Crouching Vampire, Hidden Fang do-7

by Кейти Макалистер

  “Agreed. Where did you learn to do that?”

  “Do what?” I asked, wondering if he thought Americans went to school to learn lovemaking techniques.

  “When you gripped me like a vise.”

  I took one step, stumbled, and glared when he snickered. The only thing that saved him from another faceful of mud was the fact that he scooped me up and carried me to the lounge.

  “That, Boo, is the result of years of Kegeling. My mother told me to start young so that when I was an old lady I wouldn’t have to wear bladder pants like my granny.”

  “That may be the result of years of intimate exercise, but you haven’t been quite so vigorous in the past.”

  I grinned over the towel I was using to dry myself off. “Just so I know-are we thumbs-up or thumbs-down on the Kegel vigor?”

  “Thumbs-up. Definitely thumbs-up,” he said, looking down at himself ruefully. Even quiescent, he was still impressive. “Although if you keep it up, you won’t be the only one walking funny.”

  An unexpected sense of peace and happiness filled our remaining hours at the spa.

  “How did your parents meet?” I asked after I had recovered enough wits to kick-start my brain into functioning again. I lay draped across Kristoff as he lounged on a plush red curved sofa, clad in one of the spa’s thick bathrobes. Kristoff was clad only in me, a fact I much appreciated as I traced the lines of muscles in his chest and upper arm. He was still too skinny for my taste, but I was happy to notice he was filling out nicely with regular meals.

  He opened one eye. His hands were lazily tracing shapes on the outside of one of my thighs, the touch casual, but so sweetly intimate it made my eyes burn for a moment. “My parents?”

  “Yes. You know, the people who gave birth to you and raised you?”

  An odd sense of withdrawal touched my mind. I stopped stroking the muscle of his biceps and looked up at him. Both his eyes were open now, looking at me with suspicion.

  “Why do you want to know about my parents?”

  “Why shouldn’t I want to know about them? We’re bound together for the rest of time, Kristoff. I’d like to know more about you, that’s all. Is there something about your parents you don’t want to talk about?”

  He sensed me sensing his emotional withdrawal, and stopped, but there was a wary edge to him, as if he were walking on the blade of a razor. “I’ve told you about my mother. My father was a tanner. He died when I was very young.”

  “I’m sorry. That must have been hard for your mom. Were there any kids other than you and Andreas?”

  He shook his head, and once again I felt a spike of awareness inside him. He was watching me closely as he spoke. “No. He was born later than me.”

  “I gathered you were older than him,” I said lightly, continuing to stroke his arm with long, soothing touches, but wondering all the while what it was about his parents that had him so keyed up. “How much older are you?”

  “Twenty-two years.”

  “Really? Wow. That’s quite a difference.” I was silent for a moment, very aware of his now still fingers on my leg. “You said you were born human. How did you come to be a vampire?”

  “I was cursed to it.”

  “Cursed? Someone can do that?”

  “It takes a demon lord, but yes, you can make a Dark One.” His voice was suddenly flinty hard. “Why are you questioning me about this?”

  “All right,” I said, pushing myself up. I swung my leg over until I was straddling his thighs. “What is it that bothers you so much about me asking about your past?”

  “Why do you care how I became a Dark One?” he countered, his eyes lightening a smidgen.

  I pointed a finger at him. “Don’t you dare lighten your eyes at me, Boo! I have no ulterior motive in asking you about your origins other than curiosity about you. It may have escaped your notice, but I just announced to you that I’m in love with you.”

  “It didn’t escape my notice,” he said quickly.

  Pain stung me. Of course he hadn’t missed what I said, but being an honest man, he hadn’t lied to me and told me the feeling was mutual. “I’m interested in people I love. I want to know things about them, what they like and what they don’t like, and how their childhood was, that sort of thing. And you’re just going to have to deal with a whole lot of curiosity about Dark Ones, because up until two months ago, I didn’t believe vampires really existed.”

  Mollified, he released the grip he had on my legs. “I am interested in you, too.”

  “Good. I’ll tell you all about my boring life and family another time. Right now I want to know what happened that had you ending up a vampire.”

  He was silent for a moment, reluctance thick inside him. “It was an act of revenge. Someone I knew injured another person.”

  “Someone you knew?” I asked, puzzled why he would be the victim of revenge.

  “My wife.”

  I sat up straighter at that, my mouth hanging open in astonishment for a moment. “Your wife? You were married before me? That is . . . we’re not really married, but you thought we were getting married, so it counts.”

  “We are really married, and yes, I was married before. In 1640, so you can stop pretending you’re jealous. My first wife is long dead.”

  There was no pretense about the quick spurt of jealousy that riddled me, but I ignored that comment just as I ignored the emotion, instead doing a quick calculation in my head. “You were married when you were seventeen?”

  “Yes. It was a reasonable age for marriage then. I was apprenticed to a cobbler, and wed his daughter.”

  A question rose up on my tongue. I tried to fight it, tried to keep my lips from forming the words, but my brain gave the go-ahead without my permission. “Did you love her?”

  He looked somewhat startled by the question. “I wanted to bed her.”

  “Lust and love aren’t the same thing,” I pointed out.

  “No, they aren’t.” He was silent for a moment. “I suppose I loved her. She was pretty and we enjoyed each other in bed.”

  “Oh, that really does my self-confidence a lot of good,” I said somewhat acidly.

  The corner of his lip twitched. “I enjoy you in bed, too.”

  “Not even remotely near as much reassurance as you’re going to have to provide in order to erase the memory of you hitting it off with another woman,” I told him. “But I am nothing if not magnanimous, and am willing to move past your lustful ways, so long as you provide the reassurances later, preferably in tangible form. So your wife hurt someone?”

  The closed feeling was back in his mind. “Yes. A woman. Ruth said it was an accident, that an ox she was driving in a cart went mad and ran the woman down, but her companion would not listen. He killed Ruth, and because I was her husband, and thus must suffer as he suffered, invoked a demon lord to curse me forever.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said, putting my hand over his heart at the sensation of pain deep inside him. “That was truly horrible. I can only imagine what you experienced trying to cope with your own tragedy as well as suddenly finding yourself soulless and a vampire.”

  His lips tightened. “It was not pleasant. My mother was furious when she found out, and traveled all over the country looking for help, but she was shunned by the Dark Ones she met. After years of searching, she finally found one who would talk to her. He told her there was no hope for me other than a Beloved, but neither of us really believed I’d find one.” A wistful note entered his voice. “I would have liked my mother to know that I did, in fact, find you.”

  “She knows,” I said, leaning forward to kiss him. “Just because she’s dead doesn’t mean she’s not still with you.”

  He said nothing, but his fingers were back to stroking patterns on my thighs.

  “How did Andreas come about?”

  “The Dark One who consented to speak with my mother is his father.” His lips twisted with a wry smile. “My mother was quite attractive, and he always had an eye
for women. Something he shares with his son.”

  “Andreas is a ladies’ man, eh?” I said, musing on the irony to be found in life. “I’ll remember that. Maybe he would stop being a bastard to you if we found his Beloved.”

  “I doubt it.” Kristoff lifted me off him and set me on the couch, rising to pull on a pair of pants. “Most Dark Ones don’t find their Beloveds. It’s not as if you can order one up.”

  I puzzled over Kristoff’s unease and reluctance to speak of his past during the subsequent hours, even onto the plane that sent us winging back to the United States. Part of it could be attributed to the mention of his previous wife; he was obviously astute enough to recognize that I was not yet comfortable enough with our relationship to discuss his past loves, which was one reason why he shunned the mention of his late girlfriend. But even given that, there was something else that he was keeping from me, something that mattered so much, he kept it locked up tight inside him.

  Something that I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to like.

  CHAPTER 12

  “Home at last,” Raymond said, stopping next to a small white rental car and taking a deep breath of dirt, diesel, and smog-scented Los Angeles air. “The sights, the sounds, the scents of the city-ah, how I’ve missed it.”

  “I haven’t,” Magda said with a sigh, dropping her suitcase next to the trunk of the car. “I could have happily spent the rest of my life in the Blue Lagoon.”

  “Oh, don’t get me wrong. I liked Iceland a lot, especially the second time around,” Raymond said hurriedly. “Without the . . . you know . . . murder and business with the police and everything. But I have to say that it’s good to be home. Or near home, in my case.”

  “I really feel bad about using up all your vacation time running around chasing vamps and whatnot,” I said as I leaned against the car, quickly leaping away when the hot metal scorched through the thin material of my blouse. “The offer still stands, you know. You guys can stay in my house while Kristoff and I deal with all this. It’s not fair to ask you to help with a problem that isn’t of your making, and that way you’d have at least a little fun time before you had to go back to work.”

  “And miss all the good stuff?” Magda snorted. “Not on your life. We’re in it for the long haul, aren’t we, pookie?”

  “Absolutely,” Raymond said, nodding eagerly. “We’re one hundred percent behind you, Pia. This is the most exciting time I’ve ever had, even including the tour to Europe. I never thought I’d become a vampire hunter! I can’t wait to blog about this!”

  “Er . . . yeah,” I said noncommittally.

  “Welcome to the City of Angels,” Magda said, blowing out a long breath. “And to think I could be soaking in a hot spring at this moment.”

  “There’s Kristoff,” I said, sighing with relief as a familiar figure emerged from the elevator. He wore his jacket and hat against the sun, but didn’t stick to the shadows, as he had in the past. “Everything OK?” I asked as he hit a button to unlock the car doors.

  “I’m not sure,” he said, looking thoughtful.

  I watched him closely as Raymond loaded the suitcases in the car’s trunk. Magda took the keys from Kristoff, murmuring something about knowing her way around LA better than he did.

  What’s wrong? I asked. Was it the phone call you had at the rental car place?

  “The phone call was from one of my associates in Paris.”

  “Uh-oh. That look doesn’t bode well. Did your buddy find out something?” I asked, a bad feeling beginning to form in my stomach.

  “No. That’s the problem. When we left Iceland two months ago, Alec told me he was going to follow up on the rumor of a new group of reapers around Marseilles, and then he’d return to his home. And yet my friend confirmed that Alec never arrived in Paris.”

  “So where did he go?” Magda asked as Raymond slammed shut the trunk and took the front passenger seat.

  Kristoff opened the back door for me. “That’s a good question. I’m working on the assumption that he would have gone home if he decided suddenly not to track down the French reapers, but thus far, my contacts haven’t found proof he’s been here, either.”

  “Hotel first, then reaper headquarters?” Magda asked.

  Kristoff got in after me, immediately pulling me up next to him. I gave myself a moment to enjoy the subconscious move on his part, my heart simultaneously mourning what it couldn’t have and enjoying what he could give me. “Neither. We will need to be prepared when we visit the reapers. Alec’s house is within an hour from here. We will go there first, and then gather our forces and prepare for the onslaught.”

  Oh, Boo , I said, filled with gratitude. You’re doing that for me, aren’t you?

  “Aye-aye, Captain,” Magda said, saluting.

  I know how worried you are about your spirit.

  You are the sweetest man I know, I said, leaning over to kiss him. Thank you.

  “Onslaught,” Ray whispered to her, patting his jacket for the bulge that was his camera. “Exciting stuff! I’ve never been part of an onslaught before. I wonder if I have enough film for it.”

  I agree that Alec is being made to look like he is the Ilargi. I believe we can kill two birds with one stone by searching his house for information on both fronts.

  Magda punched the address Kristoff gave her into the car’s GPS, making a little face at the results. “With the traffic, it’s going to take us a while to get there. Maybe we should go to the hotel first, then visit the house, then prepare for the onslaught?”

  “Alec’s house first,” Kristoff said stubbornly.

  “House it is.”

  It took exactly two hours and twenty minutes to get there, but as I gazed in awe at the building, I decided it was worth it.

  “ Et voilà. Casa Alec. Ooh. And it is a very nice casa.” Magda pulled up outside of an arched gate that spanned a drive that curled around to the back of a pale yellow chiffon-colored house.

  “That’s one heck of a house,” Raymond said as we all got out of the car. He took a few quick photos. “Not at all what I expected a vampire to live in.”

  “Gothic castle with bats circling a bell tower?” I asked, smiling.

  He flashed a grin. “Well, maybe. But this one . . . hoo. Must have set him back at least a mill. Maybe two. Do you think it has a view of the valley below?”

  “Shall I ring?” Magda asked, poised to ring the visitor’s bell.

  “Won’t do any good. There’s clearly no one home,” Raymond answered from where he was peering through the brown metal fence to the house. “Looks deserted. Maybe we should come back.”

  “Not after all we’ve been through,” Magda answered, pressing the bell. “Let’s see if anyone answers.”

  We waited a few minutes, but when it became clear that no one was either home to answer the ring or willing to do so, we decided we would have to rely on our own resources.

  “Boost me over the fence, and I’ll see if there’s a way to open it from the other side,” I told Kristoff.

  “No,” he answered, just as I figured he would.

  “You know, I’m not sure that that’s not technically breaking and entering,” Raymond answered, his voice filled with reluctance. “It might be better if we waited until we can get hold of someone who can legally give us permission to go in the house.”

  “Don’t be so straitlaced,” Magda told him with a grin. “A little light breaking and entering is good for you. Besides, I want to see inside. I’m dying to see how a vampire really lives.”

  “I assure you, we live just as a mortal does,” Kristoff said dryly.

  “No coffins?” Raymond asked, his curiosity clearly getting the better of him. “No odd servants undertaking mysterious tasks late at night? No mirrors draped in black to hide the fact that you don’t have a reflection?”

  “He has a reflection,” I said, coming to Kristoff’s defense. “How do you think he shaves without being able to see himself?”

  Raymond’s mo
uth opened and closed a couple of times, like a confused fish. “Well, I . . . I . . . I guess I never thought about it. I just assumed that vampires didn’t need to shave. No one on Angel ever shaved.”

  “You mortals watch entirely too much television,” Kristoff said as he approached the gate.

  Raymond murmured a vague excuse while Magda giggled.

  “I just hope the fence isn’t electrified or anything like that,” I said, standing next to him, eyeing the large brown metal gate. “I assume you want to go first. Just be careful in case Alec has booby-trapped it somehow.”

  “I don’t need to climb the fence; I know the code,” Kristoff answered with a long-suffering look at me.

  Don’t even think of lightening your eyes, Boo.

  I don’t have the slightest idea what you’re talking about, he answered.

  Oh, don’t you try to tell me you aren’t aware vampires can change their eye color.

  Some can, perhaps. I wasn’t aware I shared that trait.

  You do. It’s like a barometer for your temper. Light is pissy, and dark is . . .

  I stopped and waited.

  Dark is what? Happy? he asked.

  Aroused. Allow me to demonstrate. I sent him a few memories of our time spent in the Blue Lagoon. His eyes darkened from their normally flawless teal to a deep navy. See? Your eyes are dark now. You’re aroused.

  A fact that will become evident to others if you continue along that particular memory. And that one.

  I smiled.

  That one, my little temptress, is likely to get you bent over my lap.

  Promises, promises, I purred, suddenly standing up straight when Kristoff spent a few moments indulging in just how I was going to be punished.

  Luckily, Magda’s impatience distracted us before Kristoff’s pants grew too tight and I started squirming in earnest.

  “Let’s go. What are we waiting for? It will be getting dark in another hour.” She poked Kristoff in the arm.

  Kristoff punched in some numbers on the recessed panel, and the gate slid open with a nearly silent hiss.