Accepting the Moon: Prequel (Moonrising Book 1) Read online

  Accepting the Moon

  A ‘Moonrising’ Story

  Prequel

  By K. S. Haigwood

  K. S. Haigwood

  Text copyright © 2014 by K. S. Haigwood

  License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite retailer and purchase your own copy

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, locales or events is entirely coincidental.

  Accepting the Moon

  Edited by: Ella Medler

  Table of Contents

  Other Books by This Author:

  Dedication:

  Acknowledgements:

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Sneak Peek of ‘Midnight Moonrising’

  Chapter 1

  About the Author: Connect with Kristie

  Kristi's Bookshelf

  For The Reader

  Other Books by This Author:

  Save My Soul Series

  Save My Soul – Book 1

  Hell‘s Gift – Book 2

  Good Side of Sin – Book 3

  My Sweet Purgatory – Book 4 (Coming Soon)

  Stand Alones

  Forbidden Touch

  Eternal Island Series

  Eternal Island – Book 1

  Eternal Immortality – Book 2

  Eternal Illusion – Book 3 (Coming Soon)

  Moonrising Series

  Accepting the Moon – Prequel

  Midnight Moonrising – Book 1 (Coming Soon)

  Also Coming Soon

  The Last Assignment

  Dedication:

  For the voices. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be me.

  Acknowledgements:

  Editor: Ella Medler

  Beta readers: Dottie Schmeckpeper, Christy Mann, Jessica Parra, Amanda Wright, Tbird London, Katie Harder-Schauer

  Special Thanks to: Shawn and Riley for being my rock when I needed a little bit of reality to hold on to.

  Chapter 1

  Mena

  Twelve years.

  The silence was deafening as I stared at him through shimmering tears, waiting—waiting for that answer, an answer I already knew to be true. I was torturing myself by doing it but, for some reason, I had to know. Why didn’t I just turn and walk away? Would hearing him say it actually make me feel any better? It wouldn’t change the past, it wouldn’t change what he did and it damn sure wouldn’t change my mind about leaving him, so why the hell was I still standing before him, trembling with anger and humility and waiting for him to respond to my question?

  Twelve years wasted. It was all I could think about; that, and the fact that I was scared to death, because I had no idea what I was going to do. In a single, heart-stopping moment of weakness, he had chosen to erase everything we had ever had together, everything we had worked for and everything we had become. Everything was just… gone.

  Because of her. Because of him. Because of what they did together!

  I wanted to scream and shout at him to say something, but the words were stuck somewhere on the other side of the huge lump in my throat.

  The guilt and shame were clear on his face, but it didn’t matter to me that he regretted anything—or that he merely pretended to. I would never be able to look at him the same, even if I could somehow muster up enough compassion to forgive him for stealing the best years of my life and throwing them back in my face as if I was nothing important to him at all.

  My breath hitched in my throat and I jerked back when he took a step toward me. His frame went rigid and his left hand remained extended out to me as if silently pleading with me to stay.

  Nervous brown eyes followed my gaze to where I had placed a platinum wedding band twelve years earlier, and he swore under his breath at the sight of the slightly lighter shade of skin there, at the base of his ring finger.

  The blood drained from his face as the brimming tears cascaded down my cheeks.

  “Mena, I never meant—”

  “Was it worth it?” I whispered, cutting his lie short.

  He exhaled slowly as he turned away from me, that left hand coming up again, but this time so he could run his fingers through his hair—hair that I had only just noticed had begun to recede and turn gray a bit at the temples.

  He sighed as he pinched the bridge of his nose and exhaled loudly. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “How about the truth? After what you’ve done, don’t I deserve at least that much?”

  He sighed again, and I dug half moons in the palms of my hands in the long, uncomfortable silence that followed.

  “I’m sorry.”

  I waited for him to continue, to say something—anything—else. Nothing came. He just stood there, avoiding eye contact and waiting for me to—to what? Say, ‘Okay, you are forgiven?’ Bullshit!

  “What?” I said, and my voice cracked in disbelief or anger; I wasn’t absolutely sure which. It could have been both. “Exactly what are you sorry about, Marc? Lying to me? Destroying our marriage? Sleeping with another woman?” I screamed the last question at him and involuntarily bent at the waist. Dizziness and a wave of nausea took over my body at the thought of him, my husband of twelve years, having sex with another woman.

  Where had I gone wrong?

  He touched my shoulder and I quickly moved out of his reach.

  Glaring up at him through my dark lashes, I took another guarded step back and forced myself to stand upright. “Don’t you dare touch me.”

  “Christ, Mena, I never meant for anything to happen! It just—shit! It just did. She meant—she means—nothing to me,” he finished softly, and his eyes begged me to believe the lie.

  Trembling from head to toe, I rubbed my hands up and down my arms, desperately trying to chase away the queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.

  “How did we get to this place? I feel like I don’t even know you anymore,” I whispered.

  He huffed, but seemed relieved that I had decided to stay and talk things through. I suppose he still thought he had a fighting chance. “I know. I don’t know you, either, Mena, but I want to. We’ve grown apart. We’ve changed—everyone changes,” he stressed.

  A collage of wedding photos hung above the fireplace mantle behind him, and I stared at the frames without really seeing the memories frozen behind their glasses. A girl’s wedding day is supposed to be the happiest day of her life, but I barely even remembered mine.

  “This wasn’t in the plan,” I said. “This was not supposed to happen to me.” I knew that seemed so cliché of me to say, and I knew people cheated on their spouses all the time, but I honestly
never thought it would happen to me.

  “I know,” he said again. “I’m so sorry, baby. Please—”

  My eyes widened in surprise. “Please? Please what, Marc? Forgive you?” I laughed sarcastically. “How? Tell me how I am supposed to ever be able to trust that you won’t do this again.” I shook my head. “No—I don’t think I will forgive you for this—not today… not ever.”

  I think he realized in that moment that I had no intentions of staying with him. Did he think I was ignorant?

  Swallowing hard, he took a hesitant step toward me. “We can get through this, baby. I promise I will never hurt you again. I’ll make this better if you’ll just let me. I love you,” he whispered, and even managed to keep eye contact with me.

  How many lies had he told that I never saw through to the real man he was: a deceiving, mind-manipulating, cheating bastard.

  Yes. He thought I was ignorant. And I guess I had been, but I wasn’t going to be any longer. I refused to lie to myself every day while knowing, deep down inside, that he would do it again and again.

  I let him take another step closer while I turned the two-carat diamond engagement ring to the inside of my hand with my thumb.

  “How could you do this to me, to us?”

  He shook his head and moved into my personal space. “I didn’t realize how much you mean to me. I know now. It will never happen again,” he said, his voice shaking with emotion. If I hadn’t caught him in so many lies already, I might have believed he was genuinely upset. “I need you, Mena.”

  “You should have thought of that before you put your wedding band in your pocket and screwed someone other than your wife!”

  In an instant, his expression turned sour and I couldn’t get my arm up in time to block the blow from the back of his hand across my cheekbone. I was too stunned to cry out. He had never hit me before.

  I whimpered as my hand hovered shakily over the throbbing area under my eye. I knew I needed to pull myself together. I couldn’t let him beat me without a fight. I refused to let him have that sort of control over me.

  “I hate myself for hurting you like that, Mena, but I said I was sorry, damn it! You should have just accepted the apology and forgiven me. Do you think this is fun for me? Do you think I enjoy hurting you?”

  With so much adrenaline rushing through me, it had been difficult to stay calm while he made it sound like him hitting me was my fault. I couldn’t hold it back any longer, and I nearly missed the look of shock in his eyes before my left hand slapped him hard across his right cheek.

  Bright red blood poured freely from the long gash my ring had carved in his cheek, and he looked at me in horror as I grinned menacingly at him.

  “Explain that to your whore. Your wife is leaving you.”

  Chapter 2

  Jaxon

  Jaxon scanned the growing crowd of the club with guarded eyes.

  Puppets, every last damn one of them, he thought.

  Shaking his head, he slapped a twenty and the empty old fashioned glass on the bar hard enough to get the bartender‘s attention over the raging, death-metal music that was the club‘s entertainment for the night.

  “Another double?” the bartender asked, and Jaxon nudged the glass with the tips of his fingers to encourage the pouring of the sweet, burning poison.

  He smelled the approaching human before he heard her voice, and his lips curved up at the corners as she took the seat beside him. It appeared she was going to make it easy for him.

  “I haven‘t seen you in here before. You from out of town?” the female voice shouted over the noise pollution.

  Not really, but he couldn‘t hunt in the same area too often or eyebrows would start to rise. He wasn‘t about to tell her any of that, though.

  “I‘m visiting a friend,” Jaxon shouted back as he turned his head, flashing his million dollar smile at the girl. She looked to be in her early twenties, pretty, bleached-blond hair, maybe a little too thin and a bit over the top in the make-up department, but she would do. He didn‘t want her body, after all.

  He offered her his hand to shake, but when she took it, he brought her knuckles up to his lips for a tender kiss, keeping eye contact with her the whole time.

  She swooned, and he grinned as he released her fingers.

  “Is your friend here at the club?” She glanced to his other side, obviously making sure there wasn‘t another woman sitting there that had already staked her claim on him. She smiled when she found the spot empty.

  To her obvious delight, Jaxon shook his head. “I‘m Brandon,” he lied. “And you are?”

  She sighed heavily as her eyelashes fluttered and her glossy eyes focused on his. “Yours for the night, if you‘ll get me away from all this noise and smoke. I wasn‘t quite expecting,” she winced and cupped her hands over her ears as she shouted, “this. My friends insisted we come see The Fighting Tarsier.”

  He grinned and ran his fingers lightly over her knee. She inched closer, encouraging the forward gesture. “Your place?” Jaxon said.

  She grimaced in what appeared to be actual pain. “I live with my parents.”

  Jaxon‘s lips flattened into a tight line as he wondered if she was really even old enough to be in a club. His head jerked once in the direction of the exit sign. “I‘ve got a room at a motel a few blocks from here. C‘mon.” He stood, grabbed his jacket from the back of the stool and led her through the crowd of jumping bodies. He was sure he had never seen dancing quite like that before, not in the last two centuries anyway, and never in the United States.

  She appeared to be delighted with the idea of leaving the club with a total stranger, but Jaxon honestly couldn‘t care less about where she placed her standards. He only needed one tiny, meaningless thing from her, and then he would send her on her merry little way.

  “Do we need a cab?” The blonde asked as they stepped out into the frigid January air.

  Jaxon shook his head. “If you don‘t mind the cold and a little bit of misty rain for a mile or two, we can take my bike. The motel is about ten or twelve blocks that way.” He nodded to the west, toward the bad side of town, and Blondie, all of a sudden, didn‘t look all that enthused about leaving with him anymore. She glanced longingly toward the street and a passing cab.

  He closed the distance between them and lifted her chin with one of his fingers, turning on his charm. “It‘s safe. I promise no harm will come to you. You can trust me.”

  She nodded once, then took his hand and let him lead her around the corner of the club to the alleyway.

  Jaxon could have taken what he needed from the girl then and there, but the risk of being seen was too high and, as second in command under Phoenix, he couldn‘t afford to screw things up… again.

  The slight drizzle had become a downpour by the time Jaxon parked his bike at the motel he used for special occasions, such as this one.

  It wasn‘t the Ritz-Carlton, or even a Motel 8, but there weren‘t any cracks under the door and the roaches were pretty small. He never stayed more than half an hour, so spending the thirty-eight dollars for four walls out of sight suited him just fine. He wasn‘t the only male who paid for rooms by the hour, although his reasons were quite different from the other lowlifes he‘d seen coming and going.

  They ran underneath the short awning over the office door and Jaxon pushed his way inside. The girl tugged her hand free of his and held her cell phone up when he turned to see why she had stopped.

  “Go on ahead. I‘ll wait for you right here. I just need to text my friends and let them know I left the club. I wouldn‘t want them to worry about me.”

  He eyed her a moment longer, thinking the second he turned his back she would bolt, but the night was still early and he could just wait for one of the hookers to drunkenly stumble out of one of the other rooms if his prey scurried away, so he gave her a nod and turned toward the man behind the counter to get his room key.

  Chapter 3

  Mena

  I scrambled to fi
nd the wiper switch again and quickly realized the blades were already wiping the sheets of rain from the windshield as fast as they could. As if not being able to see through the storm wasn‘t problem enough, I couldn‘t seem to keep my tear ducts from leaking and blurring my vision even further.

  “Stupid, cheating bastard,” I mumbled under my breath, and wiped the dampness from my burning cheeks with a tissue.

  I refused to say, ‘What else can possibly go wrong?’. Out loud anyway. I already had the feeling Karma was kicked back with popcorn and laughing out loud at the obstacles she was throwing at me. Giving the bitch a challenge was not on my list of things to do.

  Up ahead, a massive animal darted across the road and was out of sight before I could tell what the thing was. A wolf, maybe? It wasn‘t uncommon to see one up north, on the outskirts of the mountains, but in the city? I had never even heard of a sighting. Maybe it was only a large dog, I thought.

  I eased off the accelerator just in case it had friends about to follow. Hitting an animal of that size could do some serious damage to a car, and I didn‘t need to be stranded in the bad part of the city in a storm with a wrecked vehicle and an injured, pissed off wolf just waiting for me to open the driver‘s door of my Audi.

  I laughed a little at the image my imagination had dreamed up, and then screamed as I slammed on my brakes and cut the wheel, desperately trying to keep my car on the slick pavement and avoid hitting anything in the process.

  The Audi finally came to a stop and was pointed in the direction I had come from. I hadn‘t hit anything. There wasn‘t much to hit; there wasn‘t a lot of traffic through this area, especially at one-thirty in the morning.