The Vampire Narcise (Regency Draculia 3)

She turned, fighting to pull her fangs back into place. Perhaps she should leave. The sun had nearly set. She could do what she needed to do away from his judgmental, greedy eyes.

"Word is out that we've escaped from your brother," Chas said flatly. "Not only does he have his makes pouring through the streets and along the Palais searching for us, but because of Bonaparte, he's got the soldiers on the watch during the day."

A tremor of fear shivered in her belly. "Are we trapped? Will they find us?"

"Of course we aren't trapped," he replied, disdain replacing revulsion. She found she preferred that reaction to the disgust in his face. "I can get us out of Paris and across the Channel, but it will take more planning than I'd anticipated." His face turned expressionless and his eyes skirted away. "We'll have to stay here for a few days longer."

Narcise nodded. A bolt of relief that he didn't intend to leave her alone made her smile a bit and relax. She wasn't quite ready to be completely on her own yet, particularly in the same city where her brother lived.

There was still that blind fear of being found, and dragged back to his chilly, dark chambers. "Did you send word to Dimitri?" she asked, sitting on the edge of the bed. "How will you get a message through the blockade?"

"We have several methods of communication. In this case, I used a blood pigeon, which navigates across land and sea, and will find the particular person to whom it's trained to scent by following his or her blood."

"It smells Dimitri's blood from London all the way here?"

"No, no. We have many pigeons cloistered about the city, and they each have a location to which they fly, or return home. Once in the vicinity of its home area, the bird will scent the blood and go directly to its master, wherever he is." Chas had taken a seat in the chair. He rested his elbow on the table next to him and turned up the gas lamp for the darkening room.

"You're very concerned about your sisters," she said, wondering what it would be like to have a brother like Chas Woodmore instead of Cezar Moldavi.

"Our parents died more than ten years ago, and since then it's been just the four of us. We're very close, of course, but I travel a lot, and so they are often left to their own devices under the watchful eye of their chaperone. But I miss them always, for each of them is so different."

"Tell me about them. I've heard rumors...your family is quite special, isn't it? You have what is called the Sight?"

"Thanks in part to my great-great-grandmother, who fell in love with her late husband's groom. He was a Gypsy and since she'd already been married once according to her father's wishes, now that she was a widow she decided she'd wed whoever she wanted. And so she married her groom. Her great-granddaughter, my Granny Grapes, used to tell us stories about vampirs when we were younger."

"That's why you are so successful with hunting the Dracule. Who could be better than one whose family comes from Romania? How did you ever decide that it was important to seek us out and kill the vampirs?"

Chas rose abruptly and walked to the bellpull, ringing it sharply. "Forgive me, but it seems odd to be talking about such things with you."

"Because you're sworn to kill me? But you haven't. In fact, you helped me. Perhaps you aren't such a merciless hunter after all."

He looked at her suddenly over his shoulder. "Perhaps I am. Perhaps I am only now planning how to slam a stake into you, pinning you to the bed." His eyes were dark and glittering. And that was when she realized how very drunk he was. "Or perhaps there are other thoughts weighing on my mind."

Narcise's breath clogged and a sharp spear of desire shot through her belly. Her first reaction wasn't revulsion, however. And that frightened her nearly as much as the thought of being taken back to Cezar.

She was saved from replying by a knock at the door, and as Chas was speaking sharply to whoever had come, she went over and opened the shutters again. Drinking in the cooling air, scenting the chill breeze wafting from the Seine, mixing with smoke and trash and stewing meat, she looked out over the street below.

What if Cezar was out there, right now, looking for her? What if he looked up and saw her peeping down at him? Or across the way-there were windows across the narrow street so close she could jump to them.

Narcise ducked back inside the chamber and realized she and Chas were alone again. "Your sisters? It's said it is they who have the Sight," she said, hoping to keep the conversation light...at least until one of them decided to go to sleep.

"The two younger ones do," Chas replied. "After a fashion." He still stood at the door, now positioned there with his arms folded over his chest. "But Maia, the oldest, who is still younger than I am by nearly ten years, does not. However, she makes up for it by commanding every aspect of everyone's lives in the entire household."

His lips relaxed and nearly eased into a smile-the first one she'd seen on him, it seemed. The effect was very nearly devastating, giving him a soft, sensual look in a highly shadowed face. A dark angel, she thought again-and not in the same way of Lucifer.

"I can hardly imagine how she and Corvindale will get on," Chas continued, the smile going even wider. "For in my extended absence, I've arranged for the earl to attend to them."

"You speak of her with such affection," Narcise said. "My brother cared for me so much that he sent Lucifer to me." She made no effort to hide her hatred and bitterness.

"And so that is how it happened? You blame your brother?" Chas's voice was whip-sharp and filled with judgment.

But Narcise had come to terms with her fallibility long ago. "I blame my brother only for begging Lucifer to turn me Dracule, for sending him to me, but it was of my own will that I agreed to it."

"He came to you in a dream?"

"He came, as I believe he must always do, at a most crucial moment, and yes, in a dream. Where one is the weakest, the most vulnerable to his suggestion. I know of no one who was given the opportunity and who declined the Devil's bargain. If I ever met such a person, I would like to know how he did it."

She closed her eyes for a moment, curling her lips into themselves. "Someone once said to me that I was the strongest person he'd ever met. But by the time I became strong, it was much too late." Her insides heaved at the memory of Giordan-and she locked it back away. "I'd already given my soul."

Someone knocked at the door again, and Chas, who she realized had been waiting for the arrival, opened it. A servant brought in a large jug of ale and two cups, placed them on the table, and left without a word or glance at either of them.