Possession-Blood Ties 2 by Jennifer Armintrout Page B

through. “What is your thing against werewolves?”
    “It’s not my thing against werewolves that makes me dislike that one. Bella DeCesare. She’s a real bitch.” He winced at the terminology. “Breton gives her all sorts of prime assignments, flies her all over because she’s his only assassin who can travel commercial. He says it’s because she’s got the best kill record of all the werewolves in the Movement. I say he’s boning her.”
    “Nice.” I remembered Cyrus talking about lupins and how they’d distanced themselves from their more primitive cousins, but the way he’d described werewolves had made me picture hairy, half human beasts loping around in the woods, preying on innocent campers. The woman I’d seen had been anything but primitive. “So, they play for this side, as well. There were some lupins at Cyrus’s house, but I wasn’t sure exactly who they were.”
    A look of utter disgust crossed Max’s face. “Let’s limit your use of that name to about zero times a day. But she’s not a lupin. She’s a werewolf. According to them, they’re not interchangeable terms.” He sounded as if he didn’t care two figs for their differences.
    “They’re not as different as the lupins want you to believe. Werewolves are still tied to the earth and moon. There was some pack council a hundred years ago where they met to discuss controlling their cycles—”
    “Wait,” I interrupted. “We are talking about their changing-into-dogs cycles and not menstruation, right?”
    “Yes. And let’s go ahead and put that one on the zero tolerance vocab list, as well.” He gave another disgusted look. “Anyway, werewolves have always been really into that hippie-dippy earth magic crap like Nathan’s got in his bookstore. Except they know what they’re doing, because they’re more or less ruled by nature. For centuries, they’ve dabbled in magic to alter time and skip over the days of the full moon’s influence. Then some of them turned to science, came up with an injection that will suppress the change. The resultant rift split the species into two clans, werewolves and lupins.
    “The lupins believe they’re superior, because they advocate the vaccine that allows them to live as humans. The werewolves think the lupins are traitors for turning away from magic. So a war started, and since lupins have no problem feeding on innocent humans, the Movement sided with the werewolves. They join up and get the chance to kill lupins and vampires. Personally, I wouldn’t care if they lost their collective cool and ripped each other to shreds.”
    “I’ll remember that, when it’s time to call in a cleaning crew to mop the fur and guts off the walls.”
    I jumped at the cultured, but very commanding, British voice. So did Max. The man who’d spoken surprised me. I had definitely formed a picture in my head based around Breton’s military title. I’d expected a man in his fifties with an iron jaw, deep lines by his eyes and a haircut so precise as to be geometrical. Breton was nothing like that, except for the iron jaw. He’d probably been turned in his late thirties. His long, wheat-colored hair was pulled back in a severe horsetail, accentuating his sharp features and long, straight nose. His lips quirked in an expression that was either annoyance or amusement. It was hard to tell which.

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    “General Breton, I presume.” I hoped I sounded more confident than I felt as I extended my hand and prayed my palms weren’t sweaty.
    The man didn’t take it. “We are not so formal here. You may call me General, Dr. Ames.”
    “And you can call me…” I hesitated, rolling his words around in my brain. “Doctor?”
    He gave me a cool, appraising look. “Come inside.”
    We followed him through the door, Max showing Breton’s back the middle finger the whole time.
    The inner office was a bit of a shock,