Page 204 of Moon Craving

wolves stood a mere ten feet from her and Guaire.

The redhead had turned when she did. His expression mirrored her shock. "Laird?"

Talorc nodded, though he maintained his wolf's form. The wolf beside him looked

like he might be white, but he glowed a pale silver in the moonlight.

Guaire trembled beside Abigail. "Niall?"

The other wolf did not answer as Talorc had done, but padded forward, stopping

only when his big head butted against Guaire's side. A look of wonder took over Guaire's

features, dissipating the defeated pain that had been so strong only a moment ago.

He reached down and ran his fingers through the wolf's pelt. "Is this okay?" he

asked the beast.

Niall barked. Guaire dropped to a crouch. The white wolf rubbed his head against

Guaire's cheek and the seneschal buried his head in the beast's fur. The wolf's body

shook as if beset by intense emotion, and the man wrapped his arms around the beast's

neck.

"He is not afraid of Niall's wolf at all," Talorc's voice was tinged with bleakness.

Abigail used her voice, such that it was, to speak. "If I had known it was you, I

wouldn't have been afraid of you either."

"You are so certain of that?" The wolf's eyes . . . Talorc's eyes . . . seemed to look

into her heart.

"I have always trusted you with my safety. From the very first moment."

"And yet you ran away."

"You complained about me to your king. You wanted rid of me." Her earlier distress

returned, setting grief like a stranglehold around her heart.

"I sent a messenger in a drunken moment of idiocy. I did not want rid of you. Surely

I made that clear after I sobered up."

Abigail turned away from him only to find Niall tugging Guaire's plaid off. Shock

forced a reaction other than sorrow, at least for that moment.

"Surely he does not mean to mate with him as a wolf?" Abigail asked in her mind of

Talorc.

Unwanted pleasure filled her as he answered her. Until that moment she had not