The Vampire's Mail Order Bride

Hugh caught Delaney’s eye. “Be careful.”

“I can go with you,” Pandora offered.

“I’ll be fine. You two carry on with business. Back in a sec.” She grabbed her purse and started threading her way through the crowd, watching where she was going in a peripheral kind of way. Without Hugh’s arm around her, without his fingers on her bare skin, it was easier to think.

Mostly about just how crazy over him she already was. Stop being a fool. He only lent you that jewelry so you’d fit in. Maybe. Maybe not. Her inner voice didn’t know everything. When she went back to him, if Pandora wasn’t still there, she’d ask him how he felt about…them.

There was a them, wasn’t there?

The door to the ladies’ room was in sight when she walked into the path of a mountain of a man. He peered at her, nostrils flaring.

“You’re human.” His eyes narrowed. “Tonight just got a whole lot more interesting.”

Hugh watched Delaney disappear into the crowd, bereft she’d left him so easily. He hoped she hadn’t left because of Pandora. If Delaney thought he was in any way interested in the witch, she was dead wrong. And now that she was out of his sight, a prickle of unease crawled over his skin. She was the only human here. “Excuse me, Pandora. Call Sebastian about the space. I have to go.”

“But I—”

He left his drink and Pandora behind and went after Delaney. The crowd seemed to have grown in the few minutes they’d been inside. Where the hell was she?

He pushed deeper into the club. People tried to stop him, tried to talk to him. He turned them away.

Finally, he spotted her. A man he didn’t recognize towered over her, blocking her path.

The edges of Hugh’s vision went red at the thought that she might be in danger. He stormed forward, anger charging him for a fight.

Then Delaney threw her head back and laughed.

The color at the edge of Hugh’s vision shifted from red to green, although his anger wasn’t completely gone. She was chatting up another man? What had he said to make her laugh? With a cacophony of emotions bombarding him, Hugh sidled up to her. “Everything okay?”

She smiled at him and lightly touched his arm. “Everything’s great. This is Nick Hardwin.” She turned to the big man. “Nick, this is Hugh Ellingham.”

Nick smiled respectfully. “I know who you are, Mr. Ellingham. Good to meet you in person, sir.” He held out a hand the size of a Christmas ham.

Hugh’s anger fizzled out. He shook Nick’s hand but couldn’t fake an expression to match his words. “Nice to meet you, too.”

Delaney chatted on, oblivious to the fact that Hugh had been about to take the man’s head off for a perceived transgression against her. “He’s new to town too. He’s a friend of the sheriff’s, but he’s not a werewolf, he’s a gargoyle.”

Nick nodded. “Merrow and I were in the same battalion. Shared a tour in Afghanistan.”

“Which totally deserves a thanks,” Delaney said.

Hugh grunted. “Thank you for your service.”

“Anyway,” Delaney went on. “He knew I was human right away and I told him I was here as your guest—Nick’s a bouncer here and is supposed to keep tourists out on the off chance any manage to get in—and then we started talking and, short story, I still haven’t made it to the ladies’ room.”

Nick seemed a little more aware of Hugh’s mood. A quick glance at Hugh’s face and Nick made his goodbyes. “I should get back to work. Nice to meet you, Delaney. Mr. Ellingham.”

“Bye, Nick.” She squeezed Hugh’s arm. “I’ll be right back, okay? Don’t go anywhere.”

Where did she think he was going to go? Before he could respond, she’d slipped away to the ladies’ room. He leaned against the wall and considered what had just happened.

How he’d been driven by the need to protect her. Then driven by the need to have her for his own. He’d been jealous. Over nothing, really. But jealous all the same. He shouldn’t have sucked that drop of blood from her finger. It was just a drop, and it wasn’t like he’d actually bitten her, but maybe with her, a drop was all it took. He was walking a dangerous line.

The reality of what was happening couldn’t have hit Hugh any harder than if Nick had punched him. He was falling for Delaney.

Hard.

Which also explained why he’d lied to her about the necklace.

That dragonfly hadn’t belonged to his mother. It had belonged to Juliette. A gift on her twenty-third birthday. There was no other reason for why he’d wanted to see it on Delaney except that he’d wanted to mark her as his. To lay claim to her before bringing her here.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt that kind of base, primal need. Yes, he’d loved Juliette despite their marriage being arranged, but that had come sometime into the marriage. The guilt he felt over her death, a death he’d brought upon her, that was just an extension of his love. Wasn’t it?

Another thought niggled at him. Perhaps there was one other reason he’d wanted to adorn Delaney with those jewels. To test himself. To determine if seeing another woman in his beloved late wife’s jewels moved him in anyway.

It had. Just not the way he’d expected.

His first thought had been that the dragonfly had never looked as right on Juliette as it did on Delaney. A traitorous thought to be sure, but there it was. In Delaney’s bright and unreserved light, Juliette’s sainted memory had begun to fade.