Disclaimer: Still not mine and since I hate putting these at the start of each chapter this will apply to all subsequent chapters.

AN: Thank you to my reviewers, sorry I didn't gat a chance to answer you but it's been a busy week for me. Mouf-Mouf, you will never find me commenting on your grammar since mine tends to be worse as I'm dyslexic. Sue, I double checked and Kyle later calls his sister Ally so the Thanksgiving invite can't have been from her but if you pick up any more continuity errors please let me know.

Dedication: For Anduria Trianys, who has beta-read this despite never actually having read the series and has fallen in love with Warren and Kyle.

Moon Called Part 2

My face was the blank mask that Warren liked to call my lawyer's face, not revealing anything I was thinking or feeling. I glanced at Mercy once as I started the car, wondering what was in Howard Amon Park that was so important to her that she wanted to go there now, at night in November.

She said nothing but my reading of her body language and posture was that she was nervous about something and I wondered angrily if she was involved in what ever Warren was caught up in.

We drove in silence through the light Wednesday evening traffic, both of us caught up in our own thoughts. My mind continued to revolve around Warren and his out right refusal to tell me anything, and as much as it hurt me to admit it I had had enough. If he didn't start explaining things to me soon then it was over between us, I simply was not prepared to endure the lies any more.

I pulled into the parking lot and parked in one of the many empty spaces in the near empty lot. I glanced over at Mercy and noticed for the first time that she was still dressed in only a tee shirt, not an ideal choice for going outside in the November night air. "It's cold, we could talk in the car." I offered

"No," She insisted and got I, I sighed and followed her. She was already shivering in the old night air and I felt the cold as well so I went to the trunk of the car and pulled out the light jacket for myself leaving the warmer trench coat that I also kept in there for her since her clothes were thinner than mine to begin with.

"Put this on before you turn blue," I told her as I handed it to her.

She gratefully pulled it on, since we were a similar size it fit her pretty well and she seemed to agree.

"I like it, I need to get one of these." I tried to smile but all I felt was tired, tired of lies and secrets, tired of everything that was wrong in my relationships. "Let's walk," She suggested.

I allowed her to tuck her arm through mine and let her lead me past the disserted play ground and onto the path that ran beside the river. I kept silent as we walked, she was the one that had come to me and then insisted that we drive to an almost disserted park, she could be the one to break the silence and explain what the hell we were doing out there.

"Do you love Warren?" Her question surprised me a little, it was not how I'd expected the conversation to start and it was certainly not a question I expected her to ever ask, I thought the answer was obvious. She clarified it a little. "Not the good sex and great company kind of love. I mean the I'll-follow-you-to-death-and-beyond kind."

I paused for a moment to think about it and then came up with the best example I could think of to explain how I felt about Warren. "My sister Ally is the only one of my family I still talk to. I told her about Warren a few months ago. I hadn't realized, until she mentioned it, that I'd never told her about any of my other lovers." I placed my other hand over hers where it rested on my arm. "My parents denied what I was for years." I explained to her, "When I finally confronted them about it after my mother set me up with yet another young woman with a good pedigree, my father disinherited me." I edited out all of the screaming and shouting that had also heavily featured in my last conversation with my parents. "My sister Ally called as soon as she heard." Been older than me Alison, better known as Ally, always felt that she had to take care of her little brother.

"But, after that first conversation, we avoid talking about my being gay. When I talk to her, I feel as if I have a scarlet letter sewn on my chest, and we are both trying to pretend it's not there." I laughed bitterly at the small amount of tension that existed when ever I talked to my big sister, it was certainly better than when I tried to talk to our parents. My laugh trailed off as I remembered what Ally had said the last time we'd spoken, "Ally told me to bring him to visit." I said in a subdued tone before looking at Mercy, hoping that she could se in my eyes just how much that invitation meant to me, that the only family I had left wanted to meet Warren meant more to me than words could describe.

We'd been walking fast along the path and soon the well manicured lawns that banked the river gave way to knee-high grass and wild bushes. There was a metal swing seat nearby, the type that you tend to get on porches, a short distance away and Mercy pulled me in that direction.

We sat there and watched the near black water of the river as it flowed past us, but I wasn't paying attention to the scenery, I was having a minor epiphany and it had brought tears to my eyes. I loved Warren, really and truly loved him. The I'll-follow-you-to-death-and-beyond type of love, as Mercy had put it.

"God," I said after I wiped away the tears that had formed as I had my revelation. I noticed Mercy flinch slightly and reminded myself not to say stuff like that around religious people. "I love him." It almost hurt admit it, knowing all the trouble that existed between us. "But he won't let me in." Now I'd started I couldn't stop, I had to say all of it aloud to someone and I had a feeling that Mercy might understand, at least she seemed to know what was going on with Warren, perhaps she could explain some of it. While I'd prefer the explanation came form Warren it had reached the point where I'd settle for anyone explaining. "People call in the middle of the night, and he leaves without telling me where he's going."

A lone bicyclist, dressed in the skin tight Superman blue lycra that marked him as a true die-hard enthusiast. "Nice legs," I commented, as much out of habit as to try and ease some of the tension that I followed my declaration.

Mercy leaned her head against my shoulder "Too small. I don't like it when I outweigh my men." It was an old game for us, Mercy and I would compare noted on men and Warren could pretend to be exasperated with us but I could always see the laughter in his eyes.

I leaned back against the swing and looked up at the sky, there was so much going on that I didn't understand. Sometimes it almost seemed as though Warren was two different people, most of the time he was confident and commanding, not taking shit from any one. But then around certain people he backed down and allowed them to treat him like dirt. It didn't make any sense.

"When we were in Seattle last month," I didn't know why I was telling Mercy this but I just wanted to tell somebody. "He drove away a group of drunken, redneck gay-bashers, just scared them off with a few words. But that Darryl treats him like" I struggled to find the right word. "Like dirt, and Warren just puts up with it. I don't

understand. And this stuff tonight" I paused and took a deep breath. "Is he involved with drug dealers?" Warren had said it wasn't anything illegal but I had to check. That was my greatest fear, that Warren was managed to get himself involved in something dangerous and he was going to end up in a morgue.

Mercy shook her head quickly. "No. Nothing illegal."

Well that was a relief, and she had answered so quickly that I sure it was the truth. Though that did still leave the question of what could be going on, excluding illegal stuff and assuming it wasn't an affair because no matter what I couldn't see Warren doing that. One thing came to mind, one that would explain the secrets easily. "Is he a fae, then?" I wouldn't bother me if he was, just so long as I knew.

"The fae all came out years ago." Mercy said.

I snorted. "You're not that dumb." And on top of that I knew that she knew at least one fae, her old boss Zee. "I know a few doctors and teachers who are still in the closet about being gay and all they have to worry about is losing their jobs, not having a group of idiots burn their houses down." I relaxed a little, Warren been a fae would explain a lot, "That would explain some things, like how strong he is and how he knows who's coming before he answers the door."

"He's not fae," She told me, it seemed like she wanted to say more but wasn't sure how to go about it, I sighed.

"Warren should be the one telling me this."

"Right," She agreed. "But he can't."

I scoffed at that, "You mean he won't."

"No. Can't." She was very firm about that point and it made me wonder again just what the hell was going on that Warren not only wouldn't tell me about it but couldn't. "I don't have many friends," She continued, it seemed off topic to me but if it helped her to get out what she wanted to tell me then I wasn't going to argue. "Not 'come over and eat popcorn and watch a stupid movie' friends. You and Warren are sort of it."

"Pretty sad," I commented and, "You and Warren are the only people I eat popcorn with, too." I admitted.

"Pathetic." She agreed and then dropped her bomb shell. "Warren's a werewolf."

"A what?" I said, my mind immediately filling with images from horror movies of hairy monsters howling at the moon and baying for blood. A part of me really hoped I'd misunderstood what she had said.

"A werewolf." Mercy repeated, "You know. The moon-called, run-on-four-feet-with-big-fangs kind of werewolf."

So much for misunderstanding. "You're serious." I'm good at reading and her face told me that she was deadly serious.

Though my comment had been a statement not a question she nodded any way. "And you're not going to breathe a word of it."

"Oh?" It was more my curiosity at why she was so certain than questioning whether I would or not, no matter how bad things got between Warren and myself I would never betray his trust like that and expose his secret. I may have been young when the fae first came out but I remember what it was like and I would never subject Warren to that.

"That's why Warren couldn't tell you. That and because Adam, the pack Alpha, forbade it." She was talking so quickly that I had to focus to understand her but since she was also giving me the answers I needed even if they weren't necessarily the ones I wanted I put all my effort into paying very close attention. "If you go out now and talk to the authorities or the papers, even if they don't believe you, the pack will kill you. Warren will fight them, but there are too many of them. He'll die, and you'll die with him."

I had to stop her there. "Hold on. It's a little soon for you to have Warren and me dead, don't you think?"

She took a deep breath to steady herself. "I hope so. You have to believe me on this, they take their secrecy very seriously. How do you think they've remained undetected for so long?"

This just seemed unreal. I may have wanted answers but these weren't the ones I expected or in truth even the ones I particularly want and that made me question if it was real. "Mercy. A werewolf?" In a world where the fae exist not believing in werewolves might seem strange but I've seen the fae, I know they are real. Accepting that a man can turn into a wolf was more difficult because I hadn't been given direct evidence that it was possible. And moreover believing Warren to be a werewolf was almost impossible, I just couldn't picture him as one of the blood thirsty killers that populated the film and TV screens.

"Twenty years ago no one believed in the fae, either." Mercy pointed out quite reasonably. "Look, I can prove it to you." She glanced over towards a thicket of leafless bushes, "Wait here." She pulled off my trench coat and handed it to me before disappearing into the bushes. My mind hardly had time to question what she was planning, if she was a werewolf too, when a four legged animal stepped out of the bushes Mercy had just disappeared into.

There was only one explanation that I could come up with. "Mercy?" I asked looking at the animal, a rather large part of me had refused to accept were wolves could be real but now I had proof that shape shifting was possible then surely werewolves must be too.

Mercy wagged her tail like a pet dog and made a soft crooning noise, it sounded as though she was inviting me closer. Slowly I got up, still suffering from mild shock, and made my way over to her. One thing I was certain of was that while werewolves might exist and Warren might be one of them, Mercy wasn't.

My sister Ally like animals when we were growing up and though I'd never had much interest I could still identify a wolf and the creature in front of me wasn't one though I could hazard a guess as to what she was. "A coyote?"

She nodded, a very strange thing to see a coyote do and then headed back into the bush where she had changed. I had to follow her, not from any desire to see her naked but because my curiosity demanded that I see her change forms. I was amazed a the speed with which she could do, it seemed as though she melted from one form into the other. I was a lot less surprised by the speed at which she put her clothes back on, it was getting very cold out.

"I'm not a werewolf," She told me as she ran her fingers through her hair trying to straighten it out after her change. "But I'm as close as you're going to get until you talk Warren into changing for you."

I pulled her hands away and rearranged her hair myself, using the simple mundane take to try and give myself a chance to absorb everything she had told me tonight. She continued to speak though I wasn't able to take much of it in, my mind still coming to terms with the bigger issues.

"Werewolves are bigger," She said. "A lot bigger. They don't look like wolves. They look like really, really big wolves who might eat you."

"Okay," I said, not really having heard anything she had just said, I knew my lawyer's face was in place but that was more because I wasn't sure what I was feeling than because I wanted to hide it from Mercy. "Warren's a werewolf."

She sighed "He couldn't tell you." I almost interrupted to asked why exactly he couldn't tell me but she explained it before I could. "If I tell you, and you don't do anything stupid, you and he are both safe." Which was reassuring at least. "But if he told you, no matter how you reacted, he would have disobeyed a direct order. The penalty for that is brutal."

I kept my face blank but on the inside a small part of me was beginning to understand, Warren had kept this secret because he'd be punished if he didn't, I assumed that the penalty was a very painful beating if not worse. So he'd lied to save himself that pain and possibly save me from been killed. One thing bugged me about that though. "Won't his pack," I stumbled over that word a little it was so strange to apply a word I knew related to animals to people instead. "Won't they think he told me?"

"A lot of werewolves can smell a lie," She told me, which would explain why Warren always knew when I was trying to set up a surprise for him. "They'll know how you found out."

I noticed Mercy was shiver and realised that was because I left the trench coat on the swing. I went back for it and she followed me. I passed it to her and then sat down again, she pulled it back on before settling beside me.

I decided that I want to know more, I needed to know more. If I knew more then maybe I would be able to understand Warren better and maybe things between us could survive this. "Tell me about werewolves."

Mercy immediately launched into a description of werewolf life, starting with the difference between a lone wolf and pack wolf, explaining that Warren had been a lone wolf for a very long time until he had met her and she had then introduced him to Adam and his pack. Her description of how dangerous life could be for a lone wolf lead into a description of how dangerous werewolves in general could be, with a side trip into her own up bringing when I demanded to know how she knew so much about this secret werewolf world. She was just getting on to why it wasn't a good idea to annoy high ranking wolves, especially by flirting with them, when her phone rang.

From the tone of the conversation there was only one thing it could be. "Business?"

"Yes." She bit her lip and looked as though she was torn between needing to go and take care of this business and wanting to continue explaining things to me to be sure I understood.

While I appreciated the sentiment my poor brain had taken in just about all it could at the moment and needed time to process everything. "It's all right." I assured her with a smile. "I think I've heard enough secrets for one day. I take it you need to go back to Warren's?"

"Don't talk to him yet, wait for it to sink in." That was exactly what I had been planning on doing, besides it wasn't a conversation I wanted to have with several other werewolves there. "If you have other questions, you can call me."

"Thanks, Mercy." I said as I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and led the way back to the car, I appreciated the offer but it wasn't what I needed. "But I think I need to talk the rest out with Warren, after his business is finished."

That was what I needed, to talk it out with Warren, to have him be the one to explain it to me because when it came down to it this wasn't about werewolves, although that was a significant factor. What it was really about was me and him, how his been a werewolf affected everything and where we could go from here. Besides that I wanted to hear it from him, now that I knew surely there was law against him giving me further details. Details that I needed before I could decide if Warren and I had a future together, I'd like to think we did but I wasn't sure anymore.

One thing was sure though as I looked at the lights of Warren's house after I dropped Mercy off, a part of me wished it had been drug dealers.

Apologies for any errors and please leave me a review.