A Mermaid's Ransom (Daughters of Arianne 3)

"He can," Alexis said firmly. "With the three of you, I couldn't be safer."

"We go to see the eldest of the vampire kind. Assume nothing." Mina began to etch a circle around them, presumably to transport them to the vampire in question.

As Alexis retrieved Dante's drawing, locked the car then returned to the circle, she sensed Dante's tension had moved to what lay ahead. She took his hand again, risking that he might pull away. While he didn't, his fingers were tense, unresponsive, his body prepared for the possibility of another threat. It made it all the more critical she go with him.

You're going to find out more about your kind, Dante. That's a good thing. And I will have faith in you. Try to have faith in yourself.

It will not be my kind. No species welcomes half-breeds.

MINA grouped them around her and ordered everyone to grip her arms, Dante and Alexis's hands on her right, David's on her left. Alexis noticed his thumb caressed his mate's elbow, then Mina uttered a short enchantment and the world spun.

She knew the witch was powerful, but her command of magic was always breathtaking in its effortlessness. While there was the brief sensation of traveling in a tunnel, it was barely a blink of time, before it was over. Alexis swayed, disoriented, as they materialized outside a wrought iron gate.

"We're at Lady Lyssa's Atlanta home," Mina explained. The gate buzzed, as if someone was watching for their arrival, and she pushed it open, guiding them in. Dusk was drawing in, but the drive was well lit, leading them up a paved, long driveway to a plantation house with graceful columns and stunning roses clustered along the borders and against the foundation of the estate. "She's of royal blood," Mina was continuing, "the last queen of the Far East clan of vampires, and over a thousand years old. I'd be careful of that attitude of yours." She shot Dante a warning glance. "Much as I'd enjoy seeing her knock it out of you, the point is to find out about your mother and background. Her willingness to help can vanish if she's provoked."

In response, Dante stopped and spun on his heel, bringing Alexis behind him in the same movement. He'd removed the sunglasses for the transport, and now his eyes glowed like embers in the shadows of twilight, light glistening off bared fangs.

When an ominous pair of growls answered out of the darkness, David put his hands to his daggers and stepped in front of Mina, presenting a solid male front.

A short command and the growling subsided. A man stepped out of the darkness with two Irish wolfhounds at his heels. Tall and handsome, with reddish-brown hair and blue eyes, his aura, similar to Dante's, told Alexis they were facing a vampire. While he wore jeans and a T-shirt, it was deceptively casual, like Mina's. It would be unwise to overlook the vibrant focus of his eyes, the otherworldly strength emanating from the lean body.

"You asked to meet with my lady as guests, but your behavior suggests something different," he said, a faint Irish lilt in his voice. Though there were a variety of powers before him, he accurately kept his gaze pinned on Dante as the most unpredictable threat. "I'd take the witch's advice and tone it down, if you have any desire to meet with her."

"He's new to your ways," Alexis spoke up. But when she moved to stand beside Dante, he blocked her.

Stay where you are, and do not speak, Alexis.

"Which is why I gave him the courtesy of the warning," the other vampire replied. He changed his attention to Mina, though he paused for an intrigued assessment of David, particularly the one black and one white wing the angel possessed. "I'm Jacob, Lady Lyssa's servant. We spoke before."

"I figured." Mina nodded. "She's correct. Dante isn't used to being around your kind . . . or anyone much other than Dark Ones. He's not housebroken."

"Which means, like the dogs, he won't be permitted into my house until he learns manners." The shadows moved, and materialized into a woman.

Lex, still getting her mind wrapped around the idea that Lady Lyssa had a vampire as her servant, rather than a human, tilted further on her axis. The woman in front of her had a vampire vibration, but it was like a memory. Something far different and more conspicuous ran through her veins.

Lex was used to being around powerful entities. Mina was probably the strongest, with her father a close second, close enough she'd always hoped they would never be on opposing battle lines. While the vampire queen was not on par with those two, there was a heady, exotic perfume to the forces that swirled around her that gave Alexis pause. Jacob's energy imprint meshed unexpectedly with them, as if they shared the same power source. Apart, she wouldn't want to anger either of them. Together, she suspected they could have an impact similar to a category five hurricane.

Aside from the powers of destruction she might harbor, Lyssa had another potent weapon. Long black hair and jade eyes with a hint of Asian ancestry complimented a petite, graceful frame that emitted an overwhelming wave of sensuality. While the two males remained in alert posture, a simmering violence from Dante and calm readiness from David, Alexis picked up an additional attentiveness toward the vampire queen that made her grimace.

Surprisingly, Lady Lyssa ignored Dante and Alexis, riveted on David instead. Lex remembered how Jacob had paused on his wings, and now her jade eyes focused there as well, only for a more lingering regard. "How amazing," the vampire queen noted at last. "A thousand years, and there is always more to see. I remember the Mountain Battle, of course, and saw your kind then, but there was little time to observe you before you were gone. Would you be offended if I touched one of your wings?"

Her tone remained as royal and remote as if she'd commanded it, but David shook his head and stepped forward several paces. He stretched out the white one, so it curved forward over his bare shoulder. Alexis noted that the position kept him facing both Jacob and Lyssa. His left hand remained on the hilt of one of his daggers. Jacob noted it as well, for he stepped forward, closer to his lady.

"I mean her no harm if she does none to me or mine," David said.

"I would say the same."

David nodded, the two males apparently in accord. Lex glanced at Dante. He was radiating the most tension of the group. It wasn't hard to understand why. They were surrounded by incredibly potent energies. Dante's might be at a lower decibel, but possessed a far more erratic tempo, which she suspected was why Jacob's regard remained on him, even with a watchful eye on David.

Lyssa laid her hand on the wing, stroking her finger through the feathers. A look of wonder appeared on her face as she glanced toward Jacob. "You can feel the heat coming from them, the light energy." Drifting down, she followed the feathers to the ends and grazed David's forearm, the silver arm brace he wore there, engraved with praises to the Goddess. The opposite one had a dragon engraving, which Alexis knew was his tribute to Mina. Lyssa cocked her head, as if someone had spoken to her, and her eyes glinted.

"My mate says I cannot resist touching," she said.

"Try."

Mina's voice was every bit as remote as the vampire queen's, but there was a power resonance to it that shuddered through the ground, sending a chill breeze rippling through the trees above them. It shifted Jacob's attention from Dante to Mina instantly. Alexis was so accustomed to Mina's general scariness, it was a surprise to see Jacob had assumed David and Dante were the ones to be reckoned with, overlooking who the strongest force for destruction was in this gathering. Lyssa's gaze had locked with the witch's. After a long, testing moment, she inclined her head with a feral smile and withdrew her hand. Alexis admired her unruffled demeanor.

"You are most fortunate. Things are not always as they seem." The vampire queen gave David a second, more assessing look. "But then, who holds the reins isn't always about who has the most power, is it?"

Mina blinked once. "No, it's not. But either one of us is more than capable of curing you of your need to touch."

The queen laughed then, a silvery sound that whispered along nerve endings and made Alexis think of secret desires, caresses in the dark. "Your power is great, witch, but you cannot have a jewel like

that and not expect him to be desired." She glanced then toward her mate, meeting Jacob's intent blue eyes, her gaze lingering on his serious mouth. "I have no designs on your mate, except for how the pleasure of his body makes me think of the pleasure of the one that belongs to me."

Now her gaze returned to Dante, and Alexis's stomach tightened with anxiety. "You are vampire, and yet other," she observed. She glanced at Alexis. "And you are his fully marked servant. The form of it is different, because of the Dark One blood. Or perhaps because of what you are."

Dante shifted, blocking her view, and Lyssa came back to him. "Your face is familiar," she said.

"We have a drawing of his mother." Alexis spoke up again, but when she tried to move out of Dante's shadow once more, he recaptured her arm, only this time his grip was less controlled, biting into the bone like a bear trap. She gasped, and if she'd held the paper in that hand she would have dropped it.