Page 157 of Moon Craving

wife, if you will have me."

"Why?"

"I love you. I told you that yesterday."

"You could have been lying."

Her broken heart shattered a little more. "I wasn't."

"Have you lied to me about anything else?"

"No, but I have hidden something from you."

"What?"

"I began hearing a voice in my head. I like to think it is you, but it can't be anything

except my imagination. I do not hear anything else. Well, besides the one night I heard the

howl of a wolf."

"Is that all?"

"Yes."

He nodded and then turned to go, as if all had been settled between them.

"Doesn't that worry you?" she asked desperately. "The voices in my head?"

"No."

Was that because he intended to get rid of her? "Are you going to send me away?"

"You are my wife."

She had no reply for that, and before she could conjure one up, he had gone.

Talorc ran through the forest in his wolf form. He had swum in the loch to clear his

whiskey-addled head, but it had done nothing to dispel his confusion in light of his wife's

revelations.

She had deceived him just as Tamara had deceived his father. Only his father had

realized his wife's true nature too late. Talorc was now all too aware of Abigail's clever

manipulations, but he had no desire to banish her.

The problem was that, like his soldiers, he admired his wife's ability to hide her

weakness. He could not help feeling proud that she was so talented at reading lips and

speaking, no one had guessed at the fact she could not hear. The admiration he felt was

at odds with the sense of betrayal choking his insides, and yet he could not rid himself of

it.