Dark Bites

by Sherrilyn Kenyon

Andrei took a deep breath before he answered. "Because of Stephen Corwin."

  She was baffled by the name. How in the world could he fit into this madness? "The investment broker?"

  "Among other things," Francesca said. "Remember when I told you I had a weird feeling about him?"

  "You have weird feelings all the time. Nine times out of ten, they're attributable to either pizza or spoiled beer."

  Francesca gave her an unamused stare. "Yeah, right. Remember when I told you that his scent bothered me? That I couldn't place it? Well, I did some checking and it turns out he's a member of the Order of the Dragon. Sound familiar?"

  Retta rolled her eyes. Both her father and grandfather had been members. Their epitaphs of Dracul and Dracula had stemmed from their membership. "That order ceased to exist not long after Velkan killed my father."

  Raluca shook her head. "No, Princess, it didn't. They merely went underground and wanted the rest of the world to think that. It was a cousin to Mathhias Corvinus who lost his wife to a Daimon. Horrified by the demon who claimed her life and soul, he reestablished the order to purge the world of the undead. They went on a killing spree of Daimons, and he called for his brethren to help him. But they didn't stop there. They killed our people and countless Dark-Hunters as well. They don't distinguish between us. To them, one preternatural being is the same as the other and all of us should be exterminated. Even now, centuries later, they hunt us without discrimination, brutally slaughtering all they find."

  Retta felt terrible about that, but it still didn't explain why they wanted her to stay here. "What has this to do with me?"

  Francesca took a deep breath before she answered. "I think Stephen was sent to kill you."

  Retta scowled at her friend. "Are you insane? There's no way."

  "Remember the tattoo on his arm you told me about? The one of a dragon coiled around the cross? It's their emblem. He's one of them, Ret, trust me."

  "Trust you? After all these centuries when you were lying to me? Think again. Stephen wouldn't hurt me. He's had ample time to try."

  Francesca gave her a deep, meaningful stare. "Are you sure?"

  Retta hesitated, then hated herself for it. Stephen had never once given her an indication that he was anything more than an acquaintance who wanted to be more significant in her life. But since she was still technically married and an immortal, she'd kept him at bay. "Of course I'm sure."

  "Then why has he been sniffing around you?" Francesca asked coldly.

  "Because maybe he likes me?"

  "Or he was trying to use you to get to Prince Velkan," Raluca said. "That has been my theory. It is why the prince made sure that all mentions of you and your mother were purged from historical records. He didn't want anyone to learn that Vlad Dracula had a daughter, and most especially he didn't want them to know that you had married him. He knew that The Order would pursue you to the ends of the earth if they ever learned of your existence."

  "It makes sense," Andrei added. "The Corvinuses and the Danestis have a long history of bad blood between them."

  Still Retta discounted their argument. "This is not the Middle Ages, people. In case you haven't noticed, the wars are over."

  "No," Andrei said, glancing past her, toward the door. "I think the war is only beginning."

  Frowning at his dire tone, she turned her head to see what had his attention.

  Her heart stopped beating as she saw the tall figure dressed in black armor, complete with helm and heraldry.

  It was Velkan's.

  And he was heading straight for her.

  3

  Retta couldn't so much as draw a breath as Raluca opened the door and Velkan swaggered in. At six foot four, he'd seemed like a giant to her when she'd been human. And again, she remembered the first time she'd seen him. Blood had coated that black armor. The blood of those out to rape and kill her. She could still recall the sound of steel scraping steel as he moved. The sight of his dexterity even though every inch of his body had been covered by armor.

  More than that, she remembered the beauty of his face... the tenderness of his callused hands as they caressed her bare skin. The way he'd held her as if she were unspeakably precious, as if he feared she would shatter in his arms and leave him alone again.

  Those memories surged and buried all the anger and hatred she'd nursed against him. There for a moment, she wanted to go back to the beginning of their marriage. Back to the days when she had lived and died for this man. When she had trusted him without question.

  He had been her entire world.

  She'd known this moment would come, and in her mind she'd practiced a thousand things to say to him.

  A thousand and then some.

  But every one of them fled her memory as he approached her and some foreign part wanted to embrace him after all these centuries. She wanted to rush into his arms and just feel him hold her again.

  She'd expected him to curse her or kiss her. To stare at her as if he couldn't believe she was here. To try to strangle her. Something. Anything. But in all her imagined scenarios nothing had come close to what he did next.

  He walked right past her as if he didn't know her and seized Francesca in a fierce hug before he danced around the room with her.

  Baffled, Retta put her hands on her hips as a wave of rage whipped through her body. How dare he grab another woman and not even acknowledge her! She opened her mouth to speak only to be hushed as the knight started laughing in a tone that was nothing like Velkan's. It was light and almost boyish.

  "Oh, my little sister! It's been far too long since I last saw you. How have you been?"

  "Viktor," Raluca said with a laugh. "Put Francesca down before you bruise her."

  Francesca pulled the bird-shaped helm from his head, exposing his laughing features, as opposed to Velkan's serious countenance. With brown hair and teasing blue eyes, Viktor quickly complied with his mother's orders and set Francesca back on her feet. Laughing, she hugged him close while Retta let out a long breath.

  That had been close. Too close in fact and it made her realize that she didn't want to meet Velkan on his terms. She needed to make sure that she had control of their first meeting. That her emotions and body didn't betray her again.

  "It's so good to see you," Francesca laughed at her brother. "I've missed you so much."

  And those words tugged at Retta's heart as she saw the affection her best friend shared with her family. Retta's own brothers had died hundreds of years ago, as had their entire lineage. There was no joyous homecoming for her. No parents.

  No husband.

  Nothing.

  That hurt most of all.

  Viktor paused as he realized that they weren't alone. "Princess Esperetta?"

  "Yes," Raluca answered for her.

  Panic flickered in his blue eyes. "We must get her out of here before the prince sees her."

  Finally someone who actually saw reason.

  Raluca waved his words away. "He won't come here this early."

  Viktor shook his head in denial. "She can stay the night, but come the morrow, she needs to leave before he learns that she is here."

  Francesca argued with him, "I brought her here for protection. She must stay."

  "No," Retta said, growing tired of the way they spoke about her like she was a lost puppy who was out in the garage. "I came here because Velkan is planning on putting my father's remains on display."

  They exchanged a puzzled frown as Francesca turned a bit sheepish.

  Absolute rage tore through Retta's entire being. "Don't tell me you lied."

  Francesca cringed. "Only a little. I knew if I told you that, that it was the one thing that would get you to leave Chicago."

  In all her life, Retta had never been more livid. "Unbelievable! Un-friggin'-believable. How could you do such a thing?"

  Francesca was completely unrepentant. "I did it to protect you."

  Retta held her hand up as pure disgust filled her. "Thanks, Frankie. It's not l

ike I have a life as well as clients who need me."

  "You can't have clients if you're dead. Besides, Trish is handling them. They won't even miss you."

  "Save me the bullshit." She looked at Viktor. "Get me a cab and I'm out of here. Right now."

  He started for the counter.

  "Viktor," Raluca said in a thick, drawn-out accent. "Touch that phone and you will regret it for the rest of your existence."

  He arched both brows as he froze in place. "But Mother... the prince will - "

  "I will deal with the prince. You need to prepare yourself for the tour. Now go."

  Retta could tell he wanted to argue but didn't dare. Instead, he cast a sullen look her way before he complied with his mother's orders.

  "Where is Velkan?" Retta asked Raluca.

  "Not to be flippant, Princess, but he is wherever it is he wishes to be."

  "You won't tell me?"

  Raluca hesitated before she answered. "I will not allow you to blindside him in his home after all he has suffered for you, Princess. I know of your feelings toward him from my daughter."

  "And still you side with him?"

  Raluca's gaze went toward the blunted spike tip on the wall. "I will protect His Highness with every breath I hold in my body. But for him, I would have been impaled, too." And with those words spoken, she turned around and left Retta alone with Francesca and Andrei.

  Retta gave Andrei an expectant look.

  "He will be in the Bloody Dungeon later."

  "The what?"

  "It's a club," Francesca explained. "One where Daimons tend to pick off tourists who want to meet real vampires."

  Well, didn't that make perfect sense? "What time does he go there?"

  Andrei shrugged. "Any time between now and dawn."

  "You are just so helpful, Andrei."

  "I try to be, Princess."

  "And you fail with such panache."

  He ignored her sarcasm.

  Sighing, Retta looked at Francesca. "I don't suppose I could talk you into just poofing me home again, could I?"

  "You don't like to teleport. It makes you queasy. Besides, I thought you didn't like me anymore."

  "I'm bordering on it. But you are the only family I have. Good or bad, and right now it's definitely bad. Let me go home and I will forgive you."

  "I can't do that, Retta. Sorry. But trust me, this is for your own good."

  Fine then. Come morning, she'd slip away from them one way or another. She looked back at Andrei. "We are one hundred percent sure Velkan won't come to this hotel, right?"

  "Oh, I can absolutely guarantee it. He wants nothing to do with your family. He only ventures here once in a blue moon."

  That just made her all warm and toasty inside. "Then why do you run this place?"

  He grinned at her. "The money. We make a killing on it."

  Great, just great. "Whatever. I'm going to bed now. Give me a key and let me put this whole nightmare behind me."

  Francesca frowned. "Aren't you hungry?"

  "No. I just need to sleep and forget this whole day has happened."

  Andrei went behind the counter to sign her in. "Would you like Dracula's Suite?"

  Retta narrowed her eyes at him. "Keep pushing, Andrei, and you and I are going to play a game."

  "And what game is that, Princess?"

  "Find the Ball in My Hand."

  He frowned. "I don't see a ball, Princess."

  "Oh, you will, just as soon as I snap it off your body."

  He flinched.

  Francesca laughed. "She's teasing, Andrei. Her bark is always worse than her bite."

  Wishing she'd left her friend at home, Retta took the key card from his hand. "Where's the room?"

  "Top floor."

  Without a word, Retta grabbed her suitcase and headed for the elevator. She got in and turned around to see Francesca and Andrei teasing each other as the doors closed. Pain sliced her heart. How she wished she could have her family back again. She'd adored her two little brothers. They had been one of the greatest joys of her human life. And a twinge of guilt went through her that she'd deprived Francesca of hers. She hated they'd been apart all these centuries.

  But that had been Francesca's decision, not hers.

  Sighing, she rode the elevator up to the room, and as soon as she pushed open the door she felt the need to go downstairs and hurt Andrei and Raluca. To say the place was tacky would be an insult to tackiness. The suite was large and airy, with blood-red walls that were decorated with every kind of woodcutting imaginable that depicted impalements.

  She rolled her eyes as she headed for the bedroom, then stopped dead in her tracks. Unlike the sitting room, this one was done in black, white, and gray and was identical to the bedroom from Bela Lugosi's Dracula, where he'd bitten his fair maiden.

  "You people are sick," Retta said, grateful that at least in here there were no reminders of her father.

  Setting her suitcase down, she peeled her coat away from her body as she toed off her shoes, then headed for the bed. She'd take a little nap to get the edge off her exhaustion and then she'd see about finding a rental car to get back to the airport. One way or another, she was going to get out of this place and go home.

  She pulled the covers back and tucked herself into the large bed that cushioned her like a cloud, and before she knew it, she was sound asleep.

  But her sleep was far from peaceful. In her dreams, she could hear her father's voice calling out to her. She could see Velkan delivering the death blow that had ended her father's life as his serpent emblem drifted through her mind, over all the images.

  You are the daughter of the dragon... Death to the Danestis.

  She came awake with a start. Retta lay silent as she listened to a fierce wind whipping against her windows. But that wasn't what had disturbed her.

  She sensed a foreign presence in the room. It was powerful and frightening.

  Reacting on pure instinct, she quickly rolled to her feet and struck out at where she sensed the presence. There was nothing there but air.

  Now the presence was behind her.

  She whirled about to confront the intruder only to find herself face-to-face with the last person she expected.

  Velkan.

  He stared at her with eyes so black she couldn't even tell where the iris stopped and the pupil began. Dressed in a pair of jeans and a tight black shirt, he wore his long, wavy black hair pulled back into a ponytail. He still had the same sharply chiseled features. The same feral look that announced to the world this was a man who not only could take your life but one who would relish the killing.

  God, he was unbelievably sexy. Tall and commanding, he made every part of her warm and breathless. And as she stood toe-to-toe with him, she was tormented by images of being held between those muscular arms while he made love to her. Of being kissed by that perfect mouth. Of fingering the long scar that ran from the outer corner of his left eye to his chin. A scar that in no way detracted from the beauty of that masculine face. If anything it added to it.

  She couldn't even think as a wave of pent-up emotions seared her to the spot.

  Velkan couldn't breathe as he stared into eyes so blue they reminded him of the summer sky he'd not seen in over five hundred years. The scent of her hung heavy in his nostrils, reminding him of a time when that scent had clung to his body. Her skin was still as pale as a snowy field. Her hair the deep auburn red of a fox.

  Not once in all these centuries had he forgotten her beauty. Her scent. The sound of her voice calling out to him.

  The sound of her voice cursing him to death.

  It was a mistake to be here. He knew it.

  Still he was here, staring at a woman he wanted desperately to kiss.

  A woman he wanted to kill. He'd given her everything he had and more, and in return she'd spat at him. He hated her for that even as a buried part of him loved her still. He'd lived and died for her. Had died a death no human being should ever have to suffer. And for what? So that she could run from him and deny they'd ever loved each other.

  His father had been right. Women were useless outside of the bedroom and only a fool would ever give his heart to one.

  "What are you doing in my room?" she breathed, finally breaking the taut silence that was rife with their bitter emotions.

  His gut tightened at the sound of her cadent voice that was so similar to what he remembered and at the same time alien. She no longer bore her native accent. Now she sounded like the women in the American TV shows that Viktor watched.

  Velkan ached to reach out and touch her, but honestly he didn't trust himself not to choke her if he tried. Anger, lust, and tenderness were at war inside him and he had no idea which of them would ultimately win. But none of it boded well for the woman in front of him.

  "I wanted to verify your presence with my own eyes."

  She held her arms up in a sarcastic gesture. "Obviously, I'm here."

  "Obviously."

  She stepped back, her eyes guarded. "Well then, you can leave." She gestured toward the door.

  It was hard to stand here when all he wanted to do was pull her into his arms and taste those mocking lips. The air between them was filled with their mutual hatred. Their mutual desire. He still didn't know how it had come to this. How a man could love a woman so desperately and still want to kill her.

  It didn't make sense.

  A million thoughts clashed inside his head. He wanted to tell her that he'd missed her. He wanted to tell her that he wished she were dead. That he'd never laid eyes on her.

  Most of all, he just wanted to stay here and soak in the beauty of her features until he was drunk on them. You are one sick bastard. This was a woman who'd abandoned him five hundred years ago.

  He might not have much in his life, but he did have his dignity. Be damned again if he'd allow her to take that from him. With a curt nod to her, he stepped back and turned toward the window to leave.

  "I want a divorce."

  Those words stopped him cold. "What?"

  "You heard me. I want a divorce."

  He laughed bitterly as he looked at her over his shoulder. "As you wish, Princess. But make certain that you take a camcorder to the courthouse, as I would like to see the look on their faces when you present them with our marriage scroll and they note the date of it."

  "That's not what I mean," she said coldly. "I want to be free of you. Forever."

  Those words tore through him like a hot lance and did twice the damage. Grinding his teeth, he looked out the window, into the black night that had been his only solace all these centuries past. "Then take your freedom and leave. I never want to see your face again."

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