by Bec McMaster
Any blue blood who reached craving virus levels of 70 percent or higher was to be reported to the authorities as standing on the edge of the Fade, that moment in time when the color began to bleach from their bodies in preparation for the transformation into a vampire.
Yet, it was only in recent years they'd discovered there was one more way for a blue blood to evolve.
The Falkirk project had been kept quiet. Meddling with blue bloods almost on the verge of becoming vampires? The human classes would have rioted.
So Falkirk burned, all the records within it were lost, and it was only in the past year, with dhampir surfacing out of the dregs of myth, that Malloryn began to find traces of information about the project.
There was no way of telling how many dhampir were arrayed against them.
Gemma needed that information.
Suddenly, escape was not the first thought in her mind. Could she do some good here? Could she gain Obsidian's trust? Learn more about who COR faced?
"Ghost is your fellow dhampir, is he not?" she continued, as Obsidian shot her a sharp look. "And he knows about me." She paused. "He knows about Russia, and what lay between us."
And he had warned Obsidian away from her.
"He's the one who sent that dhampir to kill me, isn't he?"
The muscle in Obsidian's jaw flexed. "You're not going to gain anything else from me, Miss Townsend."
Oh, I already have.
"I never realized why your hair was so pale in Russia. I thought it your natural coloring, or perhaps you were close to the Fade. We had no inkling then, of dhampir. You were at Falkirk, weren't you?"
A flinch.
"Or was it the Russian court who experimented upon you?" No flinch. "No. You were born Russian, I suspect, but you were experimented upon here. When did you arrive in England? Were you a blue blood before you were sent to Falkirk? You had to be. According to the Duke of Caine's records on the facility, only blue bloods were interred there—"
"Do you want this, or not?" His hand clutched tight around the flask, knuckles splayed white.
Struck a nerve, by the look of it. "I'm only curious," Gemma protested, uncrossing her legs from where she sat on the marble slab and pushing to her feet. "There's not a great deal to do to pass the time, apart from think. You can only blame yourself for not providing adequate entertainment. I'm curious about you."
And she couldn't help thinking about the past.
Her feelings... had been real, had they not? But how could her love have existed when he'd been a virtual stranger? She knew nothing about him, nor he her. Only a bunch of carefully concocted lies the pair of them wove as they danced about each other.
It made a mockery of what they'd shared.
I loved a man who didn't exist.
"Don't be." He withdrew the flask as she reached for it, and Gemma's eyes narrowed.
Slowly, he let her take it.
"Drink," he commanded abruptly. "Then turn around and place your hands behind you."
Gemma unscrewed the flask with greedy hands, tipping it to her lips. She preferred to take her blood in her cup of hot tea, or laced into her wine, but beggars couldn't be choosers. The second it hit her throat, the hunger exploded through her, flaming through her veins like a fuse racing toward a stick of dynamite. Fatigue sloughed away from her, and the constant bone-deep chill vanished.
She gulped down half the flask before she realized he was watching her.
"You've been starving me," she pointed out, patting the blood from her lips. "This is hardly the situation for etiquette."
One did not gulp one's blood as if one was an animal. It was meant to be sipped and savored, to prove you had complete control over the violence of your hunger. Especially when one was a woman and prone to "hysterics" and hence had more to prove when it came to controlling oneself.
But right then, she didn’t care.
"Are you done?" he murmured, holding out a thin rope.
And Gemma remembered the other part of his request. She lowered the flask, then set if on the floor and slowly turned around, forcing her wrists together. She needed to gain his trust.
She wasn’t sure if he had hers.
"Where are you taking me?"
"Somewhere you requested," Obsidian said softly, tugging the ropes around her wrists tight.
"Is that...." Gemma's jaw dropped as Obsidian pushed her through the door into a tiled room. "A bath."
Steam curled off the elegant bath in the center of the wash chamber. Bubbles popped on the surface, and though the room held the chill of autumn, the scent of lavender filled the damp air. A single candle burned on the vanity.
"I was forced to fix the boiler," he said, "but the tap still works."
He'd done more than merely fix the boiler. The room was swept clean, though dust was piled in the corner. From the state of the rest of the dying manor, she suspected he'd cleaned the bath too.
"Thank you." Gemma glanced at him from beneath her lashes. "You found soap."
"As requested." A blank, blank face. "There is also a clean gown and undergarments on the vanity, though the sizing may not be quite right."
What was going on here? She didn't think it a kindness. No, he wanted something.
Was this the plan all along? Capture her, soften her, then... learn something from her? She still didn't know why he'd taken her.
Or....
"Are you planning on watching?"
Hard hands spun her around, tugging the knot of the rope free. "Would you enjoy that?"
"I'm not entirely certain I've forgiven you for earlier." She realized she was staring at the bath. "Though I suspect I could work up to it."
A lot of things could be forgiven for hot water and soap.
"Don't try anything. I'm not going anywhere," he said, as she rubbed at her wrists. "Don't waste your time. You have twenty minutes."
Then he turned back to the door and gave her his back, as if to prove he had no damned intentions of watching at all.
Gemma cleared her throat. "There is one slight problem."
Long strands of brown hair brushed his collar as he turned his face in profile. Though he clearly dyed it, there was a faint ashen color leaching through, as if the silver blond sought to reassert itself. "Miss Townsend," he warned.
"I have a friend to assist me at the safe house." Sweeping her tangled black hair over her shoulder, she turned around, presenting the problem to him. "Consider yourself lucky you are not a woman and can dress yourself. I cannot unlace my corset without assistance."
"I swear to God, Gemma." His voice came out hard, and a little part of thrilled at the sound of her name on his lips.
Or the name she was currently using.
"It's not a trick," she shot over her shoulder. "Have you ever tried to wear one of these infernal contraptions? And it isn't as if you had any compunction about stripping me out of my dress the other night. Unless, of course, now you suddenly do, hmm?"
"Fine." Drawing his knife, he jerked her around again.
Gemma flinched, glancing to see what he was doing. Obsidian sliced the ribbons apart along her spine, the corset gaping with an abrupt jerk.
Gemma caught it to her breasts, her pulse suddenly pounding. "That corset was pink velvet with seed pearls hand-stitched to it! It came from Emerson's!"
"It was ruined anyway."
She stared down in dismay. "It cost me an entire week's worth of wages!"
"Then perhaps the Duke of Malloryn should be paying you more. It's just an article of clothing. You can replace it."
He didn't understand. She'd spent her entire childhood dressed in a nondescript training outfit every other Falcon trainee wore. They'd called her cadet, and shaved her head for the first twelve years—all the better to prevent another student from gaining a crucial hold during their bouts. When she'd won her way free of the Falcons, Gemma had found herself fighting to find her identity. She was the one who chose her gowns now, silks and velvets and frivolous undergarmen
ts that clung like a second skin. Decadent colors she'd never been allowed to wear; gorgeous boots she'd spent a small fortune upon. As a spy, there was little she could own that held any value, and no point in collecting items of a personal nature just in case she had to flee if her cover was broken and leave them behind. Her wardrobe was the one aspect of her life she could control, that could remind her of who she was now.
It was as much a part of the construction of Gemma Townsend as her devious little mind.
But how could she even explain such a thing to him?
"Warn me next time," she told him, a little breathlessly. He had not so much as marked her skin. "I almost reacted to the knife."
Flipping the blade into his fingers, Obsidian gave her a slow, heated look as he sheathed it at his hip. "You'll never get it off me, so don't give me that look."
Gemma shot him a devastating smile as she turned to face him. "I wouldn't dream of it."
She let the corset go and it fluttered to the ground, taking his gaze with it. Knowing when she didn't need to speak to make her point, she turned and slinked her way toward the steaming bath, her fingers tucking under the hem of her shift.
A pause.
A glance over her shoulder.
Obsidian's eyes met hers, flashing black with the hunger, before he turned and very pointedly gave her his back. "Be swift."
Like hell. She'd earned her bath.
Stripping the shift up her body, Gemma made good use of the movements, knowing he'd hear every last rustle of fabric. The imagination was a powerful weapon. Her drawers hit the floor. Finally she was bare, except for her stockings, and as she peeled the last one down her leg, she balled it up and threw it at his back.
Obsidian reacted as if he'd been shot, but Gemma had turned away and stepped into the bath by then, not caring whether he watched or not.
Hot. Water.
Soap.
Bubbles.
Oh, God. She sank up to her throat in the heat, moaning a little. "You have no idea how good this feels."
Was it her imagination, or were his shoulders a little stiffer?
All her frustration swept away as Gemma made good use of the soap, slicking it across her arms and down her breasts. Delving it between her thighs. Down her legs. Water splashed and dripped on the floor. A mischievous mood afflicted her, and she tossed a handful of it in his direction.
Obsidian shot her a glare as it splashed against his legs, and Gemma bit her lip, catching the flash of his glance across her bubble-coated breasts.
"It's safe to look," she taunted. "Unless you wish to keep trying to pretend you don't want to? It's all right, Obsidian. I'll keep your little secret."
"Enjoy it. It's going to be the last bath you get." A rough, heavy sentence, almost growled out.
"Do you think you could wash my back?" She cupped the soap and glanced up at him from beneath her lashes.
Then she couldn't help herself. Laughter burst from her at the expression on his face: one part murder; one part frustration; and two parts pure, unadulterated hunger.
"Were you always this frustrating?"
"Most likely." She let her gaze rove over the broad planes of his shoulders. Goodness, the man could fill out a coat nicely. "Were you always this cool and controlled? You're not the man I remember, but then... that could always have been an act."
"I wasn't the one acting."
"No? Do you know what I think?" She lifted one of her legs and rested her heel on the edge of the bath. "You say I'm the actress, but I never chased you, Obsidian. Sergey was my target. Not you. And every damned time I got close to him, you would appear and intercept me, and I did my best to drive you away. That wasn't an act. I never tried to pretend to be anything to you, because I never had to. You were the one who was charming and reckless. You challenged me constantly. And yet, here you are, and none of that remains." She flicked water in his direction. "It makes me wonder... just who was fooling who?"
He'd laced his arms over his chest. "Perhaps I was charming. Perhaps I had a reason, back then."
"Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps," Gemma growled, smashing her fist into the water. "Can you not ever grant me a straight answer?"
He stared at the wall for so long, she had to look to see if he'd heard her.
"I don't know."
"Was I that insignificant?" She lay back in the cooling water. "Could you not be bothered remembering me?"
Obsidian had crossed to the vanity, examining the old vial of perfumed oil there. "No. I don't remember."
It took her breath. Gemma sat up, sloshing water everywhere. That's not the way I remember it, he'd said yesterday. "What do you mean?"
"I have very little recollection of Russia," he said in that silken-soft voice that stirred through her. He set the vial down. "I didn't remember shooting you until you mentioned it. All I remember is the fire. Kissing you. Once. Flashes of the first time we met. You were an enemy spy who seduced me. You tried to kill me."
She didn't know what to say.
"I didn't try to kill you," Gemma whispered. "I had nothing to do with the fire, I swear. By the time I slipped from your bed you were fast asleep, but I didn't think it unusual. And then it was hours later when the outcry went up. My chambers were right next to Malloryn's at the other end of the house. We shuffled out into the snow, and when I realized your end of the house was aflame, I tried to find you but you were gone."
"You're lying."
For the first time she gained the impression he wasn't saying it to her.
"Your cover had been blown. Malloryn discovered you were working for Balfour, and warned me to stay away from you. The next time I saw you it was night," Gemma continued. "I was walking home from a friend's. I'd been trying to find word of what happened to you, and Malloryn caught me. He was lecturing me when you appeared out of nowhere." She saw it all over again. Dmitri stalking toward her through the snowy night. The burst of relief she'd felt when she realized he was alive. Unharmed. Malloryn calling out to her from behind, "Damn it, Hollis, get out of the way!"
"No!" she'd cried, throwing her arms wide, so Malloryn couldn't take the shot.
"I ran toward you, but it was as if it wasn't you at all. You looked at me so coldly. It felt so wrong. And I slowed to a halt right in the middle of the bridge, alerted by some instinct. And that's when you shot me."
The slam of a weight into her chest, as if she'd been hit by a freight train. Tumbling backward over the bridge, and smashing straight through the ice. Cold. So very, very cold.
Gemma rubbed at her chest, and the faint scar there where it still sometimes ached.
"When I woke I was on an airship, being evacuated to England. Malloryn saw everything happen, and he'd dived into the river and hauled me out. My lung was pierced, and he was forced to give me his blood to survive, thus infecting me.
"I heard about the explosion while aboard. I didn't... I didn't know what to think. I thought you were dead, and a part of me was so angry at you, because I'd loved you, and you'd tried to kill me. But I didn't want you to die."
Obsidian cocked his head, as if he were trying to pick through her story. "Why would I believe you?"
"The question you should be asking yourself is why did you think I tried to kill you? If you cannot remember what happened in Saint Petersburg, then someone had to have told you. Do you trust their version of events? Or do you trust mine? What reason would I have to lie to you?"
Obsidian stared at her flatly.
Then he pulled his pocket watch out of his waistcoat and examined the time. "Your twenty minutes is over. I'll leave you to get dressed."
Then he was gone, and Gemma didn't know what to think.
10
What reason would I have to lie to you?
Damn her. The words played over and over in Obsidian's head, twisting and warping his memories until he could almost smell the smoke curling off the pistol in his hand, and see Gemma's eyes widen in shock.
I shot her. She's not lying about that.
But why? Why did I do it?
Why can't I remember?
He couldn't afford to let any of his turmoil show. Not right now with both Dr. Richter and Ghost watching him like a pack of hounds circling an injured calf.
"Tell me," Dr. Richter said, picking up one of his infernal notebooks. "Have you been suffering from any strange dreams or... recollections that might seem like memories?"
Obsidian hadn't been able to avoid this assessment session. Ghost insisted, the message had said, and he'd come here directly, his fist still crumpled around the scroll of paper one of the acolyte's had given him when they tracked him down near the tower.
"Memories?" Obsidian's heart kicked hard, and the doctor glanced at the machine on the counter as the arrow on the pendulum ticked, just faintly. Obsidian eased out a breath, his chest straining against the leather straps that bound him to the chair. "No. Should I?"
He lied as easily as he breathed. He hadn't been able to, once. He remembered that. But now he knew all the little quirks they'd be looking for. The right words to say.
Richter examined his dissimuler device, examining the counterweights. The faintest pressure could set the pendulum moving; a sign of a swift intake of breath, a rapid shift of his heart rate, or muscular tension. The doctor claimed it could help discern a man's truth.
But he'd managed to outwit it years ago.
Obsidian stayed as still as a cobra about to strike, forcing his heart to still to a slow, steady beat. His body held the silence of a sniper taking a breath before he peered through his rifle and pulled the trigger. He let all of his inner turmoil—his thoughts—wash out of him, leaving nothing behind except for a sudden, intense clarity.
"Hollis Beechworth. Do you recognize this name?"
"She tried to kill me," he said, by rote.
"Very good." The doctor made a notation in his notebook. "And Gemma Townsend? What does this name mean to you?"
"One of Malloryn's spies. She was once Hollis Beechworth. She seduced me, then tried to kill me in Russia."
