root. You needed rest.”
“Rest? I was practically unconscious.”
“Maybe Cody was afraid you would bite him again,” Faelan said to Shay. Bree elbowed him. “Sorry,” he said,
