Serafina and the Silent Vampire (10 page)

“No,” Blair said disparagingly, then, “Well, sometimes some do.”

Sera stood up. “More of an under-the-mattress type, are you?” she mocked.

He glanced over his shoulder, and the glow was back in his eyes. “Come and look,” he invited.

Blair’s mattress, Blair’s bed, and Sera falling onto it with him, naked, skin on skin, his hard body sliding against her as he pushed inside her.
Oh yes, oh God…
She held his gaze only from defiance.

They both heard it at the same time, the already familiar click of the front door as someone entered with a key.
Jason?
Silent and lithe as a cat, Blair sprang toward the door and switched off the light. Great. Now she couldn’t see either; but presumably, Blair felt the darkness gave him an advantage, which meant the newcomer at least wasn’t a vampire.

Didn’t it? Just to be on the safe side, Sera felt in her pocket for the sharp wooden stick and tried to focus.

Human breathing filled the silence—her own and someone else’s. Whoever this was must have seen the light on, must have guessed they were there. The living room door pushed open, widening the arc of dim light from the hall, and someone stepped inside. Blair grabbed him from behind and pushed his head on one side to reveal his throat.

“Blair, no!” Sera yelled through the man’s strangled gasp. “This is Mr. Bell.”

Blair glanced at her without noticeable interest. He was hungry, she saw with a shiver that wasn’t entirely unpleasant. The hunger in his eyes, when he had her pressed up against the wall, had been weirdly enthralling. The memory still was, even now when she recognized it as blood lust rather than sex lust. Bastard.

“Mr. Ferdinand Bell,” she added severely. “Jason’s father.”

Reluctantly, Blair released old Ferdy, and when Sera continued to glare at him, he brushed the old man down with only a hint of mockery.

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Bell,” Sera said. “We didn’t know it was you.”

Ferdy squared his shoulders and adjusted his tie. As nearly always, he wore a smart three-piece suit. “Miss MacBride? What are you doing here?” He sounded more bewildered than angry, although his eyes were wary as he glanced at Blair. “How did you get in? Is Jason here?”

“No. I found the door open,” Sera said with perfect literal truth. “What brings you here?”

“This,” said Ferdy, producing a bag from his pocket. He took out four bulbs of garlic and three roughly bound-together wooden crosses.

Sera looked at him carefully. “You’re protecting Jason?”

“I’m waiting for Jason,” Ferdy said grimly. From his other pocket, he took one of the wooden stakes Sera had made for him the day of the party,

Her throat closed up with shame. “Oh no,” she said, going to him in distress, “you can’t…”

He looked at her with genuine sadness but also with that trace of hamming it up that she’d sensed and misinterpreted so badly before. “You know what he is now. He isn’t my Jason.”

“Even if he isn’t, you shouldn’t be the one to do this.”

“Who better? I couldn’t let anyone else do it.”

“Fair enough,” Blair said cheerfully. “That solves one problem. Let’s go, Serafina.”

“No!” She glared at him while Ferdy’s eyes widened with startlement at her vehemence.

“I’m afraid this isn’t up to you, Miss MacBride.”

Sera dragged her fingers through her hair. “I didn’t mean that,” she said hastily. “But think about it, Mr. Bell. Our only hope of catching whoever did this to Jason is by Jason leading us to him.”

“No, it isn’t,” Blair said irritably. “You’re doing just fine.”

Sera ignored him. “To him or her,” she added. “Jason can’t lead us anywhere if he’s dust.”

Ferdy tapped the stick on his open palm, looking thoughtful. “That is a fair point,” he allowed at last.

Sera exhaled. “I think you should go home,” she advised. “And let us follow Jason.”

Ferdy lowered himself onto the dust-covered sofa. “There is one other point to consider,” he said with obvious pain. “I have to protect my wife.”

“You think Mrs. Bell’s in danger? From Jason?” In a surge of fresh pity, Sera crouched down opposite him, gazing into his face.

“Isn’t it true that vampires go after the people they’ve loved most in life?”

“I don’t know.” Helplessly, Sera looked up at Blair.

“No,” he said. “It’s not true.”

“It’s not true,” Sera repeated in relief.

Blair stirred. “At least, not generally. Depends whether the vampire in question has unresolved issues with his supposed loved ones. I knew a vampire once who did in his entire family because they laughed at his choice of trousers when he was fifteen.”

Sera cast him a glance of dislike. “Was your relationship with Jason good?” she asked Ferdy. “Was Mrs. Bell’s?”

“Oh yes.”

“He didn’t resent you for anything? Even when he was at school? Did you ever have to stop him from doing the sort of unsuitable stuff teenagers always want to do?”

“Not that I can recall.” Ferdy dropped his head into his hands. “To be honest, he wasn’t that sort of a teenager. He was always very—motivated. Brilliant and hard working.”

“Poor bastard,” said Blair.

Sera looked around for something to throw at him before she realized the futility as well as the stupidity. Rising to her feet, she said, “I’m sure you were always very supportive. And I’m
pretty
sure you and Mrs. Bell are safe from Jason. He deliberately moved out of your house, after all. And he had opportunity to attack you before then.”

Ferdy lifted his head with a sad smile. “You’re right, of course. I’ll take comfort in that.”

“Okay, I’ll be in touch soon. Maybe the best you can do right now is keep out of Jason’s way.”

“Good night,” Ferdy sighed, rising as if he too planned to leave.

There was nothing for Sera to do but take Blair and vacate the flat. At the living room door, she paused and glanced back at Ferdy, who had his back to her as he gazed out the window.

“I don’t suppose,” she said, “that you know a man called Nicholas Smith? Did Jason ever mention the name?”

Ferdy appeared to think about it. “Not that I can recall,” he said at last.

“Okay. Good night.”

“Do you know,” Blair said in the hall, “that’s another odd thing. A newly turned vampire is hungry. I mean
very
hungry. He’s unlikely to go after particular people; he’d just focus on the feeding. And yet Jason went to his parents’ house the same night and didn’t feed.”

Sera frowned, opening the door and stepping out into the night. “Unless he did feed from them but left them alive? Only they don’t remember. Like Tam didn’t remember what you did.”

“Possible.” Blair descended the front four steps in one stride. “But unlikely. It takes time to develop that kind of skill.”

“I peered at Ferdy’s neck for wounds the next day,” Sera confessed. “Just in case. He didn’t have any. But then again, neither did Tam.”

“They heal very fast if you do it properly. I would expect Jason to leave some kind of mark, at least at first.” He strode off along the street, and Sera scurried to catch up with him—which wasn’t really necessary in order to hear what he was saying in her head, but old habits died hard. “The point is,” Blair went on, “Jason seemed determined to get on with his life. Not his—er—unlife.”

Struck, Sera thought hard about that. “Maybe he didn’t know what else to do. Maybe he was so motivated to work in life that he carried it into death.”

“Maybe.” Blair didn’t sound convinced. “But then there’s the girl belonging to the black dress. From what you say, she’s also carried on working. No one’s supposed to know these guys are dead. How important is she in at C & H? Do you have a name for her?”

“Not yet. But I can probably get one from Ferdy tomorrow. And I’ll see what we can dig up about Nicholas Smith too. Just in case he’s involved.”

Blair glanced at her, not quite smiling. “This sounds like a parting conversation.”

“It is,” Sera said firmly.

“I can’t entice you to my lair after all?”

“Absolutely not. I don’t know what I was thinking of.”

“Sex,” Blair said helpfully. “Lots of it. With me.”

It seemed pointless to deny it after her behavior, so, although her body flushed hot with memory as well as at the current hot gleam in his eyes, she said, “I’ve thought better of it. Much better.”

“Why?”

“Loads of reasons!” she exclaimed. “I’ll stick with the three at the top: you drink blood and will probably kill me; I’m tired after walking around the city for hours and need to sleep; and I do not want the embarrassment of running into Tess again!”

“Who’s Tess?” He sounded genuinely curious.

She stared at him. “The girl at your flat last night. I took her away.”

“She was my dinner,” Blair chided. “I had to go and get more.”

“You can’t
talk
about—you can’t
treat
—human beings like that!”

“She was having a good time. Anyway, we weren’t talking about her. We were talking about you.”

“Yes, well, I’m not some floozy you can pick up in a bar for a cheap fuck and a bite and then erase my memory.”

“Lots of reasons there,” Blair commented after a moment. “But none of them say what you want.”

There was no mockery or humor of any kind in his dark eyes now or in the voice in her mind. There was only six foot plus of gorgeous male whose attention, however temporarily, was entirely focused on her. Her body began to heat all over again. Those butterflies in her stomach ran wild and dived. Again, she imagined falling together onto Blair’s mattress… To have his attention all night, to drown in his eyes while they fucked…

She drew in a sharp breath. Was he mesmerizing her?

“In this case,” she said, just a shade too harshly, “what counts is what I
don’t
want.”

He smiled. She could make out the texture of his pale, sensual lips. “Not even a good-night kiss?”

Although he’d made no move to get closer, she flung up both hands to ward him off. If he kissed her again, she’d be lost. “Absolutely not!” she exclaimed.

And that was when a figure fell suddenly from the sky and landed in front of them. He held a bottle in one hand, and his ferocious smile revealed sharp, pointed fangs.

Sera had just about had enough of vampires. Falling back a step, she snatched the sharpened stick from her pocket and stood poised to strike.

The newcomer’s smile broadened. “How very Buffy-esque,” he observed in apparent delight. Without so much as glancing at Blair, he held out the bottle to him. It looked like whisky. “Care to swap?”

Two things struck Sera at the same time. Firstly, Blair hadn’t moved except to stuff his hands in his pockets; and secondly, the newcomer, like Blair, spoke in her mind without moving his lips.

“Fabulous,” Sera said bitterly. “Another bloody ventriloquist. What the hell do you want?”

The newcomer’s eyes widened. “She can hear us, Blair!”

“Yes, she can,” Blair agreed. “And if you’ve had as much of that bottle as I think you have, you’d better back off, because she’s also quite fast for a human. Serafina—Phil. And no, I have no intention of swapping her for that gut rot.”

“Why not?” Phil asked, his gaze riveted to Sera’s neck. “It grows back. The gut, I mean.”

Blair stirred at last, removing one hand from his pocket to clap it to Phil’s shoulder and drag him back from Sera. Rather to her surprise, Phil didn’t put up a fight.

“No,” Blair said mildly, and yet when she glanced at him, his eyes were like flint under the streetlight.

Phil met his gaze and laughed. He lifted the bottle to his lips. “Oh, very well. Have it your way.”

Hearing his voice while he drank seemed weirder than anything else that night. Sera glanced at Blair for enlightenment.

“Phil won’t harm you. Now,” he added, obviously in the interests of strict truth.

“Not me she should be worrying about, though, is it?” Phil interjected and lowered the bottle again. In apparently friendly spirit, he offered it to Sera.

“No, thanks,” she said, baffled.

“You don’t drink?”

“It interferes with my powers of vampire detection. So you don’t talk either? With your vocal cords, I mean.”

“Of course, I don’t. I’m dead.”

Despite the bizarre, not to say chilling, nature of Phil’s words, there was a spark of laughter in his intense blue eyes that was curiously beguiling. Sera almost smiled back, then glanced rather wildly at Blair for guidance. Blair, however, appeared to be watching the other vampire very closely.

“So what’s happening in Edinburgh?” Phil inquired. “Any more vampires?”

“Lots,” Blair said bitterly.

“Really? How very peculiar! What in the world are they up to?”

“Talking, for one thing. With their vocal cords.”

“They don’t do that,” Phil said positively. “You must—”

“Yes, they do, and I can’t really see what the big deal is,” Sera interrupted. “You walk and drink and wave your arms around. I can’t really see why your vocal cords shouldn’t work either.”

“She has a point,” Phil allowed. “Perhaps it’s because we don’t need them? Whatever, it doesn’t happen. Even Ailis doesn’t talk.”

“Who’s Ailis?” She had a feeling she didn’t want to know, but the answer made her jaw drop.

“The oldest vampire we know. She was made by the Founder.” Phil jerked the end of the bottle toward Blair. “And she’s his mother.”

“His
mother
?” she blurted, staring at Blair. “Your mother is a vampire too?”

“Not his birth mother,” Phil chortled—and that was weird too, for he really did laugh while he was talking. The two sounds were quite separate and yet occurred simultaneously, almost in harmony. “His maker. The vampire who turned him.”

Phil’s attention wavered to a couple of young women who crossed the street to avoid passing them. “I’m torn,” he complained. “I’m hungry, and yet I want to hear more about those talking vampires.” His gaze fell back to Sera, and his eyes gleamed. “I know. Let’s go to Blair’s, and perhaps I could prevail upon—”

“No, you bloody couldn’t!” Sera interrupted, since his meaning was blatant. “I’m going home, and if either of you comes within a hundred yards of me—”

“Phil knows who Nicholas Smith is,” Blair said mildly, halting her mid-flow.

She closed her mouth and glanced from one to the other. It was Blair who held her gaze. “How do you know that?” she asked suspiciously.

“I asked him.”

“I didn’t hear you,” she challenged.

Blair smiled, and in spite of fear and loathing and everything else, her stomach did a not unpleasant summersault. “I can be silent,” he observed. “And I can be very silent.”

“Apparently, so can he,” she said dryly with a jerk of her head toward the other vampire currently swigging from his bottle. “So who
is
Nicholas Smith?”

“Sorcerer,” Phil said apologetically.

****

Sera was sure that when she thought about it later—if she ever had the chance to think about it later—she’d be appalled at her own stupidity. But at the time, it seemed less scary to go to Blair’s house with two vampires than with Blair alone. Besides, she’d worked out that Blair at least needed her tracking skills and seemed prepared to protect her from other vampires, whatever his own designs. His strength was such that if he’d really wished to, he could have drunk from her, or killed her outright, at any point in the evening. That he’d chosen not to must mean something.

And she wanted to hear about Nicholas Smith the sorcerer.

So she found herself reclining on a pile of cushions in the room of her vision of Blair—the elegantly proportioned room with the three Georgian windows and the same long, black velvet curtains she’d already seen in the downstairs room, now open to the night. As Blair had led them inside through the garden flat and up the dark staircase, Sera was sure she felt cobwebs.

But Blair’s sitting room was surprisingly civilized, with tall bookcases lining the walls, a chaise longue and a sofa, and an artful pile of silk-covered cushions, which Sera immediately took possession of to avoid sitting beside either of the vampires.

Now, somewhat relaxed by their unthreatening manners, Sera began to feel a little too comfortable. The tired ache in her feet was fading. In her hands, she nursed a glass of single malt whisky. The feel of the glass in her fingers gave her a pleasant little buzz of “oldness,” of continuity and things that never changed. But there was no revelation, no vision. When she wondered if he’d ever drunk blood from it, like in
Interview with the Vampire
, she was sure he hadn’t and was glad. Even relaxed as she was, she’d have thrown up if she’d imagined she was drinking from a glass that had once held a victim’s blood. Was that trusting of her? Or hypocritical? Right now, it didn’t seem important.

The vampires lounged close by, Phil on the chaise longue, Blair on the sofa, both with glasses, since Blair had made Phil pour from his bottle in a more civilized manner.

“Nicholas Smith,” Sera prompted, since they seemed inclined to forget why she was here. She’d almost forgotten herself.

“I haven’t met the man,” Phil admitted with something like apology. “But in my travels, I have heard rumors of him from other vampires.”

“What rumors?” Sera asked.

“That he’s a genuine psychic with genuine powers of sorcery.”

“But what does that
mean
?” Sera demanded.

Blair stirred and stretched out on the sofa. “That he can harness occult powers for his own ends.”

“Magic…” Witchcraft, like her friend Melanie? Sera wrinkled her nose and took a sip of the gorgeous whisky. It burned, smooth and smoky, as it slid down her throat. “What ends could he possibly have with a bunch of undead?” As the thought struck her, she leaned forward excitedly. “Wait, though! What if he’s serving
their
ends? What if he’s somehow cast some spell for them that lets them talk and mingle with human society?”

“Why would they want to do that?” Phil asked, raising both eyebrows in wonder. “Vampire don’t
mingle
. We move in silence and prey in secret.” He lifted his glass to her. “Present company excepted.”

“More to the point, why would
Smith
do that?” Blair said lazily, drinking his whisky as he watched her. She had a sudden vision of him sipping not from the glass but from her neck and looked immediately at Phil instead.

“Because they compelled him. He has something they need—magic. Blair won’t believe me, but I think he was trying to help me when he saw me in Blair’s company.”

“He was certainly trying to detach you from my company,” Blair allowed. “But there’s no evidence as to motive.”

“He was anxious,” Sera insisted.

“I have that effect on a lot of people.”

“At least admit you don’t know that he
isn’t
being compelled.”

“He didn’t look very compelled when he let the vampiress into his house the night before last. Besides, what’s so kind about inviting you into a house full of vampires?”

“You were the only vampire within spitting distance,” Sera retorted.

Phil stood up. “You two should be married or something,” he observed, weaving across the room to slosh some more whisky into his glass. “Seems to me the only thing we know is that there
is
a connection. Any more connections?”

“C & H. I’m going to look into that tomorrow,” Sera said reluctantly, leaning back against the cushions. Her wrist brushed against the silk, picking up an unexpected aura of peace. As if he never killed or was even angered in this room.
Am I being manipulated?
She took a last sip of whisky and set the glass down on the floor with determination. “Now I’m going home.”

She expected some opposition from Blair, at least, but, jumping to her feet, she was ridiculously piqued to discover that neither vampire was paying her the slightest attention. They were in fact, gazing at each other, as if in some tense yet silent communication. Without a word, Blair got up and left the room.

“Bye,” Sera said dryly to the closed door, torn between amusement and annoyance.

Phil rose to his feet with surprising elegance. For the first time since she’d met him, he held neither bottle nor glass. “Blair has unexpected company,” he said politely inside her mind. “He’s hoping you’ll wait until he returns before you leave.”

Sera scowled. “If he’s brought that girl back for his ‘supper’—”

Phil turned his head on one side to regard her. “What is it with you and Blair?”

She stared at him, suddenly overwhelmed by the memory of those few feverish moments in Blair’s arms. “Nothing! There is absolutely nothing between me and Blair. Two nights ago I didn’t know he or his kind existed.” She paused. “Now, it seems, we both have an interest in finding out what the hell is going on.”

Then, since Phil merely nodded sagely and she was insatiably curious, she asked, “You and Blair are old friends?”

Phil smiled amiably. “We’ve shared the odd meal over the centuries.”

Ignoring that, she asked, “How come you can ‘talk’ to each other without me hearing?”

“Practice. Like a different level, a different path.” His eyes, suddenly, were extremely focused and cold enough to remind her exactly what he was. “I’ve never encountered a human telepath as strong as you.”

“I’m not a telepath,” she argued. “Or at least, I don’t think I am. I can talk to the dead, that’s all.”

“Who were your parents?”

She blinked. “What?”

“Your parents. Gifts and disabilities are often passed through blood. I know ours are.”

“Mine aren’t. My parents were drug addicts who left me at the local clinic.” Although it was suddenly difficult, she managed to hold his gaze until a massive thud in the room below caused both their heads to snap downward as if they could see through the floor. “What the hell was that? Are his visitors—hostile?”

“Sounds like it,” Phil said without apparent interest as another bump and a swishing sound was heard beneath.

Instinct propelled Sera across the room to the door, but by the time she got there, Phil was before her. “Don’t worry,” he said, amused. “He doesn’t need us.”

Two odd thoughts crashed into her mind: that she shouldn’t be this worried about a vampire’s safety; and that she was, to all intents and purposes, a prisoner.

****

It was the discourtesy that irritated Blair. Fighting a vampire for territory was one thing; breaking into his home with a party of allies was just plain rude. As he made his silent way downstairs, he sensed four of them in close proximity, and more outside. It was hard for a vampire to surprise other vampires, so he knew he’d need to rely on speed.

His skin tingled; his fingers flexed and closed around the stake in his pocket. There were two lurking at the foot of the stairs, ready to jump him from either side. He could smell their aggression, their eagerness for blood, but no trace of fear. It was a pity they wouldn’t have time to learn about that one.

As soon as his foot touched the bottom step, they leapt on him from the shadows. The first impaled himself on Blair’s stake, an expression of ludicrous surprise on his face at encountering such a thing at such a moment. But Blair didn’t have time to laugh. Even as he seized the other vampire to break his neck, someone else dropped on him from above, another from straight ahead, and he could sense those outside coming closer.

As he fell to the floor under their combined weight, Blair’s teeth found flesh, buried themselves, and with two powerful sucks, the flesh’s owner disintegrated. Clutching one attacker’s neck, he heaved himself to his feet, shaking another loose like a dog dislodging rain water from its fur. A backward thrust of the stake and an upward twist, and a third vampire was dispatched.

The fourth, he grabbed and threw across the hallway just in time to strike the vampires pouring out of the room in which he’d first entertained Serafina. Several of them fell back in. Blair followed, bent over the thrashing pile, and stabbed the top vampire in the back. He was plunging with cool efficiency for the next in line when the light blazed on and a strange woman’s voice said in horror, “Stop, for God’s sake!”

It might have been curiosity that gave him pause, made him haul the vampire upright instead and hold him in front of his body like a shield. He wasn’t used to a vampire invoking the Almighty, audibly or otherwise. So he sidestepped the rising heap of vampires, stake at the ready, and faced the vampiress who’d spoken.