By then, other matters had got in the way, including Marcus and Ilaria’s return.
Chapter Seven
Sasha had finished his tea and was considering going and finding Nial to see what he could do, when Patrick came looking for him.
“The gatehouse says Kimball just pulled up, with Marcus and Ilaria.”
Sasha sighed. “Thank you. Kitchen door?”
“It’s the only one out of sight of the paparazzi,” Patrick told him.
Sasha had seen a group of photographers on the verge of the road opposite the gate when he had arrived, huddled together between cars. They had spotted him and turned away, disinterested. He was no one. He had kept his head averted, anyway. Digital photos had a way of living on forever.
“Even at night,” Sasha said, now. “I thought the Summanus would keep them away at night at least.”
“At night, more than ever,” Patrick said and grimaced. “It’s the sword, I think.”
Sasha looked at him, puzzled. The reference to a sword meant nothing to him. Time was ticking on, though. “I will be there for Marcus and Ilaria, when they come in,” he told Patrick.
“That’s what I figured. Everyone else is going to give you a moment or two. We’ll wait in the main room.” He nodded and walked back to the kitchen with Sasha. Sasha brought the jar with him and put it in the sink. Even the guard who sat at the table was gone.
Sasha nodded at Patrick, who left silently. There were sounds outside the kitchen door now. Footsteps on the tiles.
His heart beating heavily, Sasha watched the door.
Marcus pushed it open, his head down, watching his step. Then he turned and held it open for Ilaria.
Sasha had forgotten how tiny Ilaria was. She was a name in the military world, rated as one of the top three snipers in the world. She was also one of the fashion icons of Europe. Sasha had seen women officers of the GRU pouring over fashion blogs featuring Ilaria and her clothing choices. That made her a powerful global influence in at least two realms of interest, yet her physical stature was the complete opposite—in appearance, anyway. She was a vampire and could probably toss Sasha across the room with one hand.
He wouldn’t test the theory. Ilaria looked frail. She wore enormous sunglasses that hid most of her face, yet her cheeks were drawn. She moved slowly, as if every step was an enormous effort and once she was properly inside the kitchen she stopped, looking down at her feet, as if she had lost the willpower to move any farther.
Marcus looked up and his eyes widened when he saw Sasha standing there. For just a moment, his face worked. Sasha saw agony and raw pain, there. Then it was all gone, wiped away like snow on a window.
“Sasha….” He came over and hugged him.
Sasha held him tightly.
“I don’t know why you’re here and I don’t care,” Marcus said roughly. “It is so good to see you.” His voice was rough. Then he stepped back and just looked at him.
Despite the stoical expression, Marcus looked wretched. He was pale, as drawn as Ilaria was. He looked shell-shocked, which he probably was.
“I’m here for a while,” Sasha told him. “Possibly, a long while.”
“Things are bad then?” Marcus asked.
Not as bad as they are for you. Sasha shrugged. “Interesting, is closer.”
“Tell me later?” Marcus picked up Ilaria’s hand.
“Hello Ilaria,” Sasha said gently.
“Alexander,” she said, her voice bodiless.
“Sasha,” he corrected. “You’re practically family, after all.”
She drew in a breath and let it out. It was a silent sigh.
“We’re both…well, tired,” Marcus said awkwardly. “It has been a long few days. We just want to relax.”
“You should know that everyone is in the big room, waiting for you,” Sasha warned him.
He glanced at the door that led out to the main living room. Then he looked down at Ilaria and squeezed her hand. “No problem,” he said with stiff joviality. “They’re all friends.”
Sasha wanted to sigh just as Ilaria had done. Marcus was a tightly bound bundle of emotions, most of them toxic. He was holding it all in for Ilaria’s sake.
“Most of them are friends,” Sasha said darkly.
Marcus frowned. “Most?”
Sasha chided himself. “Pay no mind. I am being too Russian.”
Marcus smiled and it might even have been genuine. “I see you’re making friends everywhere you go, Alexandrovich. Lead the way.”
* * * * *
Dante stayed by Rory’s side, both of them standing slightly apart from the quiet group of people who greeted the man and woman with hugs and tears and soft voices.
“Did you know the one who died?” Dante asked her, speaking very softly. He knew she could hear him even if he whispered.
“By reputation,” Rory told him. Cyneric Pæga had been infamous. For centuries, no one had been certain of his loyalties. His association with Heru, the Deadly Moon, had made him a pariah among more modern vampires. It was only in the last year that the extremely long game Pæga had been playing, worming his way into Heru’s confidence, had become common knowledge. “I always told myself that one day we would cross paths and then I would be able to find out how his mind works. He was brilliant, they say. A human computer.”
“I can see why you wanted to meet him.” Dante was smiling.
“That’s not possible anymore, alas. If he was even half as smart as they say he was, then I can understand Nial’s concern over losing him at this point in the war.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t just the loss of a tactical advantage to Nial. He looks just as unhappy as the others,” Dante said, looking over to where Nial stood with Winter and Sebastian.
Nial’s shoulder was touching Sebastian’s and Winter stood in front of both of them, almost in contact with them, too. She was certainly close enough for her body heat to reach them. They were a tightly clustered little group, waiting to say hello to Marcus and Ilaria.
“Don’t underestimate Nathaniel,” Rory told him. “He is utterly ruthless when he needs to be. He has lived a very long time. He does not think in normal ways anymore.”
Dante looked at her. “Yet he fell in love.”
Rory rolled her eyes. “It is not falling in love that is the flaw, it is the cozy little domestic arrangement that goes with it I find deplorable. It is a weakness the enemy can exploit. They nearly killed Sebastian last year, yet Nial has not changed as a result.”
“And now they have killed his friend. Be nice, Rory. Your hard-ass act isn’t fooling me. You find the idea of a very old vampire dying as unsettling as they do.”
Rory swallowed. Dante had put his finger on the core of the hard little knot in her chest. This was affecting her. “Waste always offends me,” she muttered.
Dante rolled his eyes. “You old softie.”
“I am not,” she said stiffly.
“Then why did I have to talk you down from taking a bite out of Sasha’s neck this morning, when he was a jerk-off? It’s not as if he insulted your profession of choice.”
Rory breathed steadily. “We should remain silent and respectful.”
She could feel Dante chuckling silently next to her. She kept her eyes ahead, watching the man called Marcus and Ilaria Scavo move around the room, greeting everyone.
Cyneric’s death was a waste. In all ways. Those two looked as if the world had fallen on them from a great height. Even after the pair went upstairs to “rest”, the other people in the room remained sad and preoccupied.
Then three more people appeared. They were young adults in size and behavior. Perhaps older teenagers, on the verge of adulthood. The two girls were nearly identical in appearance. Twins, clearly, while the boy with them had enough similar genetic markers to be their brother. All three dumped backpacks and bags on the floor by the door to the kitchen and utility rooms at the back of the house.
The girls hugged the deaf man, Dominic, while
the boy arrowed directly over to Patrick Sauvage and sat on the arm of the chair Patrick was using and spoke in low tones.
The woman, Blythe, who was the mate of Patrick and Dominic, got to her feet and stood by the pair on the armchair for a moment, her hand on the boy’s shoulder. Then she went over to Dominic and the two girls and crouched down next to the big cushions they were all sitting on, to talk to them quietly.
Then she got to her feet and said more loudly; “Cookies and homework in the kitchen, please.”
The boy groaned. Patrick pushed him to his feet, while the girls chatted to each other as they picked up their bags and headed back into the kitchen.
It was a very domestic scene, which Rory found extraordinary, here among a house full of vampires and non-traditional living arrangements. The fact that their mother had two partners did not seem to disrupt the children’s’ perfectly normal life in the slightest.
Then Rory saw Kate’s face.
The blonde woman was standing by the big buffet sideboard against the back wall. She had just poured herself a glass of mineral water, which she held untouched in her hand. She was watching the three teenagers with close attention. The expression on her face was one of sad yearning.
Rory studied her more carefully, startled at the hunger in her eyes. Nial had given Rory a quick and dirty breakdown of the people living in the house and their partners, so Rory knew exactly who Kate Lindenstream was and her relationship to Garrett and Roman Xerus. The woman was loved, professionally successful, financially stable and above all, personally powerful. Did she really believe that children would make her life more complete?
Kate was only human yet she had extraordinary perception. Her gaze swung to meet Rory’s and her face shifted to perfectly neutral. Her chin lifted, as if she was daring Rory to say anything.
Then Roman came up to speak to Kate and she turned her head away. The moment was broken.
“Those sandwiches look pretty good,” Dante said, nodding toward the tray on the sideboard.
“You should eat,” Rory told him. “It seems that eating, here, is a secondary activity that happens in the background.”
Dante shrugged. “There are more vampires than there are humans. That figures.”
“Does it bother you?” Rory asked. “To be among so many of us?”
“Should it?” He was smiling now. “They’re all house-broken, just like you.” He headed for the buffet. He was not the only human drawn to the food there.
“You do that a lot, don’t you?”
Rory turned to look at the dark-haired man who had asked the question. He was standing to one side. She had not noticed his approach at all and chided herself. She was usually better at tracking where everyone was in a room. “Sasha Mikhailov,” she said. “The man who does not like football.”
Sasha lifted a brow, the corner of his mouth quirking upward. “You make it sound as though I am a freak of nature. There are plenty of other people on the planet who don’t like football, who have never seen a game of football.”
“Then how do they know they do not like it? Have you tried watching a game?”
“Ten minutes of one. Nothing happened that entire time.” He considered her. “Sebastian says you actually own the ‘49ers.”
“I am a minority owner.” Very minority. The ‘49ers corporation was worth millions.
“You like football that much?”
“I like games that much.”
“Game theory, yes?”
Rory was startled. “Sebastian’s report on me was thorough, I see.”
Sasha shook his head. “That was something I learned from the GRU file on you.”
“They have a file?”
“The GRU have been monitoring vampires in Russia for over a decade.”
Rory frowned. She had lived in Moscow for nearly twenty years, before leaving just over nine years ago to pick up a new life thread in the United States. “I see…” she said slowly. It didn’t surprise her that the GRU had a file on her, although it was a small shock to know they knew she was a vampire. She had only revealed her true nature a year ago, when vampires all over the world had stepped out.
Sasha’s smile held a touch of mischief. “There was a file but no photo. Everyone on the project thought you were a man.”
“While I thought that with a name like Sasha, you would be more feminine.”
Sasha’s smile broadened. “You lived in Russia. You should know that Sasha is the short form of Alexander there.”
He had reacted exactly as she had expected him to. It was almost a disappointment. Rory finished the gambit, anyway. She smiled sweetly. “You prefer shortness, then.” She let her gaze almost reach his belt, then brought it back up to his face.
Sasha’s lips parted and surprise widened his eyes. Anger glinted in them.
* * * * *
Dante loaded up the plate with sandwiches. He didn’t know when he would next get an opportunity to eat. His basic calorie needs for a day were still huge, even though he wasn’t as active as he had once been.
This house of vampires was a fascinating one, primarily because everyone seemed to work with a different set of principles and values to the ones he was used to measuring people by. The way they almost ignored standard meal times was just a minor example.
Work and play and relaxation seemed to flow seamlessly in and around each other. There was nothing like a nine-to-five mentality here, yet the amount of work that got done was prodigious.
Dante had peeked into one room earlier that morning, to see Kate, Patrick Sauvage and the vampire with the tattoos that he thought was Roman, all working on computers that had the same image on the screen. It looked like the frozen frame of a movie.
Later, when he had been talking to Nial, Nial had confirmed that yes, it was a movie they were editing for commercial release. In the next room, where Nial had been, Sebastian and a human called Lucas Ford had been setting up a map grid of coordinates for the hunter units going out that evening.
On another computer in the same room, Dominic Castellano had sheet music up on one flat screen, while he coded a computer program on the other. He was humming and he had perfect pitch, which was impossible for a deaf man—but then, so was hearing and he seemed to be able to do that, too.
The range of projects and work being done was staggering. From the purely creative at one end of the spectrum, to pure hard work at the other. Dante had noticed that Francesca didn’t talk much to anyone, yet she had an uncanny ability to be where help was needed, including arriving at his borrowed bedroom door with fresh towels that morning, just as Dante had considered taking a shower.
There was an energy to the atmosphere in the big house. It was motivating and inspiring to be among such unusual people. Dante had always thought Rory to be utterly unique. She was still very different from the average human and so was everyone else that Dante had met so far.
When Rory’s voice lifted sharply, Dante whirled to see what was wrong, nearly upsetting the plate in his hands.
Sasha Mikhailov was talking to her and Dante’s belly clamped. Even though he had told Rory the Russian’s insult that morning had meant nothing, it had bothered him just a little bit. Mostly it bothered him that he was being measured and found inadequate in front of Rory.
Now the jerk was talking to her directly. Was he upsetting her? Rory always pretended nothing touched her.
She was speaking rapidly and Dante realized he couldn’t understand what she was saying because she was using Russian. It was a staccato language and even the calmest speech sounded clipped and angry. She might simply be discussing the weather.
Yet he didn’t think so. Sasha’s expression, even seen from a sharp angle as Dante was seeing it, said the man was angry. Embarrassed, even.
Rory stepped around him and walked over to the stairs, her head up. She was wearing one of her beautiful dresses that seemed to float around her, making the most of her excellent figure. Even while Dante was trying to figure out what ha
d just happened, half his mind was busy watching her hips sway and marveling once more over the size of her waist and the length of her legs.
Sasha cleared his throat. The room had fallen silent. His discomfort was being observed by everyone.
“What was that about, Sasha?” Winter said softly. “Serbian is sort of the same. She was talking about thinking….”
Sasha gave a self-conscious shrug. Dante realized with a start of surprise that his cheeks had reddened. “It was an insult,” he said. “In idiomatic Russian.” He let out a gusty breath. “About the size of both my brains.”
There was a tiny silence, while everyone stared at him again.
Then Sebastian laughed. “Russian is the best language in the world for insulting people. So inventive and colorful.”
Everyone shifted, their attention turning to Sebastian or back to their previous conversations.
Dante watched Sasha, instead. It seemed that Rory had paid back his debt from that morning, after all.
Sasha glanced at him and his gaze skittered away. Then it came back to meet Dante’s stare.
Dante could guess his thoughts, too. He had to agree completely. In a world of increasingly complex women with multiple roles and responsibilities and several identities, Rory was one of the most complicated.
She could leave a trail of men behind her, all of them confused and frustrated by the conflicting signals she gave out, because Rory insisted on living her life her way, with no compromises.
Sasha had just bumped up against her concrete walls of demarcation.
Dante took a bite of his sandwich, contemplating. Did that mean Sasha had tried to hit on her?
The poor fool, if he had.
Chapter Eight
Dominic took Blythe’s plate away from her and picked up her hand. “Come and say goodnight to the kids,” he said firmly. “You’re wilting.”
Blythe stifled a yawn as he hauled her up from the sofa and drew her toward the kitchen. They weren’t the only ones leaving the room. The other humans in the house would also be heading upstairs to sleep until around nine tonight, when hunting started for the night.
Blood Ascendant (Blood Stone Book 5) Page 8
