The Bleeding Dusk (24 page)

Perhaps it would be prudent to put him off guard. Prudent and enjoyable…and then she could change the subject back to a more pertinent one.

But apparently, for once Sebastian had other ideas, for he sobered. The flirtatiousness faded from his face, as if he'd just recalled something important. “Victoria, you must take care. He's made it clear he wants you for himself,” he said, maintaining the distance between them…yet looking at any moment like he might change his mind.

At first Victoria didn't know who he meant. She looked away from his lips and their eyes met.

“Beauregard,” Sebastian said, his voice tight and without its normal light edge. “I'm speaking of Beauregard. Although from what I understand, you've wasted no time in finding other, less dangerous men to amuse you, such as that redheaded Scot.”

Now she shoved hard at his solid chest, and he released her, stumbling back a step but easily remaining on his feet.

“You
are
playing the jealous lover. How can that be, Sebastian, when you've been no lover at all these past months? When, in fact, our attachment was of the briefest kind?”

His expression changed, his anger easing into a knowing smile. “So you
have
missed me.” Triumph colored his amber eyes, and he reached for her a third time.

This time she let him bring her so that their bodies were flush: breast to chest, thigh to thigh, feet mingling. Her skin warmed, the flush traveling from her face down to her neck and beyond. It was good to touch him again, to feel the warmth of a man's body and the strength of his arms about her.

“Hardly.” But they both knew she was lying.

She shouldn't have missed him—she couldn't trust him, for his loyalty was to Beauregard—but she
had
missed him, and she
did
trust him . . . after a fashion. It wasn't as if he could replace Phillip and the love and regard they'd had for so brief a time, but she was human.

And she was a woman. A woman who'd grown up cuddled and petted by Melly and her two friends, a woman who liked to be touched, who enjoyed being reminded that she was desirable, and who had made choices that kept her outside normal societal conventions so that she was a lonely outcast.

He made her
feel
…feel something other than darkness and determination.

He'd brought pleasure to a life that had once been so simple, so normal and easy and bland, and had become stark and dark and violent. With his irrepressible charm and unabashed flirtation, Sebastian had made her heart beat faster and her body reawaken from the grief-imposed stupor resulting from Phillip's death. Even now, as they faced each other, her belly flipped deep inside, knowing there was more to come. And she was ready for it. Her heart rammed in her chest as she remembered the way his hands would glide over her bare skin….

“Believe me, I didn't want to stay away, Victoria,” he said, his mouth hovering in front of hers, his lips twitching in a racy grin, and the clove scent on his breath a light brush over her skin. “I wished only to keep you safe.”

“Safe?” She reared her head away from him so she could look directly in his eyes, knowing that her own were narrowed. “What did you mean to keep me safe from? The vampires I hunt every night? That is a poor excuse and another false note. Can you not even once be truthful?”

“From Beauregard.” His voice had chilled, and eyes that had been soft and coaxing a moment earlier had flattened. “You have no idea—”

“I can protect myself.”

“I am fully aware of your Venatorial qualities, for you see fit to remind me of them—as well as my own shortcomings—at every opportunity.”

“I am who I am,” she told him. “I told you this last autumn—I made the choice, and if it's too much for you to bear, knowing I'm stronger and faster than you, that I have no need for you to protect me, that I'm
not like other women
who will sit at home waiting to be taken care of by the men in this world, then begone with you, Sebastian. I need you no more than you need me.”

She realized suddenly that she was crying.
My God, crying!
Victoria,
Summa
Gardella, who'd not even squeaked in shock when her beloved aunt was killed in front of her, had tears rolling down her cheeks.

Now she was angry—at herself, at Sebastian, at the choices she'd made and the losses she'd endured—and she tore herself from his hold, turning away to focus her attention on something else…anything else. Anything.

The sparkling water of the fountain caught and then mesmerized her, soothing in its rhythm, beautiful in its clarity, comforting in its holiness.

And then…the realization came…a suspicion that must have been buried deeply suddenly came billowing out. She whirled toward him just in time to see Sebastian reaching to gather her back into his arms.

She went willingly, meeting his mouth with all of the angst and anger that had built inside her since she'd had those five dreams that called her to her duty as a Venator.

Their mouths slipped and devoured as though released from a great restraint. His hands slid around to pull her hips sharply against his; then one moved up her spine, pushing her closer as he moved his lips from her mouth along the edge of her jaw, murmuring her name against her skin.

Victoria felt the dampness of his wet shirt seep into her hands, the warmth of the texture of fine linen molding to his chest under her palms, and then the direct heat of flesh beneath her fingertips as she slipped them under the hem of his shirt.

Sebastian caught his breath and tried to shift smoothly away, as he'd done every time in the past, but she was too fast for him. She'd found what she sought.

He froze and stepped back. Looking down at her, his face arrested and still, he said nothing.

Victoria's hands fell to her sides. “So, will you tell me why you wear a
vis bulla
in your navel? Or will it be more lies and prevarication?”

To his credit, he hesitated for only an instant. “I'm born to wear one just as you are, Victoria.”

Her throat crackled as she swallowed. “You think I'd believe that
you
—a man who refuses to kill vampires—are a Venator?”

“If you don't believe me, ask Pesaro. He is well aware of it, as is Wayren.”

It was true then. Max didn't lie, and Sebastian would know she'd ask him.

Victoria sank down into the chair on which his coat hung. She had so many questions, such a swarm of emotions, she didn't know where to begin.

He must have understood, for he stood over her, abashed and sober, so uncharacteristic of the brash Sebastian she knew that Victoria nearly softened. He was like a young boy who'd been discovered swiping biscuits from the kitchen, ashamed and hesitant.

She almost smiled, but her growing disappointment and anger held it back. There were so many thoughts barreling through her mind, so many things that suddenly made sense. But she seized on one. “That was why you never undressed when I…when we—”

“I didn't want you to know,” he said simply. The fingers of his left hand closed and opened, closed and opened as he looked down at her, still unsure, still caught.

Why? Why would he hide such a thing from her? Then she thought maybe she knew. “Beauregard. He doesn't know either.”

But Sebastian shook his head, still sober. “He does know, and, as you might imagine, he appreciates the irony of it—the grandson of one of the most powerful undead in Italy is a vampire hunter.”

“You don't hunt vampires because of him, even though you're a born Venator?”

“It's not that simple.” Then, as if shaking off the discomfort of the moment, he bent toward her, resting one hand on each of the chair arms to bring his face closer to hers, a provocative grin lifting his lips. The charmer had returned. “But you need not fear, Victoria, that we're too closely related by blood to carry on with our…previous activities. The Gardella name hasn't been part of my mother's family for centuries, if not longer.” He shifted to one hand, lifting the other to brush it over her cheek. “You and I are only distantly related. And for that I am immensely grateful.”

Victoria jerked her face away, anger spiking through her again. He acted as if that were the most important issue at hand. “If you find it necessary to hide your calling, why do you bother to wear a
vis bulla
at all?”
That was perhaps what incensed her the most—that he wore it, but didn't use it. It was blasphemy.

And it also explained, perhaps, the contempt with which Max seemed to hold Sebastian.

Max had handed his
vis
to her when he walked away from the Venators, and Victoria herself had removed hers when she took a year to grieve for Phillip, unable to trust herself to wear it. She'd almost killed a man—a mortal—because she'd been overcome with grief and anger about Phillip, and the
vis
was a convenient weapon. It had been much too easy to let her fury get away from her and take over her actions. But once she regained control of herself, she'd worn it again, just as Max had done.

“I move among vampires, and among them it's known that I'm of Gardella blood, and also that I've been Chosen. Beauregard, as I said, appreciates the irony, and the others respect me. I've taken great pains to keep it a secret from everyone else.”

“That was why you were so comfortable being around the undead when you owned the Silver Chalice. It was a way for you to protect your grandfather's friends.”

He must have read the abhorrence in her face, the confusion in her eyes, for he took her reluctant hands and tugged her out of the chair with ease.

And this was why, she realized now, he'd always seemed unusually strong. Even from the beginning.

Anger shot through her, sparking emotions so her cheeks burned hot. He'd taken care not to appear too strong or too capable as they'd faced vampires last year when Dr. Polidori was killed by the undead after writing a novel that told too many of the vampires' secrets. He'd done just enough to let her think she'd saved them both, that she'd been the one to protect them all. She'd almost died, and so had he. And he'd never told her.

And last autumn, at the theater where Akvan's Obelisk was being kept and when Aunt Eustacia was killed, he didn't tell her then.

He'd even made self-deprecating remarks about himself in comparison to her, the Venator, the warrior. Now that she thought about it, she remembered bitterness in his voice when he spoke of her skill, and her assumption that he had none.

Anyone can stake a vampire,
he'd told her once.

If they can get close enough,
she'd replied flippantly, clearly implying he hadn't a prayer of doing so.

“You stood by and watched my aunt die last fall,” she said, anger bursting forth. “You watched it all happen, and you did nothing!”

His hands were tight on her upper arms, and this time he didn't bother to hide his strength. “What could I have done? What could you have done? It was two of us—three, with Pesaro—there was nothing that could have stopped those events. You know it.”

She knew he was right, but the anger didn't slide away. “That night—when Polidori died…Sebastian, if I'd known you were a Venator—”

His sharp bark of a laugh cut her off. “You wouldn't have disparaged my skill with a sword? You would have expected more from me? Victoria, it was I who held back the Imperial while you were nearly mauled by that Guardian vampire. If you'd been less self-absorbed you would have realized you could never have matched against a Guardian and two Imperial vampires on your own, and wondered how a fop such as I could have matched swords with an Imperial.”

While the pink-eyed Guardians were powerful in their own right, Imperials were even more fearsome. With blazing purple-red irises, Imperials were the strongest, fastest, and most powerful beings in the vampire race. They were often centuries, even millennia old, and not only glided through the air, but also wielded deadly swords as their weapons.

“I was the one who'd been charged with protecting Polidori, until you waltzed into the picture and insisted on taking charge,” Sebastian continued.

“And you were only too eager to let me! If there was someone else to do the dirty work, you'd step back and let them. If you hadn't disappeared—run away—from The Silver Chalice when Lilith sent the Guardians after you, Phillip might still be alive! You might have been able to help him!”

“Perhaps. But likely not. There were eight Imperials, along with a myriad of other vampire patrons who would have leaped to their defense, and only Pesaro and myself. I am sorry, Victoria. I've told you before that I wholly regret what happened to your husband. I would not have wished that on anyone. Believe me.”

Her face was wet with tears, and she'd stopped trying to pull free from his arms. But though her muscles eased, her fury and disappointment did not. “And that night in the carriage in London…you tried to seduce me and then delivered me to those vampires. You let them take me away!”

Sebastian was shaking his head. “As lovely as that distraction was, do you truly think I'd allow my attempt to seduce you to be interrupted by something as unpleasant as the undead? I realized they were present just when you did. I tried to keep them from taking you, but I wasn't able to. It was I who found your driver and told him where you were so Pesaro could extricate you from Lilith's minions. She was too angry at me for helping you, and was watching me too closely to allow me to do any such thing myself.”

“You mean you wished not to tip your hand to her that you were playing both sides of the game. What is it, Sebastian? Whoever is winning is the side you choose?”

He looked as though she'd slammed him in the stomach with all of the force of her two
vis bullae.
“Victoria, you cannot—”

“I certainly—”