“And so you are a vampire, and my brother is a vampire hunter? And you are friends? He works for you?”
“A rather irregular circumstance indeed, but true, nonetheless.”
“But how can that be? Aren’t you—well, mortal enemies?”
The corners of his eyes crinkled a bit, which Maia took to mean that he’d had a flash of humor. Astounding. Twice in one night; in less than one hour?
“Now who is sounding sensational, like one of Mrs. Radcliffe’s Gothic novels, Miss Woodmore?” he asked, almost lazily.
Something fluttered inside her, for his voice had dropped low. She could barely hear it, mixing as it did with the constant rumble of carriage wheels. There were no other sounds outside, and she realized with a jolt that it must be very late. Near dawn.
“Well?” she prodded tartly. And then realized that, for all of her irritation with the situation, he was still an earl, a peer of the realm. And a vampiric—was that even a word? She dared not ask him, but he would certainly have an opinion—one at that. And her manner had become quite familiar with him.
He shifted, adjusting his coat lapels and running a hand briefly through his hair in a surprisingly endearing gesture. “I shall make a very complicated situation as simple as I can, Miss Woodmore,” he said.
“Oh, you need not condescend to me, Lord Corvindale.” The kitten had unsheathed her little claws again. “I’m quite capable of comprehending any situation you might describe. It was I who had to tutor Chas in geometry and Greek.” And what a task that had been, especially since Greek was just as difficult for her. But she would never have admitted that to Chas.
“Indeed? Very well, then,” the earl said. And his eyes crinkled a bit more, and perhaps even the corners of his lips shifted. “I have a variety of business interests throughout the Continent, the Far East and even some limited ones in the New World. As the wealthy and powerful often do, I have more than my share of enemies—”
“I can scarcely imagine that,” Maia murmured.
“—who would take any chance to see my investments fail, or to damage them, or any variety of things,” he continued as if she hadn’t spoken. But his eyes had sharpened a bit and she knew he’d heard her. “Many of those are members of the Draculia, and there are some who are mortals, as well. Your brother acts as my agent and, if necessary, will—er—remove any problematic individuals from—er—causing any further disruptions. He also assists me in managing some of my other associates, who are also of the Draculian race.”
“What you mean to say is that my brother is your paid assassin?” Maia said, her eyes wide. “He kills people?” She thought she might faint. Her heart was pounding in her chest in an ugly beat, thrumming through her stomach, which had suddenly become queasy.
Mama and Father…what would you think if you knew? Oh, Chas, what are you doing?
“Not people, Miss Woodmore. Your brother has never, to my knowledge, ended the life of a mortal person. But he has removed or otherwise dissuaded more than a few vampires—and he was doing so for quite some time before I met him. Which, by the way, was when he attempted to do the same to me.” Corvindale fixed her with his eyes, and Maia felt a little wavering tug deep inside her. “You see, Miss Woodmore, the simple way to look at it is that there are good vampires, and there are bad vampires. Your brother kills the bad vampires.”
“And presumably you don’t count yourself among the ‘bad’ vampires?”
Maia didn’t know how or why she had the courage to say such a thing—for once again, it dawned on her that not only was she in a carriage with an earl, one of the most powerful men of the ton and in England, but that he was a vampire. A bloodthirsty vampire.
And, ward or not, she was alone with him.
He made a deep sound that at first she didn’t recognize as laughter, but when the light fell on his face, outlining harsh cheekbones and the straight line of his nose, she saw that his lips were curved. His laughter was brief and as sharp as he was, and then it subsided. “As I highly doubt that Attila the Hun or Judas Iscariot or even Oliver Cromwell considered themselves ‘bad’ or ‘evil,’ I suggest that your question is moot.”
But then he fixed her with his eyes again. “Naturally, you could pose the question to your brother if you aren’t certain which side of the battle lines I’m on, Miss Woodmore. But I suspect you already know what his answer would be.”
Maia kept her lips compressed together. Indeed. Chas loved her and Angelica and Sonia, and he would never expose them to any danger if he could help it. And he was a good and moral man himself. “Indeed,” she replied. “And so I am to assume that Cezar Moldavi is on the other side of the good-versus-bad-vampire battle lines.”
“Your logic is astonishing.” His words were bored, but she swore she saw a bit of light in his eyes.
It occurred to her at that moment that perhaps he enjoyed the verbal sparring as much as she—well, she didn’t really like the exchanges of insults and banter between them, for Maia found it outside of infuriating. But perhaps he found it difficult being both vampire and an earl. After all, earls were intimidating all on their own, but to add the fact that he was a vampire into the composite…perhaps no one was willing to stand up to him.
Perhaps they were afraid he’d bite them—or worse—if they did.
Perhaps—now here was a fanciful thought—he didn’t mind being treated like a normal person. Occasionally.
“Do you truly drink blood?” she blurted out. “From people?”
He became very still. Even his eyes didn’t shift, nor his fingers. And the carriage all at once seemed to shrink, becoming very close and dark, and her heart began to pound again in that ugly way. She wished fiercely that she could take the question back.
“It’s the common means of survival and obtaining sustenance,” he replied after a moment. “But I do not.”
Maia opened her mouth to ask more, but something stopped her. She sensed that their tenuous connection might be strained, or even broken, if she did. Instead she said, “Is it true that vampires cannot go about in the sunlight?”
“Direct rays from the sun cause excruciating pain, so one must take care if one ventures out during the day. Surely you haven’t heard this information from your brother,” he said. “I was under the impression you and your sisters were blissfully ignorant of his…occupation. But you seem to have some…reasonable…knowledge.”
“We grew up listening to stories from our Granny Grapes, who was part-Gypsy. She had many tales about the vampires in Romania. Of course, at the time, I had no idea that not only were they true, but that I would actually meet some of them.”
“Granny Grapes?”
Maia felt her face soften into a fond smile. “She was our grandmother, and for some reason when I was very young, I got it all mixed up and thought she was our great-grandmother. So I got it into my head that her name was Grape-Grandmother. And so the name remained fixed.”
Silence settled between them then, causing Maia to silently muse that she couldn’t ever recall being alone with the earl and not fumbling or grasping for something to say. Or being skewered by his wit.
It wasn’t an uncomfortable quiet. In fact, with the rhythmic rumbling of the carriage wheels on the cobblestones and bricks, the moment was rather pleasant.
Without being obvious, she glanced at him sidewise. He was staring out the window, and it occurred to her with a start that he might be watching for another attack.
But, she reminded herself, that was unlikely, as the attack had already occurred. And so perhaps he was simply fascinated by a world that was beginning to brighten with dawn. A world that he must never experience fully illuminated, and warm.
What a terrible thing, never to bask in the sun or to walk through the rows of flowers when they were in full bloom. Not that she actually pictured the rigid earl walking through flower gardens, brushing his strong fingers lightly over rose blossoms…
He turned and the broad light of a streetlamp played over his mouth and jaw.
Maia looked at him, her gaze suddenly fully fastened on the lower half of his face. On his mouth. Her breath stopped.
A mouth utterly, horribly, impossibly recognizable to her. A mouth that she’d remarked on, a mouth that she’d scrutinized and thought about the fact that she was doing so because the upper half of his face had been masked. A chill washed over her, followed by a rush of heat. No. It was impossible.
She’d almost made the same mistake before.
But the image was eerily familiar: his eyes in shadow, his mouth and jaw exposed.
Maia must have gasped or otherwise indicated her shock, for he turned to look directly at her. Their eyes met, suddenly clashing and holding, and she could no longer deny it.
“Is something amiss, Miss Woodmore?” he asked coolly.
It was he. There was no question.
I do hope you aren’t about to cast up your accounts on my waistcoat, your majesty, the Knave of Diamonds had said that night.
While on this night, Lord Corvindale had said, I do hope you aren’t wiping your nose on my shirt, Miss Woodmore.
She’d been kissed by the Earl of Corvindale? She’d waltzed with him? Flirted with him?
Maia felt faint. And queasy.
And…warm. Suddenly very, very warm. She needed to swallow, to lick her dry lips. That kiss had been…well, she’d tried not to think about it. Because of Alexander.
Because if she was going to marry a man, she shouldn’t be thinking about the kisses of another one—especially a bad-tempered, vampiric earl. She shouldn’t even have been having kisses from another man.
Something awful churned inside her. Guilt and shame, and yet…the tug of memory, of need, overrode it.
She raised her eyes and looked at Corvindale directly. He must know it had been she, even if he hadn’t at the time—for after their interlude, when he’d accosted her and thrown her onto the balcony, he would have recognized her from her costume.