Flesh And Blood: House of Comarre: Book Two (House of Comarre 2) (16 page)

‘Was that supposed to mollify me?’

‘You refused to speak to me, so I did what any comarré would do in that situation – the best I could.’

‘What you did was keep me at arm’s length. You could have come yourself, but then you would have had to face the fact that you’d lied to me. Yet again.’ She’d lied to him so much when they’d first met that he’d thought her incapable of the truth. Maybe he’d been right.

‘I didn’t lie about helping you.’ She shook her head, her mouth opening and closing as if the right words wouldn’t come. ‘You don’t understand.’

He crossed his arms. ‘Then explain.’

Anger and tension spun off her in waves. She tilted her face away from him, and he thought if not for her wounded palm, she would be wringing her hands. Blonde strands swung down to brush her cheek. ‘Contacting the Aurelian means a return trip to Corvinestri. I wasn’t ready to do that then. I thought you’d understand, give me time to get over Maris’s death.’ She turned
her head just enough to make eye contact. ‘But you shut me out almost immediately.’

‘I didn’t shut you out.’ On the flight home, she’d sat alone, curled up and facing the wall. He’d let her be. He understood sorrow. ‘I gave you space to grieve. But you stayed silent.’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Yes, and you were the epitome of communication.’

He shook his head and angled himself toward the house. ‘This is pointless.’

‘Do you know where I went before I ended up at Seven that night?’ She moved forward a step. ‘I went to the freighter.’ Then another. ‘To see you.’ One more put her within a foot of him. ‘To tell you I was ready to help. But you weren’t there.’

She was too close. The needy ache throbbing in his belly again forced him back in her direction. ‘That’s convenient.’

‘It’s the truth.’ Her eyes dared him to call her a liar again.

‘So help.’ He spread his arms. ‘I’m right here.’

‘I will. Soon. I have to speak—’

‘Another delay.’ He threw his hands up and backed away. ‘How surprising.’

She grabbed his arm with her injured hand. Heat seared his skin. The voices whined at the blood contact, always hungry but always hating her.
Bite her, drink her, drain her.
‘Listen to me. I’ve found a way to get to the Aurelian without going back to Corvinestri, but it’s dangerous—’

‘To who?’

‘To me. Now shut up and let me finish.’

He cocked a brow. Someone was shedding their sweet comarré image. ‘Go on.’

‘I just need to speak to someone who’s been part of the process before. Maris left some details in her journal, but not enough to
make me comfortable.’ She scooped up a leather-bound volume from the table and began flipping through it. She stopped and tapped a finger on one of the pages. ‘This could be clearer.’

He glanced over her shoulder and snorted. ‘I don’t know what kind of trick you’re pulling, but that page is blank.’

Her face screwed into a questioning frown. ‘Are you blind?’ She lifted the journal. ‘This page isn’t blank. Granted, Maris’s handwriting is cramped, but it’s not impossible to read.’

‘The page is blank. You understand the meaning of that word, don’t you?’

A short, strangled sound emanated from her throat. She turned the page. ‘How about this one?’

‘Blank.’

She thumbed through a few more. ‘Anything?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Well, what do you know?’ A slow, impressed smile spread across Chrysabelle’s face. ‘Maris warded her journals against vampires.’

He tried to refocus her. ‘Who is this person you need to speak to?’

‘Just someone who knows how this works.’

‘Who?’

She stared at him, petulant sparks flying off her as if she were flint and he were steel, challenging him with her eyes to say something smart. ‘Dominic.’

‘No.’

‘No? Don’t even begin to try to tell me what to do. The way I see it’ – she poked him in the chest – ‘you need me. I don’t need you.’ She swept past him and walked toward the house, muttering as she went. ‘This is the most unbalanced relationship I’ve ever had the misfortune to be a part of.’

Unbalanced? Clarity smacked him in the face. She was mad because he’d drunk her blood, but she hadn’t gotten her half of the exchange. That was easy to fix.
No.
Unpleasant.
Yes.
But easy. Carefully avoiding her injury, he looped his fingers around her wrist – noting that her wrist blades weren’t strapped on – and brought her to a stop.

‘What on earth are you—’

His mouth ended her sentence and started the voices howling. He slipped his hands around her forearms and pulled her against him, savoring the velvet warmth that seeped into his skin from hers. He told himself he was kissing her because he owed it to her, but that became a lie the moment his lips touched her carmine mouth. He kissed her because he wanted to.

Because he could.

The voices ratcheted down to a tolerable hum.

He deepened the kiss, careful to keep his fangs from nicking her. She was sweeter and more pliant than he remembered, or maybe her scent intoxicated him, making recollection impossible. Her temperature rose in time with her heartbeat, and she went boneless in his grasp.

She was pleasure in the flesh, heat and softness and every womanly delight he’d done without these past centuries. All he could wonder was why he hadn’t done this sooner, why he’d thought this a task worth avoiding. Never again would he—

She stiffened and his bliss-addled brain refused to react in time to keep her from jerking out of his clutches. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Her left fist cocked back.

‘I’m making up for—’ He ducked as she swung. ‘Drinking your blood. Your half of the deal, right? Power for power. I thought that would make us even.’

‘Even?’ She growled the word, swiping the back of her
trembling bandaged hand over her mouth. Her chest rose and fell with each breath. She shook her head, clearly provoked, if the flush across her face and neck was any indication. ‘That only works right after you ingest the blood, when your heart is beating. That kiss was … pointless.’ She spun and stomped off toward the house.

Pointless? He thought not. If nothing else, it proved she was a woman who clearly did care if he continued to exist or not. With a smile that would probably earn him another left hook, he sauntered after his comarré. Maybe life wasn’t so bad after all.

Fool, fool, fool.

‘V
arcolai?’ Tatiana grimaced as she stepped over the creature’s hindquarters and circled around to see the face of the female Nasir had brought her. A shifter. Gah. They were such lowly beings, meant to be servants or watchdogs. Couldn’t he have found a fringe? At least they were still vampire. She sighed. The girl would have to do. Tatiana didn’t want to waste time sending Nasir back to the club Octavian had found. ‘How long before the silver wears off?’

Nasir had followed the girl from the club, then injected her with enough colloidal silver to shut her system down. The result was a return to her true animal state.

‘Another few minutes.’ Nasir crossed his arms and leaned against the room’s arched doorway. ‘She is a bartender in the club. That should give you fair access.’

Tatiana nudged the she-wolf with her boot. ‘I need her awake so she can shift. I can’t do this without seeing her human face.’

Through trial and error, she’d learned the limits of her powers of mimicry. She couldn’t create an original image, nor could she take on the likeness of anyone deceased. She’d found that out
one painful, lonely night after Mikkel’s death. All she’d wanted was to see him one last time. Instead of his beautiful face looking back at her in the mirror, she’d seen … something she never wanted to see again.

Death.

The wolf whimpered, stretching her legs against the plastic zip ties binding her. Those wouldn’t hold if the creature regained consciousness.

‘Octavian, get ready with the restraints,’ Tatiana called, then nodded to Nasir. ‘Get them on her before she wakes up completely.’

‘Of course, my love.’ Nasir grabbed the wolf’s bound legs and dragged her across the cement floor to where Octavian stood waiting.

The mansion her head of staff had obtained was more than Tatiana had expected. It was shockingly suited to her needs. The kine owners, delicious as they had been while alive, had enjoyed a wide variety of kinks, evidenced by the windowless dungeon in the center of their house. A room they’d obviously used based on the equipment’s wear marks and the lingering fragrances of blood and other less-appealing fluids. She’d known mortals engaged in such things but never realized some took it to such an extent. How lucky for her.

The click and scrape of metal against concrete filled the room as Nasir fixed the largest shackle around the wolf’s throat. He tugged on the chain, testing where it was set into the wall. Octavian attached two more sets to the wolf’s legs. The creature’s thin joints barely filled the heavy metal fetters, but the one around the neck would hopefully be enough until the shifter was in human form. After that, Nasir had a drug that would prevent her from shifting again and escaping.

The creature’s lids opened, her startlingly blue eyes instantly fixed on Nasir. Her lip curled back and with a snarl, she leaped, grazing his calf before the chain snapped her to a halt.

Nasir spun, his fist raised in anger. Through the tear in his trousers, red oozed from the already mending gash. The bitter spice of vampire blood mixed with the already present scents of leather, sweat, and sex.

‘No, Nasir.’ Tatiana couldn’t have the girl bruised yet. She needed to see her human face as unadulterated as possible.

He relaxed and dropped his hand. ‘Filthy creature.’

‘Yes, I agree.’ Tatiana shot him a look of displeasure. ‘And yet you chose her for me to mimic.’

Realization flared across his face. ‘I never meant any disrespect. I only thought no one would suspect that such a powerful noble would masquerade as one so lowly.’

Octavian snickered. Tatiana raised a finger in his direction. The small gesture silenced him. He turned away and busied himself as she moved toward Nasir. ‘Do I assume to know how your potions and brews should be mixed?’

‘No, of course not—’

‘Do I tell you what metals to transform?’

‘No, but—’

‘Then don’t do any thinking for me. Understood?’

He bristled at her words but said nothing. Time was running out to appease the ire of the ancient ones. Possessing the ring was paramount. Nothing else mattered.

A shiver of magic unsettled the air. Behind Nasir, the shifter had become human.

Tatiana walked around him to face the creature she was to become. ‘She’s a lot smaller in her human form. Interesting.’

‘You’re about the same size, I believe,’ Nasir said.

She glared at him.

The girl shook, her brown eyes large and liquid. ‘Where am I? What do you want with me?’

Tatiana leaned down, careful to stay beyond the girl’s reach. Instantly, the shifter lunged. Her eyes snapped wolfen blue, and her canines jutted longer and sharper. Tatiana didn’t flinch. Instead, she shed her human face and snarled back. To the girl’s credit, she didn’t retreat.

‘Shifter, know this. You do not frighten me any more than a bit of refuse blowing in the wind. You are beneath me.’ She pointed at Octavian while keeping eye contact with the girl. ‘Your life is worth less to me than that human’s. Do you understand?’

‘I understand.’ The girl nodded and trembled with what Tatiana suspected was rage, not fear. ‘I also understand you wish to die by varcolai hands, bloodsucker.’

She could break this one if need be. Or let Nasir do it. ‘The only one in this room who’s going to die by varcolai hands is you, should you choose to take your own life.’ She stood, straightening herself to her full height. ‘Your name?’

‘Go screw yourself.’

Tatiana cracked her palm across the girl’s face. ‘Your name. Now.’

‘Mia.’ The girl’s head was down, her face hidden in a sweep of brown hair. She lifted her chin. Blood welled from the corner of her mouth, the scent hot and earthy like an ancestral forest after a summer rain. ‘You won’t get away with this. My pack will come looking for me. My brother works at the club. He’ll notice I’m gone.’