Night Thief (8 page)

Chapter Nine

Kane frowned when he lifted the stone and entered the master bedroom suite. Gerard’s scent lingered in his room, and someone paced outside his door. He pulled on a pair of pants and yanked the door open to find Gerard wringing his hands.

“Forgive me, Master. I went to wake you, but you were gone from your bedchamber. I would have alerted you sooner, but I could not locate you.” He made eye contact. “They took her.”

“Took who?” Kane frowned. “What are you talking about, Gerard?”

His manservant lowered his gaze to his hands. “Marguerite. The Commissionnaire de Policia came with a warrant for her arrest. I tried to stop them. I told them she was your wife, not
Mademoiselle
Rousseau, but they took her anyway.”

Kane clenched his fists and went back into his room for a shirt. Rushing to the jail looking like a half-dressed madman would not free Rita. He needed his wits.

And his money.

Since the fall of Napoleon and the destruction of the Bastille, a healthy purse influenced justice faster than being truly innocent. And if money didn’t solve the problem, he wouldn’t hesitate to use force.

A few minutes later, fully dressed with his money purse tied to his belt, Kane rode off on Kukulkan toward the jail in Paris.

…

The door splintered, opened without unlocking or turning the knob. Candlelight flickered behind him, leaving Antoine’s face drenched in shadows.

Only his sharp teeth gleamed white.

“You have broken my heart, Marguerite.” He grabbed her upper arm in a bruising grip and spun her around, snapping the rope that bound her wrists.

“You have no heart, Antoine. Not anymore.” His cool fingers circled her wrist, turning her back toward him. Marguerite tugged her arm, trying to jerk free from his grasp.

“Not true.” He tsked and pulled her in close. His breath reeked of blood and death. “I love you enough to offer you one more chance. You wanted to marry me once, remember?”

Tears welled, but her voice remained strong. “The artist I once cared for died the night you sold your soul for immortality.”

He dragged her into his studio, and she gasped. “What have you done?”

Callia sat with her hands and feet bound to a chair, and a tear-stained gag tied around her mouth. Her dress was torn, exposing one breast covered in bite marks. Puncture wounds also marked her arms and legs, yet she remained conscious.

“You animal!” Marguerite slapped him with her free hand.

He mocked her with a feigned look of shock. “I thought you would be pleased with my self-control. Perhaps you would rather I drank my fill while you watch the life fade from her body?”

“Let her go, Antoine.” She met his gaze, forcing back her fear. “Please. There is no reason to hurt this poor girl.”

“Do you take me for a fool?” Pain shot up her arm when he tightened his hold on her wrist. “I
know
who she is. I
know
what you were planning. How do you think I had you arrested
ma petite
?”

He walked her to his easel beside Callia, and gripped a brush. “Every time I drink from you, your memories become mine,
mi amour
. I saw the men, the trinkets, the schemes.” Dipping the tip of his brush into one of Callia’s seeping wounds, he started stroking the canvas with her blood. “I know this girl is your cousin. I know you planned to leave me. She helped you.”

Callia’s muffled weeping caught his attention. “No need to cry, little one. This will be over soon, and you will live on in art. You should be grateful to me for giving your worthless life some value.”

“Antoine, please.” Marguerite buried her revulsion and attempted to settle back into her role as his servant, tucking a curl of his auburn hair behind his ear. “Callia is innocent. Let her go.”

He spun on her, releasing her wrist and grabbing a handful of her hair. “Why should I listen to you? You whored yourself all over Paris!” His features twisted with fury. “You told me you couldn’t love me because my immortality came at too high a price, but now you hide under another vampire’s roof?”

“He is a Night Walker. He offered me sanctuary instead of servitude.”

He threw his head back, his laughter bordered on madness. Releasing her hair, he ran his cool fingers down her cheek. “Why do you always force me to hurt you? I can save you from death and love you for lifetimes.”

Marguerite lifted her chin and did her best to hide her fear. “I am not afraid to grow old.”

She never saw him move. Pain stabbed into her the moment he sank his fangs into the muscle at the base of her neck. Sucking at her skin, he bit again and again, until the fabric of her shift molded to her body, wet with her blood. Her vision wavered, heart racing, and he finally raised his head. Her blood stained his lips and chin, as if he were a wild animal feasting.

She was the prey.

Her legs wobbled, and he swept her up into his arms. Antoine shifted her until he held her in one arm. Marguerite tried to lift her head, but it felt heavy, too heavy, and lolled back. The tip of his paintbrush felt cool, stinging her as he dipped it into the gaping wound in her shoulder.

“I think I will call this one Family in Blood.”

Callia struggled in her chair. Marguerite wanted to tell her to be silent and not draw his attention, but exhaustion and blood loss stole her voice.

Antoine peered at Callia, licking some of the blood from the corner of his mouth. Pulling another chair over, he placed Marguerite in it, facing her cousin. Deep inside, her instincts screamed to run. Get up and run.

Even if she had the strength to flee, she wouldn’t leave Callia.

The monster approached her cousin. Callia shrieked behind her gag.

“Do you have something to say?” He stepped behind her chair and loosened the gag, pulling it away from her mouth.

Callia coughed, her breath hitching. “Please. Let us go. We will leave Paris. No one will ever know about you.”

“Your life depends on your cousin over there.” He pointed to Marguerite. “How much does she love you?”

Marguerite managed a whisper. “Antoine. Punish me. She is innocent.”

He pushed Callia’s head to the side, brushing her hair back from her throat. His gaze remained fixed on Marguerite.

“How much is her life worth to you?”

…

Kane galloped through the streets of Paris toward the jail. His pulse thundered in his ears like a ticking clock. If the police hurt Rita, he would kill them. No one threatened mortals under his protection. Not since the Night Demon. And never again.

There would be ramifications if he slaughtered the corrupt officers, but he would deal with them once Rita was safe.

As long as she was in peril, rational thought resided far beyond his reach.

With the building in sight, he rocked back in the saddle, pulling the reins until Kukulkan slowed, prancing in place. Kane vaulted from the horse to the ground without a sound, his inner jaguar aching for freedom…for her. He didn’t bother to tie his horse. The stallion would wait for him to return.

Kane shoved the door open, knocking an officer inside to the ground. The uniformed man behind the desk pushed his chair back and stood when Kane approached.

“Halt, Monsieur!” He came around the desk, his hand on the hilt of his saber. “What is your business here?”

Kane stared at the man, allowing his eye contact to draw in the weak-minded guard. “I am here to retrieve Marguerite Rousseau.”

“She is not here.” The officer remained mesmerized by Kane’s gaze.

“My staff informed me she was arrested today.” He frowned. He heard the other man’s thoughts. He told the truth.

“The Commissionnaire took a few men to the
Bordeaux Maison
, but they did not find her there.”

Kane wanted to tear the office apart in frustration, but that would not help him locate Rita any sooner. “Where is he now?”

“He is on patrol, Monsieur.”

Kane broke the connection with the man and wiped his visit from the officer’s memory before turning to leave. Kukulkan bobbed his head up and down, eager to stretch his legs again. Raising his boot up into the stirrup, Kane climbed into the saddle and nudged the stallion’s sides.

Hoof beats echoed through the alleyways. Kane’s chest tightened. Had the Commissionnaire dealt with her himself? He’d been adamant about capturing Le Voleur D’or, angry that she’d evaded him. Could he have taken Rita and gotten even without bothering with a trial?

He ground his teeth together, pushing the thought from his mind. His rage wouldn’t be so simple to contain. Pulling Kukulkan to the right, he raced toward the busy square around the Arc de Triomphe, opening his mind to the mortal thoughts that filled the night around him.

Lowering his mental shields in such a public place assaulted him with a myriad of strange voices in his head. Some were in love, some grieving, and others were hoping for money for bread. So far, none had thought about a stunning blond woman who could smile while she pilfered your wallet.

He winced, slowing his horse to a trot. Being an ancient, his powers in this world had increased to the point he could hear the thoughts of people far from the square. Miles away.

Kane stopped Kukulkan. Turning the stallion around, his brow furrowed. Somewhere in the mass of sound, of mortal thoughts, he caught a weak whisper.

She wasn’t far.

Kukulkan launched into a gallop away from the Arc.

Rita. Where are you?

Almost instantly, the whisper slipped into his mind.
Antoine
.

The connection vanished. She might have lost consciousness, or…

He couldn’t even consider the other option.

And he had no idea where Antoine lived.

“
Merde!
” He pulled his horse around toward his home. Gerard had delivered his message to invite Rita to show him her master’s art. He would know where to find Antoine.

Kane hoped it wouldn’t be too late.

…

“What do you want from me, Antoine?”

Her question drew his attention away from Callia. She’d heard Kane’s voice in her mind again, like the night at the lake, but had he heard her answer? She couldn’t rely on him. Her future and the future of her younger cousin were on the line. If life had taught her nothing else, it taught her the only person she could count on was herself.

Antoine knelt at her chair and took her hands. She wouldn’t waste the remains of her strength pulling them away.

“I want the life we should have had together.” His gaze searched her face. “Promise me that, and I will let her go.”

“You threw away the life we could have had.” She glanced at her cousin, pleased to see her twisting her hands, trying to loosen the bindings.

His lip twitched. “You have no right to judge me. You never loved me. I painted for you, pined for you. I took you away from your miserable father and gave you a home, jewels, and dresses, and it was never enough.”

“I never wanted those things.” She pulled her hands away from his. “You made me into a prized possession, nothing more. You drank too much wine, lost your position at the university, and took me to your bed against my will. Becoming a vampire has not changed any of that.”

He snatched her wrist again, rage filling his voice. “Enough! I was weak, a man, nothing more. But now, I have true power. I can offer you forever.”

“You offer me a cursed existence without end.” Marguerite kept talking, keeping his attention, while Callia quietly slid one wrist free and started working at the bindings on her other hand. “Surely there are ladies in Paris who would give all the jewels they owned to stay young forever. I am not one of them.”

“But you are the one I want.” He spun around faster than her eye could see, stopping behind Callia’s chair. One hand fisted in the back of her hair, pulling her head back. “The choice is yours,
ma petite.
Stay here with me and share eternity, or your cousin will be my meal.”

…

Kane dismounted his horse in front of the artist’s
maison
, relieved when voices carried from inside. With the silence of a jungle cat, he made his way around the perimeter and entered through the open kitchen. He stalked through the interior of the house, finding empty rooms until he finally found Rita. Hot rage twisted in his gut at the sight of her ravaged, bloody throat. He ground his teeth together, forcing himself to think.

“Leave her alone.” Marguerite’s tone was weak, but her will seemed strong. “I will stay with you. Do not hurt her.”

Kane stepped into the room. “Would you really place immortality on an unwilling person? Can you imagine facing centuries with someone who loathes your existence?”

The leech released the bleeding girl and strutted toward Kane with a smug smile, brazenly showing his bloodstained fangs.