Chapter Twelve
Several hours later, Wyland sat at his desk, sipping his second cup of coffee. The bright midday sun streaming through the UV-filtering windows felt luxurious against his skin. This must be what it feels like to laze on a beach in San Tropez. He indulged himself in sensation until a soft chime announced the arrival of more email. With a sigh, he set the mug down. Opening his top desk drawer, ignoring Tia’s ring lying inside, he grabbed the reading glasses he’d just put away.
Across the room, she still slept, her head and body buried in an avalanche of blankets. The covers couldn’t hide her stunning curves—curves he’d explored with exacting attention to detail. When the hospital had called, waking him but not her, he’d been reluctant to answer, not wanting to extricate himself from her strong, clinging limbs. At the memory, his penis gave an enthusiastic lurch—which he ruthlessly ignored.
He had to ignore it, because he wanted to crawl back into bed with her too damn badly.
E-mail could wait. Perching the damned readers on his nose, he rolled his office chair more squarely into the knee well, and reached for the thick envelope that hadn’t been there yesterday. Heavy ivory parchment sealed with red wax, and undoubtedly hand-delivered, Lyudmila’s ornate handwriting rivaled that of any professional calligrapher. He broke the seal, extracted the invitation, and read. He was cordially invited to a gathering at the Lake Minnetonka home of Lyudmila and Stanton, et cetera, et cetera, and so forth. He squinted at the tiny letters engraved at the bottom left of the invitation. Black tie, the first week of September.
Labor Day was almost here. Where had the summer gone?
He’d have to attend; Lyudmila, Stanton, and their daughter were his. On the positive side, going to the party would give him an opportunity to observe Mila in a non-medical setting. He sorted through the layers of card stock and translucent vellum, found the RSVP card, replied Yes, and sealed his response in the envelope which was provided. Picking up his phone, he updated his calendar.
Would Tia attend? He glanced at the messy mound of clothes still lying on the floor—the thong, the shorts, the well-worn concert T-shirt she’d stripped off and so carelessly dropped—and tried to imagine her wearing a formal gown, or a dress that was in any way appropriate for the occasion. Such a dress wouldn’t quite come into focus, but he could visualize removing it.
Very, very slowly.
“Damn it,” he whispered. From the worn, accordion-pleated file folder that rarely left his desk, he withdrew a copy of the picture of him, Bram, and Deirdre, standing outside the Lyceum Theatre. Though the picture was black and white, Deirdre’s vivid green gown was seared into his memory. That night, he’d been proud as the proverbial peacock, so proud that she was with him. Proud of the covetous looks other men cast his way. Proud of the knowledge that, no matter how much of herself she gave her audience that night, he’d be the one to remove the dress when the night was over. Proud that she’d chosen him.
But, as it turned out, not him alone.
Tossing the picture to the desk, he turned to his email. With Halloween on the horizon, his digital alert had routed too many ads for costumes, fangs, coffins, and capes his way. He quickly deleted them so he could better assess the remaining emails, the ones whose contents might lead people to suspect that real vampires walked the earth, and had for several millennia.
There were two new journal entries on Renfield’s Syndrome, the psychiatric condition in which a patient developed an obsession with drinking blood, but it was the press release announcing a new reality show filming in Romania that drew his immediate attention. Though the Draculesti family had contributed nothing but their colorful last name to Bram’s legend, the poor family hadn’t been able to shake the Dracula association…an association he relentlessly, ruthlessly, and anonymously perpetuated whenever the opportunity arose. The fact that enterprising Romanian locals continued to make the most of the situation, turning Dracula lore and vampire myths into a thriving tourist industry, helped ease his conscience somewhat.
He went to the humans’ Wikipedia, to the entries that were the most powerful magnets for Dracula buffs, crypto-zoologists, cosmetic dentists, and conspiracy theorists. No one had updated either the Dracula or Draculesti pages within the last week, but Bram’s entry had been modified. He clicked through and skimmed the file he knew as well as he knew his own circulatory system. There, near the bottom, was a link to a new article on the Vlad Tepes/Dracula connection.
As he read, the oil slick in his stomach spread. Though the article had been published at a pop culture website rather than in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal, the author referenced material from Bram’s own research notes discounting the Draculesti family connection. “Damn it.” There was too much truth in the article for comfort, more accuracy than he could allow. He clicked on the edit button—
“What are you mumbling about?” Tia’s arms wrapped around his bare shoulders from behind. “Mmm,” she purred. “You’re all warm from the sun.”
A shiver went through him as she kissed her way from his shoulder to his neck, then up to his ear. He hadn’t heard her wake up, or even get out of bed.
She gestured to the laptop with her chin. “What are you doing?”
“Working.” He brought his lips to hers, as much to distract her as anything else. Maybe if he kept her occupied, she wouldn’t notice what—
“Bram Stoker’s Wikipedia page,” she said blandly. “Isn’t that interesting?”
He gave what he hoped was a casual shrug. “I like to monitor what’s going on in online vampire lore.”
“You’re not monitoring, you’re editing.” She paused. “You’re really good at that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, stop with the lawyerly dissembling already.” She gestured to the picture lying on the desk, the one he hadn’t put back in the file where it belonged. “You recently made significant changes to your own biography.”
He lifted a brow. “You question my right to do so?”
“Not at all.” Reaching over his shoulder, she grabbed his coffee cup and took a healthy swig. Her bare breasts flattened against his upper back. “I’m more interested in why.” Setting down the cup, she picked up the picture. “Deirdre d’Amour.” Her tone was as neutral as he’d ever heard. “She’s very beautiful.”
She was right. Being on the receiving end of such dissembling was maddening. “How do you know her name?”
“Wyland, I’m an investigative journalist who just got access to the Archives. The first thing I did was pull your bio, all the Council Members’ bios, and make local copies for my research notes.”
He should have left well enough alone.
“Tell me about Bram. About her.”
Her boundaries were wide open. He sensed no jealousy—she was honestly interested—but talking to his current lover about a former lover was very poor form. “Bram and I were friends for a time.” Until Bram revealed he was writing a vampire story, which was too much of a coincidence.
“It’s so cool that you know the man who wrote Dracula,” she enthused. “This picture was taken at the Lyceum Theatre?”
He nodded. “Bram was the theatre’s business manager. Miss d’Amour was an actress.”
“And your lover, of course.” Reaching over his shoulder, Tia stroked his photographed face with her turquoise fingertip. “I can see why you’d choose her. Vampire, right? She’s absolutely gorgeous.”
“As are you.” Actually, the two women shared distinct physical similarities. Deirdre would have coveted Tia’s multi-colored eyes and Crayola-tipped hair, but they were both redheads, with near-translucent, finely grained complexions. Deirdre had been taller, but the women had killer curves in common.
Apparently he had a type.
But had he chosen Deirdre, or had she targeted him? After he and Deirdre had become lovers, he’d practically abandoned his private estate, spending too much time, distracted, in her bed. He wasn’t the only man who’d done so.
“Why delete her information from your bio?” Tia asked quietly.
Because he hadn’t wanted her to learn that Deirdre had cheated on him. That he’d been so easily duped, tugged around by his privates. That he’d made such stupid, costly mistakes.
How interesting that, at his age, he could still discover new sources of shame.
“You know Bailey’s going to restore the file, right? After I tell her you deleted so much information? Because I’m definitely going to tell her.”
Despite their unexpected enmity at the meeting last night, the two women were becoming thick as thieves.
She shivered as the air conditioning came on with a mighty wheeze. “Let’s continue this discussion under the covers.” Before he quite knew what was going on, she picked up the coffee cup, took him by the hand, and led him back to the tumbled bed.
So easily led—again—but damn it, in bed with Tia Quinn was exactly where he wanted to be.
They propped the pillows against the headboard and settled in under the covers. She took a sip from the mug, then companionably handed it to him. “So, tell me, straight up. What’s your deal with Dracula?”
Her wide-open mind was a surprisingly comfortable place. He couldn’t perceive a single whiff of judgment. Accepting the mug, he sipped slowly, giving himself time to think.
He was actually considering it—actually considering whether to reveal the shameful secret he’d kept hidden for so long, even from Valerian. The air felt thin, as if he was standing naked on the summit of Everest. His next step, regardless of direction, would send him tumbling down the mountain.
Better she know now, before this went any further, exactly how fallible a leader—how fallible a man—he could be. “My carelessness gave Bram the idea for his book.”
She didn’t react. Didn’t say anything. Didn’t seem to notice that finally saying the words aloud had sent him into an emotional free-fall. Instead, she sat there with a distinct lack of expression on her face.
How…annoying.
The wind-up clock on the bedside table ticked away the seconds, stretching his nerves to the snapping point. Finally, he set the coffee mug on the bedside table. “Say something.”
She opened her mouth. Closed it, then opened it again. “You’re the inspiration for Dracula?”
Why did she sound delighted rather than aghast? Her pupils were dilated, and her fangs were— “No,” he snapped. “Deirdre and I spent a lot of time with Bram. Soon after making our acquaintance, he started writing his vampire book, a book that’s wildly popular to this day.” He pressed his lips together. “I wasn’t careful enough. He saw…something that put our people at risk.”
She tipped her head to the side, as if considering his words. Her shoulders suddenly lurched under his hands. Then, she laughed—a long, belly-clutching laugh that shook the bed. “Seriously?” she gasped out. “I’m sorry, but…really? This is your huge, existential burden?”
He stared at her. “I’m glad the exposure of our culture’s existence to humanity provides you with such amusement.”
“I’m sorry.” Another hiccup of laugher escaped. “Really.” She laid an apologetic hand on his arm. “But…are you serious?”
And here he’d thought her an intelligent woman. “My lack of vigilance might have been responsible for Bram’s book, a book whose popularity exposed our existence to the world.”
Tia shifted in the bed, looking at him directly. The blanket shifted, baring her beautiful, berry-tipped breasts to his gaze. “How do I put this politely?” She tapped her index finger against her lips, considering. “Sir, you’re tripping balls.”
He reared back.
“Though I shouldn’t be surprised,” she continued. “You have an oversized habit of taking responsibility for things that are completely out of your control.”
“What?”
“You heard me.” She rested her hand over his galloping heart. “It’s not like Bram invented vampires. Varney the Vampire was published at least fifty years before Dracula was.”
Exasperated, Wyland leaned back against the mound of pillows. Of course she was disagreeing with him; she did so for sport. But…she had a valid point—a very small point—about Varney. Bram’s own notes indicated he’d researched known vampire lore quite thoroughly, delving into regional superstitions, Eastern European history, and local folklore. Bram had heartily enjoyed gothic novels, reading them until they were ragged.
Had Bram simply wanted to write a vampire story?
No. The fact that Bram’s vampires so enthusiastically drank blood from their victim’s necks was too much of a coincidence. How many times had Bram seen him nibbling Deirdre’s neck? If he looked at that damned picture closely enough, he’d see barely-healed bite marks. His…intemperance had put his people at risk.
And by revealing so much of himself to Tia, he’d done the same thing.
He’d made a horrible mistake. Again. How many centuries would it take for him to learn his lesson?
The mattress shifted. “Wyland.” Before he realized her intention, she’d straddled him—all the better to look down at him with a severe expression he found oddly arousing. “Even if what you suspect about Bram’s inspiration is true—and I’m not saying it is—think about the outcome.”
How was he supposed to think when her breasts were shimmying mere inches from his mouth? When his blood supply was flowing away from his brain, pooling in his cock?
“The popularity of Bram’s book tipped vampires firmly into the fictional realm,” she explained. “You might actually have helped us preserve the secret of our existence.”
“That’s a mighty charitable interpretation.”
“But a potentially accurate one.” She shifted her weight, squirming against his stiffening cock. “Did you see the local media coverage about the Zombie Pub Crawl?”
He shook his head.
She slipped off his reading glasses, carefully folding the bows before setting them on the nightstand, then speared her fingers into his hair. “A couple of years ago, Minneapolis earned a Guinness World Record for the largest number of zombies gathered in a single place. We could do the same thing with vampires, and no one would think anything of it.” The fingers tightened. Tugged. “Wyland, vampires have saturated pop culture to such a degree that we could walk into the Mall of America with gaping bite wounds, our fangs dripping blood, and no one would look twice.”
His fangs tingled as he stared at her neck. The place where he’d bitten her earlier was completely smooth, fully healed. “Mall security certainly would.”
“Well, sure—but they’d think we were cos-players. Or weirdos.” She lowered her head. Nibbled at his earlobe with her sharp little teeth. “The possibility that we were real vampires would never cross their minds in a million years.”
“But—”
“Stop. Just stop beating yourself up. Not everything is your responsibility.” She dropped a kiss on his temple, right at the border where hair met skin. Her fingernails bit into his skull, sending delicious zings down his spine. “Not everything is your fault.”
She was dead wrong about the responsibility issue, but he could tell she believed what she was saying. It was the height of self-indulgence, but he wanted to believe her, just for a little while. To be the admirable, sensual man her thoughts reflected back at him.
Deirdre was dead. Bram was dead.
And damn it, they were alive.
Spearing his fingers into her hair, he tugged her head toward his. Their lips met in a silky tangle, clinging, changing to get another angle. She tasted of bold coffee, and even bolder desire. Her hips made maddening circles against his cock, scorching him through the thin fabric of his cotton workout pants.
Rising up on her knees, she pulled the drawstring at his waist. “Take these off.”
The wicked images in her mind… He’d barely worked the waistband over his hips when her lips enveloped his cock with hot, maddening suction.
“Bloody hell.” He closed his eyes, clenched his jaw, and let her drag him down.
“Wow.” Tia stepped into Wyland’s decadent shower enclosure and closed the tempered glass door behind her. Water fell in a soft rainforest patter from multiple shower heads, and down at the far end, a wide fixture spilled a tumbling foot-wide waterfall. “This isn’t a shower, it’s a water park.” Choosing the rainforest, she stood in the center of the stall, lifted her arms, and hummed as the water streamed down her body.
This sinful playground of a shower? The high thread count bedsheets? Wyland’s shiver of reaction as her hair brushed his bare abdomen, and how she’d found him luxuriating in a sunbeam, like a very satisfied cat? Wyland was a closet sensualist.
And his mental shields dropped, utterly and completely, when he had an orgasm.
Did he realize it? Deirdre d’Amour likely had, no doubt taking full advantage, the perilous, blood-sucking bitch. Tia didn’t know the full story yet, but she’d gotten the gist: Deirdre had cheated on him. Wyland’s sexual confidence, and his ability to trust, had taken cataclysmic hits. It was going to be her distinct pleasure to help build both back up again—not that his reaction to her wasn’t a damn healthy ego boost.
Watching his eyelashes flutter as he’d fed from her was one of the most beautiful things she’d ever seen.
Her previous lovers had almost all been creative types—musicians, chefs, novelists. It was one thing to watch Chadden putter around the kitchen nude as he whipped up a decadent dessert, or to hear a song a former lover had written played on the radio, but lust slithered through her just watching Wyland read. Those rectangular-framed reading glasses? Utterly modern, and absurdly hot.
Now that she and Wyland had been pulled into each other’s orbit, the attraction, like gravity, was undeniable. She’d explored every inch of the long, lean body he kept covered with his severely tailored clothes. She knew the salty tang of his skin. Knew the resilient give of his shoulder muscles as her fingernails dug in. She’d found a dozen places on that long, lean body that, when touched or stroked, made him squirm with pleasure.
Made him beg for more.
The water slid over her still-sensitive neck, where he’d pierced her skin with his long, sharp teeth. She’d known full well Wyland’s decision to drink from her was logical and self-serving. She was a risk he needed to manage, for himself and for the species he governed, and having even superficial access to her thoughts and emotions helped. Sure, she’d yearned—burned—for his bite, but she’d also wanted to ease his mind.
Cold air suddenly gusted. “Gah!”
“Hello.” Wyland stepped into the shower enclosure, surprising her. She would have bet serious cash money against him accepting the invitation to join her.
“Tia.”
“Yes?”
“Your singing voice is…”
She let the silence hang for a couple of beats, then burst into laughter. “It’s horrible, I know. I have the ability to assess a song for craft, and describe its merits to others, but I can’t carry a tune to save my life.” Reaching for the clever wall-mounted container holding body-cleaning products, she pumped shower gel into her hand. The subtle ice water scent—Wyland’s scent—turned her knees to noodles. Stiffening them, she rubbed her hands together to create a mound of foam. “I’m so damn jealous of Scarlett I could spit. Honestly, it’s a miracle we’re even friends.”
His lips quirked as he stepped under one of the shower heads.
She stared at his mouth, mesmerized. She could count how many times she’d seen him smile using the fingers of one hand.
He tipped his head back and stood under the water. The hot spray drenched and darkened his hair, slapping against his shoulders and sluicing down his frame. Her gaze followed the water as gravity dragged it down, down.
“We’ll never get out of this bathroom if you keep looking at me like that.” His voice was low and rough, and despite the steamy heat, his nipples stood out in sharp little points. His cock was at half-staff, and climbing.
She grasped it with her foam-covered hands. “And that’s a bad thing, why?”
A frustrated groan rumbled. “I have a meeting at Sebastiani Labs in less than two hours. It’s going to take me over half that time to drive there.”
The commute from Marine on St. Croix to Chanhassen was a haul and a half under the best of conditions. “Okay, I’ll take a rain check.” She innocently lathered her breasts.
Swearing under his breath, he reached for the shampoo. “What are your plans for the night?”
Biceps and triceps flexed as he worked the shampoo into his hair. The ice water scent sharpened, intensified. White lather drifted down the wet strands, fell to his shoulders, slipped down his chest—
“Tia? What are your plans for tonight?” he repeated.
With a blink, she dragged her gaze back to his face. “I have a story to write for ILQ. Then some paperwork, and some phone calls to make.” She had to start researching property records—who owned the suburban home-turned-sex-dungeon where Robert Johnson had been killed?—and she needed to return a call from one of her street contacts, who’d tipped her off to possible trafficking activity out of a motel in Maplewood. Scarlett had left a voice mail saying she going stir-crazy, that she wanted some company at Underbelly that night.
And her mother had left a message, asking whether she was attending a party that Lyudmila and Stanton were having over Labor Day weekend. She hadn’t seen an invitation yet, but of course she was going; the glamorous and powerful vampires were two of the foundation’s most generous patrons. She’d have to dress up. Network. Work the room.
A light film of guilt settled over. She hadn’t talked to her mom since she moved into Vamp Central. Her mother wouldn’t need a blood bond to know she and Wyland were lovers. The woman was shock-proof, but…what would she think about her daughter sleeping with the Vampire Second? The mismatch seemed obvious, until one had the privilege of seeing beyond Wyland’s austere surface.
What could she say to ease her parents’ minds? “I’ve seen his O-face” probably wouldn’t cut it.
He rinsed the last of the shampoo from his hair. “Do you have everything you need to work from here?”
Shaking off the worry, she nodded. “Your network is lightning-fast.” And incredibly secure, given the highly sensitive work Wyland did from his home office. “Does Valerian use computers?” She hadn’t seen one in his bedroom or sitting room.
“He used to, but no longer.” A wisp of sadness, there then gone. “If he wants to use the Internet, Thane or I help him.”
Tia pumped shampoo into her hand, and started washing her own hair. “After work, I’m starting some boundary training with Valerian and Thane.”
Wyland reached for the conditioner. “Thane will start off with machine training, but it shouldn’t be long before you’re ready to move on to advanced techniques.”
Of course he knew the details; he’d probably worked with Thane on the damned lesson plan. Was there no aspect of her life he hadn’t utterly invaded?
No. There wasn’t. She was living under his roof. Working with him. Sleeping with him, in his bed, sharing her body and her mind. An overwhelming need to wrest some control back nearly knocked her sideways. She started scrubbing again, her movements sharp and jerky. “And I need to go to my house for a while.”
“Why?”
Because it’s my house. Because I live there. Because that’s where I’ll return after this is over. “Because I say so,” she said flatly. “The why doesn’t matter.”
He looked at her, no doubt trying to navigate the minefield she’d laid with her tone. “Of course the why matters,” he said. “Nick, or one of the other guards, can retrieve whatever you need.”
And surf on the comfortable wave of his power? His money? I don’t think so. “I don’t want Nick, or one of the other guards, digging through my underwear drawer.”
Something feral flitted through his eyes. “Thane can launder what you brought with you—”
“No. He won’t.” The thought of Thane, or anyone else, doing her laundry absolutely horrified her. “It’s not just the panties.” She needed to pick up her mail. Lyudmila’s party invitation no doubt waited, and a text message RSVP would not suffice. She needed to check her closet to see if she had anything to wear. She suspected not—her last donation to the prom dress place had been a sizable one. “Am I supposed to drag Nick, or a guard, dress shopping with me?”
“Yes,” he replied. “Whenever you leave this house, if Thane or I aren’t with you, Nick or one of his guards is.”
She goggled at him. “For how long?”
“Until I know you’re safe, damn it!”
She jerked as his voice ricocheted off the tiles. As his fear filled the enclosure.
He was deathly afraid. Afraid for her.
She stepped into his arms. Felt them wrap, too tightly, around her.
Water streamed over them. She rested her cheek against his chest, waiting until his heart stopped thundering against her ear. “Okay,” she murmured. “I’ll allow Nick or one of the other guards to accompany me when I leave the house.” She could give him that much. “I’ll take reasonable precautions, but Wyland? I will live my life.”
“Thank you.” He kissed her temple. “You still have shampoo in your hair.”
His lips were skating down her cheekbone, and his penis was rock hard. Mere millimeters separated their wet, slippery bodies. “You have a meeting,” she reminded him, drawing away. “Don’t start something you can’t finish.”
“Can’t finish?”
“Hurry along to work now,” she teased, making a shooing motion with her hands. “I’m going to enjoy this playground of a shower for a bit longer.” She brushed away a fleck of foam clinging to her nipple. “All by my lonesome.”
He kissed her, a soft, lingering kiss with barely-banked sexual heat. She’d just opened her mouth to stoke the fire when he backed away with a groan of the damned and left the shower. He grabbed a towel, slung it around his hips, and with a curse and a final backwards glance, walked out of the room.
She stared at his terry-covered ass until it disappeared from view. Giving herself a mental shake, she moved under the waterfall, planning her evening as she finished rinsing her hair. After spending some time with Scarlett at Underbelly, she’d swing by her house, if only for a while.
If only to prove that she could.