“I… I wanted some answers,” I said with a sigh. “And I got them, but they weren’t the answers I wanted. When was the last time you saw Andre?”
“About an hour ago. He was organizing a search to look for you. He was more than a little upset when he found out you left your transmitter in your room.”
“The only thing he’s worried about is me finding out what he’s been doing. Well it’s too late,” I said bitterly. “I followed him, Dad. Last night, I followed him because I was sick of the lies. Do you want to know where I found him? Out on a date with a stupid, blonde, vampire slut, that’s where.”
“Are you sure that’s what you saw?”
“I’m pretty good at reading body language,” I said sharply. “Even if I wasn’t, I overheard her asking him if he’s told me about them yet.”
“I… I don’t know what to say,” he told me in a strained voice. “There’s got to be a rational explanation. Andre has never treated anyone with that level of disrespect, let alone someone he was dating. Even when he dated girls who were absolutely horrible to him, and I hate to say it, but there were a few gold diggers in college, he ended the relationships quietly and without hurting them.”
“Well, people change,” I said with a sigh.
“He loves you, Lucy. There’s got to be something more to this that we don’t know. Would this be the girl, Alex, who claims she’s the daughter of LaLaurie?”
“That’s her,” I spat.
“He’s probably trying to get information out of her,” he reasoned.
“I tried to convince myself of that too, but why wouldn’t he tell me instead of sneaking around?” I countered. “For someone who is still jealous of a dead guy that I never had any interest in, he’s pretty hypocritical.”
“I can see why you’d say that,” he said with a frown. “Have you tried talking to him?”
“I’ve tried. He won’t talk to me. He hasn’t been able to hide his revulsion of me ever since I transformed. You know what? It doesn’t even matter,” I said, determined not to break down. “If he is that shallow, I’m better off without him.”
“Oh Lucy,” he said and put his arms around me. “I hope you’re wrong, sweetie, I really do. But if you ain’t, it’s not the end of the world. You’ve got a lot of people who love you, including, no, especially me. We’re worried about you. No man is worth endangering your life over. Come back to headquarters.”
“I can’t,” I told him firmly. “You made a promise and I expect you to keep it. I don’t know what’s happened to me, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit around waiting for someone else to figure it out.”
“That was only if you were dying, which you aren’t. But if you stay out here for much longer, you’re putting yourself at risk.”
“I know,” I sighed. “But it’s my life to risk. Already I’ve got a lead we didn’t have before.”
“Is that what you’re doing back here?” he asked. “Evan and I checked this property last night. It’s nothing but an abandoned shoe store.”
“Yeah, I saw that for myself,” I replied. “But then I found this letter back at the house last night. I can’t read all of it, but this address is clear, as well as a warning.” I handed it over to see if he could make out any of the words that I couldn’t. He stared at it for a while, squinting and turning the page over.
“Any idea who this Sam is?”
“No.”
“Do you mind if I take it back to the lab?” he asked. “If there’s any trace of DNA on it we can at least see if they are a vampire or not.”
“Just as long as I don’t have to go with you,” I replied.
“I’m not going to make you do anything,” he said with a pleading look. “But I want you to communicate with me, Lucy. I want to know where you are and if you have even the slightest inkling that you might be in trouble, you call me right away. Are we clear?”
“I promise,” I said and hugged him tightly. “You do the same.”
We walked together toward the center of the Quarter. After making me swear at least twenty more times that I would keep in touch, my father headed back to headquarters to have the letter analyzed. I checked my hemograph and found Andre’s signal a few blocks away. Once again, he appeared to be alone, but I doubted that. I headed in his direction, determined to get some answers, one way, or another.
I saw him before he saw me. To my surprise, he was actually alone, and appeared to be looking for something, carefully checking each dark corner of the alley. For a second, my heart skipped a beat and I wondered if he was actually looking for me, but then I wondered if he was just looking for me to finally tell me it was over. I cleared my throat softly and stepped out of the shadow, catching his attention.
For a moment he just stood, staring at me with a blank expression, as if he wanted to say something, but couldn’t find the words.
“We do have to stop meeting like this, darling.”
I ducked quickly back into the shadows as Alex came around the corner and snaked her arms around Andre’s waist from behind.
“Anything interesting down here?” she asked, peering dramatically over his shoulder into the alley. For a second, he almost looked embarrassed before breaking into a wide grin and turning into the vampire’s embrace.
“No, nothing at all,” I heard him say as he led her away. I was too disgusted to even think about following.
“Well, that was rather cowardly, don’t you think?”
I nearly jumped out of my skin as Damien’s whisper met my ear. I spun to see him standing too close for comfort.
“What are you doing here?” I asked harshly.
“Looking for you, my pet. My dinner offer still stands and it appears your boyfriend is too preoccupied at the moment to decline on your behalf.”
Chapter 24
My ribcage seemed to tighten involuntarily around my chest as Damien’s taunt hit home, but I pushed it aside, letting my anger at both the situation and him fester instead.
“This isn’t Paris,” I told him bluntly. “You’re as much an outcast here as I am.”
“There are many places where not only will we be welcome, but treated with the respect we deserve,” he replied.
“You’re talking about the vampire clubs? No thank you,” I said with a shudder.
“I expect after Paris you would be wary, but as you said yourself, this is not Paris, Lucy. Come,” he said and held out his hand to me. “There is a more than respectable establishment not far from here. Of course, if you’d rather sulk in the shadows while the man you thought you were going to marry wines and dines another, then I’ll leave you to it.”
“Fine,” I growled, taking his hand and fighting back tears as well as the urge to punch both Andre for his infidelity and Damien for his using it as an advantage over me. “But I’m warning you right now, this is dinner and answers only. Whether or not Andre is indeed being unfaithful does not mean that I plan to stoop to his level.”
“I don’t imagine you would,” he replied with a low chuckle, not bothering to hide his amusement. He led me down the alley, away from the center of town to a narrow area behind some of the lower rent hotels in the part of town tourists referred to as north of Bourbon. Stopping at a small, nondescript door that appeared to go to a derelict building, he pressed a bell that I wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.
Inside was a small foyer where a burly vampire sat on a stool next to a small table, looking nearly indistinguishable from any normal bouncer at any bar on Bourbon. What I did find strange was that there were two stairways leading off the foyer, one going up, and the other down. New Orleans didn’t have basements for a very good reason.
“Two for the dining room,” Damien informed the bouncer and handed over what looked like a tidy stack of bills, which the vamp pocketed discreetly.
“Enjoy your evening,” was the only response we got and Damien waved his hand, indicating that I should go first. Mercifully, we took the stairs going up, where we were gree
ted by a second vamp who was dressed in the formal attire of a maître de. In fact, it appeared as if Damien and I were the only two who weren’t dressed for the occasion, which made me self-conscious. Fortunately, we were seated at a corner table that seemed to be arranged for privacy.
“I know it may be difficult, but you can’t fault him, Lucy,” Damien said as the maître de left us.
“What are you talking about?”
“Andre,” he replied, a pitying smile twisted at his lips. “He’s a man who will one day assume control of a multinational company and there will be certain expectations put upon him. You, with your upper class upbringing and ties to the government, filled a specific role, but I’m afraid as lovely as you are, you are not what the media will want to see draped on the arm of an up and coming heir to such a fortune.”
“I didn’t come here to talk about Andre,” I said steadily, though I was fuming at the implication that Andre only wanted to marry me for appearances. “And I don’t appreciate your insinuations. You know nothing of our relationship. Did it occur to you that he may be trying to get information?”
“He has had plenty of time to get all of the information he needs, Lucy. They’ve been seen together every night since the last time we met.”
The twisting darkness that had been playing along the edges of my heart became a crushing weight on my chest and I found it hard to breathe.
“That doesn’t mean anything,” I said with as much conviction as I could falsely muster. Admittedly, it wasn’t much. The very next night after I was ordered to stay off the streets was when Andre started to become distant. What had happened that night? What had Alex said or done to make him turn on me so quickly?
“The fact that you are trying, and I’m sorry, my dear, failing to hide how upset you are speaks volumes to the contrary. What’s that old saying?” he asked, clearly enjoying my misery. “Ah yes. Let the truth set you free. You are better off without him, Lucy. Andre is as foolish as Alex is delusional.”
“Who is she?”
“Not who she says she is,” Damien replied cryptically. “Of that you can be sure.”
“Would you care to elaborate?” I asked sarcastically.
“You’ve read my brother’s journal, Lucy. Delphine LaLaurie is the one who is responsible for who I am, who my brother was. We were not born monsters, but the demons we became, we became to serve one master, and that was Madame LaLaurie. In all my two hundred twenty years of service to the witch, I’ve never once met the woman who calls herself Alex LaLaurie.”
“What about Lissandre Laurie?” I asked. “Is that a name you are familiar with?”
“Lissandre Laurie?” Damien laughed. “Lissandre Laurie is the alias Madame LaLaurie uses here, given that her reputation precedes her.”
That was unexpected. “Well it sounds a lot like Alex LaLaurie to me,” I said.
“I imagine that’s why our misguided Daughter chose the name. It’s a perfect melding of both aliases.”
“I’ve been told by a reputable source that Laurie is the founder of the Daughters of Darkness,” I informed him. “I thought you said LaLaurie had nothing to do with the Daughters.”
“I don’t remember saying any such thing,” Damien countered. “All I told you was that Delphine LaLaurie is responsible for the organization you know as The Eyes of The Sun.”
“So you’re saying she started both?” I was starting to get a headache. Whoever Damien was, he was impossible to read.
“As well as several other factions that have gone by the wayside,” he confirmed. “When she first came to New Orleans, she failed to establish herself as the rightful leader she thought she should be. She made a lot of enemies during her brief stay and I daresay that most of the legends surrounding her were the result of those she crossed smearing her name.”
“But then, if you are to be believed, she went back to Paris and pretty much took over,” I pointed out.
“While it might have appeared to you as if The Eyes of The Sun succeeded in assuming power based on their control of Paris, understand that LaLaurie has long regarded them as a failure. As such, she attempted to begin anew here in New Orleans, only to find that by the time she returned in the early twentieth century, the vampires she had left behind had fractured into their own clans, set up their own facilities, and refused to come under her rule.”
“And you know this because you worked for her,” I stated.
“If you consider enslavement the same as employment, then yes, you are correct.”
“How do I know you aren’t still working for her?” I asked. “For that matter, how do you know you don’t work for her? If, as you say, she created the Daughters, then I’m sure she employs the same mind control tactics they do.”
Damien didn’t answer right away, because at that moment a veritable army of waiters showed up at the table with wine, bread, salads and soup. Funny, I hadn’t even seen a menu. I guess it didn’t matter what they served, as long as it wasn’t blood. I was a little wary of eating anything, but admittedly, it all looked delicious.
“As far as the witch is concerned, I am still her faithful servant,” Damien admitted. “My assignment in New Orleans was simply to find you, which I have. What I have not done, is inform my mistress of this fact.”
I set down the forkful of salad and pushed the plate away.
“The food is not drugged, Lucy,” Damien said with a chuckle. “I’ve no intention of turning you over. As I said before, my only goal is self-preservation.”
“I’m not following you.”
“When you and my misguided brother destroyed the Elders’ compound, you unwittingly gave her back the power that only the council of Elders had kept at bay,” he explained. “As power hungry as the Elders were, it was their infighting that kept any one of them from assuming complete control. As the only survivor, LaLaurie no longer has to keep one eye looking over her shoulder. As you have seen, she has already launched a successful campaign, pitting powerful vampires against each other for profit. She’s determined to start over with an army of invincible vampires and she believes the building blocks of that army reside in you. Once she has what she wants, I’ll be of no use to her.”
I had to admit, his explanation was plausible, and frightening. Abe had already determined that whoever weakened me did so to take my powers for themselves. If what Damien said was true, and Lissandre Laurie was just an alias for Delphine LaLaurie, then she had already succeeded in the first step of her plan to take my abilities as her own. This also explained Holly’s earlier suspicions that Damien was working for LaLaurie. But it still didn’t explain why Alex didn’t appear on the hemograph, which bothered me, but I wasn’t about to announce my current handicaps to Damien.
“So, what do you want from me?” I asked.
“Your help, of course,” he replied in a tone that suggested I should have known this. I suppose I should have, but the whole situation still left a bad taste in my mouth.
“Fair enough, but how and more importantly, why? No, let me guess. You’re programmed not to bring harm to your master, but somehow you’ve broken the programming enough to warn me. That’s it, isn’t it?”
“I am not my brother, Lucy,” Damien said sharply. “Whatever mind control tactics the witch used during my early transformations were broken completely when I discovered who I was, who my father had been, and how he died. No, the problem I face in destroying Delphine LaLaurie is drawing her out.”
Once again, the waiters returned to the table, clearing away my untouched salad and replacing it with a garlic chicken dish, the heavenly scent of which nearly broke my resolve.
“Garlic won’t kill you, Lucy,” Damien said, noting that I still refused to touch the food. “We bred that vulnerability out centuries ago,” he added with a wink. I narrowed my eyes at him and he continued. “I’m quite serious. Garlic is a blood thinner and a poison. At one time, consuming garlic opened vampires up to many vulnerabilities ranging from infections to hemophilia.”
“As interesting as the history lesson is, get back to what we were talking about. What exactly did you mean about drawing LaLaurie out? You work for her. Don’t you know where to find her?”
“No,” he stated blankly. “As you might have surmised, she did not reside within the Elders’ compound, opting to carry out her business in secret. I know only that she is currently here, in the states, and that I am to deliver you to a specific address, however, I do not even know if she is to be the one I deliver you to. Then there is the complication of her appearance.”
“What complication?” I asked, curious now.
“Our rather striking appearance was an unintended consequence of the genetic manipulations we were subjected to,” he explained. I had surmised as much. “While the other Elders embraced the change and built upon the modification to give us additional advantages, LaLaurie did not. She went to great lengths to hide her appearance, including several attempts to graft the skin of her young servants onto her body. Though I suspect, as the folklore suggests, that she might have done that for the sheer joy of watching them suffer. Yes, the rumors her rivals spread had a grain of truth to them. Recently, her scientists discovered a way to manipulate her appearance using the genetic material of others.”
“I’ve seen that,” I said cautiously. “Any idea what that entails exactly?”
“I’m afraid I don’t,” he replied. “You’re worried about your mentor?”
“Interesting guess. Now how would you know anything happened to Dr. Hayward?”
“You told Andre that she was attacked. It was the last time we met and yes, I was watching you, so there is no need to accuse me of doing anything more than looking for an opportunity to speak to you without bravado boy interrupting. Though he still managed.”
I was about to point out that I didn’t say anything about Dr. Hayward being someone else entirely when the wait staff arrived again to clear our plates.
“Pardon me, miss,” said the elderly waiter who bumped my arm as he removed my second untouched plate, using the blunder to deftly slip me a small scrap of paper under the table. Using the commotion at the table as cover, I unfolded it and immediately recognized the script from the letters I had found. It read:
The Eyes of the Sun: The Complete Trilogy Page 86
