Darkness In The Flames (37 page)

“Indeed.”

Isolde’s glance slid up to Nick’s face and she reached for her bodice, slowly lowering the lace past her breast. “You left a little mark, Nicky. But it was worth it.” Her tongue flicked moisture over her lips and the exposed nipple beaded at the tip of her breast.

“I apologize, Isolde. It was not my intent to mar your perfection.”

“I didn’t care. I
don’t
care. You made me
come
, Nicky. I came hard, the way I like it. Hard, hot and painful. It’s the way fucking should be and you know
exactly
how to make it happen.” She stood and covered her breast once more with a sigh. “Promise me one thing?”

Nick tilted his head. “Of course.”

“If you come back this way after your business is concluded…”

Nick managed a polite and noncommittal smile. “I’ll be delighted.”

“And I’ll be satisfied—again. ‘Twill be something to look forward to.” She smiled, a sly and heated grin that promised untold wickedness.

A servant entered the room and distracted her. “Pardon, Madam. Dinner is about to be served and Miss Chandler sends her regrets. A headache prevents her from joining you this evening.”

“Does the Countess know?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Very well. I shall be there in a moment.” Isolde turned to Nick. “So I must say goodbye and go to my meal while you head into the night. Be careful, Nicky. There are highwaymen in the area…”

Nick smiled as he led her to the door and retrieved his meager belongings. “They will not trouble me. I have nothing of value, Isolde.”

“
That
, dear Nicky, is where you are quite wrong.” She brushed his cheek with a featherlight kiss and turned away as the butler moved to see Nick out into the night.

“Good luck, sir.”

“Thanks.” Nick took his coat and his bag to the horse being held at the foot of the steps. So Verity had a headache, did she?

Did she even know he was leaving FitzAdams Towers? Perhaps she was trying to avoid him too.

Nick shrugged to himself as he climbed onto his mount and set off into the darkness. He could not answer any of those questions. He could not even allow himself the luxury of wondering about them.

A gust of wind blew a strand of his hair across his face and he reached up to brush it away.

It was an odd moment out of time, since there was a fragrance lingering on his fingers and his hands. Like a melody that entwines itself in the mind, Verity had crept into his skin. It would seem that thinking of her was not going to be a luxury at all.

It was going to be an unavoidable necessity.

Chapter Seven

Within a few hours, Nick started looking around his horse to see if there was a physical tether attached to the animal’s rear legs.

Neither of them seemed to be able to get more than two miles away from FitzAdams Towers.

Every time Nick headed south, a twist in the path or a fork requiring a choice led him back into the environment he was trying to leave. Some sort of invisible boundary existed that held him in this lonely spot, but whether it was geographical or psychological, he had no idea.

He just knew that for now he could
not
quit the neighborhood. Some sixth sense was operating way below his consciousness, preventing him from deserting Verity.

Completely certain of one thing, Nick envisioned Verity holding the far end of the leading rein that held him captive. She was the reason he lingered still when he should have been miles away. There could be no other solution.

It was all about Verity.

Sighing, Nick began to scout the area, to build a picture in his mind of the lay of the land. He’d need a place to sleep before day broke and it needed to be secure enough that his horse would go unnoticed.

Fortunately the terrain was hummocky, riddled with small rises and sharply sided valleys cut by tiny streams. There was even a barrow or two, long shapes rising from level spots, softly rounded mounds of earth that extended for yards—the graves of giants, so local legends whispered.

As a boy, Nick remembered one long summer spent excavating a tunnel into one such barrow. It had been hard but exciting work—the chance of stumbling across buried treasure always only a shovelful of dirt away.

He’d found no treasure of course. But the memory served him well. What
he
had done, surely others would have done in their turn. Finding one barrow almost unnoticeable within a dark patch of forest, Nick rode carefully around it, pushing aside low branches and carefully guiding his patient horse over fallen stumps.

His luck, for once, held. There was an opening, small yet clean. Nick dismounted and looped the reins around a low bush for a few moments while he explored. Glad of his visual acuity, he stood in the darkness probing the passage with eyes and nose. There was nothing—no animal had made its lair within, nor was there a weary traveler grabbing secure repose.

Just the scent of dust and time, a fragrance Nick had come to recognize as meaning sanctuary for his rest. A quick reconnoiter inside showed him several unfinished tunnels, one with a largish chamber that must have held the original digging crew. The floor had been firmed by many booted feet, small ones by the looks of the prints.

Nick grinned. Some things would always fascinate children and buried treasure would probably never lose its allure. These amateur archeologists had moved on some time before, leaving only the shell of their presence behind.

A layer of sand and dirt covered the floor—perhaps four or five years worth. Here and there were scufflings and leaves, evidence of some creature’s nest made in the spring most probably.

For now it was quiet and dark and off the beaten track. For now it would be a temporary lodging for Nick Blaine, vampire.

A vampire who was, quite ineffectually, attempting to leave the area completely but failing to do so, held in thrall by a woman’s whiskey-colored eyes and the fragrance of her sex.

He sighed and set about making his “home” more comfortable, dragging in some pine boughs for a makeshift bed. Brush was gathered and stacked near the door. Nick would conceal the opening before dawn.

He could hobble his horse’s hooves—there was sufficient grazing to keep the animal content and he would not stray far. The sound of his movements would lead Nick to him on the morrow. Having super sensitive hearing also provided moments of usefulness.

Done with his natural furnishings, Nick returned to his mount, untied his small bundle and tossed it into the barrow. It was time to water the horse and perhaps wash the dust from his own throat as well. The occasional draft of cool liquid was not unwelcome, even to one such as himself.

A nearby stream offered both horse and rider refreshment. Sadly, the night stretched ahead of Nick, offering
him
little in the way of rest or entertainment. His mind was too busy—too troubled—unlike his horse which seemed content to be unharnessed and loosely hobbled. It sauntered to a likely patch of grass and nibbled peacefully.

The crunching of equine teeth was the only accompaniment to Nick’s thoughts and not a very soothing one.

On a whim he climbed the barrow and found himself staring at the stars through a gap in the trees. There was no moon tonight and clouds starting to build to the northeast. A storm perhaps—they were common at this time of year.

Nick sighed and lay back, clasping his hands behind his head and lifting one leg to rest on the other.

A quick glance and he would have resembled any gentleman taking a relaxing rest and stargazing.

Only he knew the secrets buried within him. And so many were unfathomable, even to him.

As if Verity’s passion had unsealed a door, Nick found himself revisiting his past, taking a new look at his situation and his despair. He did not think of Thérèse, still unsure of whether she could be summoned by such thoughts. It was something he did not want to risk.

But the part of his mind that dealt with matters scientific once more sifted, sorted, categorized and analyzed his situation. He wondered briefly if there were others like himself. If the “incident” in Hampshire he’d read about on a stained scrap of London newspaper was the key to unlocking the reasons for his continued existence—or the unanswered questions about what he now was.

Vampire. Creature of darkness. Blood-drinker.

How he despised those terms, accurate though they were. He was indeed a creature of darkness. Exposure to sunlight was painful and caused burns, wounds as painful to the skin as caustic acid.

Why? The scientist in Nick pondered the question. What had changed in the structure of his skin to result in such a reaction? Curiously, he raised his hand and licked his own wrist. Was there a tang of something more salty than usual? A metallic undertaste? Or was he imagining it?

He sniffed at his arm. He could detect no immediate change, nothing that would signify a radical difference in the structure of the largest organ in his body. That which covered it and held it all together.

Nick
had
discovered that any injuries he received healed in far quicker time than before. Other than the agonizing period he’d spent adjusting to his new form, he felt little pain and wounds disappeared within minutes.

He was still scientist enough to realize that the structure of his body had been changed from that of
normal
humans. To understand that although blood still flowed through his veins and arteries, it was also different. His heart needed only the occasional beat to send it where it needed to be.

He was not, as others would believe,
dead
. He could only describe it as
undead
. He lived in a state befitting his new physiology, avoiding that which threatened his existence—sunlight—much as any other organism would shun a threat. He fed on that which sustained his life—blood—much as any other organism.

And he still felt the urge to reproduce—to fuck—as any other organism would do.

And in that moment she came back to him, whiskey-brown eyes on fire. He could see her, skin glowing with heat, searing him as he pressed his own against hers.

Verity
.

Nick stared at her, knowing she was in his mind not in front of him, but wanting to believe that she was really there.

She smiled softly and held out a hand. “
I shall need you, Nick. Stay
…”

Her breasts trembled with the breath she exhaled and in spite of himself, Nick reached out a hand to the vision. “I will.”

It was a promise to himself and a confession. He could not leave her—not at this time.
Something
held him here. He would just have to see it through before continuing on his own journey of discovery.

A stirring in the air, a swift and sudden breeze—and Nick knew the night was ending. It was time for him to seek his lair, to bed down and sleep away the dangerous sunlit hours. Although he noticed clouds building, so it was unlikely there would be much in the way of sunlight ahead.

He checked his horse, still happily grazing. There was a thick canopy of evergreens amongst other trees, so the beast could shelter from any rains that might fall. In spite of what many said, Nick believed that horses were fundamentally bright creatures. He entered the barrow confident that his four-footed friend would seek what amenities it required during the day to come.

For Nick it was the night to come.

He unrolled his cloak and spread it on the makeshift mattress, finding comfort in the tangy resinous scent of pine needles.

Within moments, darkness descended over his mind, his heart slowed to nothing and he lay as one dead. Such was the sleep of a vampire.

Yet strangely his sleep was troubled.

For on this particular night, Nick dreamed…of
Thérèse
.

*~*~*~*

A couple of miles away from Nick’s hiding place, Verity struggled to put him out of her mind for at least the twentieth time that day.

He’d gone. There was no point in believing anything else. She’d not see him again—
ever
. It was quite obvious that whatever life he was living now had no place in it for her.

She’d woken early with an empty belly, an empty heart, a genuine headache and a foreboding sense that decisions lay ahead. Nick’s intrusion into her bizarre existence had shifted things—enough so that she no longer felt resigned to her lot.

Verity was nearing the time when her small cache of wealth might support her for as long as a year or two if she was frugal. And God knew she could be frugal when the occasion demanded it. A couple more forays into the desperate criminal world of the highwaymen and she could turn her back on the FitzAdamses forever.

She planned on heading west, finding a small village, an even smaller room and then searching for employment. Perhaps as a teacher, since she’d benefited from excellent governesses as a child. Before her life had swerved off course.
Before
…

Shaking her head a little she cleared her thoughts as she carried the customary breakfast tray in to the Dowager’s room. The old woman had rung a short while before, signifying she was ready to face the day.

Verity braced herself as she tapped lightly on the door to the Dowager’s suite.

“In.”

Sharp and cold, it was the typical welcome Verity received from the cantankerous old bitch.

“On this table, gel. Pour tea and make it snappy.”

It was to be another in an endless stream of days that heaped verbal abuse on Verity’s head and annoyingly irritating chores on her shoulders. But it differed in that today Verity tolerated it a lot less than she’d done in the past.

Nick’s loving had planted a seed of rebellion deep in Verity’s soul. If she was worth Nick Blaine’s sexual attentions then—damn it—she was worth more than being a drudge at the beck and call of a bad-tempered old woman. This was
not
how she wanted to spend the rest of her life.