Midnight Rose

by Shelby Reed

“I’ll let you go to her, then,” she said drolly. “May I leave you with a final bit of advice?”

  “Why not?” He leaned his hip against the edge of his desk and rubbed a weary hand over his eyes.

  “Don’t take her to bed, Gid. I won’t be here to quench your thirst when the bloodlust rears its ugly head. And it will. I saw her face when you thought of her, felt the desire you harbor for her.” She let the inequitable truth hang in the air for his consideration, then made a kissing sound into the phone. “Keep your fangs to yourself, darling. Au revoir.”

  Chapter Eight

  The door behind Kate swung open on creaking hinges and she glanced over her shoulder to find Jude standing on the stoop in sweatpants, his face a maze of emotions in the dim light of the porch lamps.

  “How’d it go in the chat room?” she asked.

  He lifted one shoulder in a halting shrug. “Okay, I guess.”

  “Why don’t you sit out here and tell me about it?” Offering him a reassuring smile, she held her breath and waited. Three weeks had passed since she and Jude had found the Internet chat room at the blood disorders site. Her idea, of course, and his one chance to talk to other people with his illness. Yet he hung back from such a prospect, suspicious and unsure.

  It must be a frightening thought to give up thirteen years of solitude, Kate mused, watching as he stepped out into the humid night and sat down on the step beside her. Unfortunately, his father hadn’t helped. Gideon was an aggravating mixture of good intentions, overprotection and stubbornness.

  To Kate’s frustration, he’d forbidden Jude to participate, citing something about children cruising the Internet and finding trouble. She’d pleaded with him before he’d left last week for a horticulture conference in Denver. She promised to sit over Jude’s shoulder and monitor what he was reading in case he encountered any sinister characters online, but Gideon had reacted with swift obduracy.

  “I said no, damn it,” he’d barked, sending Kate from the library with cheeks flaming and a knot in her throat. Why wouldn’t he encourage Jude to break free from loneliness and isolation? Was he that complacent in his own discomfort? In his son’s?

  The sweet idea of rebellion against his father finally drove Jude to log onto the Porphyria website, Kate was certain. He’d shooed her from the room instead of allowing her to hover over him, and she’d allowed it, wondering how Gideon would react if he came back from his trip and somehow found out. Now, an hour after Jude’s chat session began, his father still wasn’t home. Maybe she and Jude wouldn’t be busted for their grand insurrection after all.

  “There were some older people there,” he said, resting his arms on his thighs and letting his fingers dangle between his knees. “Mostly parents of kids with PCT. But then these two kids came into the chat room. One girl was fifteen, and the other was eighteen.”

  “And did they tell you about themselves? Did their experiences sound like yours?”

  “Not exactly. Some of the things they go through are the same, like having their blood taken and all that. And they can’t go out in the sun. But they don’t take the same medicine I do.” He sighed, then a smile quirked the corner of his mouth and he glanced at her. “I told them I was eighteen.”

  “You little sneak.”

  “Dad thinks some pervert’s going to warp my brain if I go in the chat rooms. He’s such a dork. What pervert in his right mind would hang out in a chat room for people with a blood disease?”

  Kate laughed and rubbed an affectionate hand across his back. He was growing. His shoulders seemed wider and stronger. “Oh, Jude, you’d be surprised. It takes all kinds to make this world.”

  “Yeah. And Dad’s one of those dork kinds.”

  “You need to get over being mad at him,” she said gently. “I don’t know what’s going on between you, but I think it deeply bothers your dad.”

  “Good.” Jude obviously meant to sound satisfied, but the furrow between his brows spoke of regret. When he turned his head to meet her gaze in the entry light glow, his eyes were blacker than the darkness blanketing the sky. “He won’t marry you, you know.”

  It took a full minute for her astonishment to subside. Then she flashed him an arid smile and leaned back on her palms. “Well, that’s a relief. Silly me. All this time I thought your dad and I were engaged.”

  “I’m not kidding, Kate. You’re wasting your time to think he likes you. He doesn’t like anyone except my mom. And she’s dead, so he doesn’t want anyone. Not you, not anyone.”

  The insult stung her cheeks. “That’s a heck of a perception you have there, Mr. Renaud. Be real careful how you throw around your theories. Someone’s feelings might get hurt.”

  “Yours will if you keep messing around with him. He doesn’t care about his girlfriends. He won’t care about you.”

  “That’s a mean thing to say about him. I won’t have this conversation with you.”

  She stood, brushed the grit from the seat of her jeans and started for the front door before he shot back, “Because I’m a kid?”

  “No, because you’re sticking your nose somewhere it doesn’t belong.” She glared at him over her shoulder. “You have a vicious way with words, Jude. You know that?”

  “I know how you act with my dad,” he said sullenly. “You like him. It’s so obvious.”

  She lowered her voice, tried to control her indignation. “I don’t want to fight with you. Your father and I are friends. You and I are friends, even if you don’t always think so. I speak to you with respect. You owe me the same.”

  He glanced at her and the amber light shone on the angry tears clinging to his lashes. The intensity of his emotion surprised her. What had triggered his outburst? Certainly not jealousy. The thought made her wince. A student-teacher crush? She’d experienced it often enough to recognize such a phenomenon, but this didn’t seem typical. Certainly she and Jude had developed an immediate and powerful bond, and she hadn’t stopped to question its appropriateness until now.

  Had she gotten too close to him, treated him too much like a peer instead of a student? It was nearly impossible to see him as an adolescent; he was too perceptive and worldly. And the light that shone behind his eyes…like everything else at Sister Oaks, it was inexplicably soulful and sensual and magnetic.

  But he was a child. And suddenly she felt sick from uneasiness. Nothing was what it should be in this place.

  Leave, whispered the distant voice of common sense.

  Before she could offer some sort of comment to break the tension between them and ease her own discomfort, headlights flashed through the trees at the end of the long, narrow drive.

  Jude squinted at the oncoming car, while Kate stood frozen behind him, attention glued to the headlights approaching like two icy, staring eyes. It wasn’t Gideon’s Audi. Inexplicably her pulse accelerated and a sick dread lumped in her stomach.

  “No one ever comes out here,” Jude said. “I wonder what they want.”

  “Maybe they’re tourists.” She descended the steps down to the driveway and watched as the dark sedan followed the circular drive around the wide loop.

  “It’s not a tourist,” Jude said abruptly.

  “How do you know?”

  “I just know.” His hushed words raised the wispy hairs at the back of her neck. “I can feel it.”

  * * * * *

  Gideon hesitated at the foot of the kitchen stairs, listening to the rise and fall of laughter coming from the sitting room above. Jakome’s voice floated down, low and warm. The answering voice, smoky and provocative, belonged to Delilah. Davide and Kate were up there, too.

  Before he’d even spotted the black Mercedes parked in front of the mansion, Gideon had sensed his old friends. He’d felt their presence the moment he’d passed under the canopy of trees marking Sister Oaks’ property. Invasive, threatening, and undeniably thrilling. They were his people, his kind. Once upon a time he’d found his darkest self within their circle, and then lost his identity in the shadow
of their mutual sins.

  Now they were in his home, and he knew how they’d found him after all these years. Delilah, damn her hide, hadn’t taken “no” for an answer.

  Setting aside his attaché and garment bag, he loosened his tie and slowly climbed the stairs, blood rushing through his veins in automatic reaction to the female warmth of Kate’s presence mixed with the sultry scent of Delilah’s skin. He didn’t want Delilah in his house, in his thoughts, in his life. But the aberrant creature within him responded to her proximity as though he hadn’t fed in months. His need was further exacerbated by his human desire for Kate, and he braced himself for the sight of her as he reached the top of the stairs.

  She sat on the camelback sofa, surrounded by vampires, innocent and unwitting and accepting. Playing hostess to an assembly of monsters.

  Urgency grabbed at Gideon and he squelched the compulsion to whisk her away. She needed more than protection from the trio who regarded her with benign fascination. She needed protection from him. For tonight he could banish her upstairs, hide her away, but she wouldn’t understand the rejection, and he wouldn’t be able to explain it.

  He couldn’t sense the thoughts of the others as they lounged in conversation with her. He imagined, however, that Jakome found her desirable, because Jakome sought beauty the way a collector coveted fine art. Davide probably regarded her with cool distance. Blond and Nordic in heritage, he’d always preferred exotic, dark-skinned victims; Kate’s features were too clean-scrubbed and wholesome to suit his taste.

  And Delilah…her sapphire eyes watched Kate the way a sleepy cat inspects a sweet, golden canary before it pounces.

  Still, they were under his roof now, the boundary where their dark world ended and his separate, peaceable existence began. How it might affect their power, he didn’t know. He could only hope their intentions were as benign as the threesome themselves appeared.

  As though sensing his arrival, Delilah turned and locked gazes with him over her shoulder. “Gideon, darling. Surprised?”

  “Completely.” Affecting an unruffled demeanor, he crossed the rug and grasped her cool fingers, bending to drop a perfunctory kiss on her cheek. “I wondered who the Mercedes belonged to.”

  “I’m certain you guessed.” She brushed her nails along his arm. “If Mohammed won’t come to the mountain…”

  “Say no more. I underestimate you on a constant basis.” They shared a long, narrowed look. Then straightening, he faced the two men who’d stood to greet him.

  “How are you, Davide?” An unexpected surge of gladness tightened his chest as he reached to clasp his old acquaintance’s hand.

  Davide smiled, his cool, arid manner unchanged after almost fifty years. “I get by. I was beginning to think you dead and gone, Gid.”

  “Me? Never.” An ironic grin crossed Gideon’s lips as his uneasiness began to thaw. It almost felt good to see his old cohorts again. They remained, as ever, unchanged, and the nightwalker in him felt enveloped in familiarity.

  His gaze drifted to the ruddy, dark-haired Basque standing beside Davide, and the instant warmth of nostalgia and regret silenced his smooth acknowledgment. All he could say was, “Jakome.”

  “Gideon.” The two men clasped hands, and then Jakome uttered a curse and enfolded him in a full-fledged embrace. “My friend,” he whispered against his ear, “Too much time has passed.”

  A stroke of luck has reunited us, Gideon responded telepathically. Let nothing shatter the pleasure of this visit.

  When Jakome withdrew, he glanced at Kate, then back at his friend with a nod of understanding.

  Gideon finally turned his attention to Kate, who sat slightly removed from the group. He sensed her hesitancy and enthrallment. These people were not like any she’d met before…for good reason.

  “How was Denver?” she asked, a pleasant flush coloring her cheeks.

  “It was fine. A good conference.” He resisted the desire to brush an errant strand of hair from her cheek. “Where’s Jude?”

  “He was already in his pajamas when your friends arrived. I sent him up to get dressed.” She stood and smoothed the T-shirt she wore, and he noted for the first time that her hair was pulled back from her face in a wispy ponytail, her features clean and untouched by cosmetics. Self-consciousness radiated from her, probably due to the simple fact that she wore jeans and sneakers amidst the trio attired in haute couture.

  “If I’d known you were expecting guests,” she added ruefully, “I would’ve dressed more appropriately myself.”

  “You could wear a potato sack and be utterly delectable,” Delilah purred.

  Gideon shot the blonde a warning glance. “You’re fine, Kate. Has the night staff left for the evening?”

  “Yes. Martha went home just before your friends arrived and Betty closed the kitchen at seven, but I’m happy to whip up something if you’re hungry.”

  “Oh?” Delilah wiggled against the down-stuffed cushions and flashed Kate a lazy smile, her white lace halter gaping dangerously between her breasts. “What’s on the menu? I’m in the mood for something sweet.”

  “Don’t worry about us—we snacked before we came.” Davide’s ever-present charm came to the rescue, an appeasing distraction when Gideon wanted to throttle Delilah where she sat. “We always take care of ourselves when traveling, Ms. O’Brien.”

  Danger draped the atmosphere. Gideon smelled it and glanced around at his visitors. “How long will you stay?”

  “Just the night,” Davide said, much to his relief.

  “Why don’t we have a drink, then?”

  “Perfect.” Delilah withdrew a pack of cigarettes from her purse. “We come bearing a gift, Gid. A bottle of the most exquisite and finely aged red.”

  “I brought it from France,” Davide said. “Later, I’ll tell you about its source. I procured it from the most brilliant vintner after relentless persuasion.”

  Gideon’s eyebrows shot up. “You? Relentless?”

  Laughter rose into the heavy wooden rafters high above their heads.

  “I’ve missed your dry wit,” Davide said, his smile just barely exposing the even edge of his teeth.

  The flick of Jakome’s lighter illuminated Delilah’s porcelain features as she leaned in and cupped her hand around the flame. “Will you partake from Davide’s rare libation, Gideon?” she asked, releasing a wisp of smoke between her full lips. “Or are you teetotaling these days?”

  “Depends on my mood,” he said smoothly. “But tonight I’m sure I can be persuaded. The bar’s this way.”

  As they walked through the foyer, Jakome glanced up at the massive chandelier. “My God, Gideon. You’ve lived in some fancy places, but this wins the prize for glaring grandiosity.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.” He paused and glanced back at Kate, who had stopped at the staircase as though to leave the group. “Where are you going?”

  “To change.”

  “And then you’ll rejoin us.” He wanted her glued to his side for the duration of his friends’ visit.

  For a moment she looked surprised by the firmness in his tone, then a flicker of humor sparkled in her eyes. “Yes, boss.”

  “Says Jane Eyre to Mr. Rochester,” Delilah murmured. “Are you aware of how provocative a situation you two share? The governess and the master of the house. So…classically naughty.”

  Kate’s brows lowered, her thoughts written across her features in splotches of crimson. She might be innocent compared to Delilah, but she seemed to know she was being baited. Fortunately she chose not to bite back and glanced away from the other woman’s mocking smile. “You know, I could just keep Jude company upstairs while you visit, Gideon. It’s already after nine, and—”

  Jakome waved a hand. “Oh, fetch the boy. We won’t keep him up past his bedtime. I’m anxious to talk to him, if only for a few minutes.”

  “We all are,” Davide added.

  Gideon watched the faces of his friends, suspicious of their enthusiasm toward
his son. Already he knew that Delilah would love to get her hands on Jude and guide him into the world of shadows that was his heritage. Hiding the boy away upstairs might only pique their dubious interest.

  “Ask him to come down for a little while,” he told Kate. “I want you both to visit with us.”

  The uncertainty dancing across her features wrung his heart. She felt drawn to his enigmatic visitors, he knew. The pull of immortality on a mortal’s subconscious was like a hapless fly to a spider’s sticky web. He also recognized her apprehension, knew she didn’t understand it, and that it wasn’t the first time she’d felt the kiss of darkness at Sister Oaks.

  He couldn’t protect her from it, but he could keep her close to his side, away from Delilah’s seductive and treacherous intent.

  Delilah had come to see the mortal who’d won Gideon’s heart, to measure Kate’s vulnerability, to toy with her humanity. Tonight, Kate’s strength of spirit might well be put to the test…and his own, too.

  * * * * *

  “Those people are completely freaky,” Jude said, thumbs frantically pumping the game’s control buttons as he focused on the television, where a computer-animated mortal slashed his way through a mansion filled with ghouls. “They just showed up out of nowhere. Don’t you think that’s a little weird?”

  “It’s not my place to judge.” Kate stood over him, staring at the game with increasing aggravation. “Come on, Jude. I sent you up here to change and you’re still in your sweats. Just throw on a T-shirt and jeans and come down for a little while. I’ll fix you hot chocolate. You can drink it in the billiard room with them and then escape back to your video game bloodfest.” She hesitated. “Please?”

  With a sigh, he paused the game, set aside the hand control, and got to his feet. Instantly Kate startled. When had he gotten so tall? He stood nearly nose-to-nose with her, where before she’d distinctly remembered him reaching her chin. Adolescent growth spurts were unpredictable certainly, and Jude seemed to be developing faster than most thirteen-year-olds she knew, but three inches in a month?