Time Without End (The Black Rose Chronicles) (44 page)

We were transported, the two of us, in a way much like the means I had employed since my transformation in the fourteenth century, except that it was somehow swifter and more graceful.

We stood on a dark ledge, looking down upon a pit of fire that seemed to have no bottom and no borders, but to be infinite. I felt its heat and heard the screams and shrieks of its inhabitants, and I admit that my very heart quailed with fear. I recall a sense of mild hysteria, and a flurry of meaningless thoughts bursting from my head like a flock of crows. I know I told myself it was good that, as a vampire, I had no bladder.

Nemesis gestured toward the inferno. “Hell,” he said, raising his voice a little, to be heard over the hideous din, “is what each man or woman decides it should be. This, Valerian Lazarus, is your hell. It is an illusion, in truth, but it will be no less real for that.”

I thought of Daisy and took a faltering step toward the fires, ready to hurl myself in, but Nemesis caught my arm in one hand and stopped me. I felt his great strength and knew then that neither Challes nor I had ever deceived or eluded him; he had merely been biding his time until the appointed moment.

“You would truly suffer torment, throughout eternity, for the love of one mortal woman?”

I did not hesitate. “Yes,” I replied.

Nemesis did not release me but instead stared deep into my eyes. I felt him probing my very soul, exploring every comer and shadow, seeking I knew not what. The only thing that was really plain to me, besides the terrible fear gnawing at my gut, was the fact that I could hide nothing from him.

“You speak the truth,” he said, marveling. He raised his free arm, still gazing at me, and in one gesture caused my spectacular medieval hell to vanish in a twinkling. We were back in the vault, at Colefield Hall, before I could quite credit that I had been spared.

“Why?” I whispered, trembling, when I realized I was safe. The memory of that dreadful place we’d visited together would haunt me for all I knew of time. “Why did you bring me here instead of
—V

“There is truth in you,” Nemesis said. “For all your evil, there is an element of good, though I confess I like you no better than I ever did.”

I could not contain my joy, my relief. But my delight was quick to fade as I felt again the unceasing heat of hell, heard the shrieks of the damned, saw the hungry flames leaping against the darkness.

“That place—will I have to go back there someday?” Nemesis gave me another searching look. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. What really matters, vampire, is the moment at hand. Nothing else is real.”

Having made this pronouncement, the angel vanished, and I was alone once more.

I wanted to will myself to Daisy’s side, but I was far too shaken. After all, I’d just had a close call, one of truly cosmic proportions, and the next few minutes were given over to gratitude.

Valerian

Las Vegas, 1995

Jerry Grover, assistant manager of the Venetian Hotel and Casino, trembled in his expensive leather shoes as the magician loomed over him. “What the devil do you mean?” Valerian demanded in a lethal undertone, looking damned scary in those Count Dracula clothes of his. “How could she have left town without telling me?”

Grover swallowed. All around, slot machines whirred and clinked, swallowing tokens with melodic greed. Bells clamored and lights flashed, and Jerry wished he didn’t have to dance attendance like a flunky, but Valerian was a headliner, and the board of directors wanted to keep him happy. Nobody packed in the paying customers like this guy, and what the star wanted, the star got. Or somebody’s head, specifically Jerry’s, was going to roll.

“I checked on Miss Chandler, as you asked me to do, sir,” Grover said in a squeaky voice. God, he hated it when he sounded weak and effeminate like that. “My contact in the police department told me she’s resigned and moved to Seattle.”

The magician glowered down at him for a long moment, during which time Jerry honestly thought his best suit might spontaneously combust, then whirled and stormed off through the casino, his black cape trailing majestically behind him. As he passed, every slot machine in the place suddenly went berserk, clanking like old-fashioned fire bells and spewing coins into the trays and onto the floor. Happy gamblers shouted for joy, scooping up their winnings with both hands.

It was the damnedest thing Jerry Grover had ever seen, and he didn’t even want to think about trying to explain it to the corporation.

CHAPTER
21

Daisy

Seattle, 1995

The ancient elevator in Daisy’s office building clanked and jerked as it made its dogged climb to the twelfth floor. It was late, and there was probably nobody else on the premises except the janitor, but that didn’t matter. Since coming to Seattle two weeks before, it seemed to Daisy that she did her best work at night.

That, she thought, with a pang and a rueful smile, was what she got for hanging around with vampires.

The cage lurched ominously, and Daisy looked up at the numbers above the ornate iron bars, feeling the first flicker of fear. If the cables were to snap . . .

She gave herself a mental shake. Since encountering Valerian and some of his crowd, she’d become fanciful, even skittish. If she wanted to succeed as a private investigator, and she most assuredly did, then she would have to put all that behind her and get back her old pragmatic nature.

The lights blinked off, then came right back on again. The needle on the indicator above the door bounced between two brass digits—seven and eight.

Daisy bit her lip. After arranging the move from Las Vegas, she’d driven to Nadine and Freddy’s place in Telluride and spent a week there, fussing over the baby and playing Auntie Mame to the hilt. All the while, she admitted to herself in the privacy of that antique elevator, she’d been waiting to hear from Valerian, to see him again.

He was alive and well and back at the Venetian Hotel, drawing crowds like never before—the newspapers and magazines were full of him. Daisy could only conclude that, after dealing with Krispin he had decided a mortal lover was a troublesome lover. Perhaps he had taken up with one of his many old flames, some splendid monster like himself.

There was a grinding sound, and then the elevator stopped completely, and the lights went out.

“Shit,” Daisy muttered.

“Not very ladylike,” Valerian’s voice responded.

Daisy’s heart stopped, much as the elevator had, then started again.
Valerian.
Had she only imagined hearing him speak to her? The cubicle was dark, but she could see well enough to know that she was still alone.

She felt a sweet heat stir in the depths of her femininity. She’d been alone in that motel room, too, midway between Las Vegas and Telluride.

“Do you love me, Daisy?”

There was no mistaking it. Valerian was speaking to her, if only inside her head.

The stress of the past few weeks had finally caught up with her.

“Yes,” she murmured nonetheless. “Do you love me in return?”

“Let me show you,” he responded.

The files fluttered to the floor as Daisy felt his lips touch hers, lightly at first, and then with passion. His hands caressed her everywhere at once, stroking her back, cupping her buttocks, weighing her breasts, teasing the nubbin of flesh between her legs.

“Damn you,” she whispered when he’d freed her mouth to let her take a breath. “Why can’t you make love to me in person?”

“Do you want me to stop?”

Daisy’s pride battled needs too long unfulfilled, and suffered a resounding defeat. “No—please—don’t stop.”

She felt her clothes dissolve like smoke, felt the heat of her desire in every tissue and fiber and pore, and sobbed for joy when he entered her in a single powerful thrust. He was neither tentative nor gentle, seeming to sense that Daisy needed a primal mating.

Satisfaction came swiftly, tumultuous and fierce, and left Daisy clinging to the handrail in the elevator with all ten fingers, barely able to breathe. The lights came back on, and the lumbering box resumed its climb to the twelfth floor with a shuddering jerk.

Daisy was still alone and frankly surprised to find her jeans and T-shirt on her body instead of in a crumpled heap on the floor. She knelt, blushing, and hastily gathered up the files scattered at her feet. All the while, satisfaction thrummed within her, deep and abiding and utterly undeniable.

Reaching her office, she was forced to lie down on the couch where clients were meant to sit, for small, sweet explosions were still rocking her from within, and she could not trust her knees to support her.

She fell asleep, bathed in silver light and feeling the lack of her lover’s presence, and was awakened sometime later by a shadow crossing the moon.

Daisy sat bolt upright with a little cry, for seated on the edge of her desk, resplendent in his magician’s garb, was Valerian himself.

“You should have been here for the lovemaking,” she said. “It was pretty good.”

He smiled and raised one aristocratic eyebrow. “Only ‘pretty good’? Maybe I’d better try again.”

“No!” Daisy said quickly and with conviction. “Another session like that, and I’ll be stimulated to death.” Valerian laughed and opened his arms, and against her better judgment Daisy went to him.

“Where the hell have you been?” she whispered. It was safe to be angry within his embrace.

He laughed again. “Exactly,” he said.

Daisy reared back to look into his eyes. “What—?” He laid a finger to her Ups. “Shh,” he whispered. “It’s over now, and we can be together. If you still want me, that is.”

“I was thinking you didn’t want me,” Daisy said, stiffening a bit but making no move to withdraw from his arms. “What kept you so long, damn it?”

Valerian smiled and kissed her forehead lightly. “I had a few scars that I didn’t want you to see, and I thought we both needed a little time to regain our balance.”

Daisy nodded. “I’d gotten mine back, but you just threw me off again. Now what?”

“Now we go about making some sort of life together.” “I’m going to get old,” Daisy reminded him. “And when I’m ninety, you’ll still look just as you do tonight. People will think I’m your great-grandmother.”

“I have never cared, overmuch, what mortals think. Or immortals, either, come to that. Such things don’t matter,

Daisy, when two lovers have been tom apart as often as we have in the past several centuries.”

Daisy rested her forehead against his chin. “Okay. But how exactly are we going to work this? I like it here, and you like Las Vegas—”

“In case you haven’t noticed, I find it easy enough to commute.”

This time it was Daisy who laughed, but there were tears blurring her vision when she looked up at him again. “What about that guy the Las Vegas police department arrested for the murders Krispin committed? Isn’t he a scapegoat, of sorts?”

Valerian shrugged elegantly. “I guess that depends on your perspective. The fellow has killed eight people, three of them children, and he’s always prided himself on pulling off the perfect crimes. Some might say that justice was done here, however indirectly.”

Daisy accepted that reply, although she knew it could have been debated for a long time to come, and returned to the original subject “I don’t see how we’re going to manage a relationship,” she fretted. “Do vampires even marry?”

“They mate, though to a much more profound degree than you probably think. Ours would be an eternal pledge, understand. Yes, you will grow old and eventually die. Then you will be born again, and I will be nearby, waiting for you to grow up and rejoin me.”

The idea was bittersweet. “What about kids? What about a house and a dog and all that?”

Valerian feigned a sigh. “Any natural child of mine, Daisy love, would be a monster in both the subjective and literal senses of the word. Still, there are plenty of children alone in the world who would be happy enough to join our unconventional little family. As for a house, you have only to tell me what you want, and I will provide it.” He paused. “The pet can be managed, too. It just so happens that an old friend has recently given me a splendid animal as a gift. You’ll like him—his name is Barabbas.”

Daisy considered her beloved’s checkered past and the multitude of romantic involvements he readily admitted he’d enjoyed. “You won’t get—restless? I should think a mortal might be pretty dull, over the long haul, when a guy’s used to lady vampires.”

He brushed her lips with his own. “If you knew what I have been through, just to be with you, you would never doubt my fidelity,” he answered at his leisure. “One day—or one night, rather—I shall tell you all about it. Furthermore, while usually beautiful and always fascinating, ‘lady vampires,’ as you so generously describe them, can be the coldest and most heartless beings in all creation.”

Daisy didn’t reply, but simply slid her arms around his neck and raised her face in the shimmering moonlight to invite the vampire’s kiss.

“Remember this night,” she whispered.