Fall (The Ragnarok Prophesies) by A.K. Morgen Read Free Book Online Page A

couldn’t help but wonder. Ronan was strange. I’d never seen him laugh or crack a joke. He rarely smiled unless he did it to intimidate someone. He’d been cocky the first time I met him, angry, but I wasn’t so sure that was the real Ronan. He wasn’t like that now. And I didn’t really think the change was because he lost Dani. I barely remembered him in past lives, but I think he’d always been somber and scary, and Dani’s murder was simply the icing on the cake for him.
    Dani, though… well, she was the exact opposite. She’d been happy-go-lucky, always smiling and laughing. She’d thrived on social interaction and people. Even in the brief time I’d known her, I could see how charismatic and well-liked she was. How had she and Ronan fallen in love when they had nothing in common?
    I didn’t get it.
    “She came to the club where I work,” he said.
    I waited for the rest of the story, but he didn’t finish. I briefly considered leaving the conversation alone, then decided I didn’t really want to. Dace was in the shower, and I didn’t want to read or sleep or worry about an increasingly grim Dace anymore. Talking to Ronan was my only other option. Besides which, I wanted to know. He’d been an almost permanent fixture since I awoke in the hospital. We had to talk at some point, and I found myself growing more curious about him by the day.
    “What happened?” I prompted.
    He closed his book deliberately before setting it aside and turning in my direction. “She tried to sneak in,” he said. “I went in after her, and she dragged me onto the dance floor.”
    I think I heard a smile in his voice, but his wooden expression didn’t change.
    “How long were you together?”
    He tensed. “A year.”
    I fought the urge to reach over and squeeze his arm in a show of support. I doubted he would appreciate the gesture. He wasn’t very touchy feely or emotional. In the two weeks since his confrontation with Beth, he hadn’t once mentioned it. I think he wanted to forget it happened. Hell, I think everyone wanted to forget the entire ugly scene.
    “Dani never knew what you were?” I asked him.
    “No.” Ronan moved his gaze back to the book on the desk. “She didn’t need to know.”
    “Did you―” I broke off, too uncomfortable to ask him that particular question.
    “Not right away,” he answered, seeming to know where my thoughts lay even without me finishing. “I found out who she was after we started dating.”
    “Oh.” I plucked at the blanket thrown over my legs. I thought, had he known who she was before, he would have avoided falling for her. I didn’t ask him that, though. It really wasn’t my business.
    “You never met her before that night?”
    Ronan shook his head. “We ran in different circles.”
    “Oh.” I frowned. “Where are your friends anyway?”
    He looked at me levelly.
    “When I met you, they were with you,” I said. “Where are they now?”
    “Elsewhere.”
    What did that mean?
    “Are they shifters?” I asked.
    “No.”
    “Oh.”
    I adjusted my position on the bed, the silence between us tense and uncomfortable.
    “They were werewolves.”
    “Were?” My frown deepened.
    “Were,” Ronan said, his voice cold. He cut his eyes in my direction. “They were supposed to watch her for me. She died. So did they.”
    I swallowed, my heart jumping. “You….”
    I couldn’t bring myself to ask outright if he killed them.
    The bleak look in his dark eyes was answer enough, anyway. Part of me was horrified he’d killed people he considered friends in cold blood. The other part though, well, that part understood his pain in some perverse way. If it was Dace, if he’d been killed on someone else’s watch…. could I let that go?
    I didn’t think so.
    The thought unnerved me, but I couldn’t deny it, and I couldn’t really judge Ronan when I knew there was even the slightest possibility I might be capable of doing the same thing. We were warriors, and this