Gypsy Moon

Chapter Seventy: Lilian

. . . . . . (early June)

"Gyam kidn*pped the county coroner?"

"I did not. I gave him the choice at the very start."

"AFTER running him off the road?"

"He just swerved a little!"

"Now, now, miss. I just had the luck to be on call tonight. He's been nothing but honest with me and I chose to come here." I scoffed.

"Because the other option was rather clearly spelled out as death!" I stormed around the Alpha's office. "Who chooses that option? Really!" Aiden sat in his chair with Sinah curled up on his lap, Donovan in turn on her breast. Aiden was pinching the bridge of his nose as I rounded on the coroner.

"If you were legitimately tortured, what would they be able to force you to say about tonight?" He had the sense to stop and think before he answered.

"If I listened to myself, I would think I was drunk, or off my rocker." I threw my hands up.

"Those corpses are what we call Hunters. Hunters have a very, VERY long history of being unpleasant, in general, and would know you weren't." I glared at Gyam. "We can't literally kidnap him, he has a job! Someone is going to notice he never showed up with a van full of bodies!" Gyam frowned slightly.

"I thought he might be useful to us." I stopped and glared into the fireplace and felt Kyle's arms wrap around me as the coroner spoke up again.

"It's not the young man's fault, miss." I glanced at him as he was calmly looking at the books on a shelf. "Merely a series of events that resulted in this outcome." Aiden looked at him for a long moment.

"Well, regardless, we need to decide what to do about you." The man turned to him and smiled at Gyam.

"This young man was very forthcoming, and I did choose to follow him into the rabbit hole, so to speak." He picked up a thin volume on raising cubs I had found for Aiden and chuckled. "If it helps, I am a solitary widower, my kids are all across the country with kids of their own. And I have been spending far too much time alone in my cups since Martha passed, if you catch my meaning." I stared at him for a long moment as he smiled at me.

"You do realize that you are justifying why our best option is to murder you?" He glanced over at Gyam and cleared his throat softly.

"The young man mentioned something about a peculiar concern. I believe it was the necessity to deal with someone rather firmly, and theoretically permanently, twice?" He chuckled as we all focused on him. "I don't know about you, but in my line of work, I like when bodies stay dead. So I suppose you could say I have a vested interest in this situation as well." Sinah began giggling and we all shifted our attention to her.

"Oh come on Lil'. What did you expect?" She unfolded herself carefully so she didn't wake Donovan and stood up. Gyam growled softly as she walked near the coroner, his body tensed and the coroner nodded and backed away from her with a slight bow. She smiled at him. "We have a habit of collecting the exceptions and the oddities. You are welcome to stay here. I have to get this little one to bed. I recommend everyone else to do the same as soon as possible." Gyam immediately joined her in the elevator. Aiden rubbed his temples after they disappeared.

"Lilian?" He grinned at me tiredly. "I love you, but I need sleep, Donovan was being a beast." I rolled my eyes and smiled at him.

"Go to bed, I will handle this." I took his seat as he stood and he pressed his forehead against mine. We've all been adopting the 'cat kiss' since it didn't trigger the sting in our mates. Kyle smiled and playfully pushed Aiden away so he could kiss me properly.

"Don't stay up too late, babe." The two waited for the elevator to return and left me alone with the coroner, who startled me by speaking first.

"I apologize for keeping you from your rest, miss." He smiled at me warmly. "Everyone is so young here, I have grandkids about your age." I returned his smile.

"Well, Grampa, the easiest solution is to fake your death."

"Actually, I think a continuation of the gang violence would be easiest." He nodded calmly. "I believe simply parking the van in a gang neighborhood and roughing it up a bit would suffice."

"How does that explain you going missing?"

"Oh, I won't. I will walk into work in the morning, say I had the van stolen by thugs, and tell them I am going to start my retirement early." He chuckled at the look on my face. "Like I said, you are all so young around here. Seems you might benefit from an older voice now and then. I'm an old man, no one is going to come looking for me that isn't family, and none of them will disagree with my early retirement if I tell them I narrowly escaped a gang conflict."

"Hunters are still an issue." He nodded and patted his pockets until he found his pipe and I bit my tongue to stop the sudden laugh. "Please don't light that in here, Grampa." He chuckled.

"No, I just like chewing on it when I think, it makes me look smart." He sat quietly for a moment, chewing on the stem absently. "The young woman, she said I was welcome to stay here, so I assume you have housing here. Well, that sounds like I found a nice community that I decided to move into for my retirement, abundant in fresh air and outdoor activities to keep me busy, rather than stay in the city." I grinned suddenly.

"Now that you mention it, we also have a fully staffed on-campus medical center, as well as many fitness and recreational facilities under construction." I giggled. "In fact, many of our available services focus on health and well-being, as well as our twenty-four hour professionally staffed kitchen designed to cater to a wide variety of dietary needs." His grin matched mine.

"Why, I think my children would be very pleased to hear that."

. . . . . .