Blood Rights

‘How are they going to know what you’re wearing?’

‘Because the Primoris Domus is the first stop I must make.’ Chrysabelle leaned against this wall. This was not going well.

Fi grimaced. ‘I had no idea. I don’t want you to get into trouble. Especially after everything your blood has done for me. Let me go see if there’s anything on the plane. Maybe Dominic has something.’

‘Thank you, that would be wonderful.’ Chrysabelle smiled as a small weight lifted off her.

‘Right back.’ Fi headed out, shutting the door behind her. She returned a few minutes later, her expression dour. ‘I’m sorry. All Dominic has is a dark gray suit.’

Chrysabelle nodded. ‘Thanks for checking. I guess these will have to do.’

Fi left and Chrysabelle surveyed the pile of unacceptable clothes, hands on her hips. She had no choice but to wear them. There was no time or place to get anything else. Apprehension worried her shore of confidence.

Resigned, she shoved the clothes to one side, then opened her personal bag and extracted the white zippered pouch that held her body armor. The pouch was slightly larger than the palm of her hand, but twice as thick. She unzipped it and shook the precious contents onto the counter. The whisper-thin silver mesh body suit slipped out, light as a promise and far stronger.

A few minutes and some carefully practiced moves later, the suit covered her from just beneath her jaw to her ankles and wrists. It fit as closely as a layer of paint, except that it breathed and moved like a second skin and had the durability of steel and holy magic. She’d worn it before, to practice putting it on and taking it off and to accustom herself to fighting in it, but this time its ability to save her life might be tested.

If Madame Rennata didn’t rip it off her for letting it show beneath her clothes. The comarré body armor was a closely guarded secret. Or had been, until now. Chrysabelle sighed. She would do her best to explain, but what did it matter? She’d already revealed secrets to Mal she shouldn’t have. Told him about the training. Maybe Madame Rennata wouldn’t care. Maybe Chrysabelle shouldn’t care. She had to break from those rules sometime, didn’t she? She sighed. To just stop being a comarré was nigh impossible when it was the only life she’d known for a hundred and fifteen years.

Of course, if Tatiana succeeded in breaking the covenant, the time might come for the true purpose of the comarré to be revealed to all. The world would need someone to stand up against the vampire nation, to protect human life. Who better than those warriors already embedded behind enemy walls?

Just because she’d chosen to leave that life behind didn’t mean she couldn’t be counted on when the call came.

Even if she had let him kiss her. Twice.

That second kiss … no, none of that mattered. Not her past, not her future, just her present. Maris needed her to be brave and strong and ignore all else. If Mal could endure losing his child, surely Chrysabelle could suffer the smaller slings and arrows. With that thought on repeat, she reluctantly began to dress.

Chapter Twenty-seven

For the first few moments, none of them said a word. Mal, like the rest of them, just stared at her. At what she was wearing. Chrysabelle had emerged from the bathroom and now stood in front of them, looking slightly disconcerted and very … un-Chrysabelle.

He finally found his voice. ‘I … That’s … Huh.’ No, he had nothing. Just the usual noise in his head. Her new look defied immediate description.

Her jaw tightened. ‘No comments, please. It is what it is.’

The rest of them nodded. Doc held his hands up in some kind of surrender. Only Fi spoke, her tone overly bright. ‘I think you look awesome.’

‘Thank you.’ And with that, Chrysabelle pushed through the group and went back to where she and Mal had been sitting, tossing the coat over her arm onto the seats. Mal followed, but hung back a little. She popped the overhead bin and threw the shopping bags inside, then set her personal bag on the seat, opened it, and started extracting weapons and slipping them into her outfit.

And what an outfit it was.

A fine silver mesh, almost like body glitter, encased all visible skin except her hands and head. What the mesh was exactly, he couldn’t tell, but then fashion was Fi’s thing, not his. Black leather enveloped the rest of Chrysabelle.

Black. Leather. The contrast between that and her signum was startling. She was sun and shadow, day and night. Good. And evil. The voices howled in agreement.

Over a white tank top, a snug vest cinched her trim waist. The pants that hugged her legs laced up the back like an old-fashioned corset. The image was not an unpleasant one. Looking at her like this, covered and yet somehow totally revealed, he’d never realized how much lean muscle she carried. The time she’d walked into the gym nearly naked, he’d been a little too overwhelmed by the startling amount of signum and bare skin on display to take in that detail.

Perhaps that was why she favored the loose tunic and wide pants, to hide her athletic build. He started to wonder if the generally accepted idea of the comarré as some kind of vampire geisha wasn’t actually a misconception the comarré themselves perpetuated. As a cover story went, it was a good one, except geisha weren’t trained to kill the men they entertained.

He walked up beside her as she tucked the Golgotha blade beneath the lacing on the back of her pants. ‘It’s not as bad as you think.’

‘You have no idea.’ She strapped on the sword across her body, adjusting the strap to fall between her breasts, now clearly delineated by the vest’s uplifting abilities.