The Reluctant Vampire taf-15

by Lynsay Sands

  “You were the captain?” he asked with a smile. “And were you Captain Alexander or Alexandrina?”

  She smiled. “Alexander, of course. Well, just Alex. But they thought me a man, or most of them did. As you can guess, few Spanish men would have worked a boat with a female captain, so I dressed as a man. I was very butch,” she assured him with a teasing light in her eyes, and then wrinkled her nose. “Or at least I thought I was. It was most disheartening when I read in their minds that most of them thought me fey and probably gay.”

  Harper threw his head back on a laugh loud enough to draw several glances their way. Drina didn’t care, she just smiled.

  “I imagine you were a very good pirate,” he said finally, and she chuckled.

  “I’m not sure if that’s a compliment or not.”

  “A compliment,” he assured her. “You’re clever enough, and had the fighting background for it.”

  Drina nodded. “Yes, we were very successful. But I eventually grew tired of watching my men die.”

  Harper arched an eyebrow as he picked up his wineglass.

  She shrugged and picked up her own glass. Turning it in her hands, she said, “They were all very skilled, of course, and I insisted they train daily, but they were mortal. They weren’t as fast or strong, and didn’t have the “healthy constitution” or quick healing I enjoyed.” She sighed. “I lost a lot of good men over the years, and finally decided enough was enough. It was time anyway. They were aging, I wasn’t, and I had taken a wound or two that should have been fatal but wasn’t.” She grimaced. “When the fighting comes from every side, it’s impossible not to take injury.”

  Harper nodded in understanding. “How did you explain that away?”

  “It was pretty tricky,” she said wryly. “The first wound I took was a sword to the back. One of the buggers snuck up behind me while I was dealing with two others and-” She shrugged. “Fortunately, it was near the end of the battle, and one we won. I woke up in my cabin with One-eye, the ship’s cook, sitting beside me, his mouth scrunched up as if he’d sucked a lemon.” She laughed at the memory. “He’d dragged me from the battle while my first took over leading the men to finish the battle. He’d carried me to my cabin, stripped away my jacket and shirt to tend my wound and discovered I had breasts. He was more horrified by that than the length and depth of the wound,” she said dryly.

  Harper laughed.

  “One-eye didn’t admit this,” she continued, “but I read his mind, and it seems he was so sure he must be seeing things when my breasts were revealed that he grabbed me through my pantaloons in search of my ‘equipment.’ Much to his dismay, there wasn’t any,” she said wryly, and Harper’s laughter deepened.

  “How did you handle that?” he asked finally, as his laughter waned.

  Drina smiled wryly. “Well, it took some talking and a bit of mind control, but I managed to convince him not to tell anyone. I suppose I could have just erased the memory and sent him off the ship, hired another cook, but he was a good man. A bit older than the others, more wizened, but a good man.

  “Fortunately, he felt I was a good captain, so agreed to keep the secret, and the whole thing was so upsetting to him that he didn’t seem to notice that I should have died from the wound.

  “One-eye kept an eye on me after that, though, watched my back in battle and wouldn’t let anyone else see to my wounds on the rare occasion that I took one.” She took a sip of wine, and then added, “I only ever let him bind me if I couldn’t manage myself, and then only once directly after receiving the wounds. It was to be sure he didn’t notice how quickly I healed. He, however, thought it was because I was shy of his seeing my body, and I let him think that.

  “For the first few wounds, he was so flustered by tending a woman that he practically closed his eyes while he did it.” She chuckled. “Actually, he was surprisingly missish about it for a pirate. I think it was only because I was his captain.” She shrugged. “But eventually he got more used to it, and then I took another wound that would have been fatal to a mortal, and that time he did notice.”

  “How did you explain it?” Harper asked.

  “I didn’t. What could I say? I just muttered that I’d always been strong and a fast healer and left it at that, but he started watching me more closely and started putting things together.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like the fact that I stayed in my cabin all day, leaving the helm to my first, and came out to man the helm myself only at night, doing so with an unerring sense of direction, as if I could see through the darkness,” she said dryly. “That I only approached ships at night to attack them. That I was uncommonly strong, especially for a woman, and that I was as nimble in the rigging at night as they would be during the day, while they had to feel their way blindly in the dark.

  “Ah,” Harper said with a grimace.

  She nodded. “Then he followed me down into the hold of the ship one night when I went to visit the prisoners in search of blood to replace what I’d lost from a wound.”

  Harper didn’t appear surprised by her words. Before blood banks, all of them had been forced to feed on mortals. Still, she felt she had to explain, and said, “I tried never to feed on my own crew, and even with prisoners I was careful not to take too much blood, feeding on several rather than one or two. I wiped their memories that I was ever in the hold, and our prisoners were always treated well. I was careful.”

  “But he followed and saw,” Harper murmured.

  “Yes.” She sighed unhappily. “He took that even worse than my being female. I did have to erase his memory then. We were already headed for port to off-load the prisoners, but I put him ashore as well. I gave him enough money that he wouldn’t have to work again and sent him on his way.” She shifted unhappily. “Privateering just wasn’t the same for me after that. And, as I say, I was tired of losing my men.”

  “So you retired from pirating,” Harper said quietly.

  “Yes.” Drina took another sip of wine and shrugged. “It was time for a change. Fortunately, I’d made a fortune, definitely enough to keep me in dresses for a couple of centuries.”

  Harper opened his mouth to speak again, but paused as their waiter returned with their meals. They both murmured “thank you” as their plates were set before them.

  Drina eyed the dish she’d selected and felt her stomach growl at the delightful aromas wafting from it. It was something called chicken fettuccini. She’d chosen it because it was listed as the chef’s special, and because it had been so long since she’d eaten that she wasn’t sure what was good or not. But this certainly smelled delightful.

  “It smells amazing,” Harper murmured, sounding awed, and she glanced to his identical plate and nodded with agreement.

  They fell into a companionable silence as they both dug in, but Drina found herself continually smiling as she ate. She was enjoying herself, enjoying Harper’s reactions to her tales, his laughter, his shock. . It was nice, and she decided she was going to have to thank Stephanie for arranging it.

  Chapter Six

  Drina sat back in her seat with a little sigh that was half regret and half satisfaction. She had enjoyed the food and was full, but regretted not being able to finish it. It was really good.

  “So,” Harper said, setting down his own fork. His expression was also full of regret as he pushed his half-eaten meal to the side, but he smiled as he glanced to her, and said, “I believe you had just finished regaling me with your pirating career and were about to explain how you landed as. . a madam?” He arched an eyebrow. “Another rebellious phase?”

  Drina grinned. He was trying not to sound shocked or affected in any way by that career choice, but she could see he wasn’t taking it as calmly as he’d like her to think. Shrugging, she said, “Surely you must be bored with tales of my life by now. You should tell me more about-”

  “Oh no,” Harper protested at once. “You can’t stop just before the best part.”

  She grinned
at his expression, and then shrugged. “After I let go of the men and sold my ship, I decided to settle in England as a wealthy widow. At least that was the plan, and I did at first,” she assured him, and then added, “Really, the madam bit was something of an accident.”

  “Right,” he drawled. “You were an accidental madam.”

  Drina chuckled at his expression. “As it happens, yes I was. One night, I was wandering along, hunting for a snack and minding my own business, when I happened upon a young woman being beaten.” Her smile faded at the recollection. The girl, Beth as she later found out her name was, had been half-dead when Drina had come upon the scene, but the man beating Beth had seemed determined to finish the job.

  Shaking away the memory of Beth’s poor battered body, she continued, “I took exception and ended it. Then I picked her up and she directed me to her home. But it turned out it was a brothel, and the man I’d stopped had been their protector.” She said the last word with distaste, for he hadn’t been anywhere near protective of any of the women under his care. The group she’d found at that house had all been terribly young, half-starved and each bearing the scars and marks of past beatings.

  Drina sighed. “Well, Beth, the girl I’d saved, told the others what I’d done. Half of the women were furious that I’d killed their “protector-”

  “Killed?” Harper asked, one eyebrow flying up.

  Drina grimaced. “It was part accident and part self-defense. He didn’t care for being tossed about by a female and pulled a knife. That rather irritated me, and I tossed him up the alley.” She shrugged. “He landed on his knife.”

  “Ah.” Harper nodded.

  “Anyway, as I say, half of them were furious I’d killed him, and the other half just didn’t seem to have the energy to care either way. Then Mary, a rather mouthy bit of goods, announced that since I’d killed their man, I was now their protector.” Drina smiled faintly at the memory. She’d been rather dismayed at the time but had felt responsible for the women and hadn’t known what else to do. So, she’d become a madam.

  “According to Mary I wasn’t a very good madam,” she admitted with amusement. “I mean, I kept them safe and made sure none of their clients hurt them, but I didn’t take any of their money. In fact, it cost me money instead,” she admitted with a grin. “And as far as Mary was concerned, that made me a failure as a madam.”

  Harper chuckled, but asked with interest, “So you just hung about and looked out for them for nothing?”

  “At first,” she said slowly. Sighing, she admitted reluctantly, “But after a particularly nasty encounter with three drunk clients who tried to abuse one of the girls. . well, I was injured. And healed,” she said dryly.

  “They sorted out what you were,” he guessed.

  “One of the risks of spending too much time with mortals,” Drina said dryly. “Fortunately, the women took it much better than One-eye had. In fact, they were surprisingly accepting, and most just seemed relieved.”

  “Relieved?” Harper echoed with surprise.

  Drina nodded and explained, “Well, I looked out for them but would never take their money. It turns out this had left them feeling beholden, and not one of them was comfortable with that. But now they felt they had something to offer me.”

  “To feed on them,” Harper breathed, sitting up.

  Drina nodded solemnly. “I refused at first, but Beth sat me down and explained that I was being terribly selfish in refusing their kind offer.”

  Harper started to laugh. “They had your number.”

  “Perhaps,” Drina admitted with amusement. “But it wasn’t what she said so much as what she didn’t say. I realized that they were afraid. I was the best protector any of them had had. I didn’t beat or rape them, didn’t even take a cut of their money and had suffered a few injuries to protect them and yet expected nothing from them in return. It confused them. They didn’t understand why I did it.”

  “Why did you do it?” Harper asked.

  Drina considered the question. “Because I could, and no one else would.”

  “I think there was more to it than that,” Harper said quietly. “You were your own woman and in charge of your life in Egypt until the Romans invaded, and it seems to me that you spent a good part of your life after that fighting to get that independence and freedom back. You managed to regain some small measure of it as a gladiator, then some more from ruling a country as a puppet master/concubine, became a duchess to escape your brother’s rule, and then pretended to be male to run your own ship.” He nodded. “I think you felt for those women. I think you were trying to free them from the tyranny of a male-dominated world, allowing them the independence to earn and keep their own money, and protecting them from those who would have abused and taken advantage of them. You saw yourself in them and were trying to give them what you’d always fought for.”

  Drina shifted uncomfortably. He’d seen her pretty clearly, and it made her feel naked. Trying to lighten the atmosphere, she teased, “Or perhaps I just secretly always wanted to be a prostitute.”

  “Did you?” he asked, surprised at the suggestion.

  “No. I was well tired of sex with mortals by then,” she said on a chuckle, and smiled wryly. “You’re probably right about my motivations, but even I didn’t understand them then.” She turned her wineglass on the table, and admitted, “Originally, I tried to get them out of the business, but none of them were interested. They didn’t see any other life for themselves.” She sighed and shook her head, reexperiencing the confusion and frustration she’d felt at the time. “Not one of those women had wanted to be prostitutes. Each had dreamed of a husband and family, a happy life. They were, every one of them, forced into it, a few by circumstance, but most by the man they had called their “protector.” Once in that life, society considered them garbage, as if in a matter of moments they’d somehow changed and become less.”

  “As happened with you when Rome invaded Egypt, and you were no longer allowed to run a business,” he pointed out. “As if with the invasion, you had become less intelligent, or skilled, and were suddenly a child who needed a man to look out for her.”

  “I suppose,” Drina admitted. “Though, as I say, I didn’t see the correlation then. And I didn’t suddenly feel less with the invasion, but they all seemed to feel they were all now less or damaged.” She sighed. “Anyway, when Beth gave me her little talk, all I could do was reassure her that I wanted nothing and wouldn’t suddenly abandon them. But, of course, her experiences in life didn’t suggest that was likely. It didn’t for any of them, and they were afraid and frustrated because of it. In their minds, there was nothing to stop me from simply pulling up stakes and leaving at any time. They didn’t trust that I wouldn’t, and the possibility left them constantly terrified. Once I realized that, I agreed to their offer.”

  “To feed from them?”

  Drina nodded. “It turned out to be a good thing all the way around.”

  “How so?” he asked curiously.

  “The women had always been on edge, fluctuating between being overly nice and snapping at me and each other,” she began, and then paused and wrinkled her nose. “Frankly, it was a bloody cathouse at times. But once I agreed to feed from them, some sort of balance was restored. They felt everyone was getting something, so it would all be all right. They relaxed, the house gained a much more pleasant atmosphere, the women even became like family rather than fighting all the time. It was nice,” she said with a reminiscent smile. “And, of course, I didn’t have to hunt at night anymore, which was handy. Everyone was happy.”

  “Everyone?” Harper queried, and she chuckled at his wry expression.

  “Well, everyone but my family,” she admitted on a laugh.

  Harper nodded, not surprised. “I didn’t think your brother would be pleased to have his sister running a brothel.” He grinned and tilted his head, asking, “Did he call on Lucian for help with you again?”

  “Of course,” she said dryly. “
When his many letters and a personal visit to try to force me to sell the brothel and come home failed, Lucian was his next ploy. And Lucian even caught a ship and came all the way from the Americas, where he was living. He sailed into England to look into the matter.”

  “And?” Harper queried, leaning forward with interest.

  “He read me, read my girls, and then turned to Stephano and surprised us all by announcing that I was old enough to make my own decisions. I wasn’t doing anything wrong. He was proud of what I was doing for these women, and Stephano should be too, but whether he was or not, it was time he stopped interfering and let me be.” Drina lowered her head to hide the tears that had swum into her eyes at the memory.

  Bloody things, Drina thought. She didn’t know why the memory of Lucian’s approval made her teary. It was ridiculous really. She stilled when Harper covered her hand on the table and gave it a comforting squeeze.

  “He was right.”

  Drina smiled faintly, and then sighed with disappointment when he withdrew his hand and picked up the wine bottle to pour more of the pale liquid into both their glasses. Setting the now-empty bottle down, he then glanced around, relaxing when their waiter immediately appeared at the table.

  “So how long were you a madam?” Harper asked once the waiter had nodded to his request for more wine and slipped away.

  She picked up her glass and took a sip before answering. “Quite a while, actually. The women all knew what I was, so my not aging didn’t matter. I was never seen entering or leaving the brothel without a veil, and I didn’t stay there all the time. I had a big brawny fellow act as bodyguard for the women on occasion so I could travel, and when I traveled, no one knew I was a madam.” She shrugged. “Of course, as time passed, some of the girls left, either to marry, or to work a respectable job. One or two saved every penny they made and set out to start their own business, but Beth, Mary, and several others worked until they got too old. Then I shut the doors and bought another, smaller, house, which I turned into a retirement home for the half dozen who remained.