Excerpt of Grace in Moonlight by Stephanie Julian

She needed to be sharp tomorrow, needed to prove herself
worthy of her son. To be useful when the lucani went to
rescue Alex.

But she couldn’t sleep because she’d worked herself into a
state of complete panic.

Until that damn wolf had walked through the doggie door.

Then she’d actually felt her muscles begin to relax. All
because she knew exactly who this wolf was.

Now with her hand stroking his pelt and his head on her
lap, she felt her nausea ease and the dizziness disappear.

Because of him.

He couldn’t take away the fear, though. That remained a
cold lump in her stomach, a raw ache in her chest.

But having Kaisie lying on the couch next to her made
everything else settle.

And that should’ve been a scary thought.

Too bad everything else in her life was even more
terrifying.

“We have to succeed tomorrow,” she said, knowing he
understood her. “And if we don’t, at least Alex has to know
we tried. I can’t let him believe I abandoned him to that
monster.”

Kaisie’s wolf whined and shook his head.

Amazingly, she knew exactly what he couldn’t say.

“Yes, he could think that. He’s only a boy. Whose mother
has done awful things. Horrible…”

She’d done them to save her son, yes, but the blood of two
young Etruscans was on her hands. The men she’d hired to
kidnap her test subjects had been less than honorable.

“I know I should’ve known when I hired them. But Alex was
dying. And I was naïve enough to think those men would
simply release those young people. I didn’t know they were
going to kill them. I should have. I know I should have.”

It was why she’d expected the lucani to simply kill her and
be done with it.

She’d begged the lucani king, Colerus Luporeale, to promise
her Alex would be well cared for, should anything happen to
her.

He’d agreed without hesitation.

Which was why she was fully prepared to die tomorrow to
ensure that Alex got out with the lucani. They wouldn’t
care if she didn’t— Well, that wasn’t completely true.

For some reason, the women here had rallied to her side.
Probably only because she was Alex’s mother. But they
wouldn’t miss her.

She’d also spoken to Tamra privately and coerced a promise
from her. Alex would have another woman in his life to
mother him if she didn’t come back. Yes, he would miss her
but eventually…

She sighed and Kaisie whined again, drawing her gaze back
down to him.

In the darkness broken only by the soft glow from the
television, she stared into the wolf’s completely human
eyes, so green they reminded her of spring grass.

Such beautiful eyes.

She’d harbored a hopefully well-guarded secret since she’d
met Kaisie, one she really hoped no one ever discovered.

She thought he was wonderful. Sure, his manners could use a
little polish and his hair needed a trim. And he definitely
needed to shave that scruff off his face.

But the man was strong, fiercely loyal, smart as all hell
and steady as a rock. Everything she’d always thought she
wanted in a man.

She waited anxiously for the minute he walked through her
door every day, longed to hear his deep voice, even though
all they did was argue.

Oh, she realized he felt a faint spark of attraction for
her. She wasn’t an ugly cow with warts who weighed three
hundred pounds.

She knew men usually were attracted by the red hair and the
haughty looks. But the only men she’d known growing up had
been introduced to her by her Mal grandmother or her Mal-
brainwashed parents. Men who cared only for wealth and
power and what she could mean to their careers.

They didn’t care that she was a damn good scientist, that
her dream date would be dinner and a show or that she loved
to read to her son.

But she and Kaisie would never get beyond attraction. At
least, he would never. She’d already lost half her heart.

And she wished he’d shift back into his skin so she could
tell him to take her to bed. To take her mind off what was
going to come tomorrow.

She’d never had sex just for pleasure. Sex had always been
a duty, a chore. Sometimes it hadn’t been consensual,
though she’d never said no. If she’d ever said no…

She’d be like her older cousin Marie, spending her days
staring out the window of her apartment in Manhattan, her
mind a vast field of nothing, wiped clean by a spell to
make her docile.

Marie was the perfect breeder. She’d already produced three
Mal for the man her parents had sold her to.

Grace did not want to become Marie.