“Didn’t feel like sleeping today?” Roy asked.
“Couldn’t,” Christian returned.
“You know you shouldn’t sit up like this. It makes you blue. Who was that gal anyway?”
“Someone from my past.”
Roy thunked his Lone Star on the counter. “How can that be? She was a kid.”
Though human, Roy was—thanks to a brief and involuntary stint as a vampire during the depression—a lot older than he looked. It was one of the reasons he and Christian had fallen in together. The associates Roy used to have would have expected him to be dead by now.
“I can’t explain it,” Christian said, his voice thick from sun exposure. “But I’m sure she’s someone I was involved with when I was mortal.”
“That was a long time ago.”
“Yes.” Christian shook himself and sat straighter. “She’s working with Nim Wei on that vampire film. Evidently, Grace is responsible for the script.” He patted the cover, just barely touching it with his palms. “There are details in here, parallels to experiences from my life, that I don’t think she could have invented by accident.”
Roy spoke around a bite of sandwich. “You think those two are running a scam on you?”
“I don’t know. If they are, I’m not sensing it.”
“So you reckon this is some sort of reincarnation deal? That this gal has a past life swimming up in her unconscious?”
It seemed like more than that to Christian, but all he could do was shrug. Roy leaned back into the counter.
“Well,” he said in his deceptively lazy drawl, “I know I owe your illustrious queen. She did turn me mostly human again. The thing is, I wouldn’t put anything past her. Besides which, casting a vampire in a vampire movie is a pretty damn big risk. How does she know she won’t blow the lid off y’all’s secret existence?”
“I believe the risk is part of the appeal for her.”
“Hmph,” Roy said, his final comment for the time being.
He finished his lunch in silence, then patted Christian’s shoulder.
The touch sparked Christian’s recall of another man, one he hadn’t thought of in a while. Hans had been a father figure to him, gruff and protective much like Roy could be. Christian’s real father had arranged to have Hans murdered, by that sneaking bastard Lavaux. He’d died bleeding in the mud beside some nameless Italian stream. Hans’s last words rose up in Christian’s mind.
Sorry, son,
he’d rasped.
Wanted
. . .
to stay with you longer.
“Get some sleep,” Roy advised, drowning out the whisper of memory. “You can’t afford not to be sharp around Nim Wei.”
“Right.” Christian looked up to meet Roy’s Texas sky blue eyes. “You tell Sam McCrory I agreed to give him his loan?”
“Yep,” Roy said. “Though I think your terms are too easy.”
Christian pushed to his feet, suppressing an urge to groan. “I don’t mind folks feeling grateful, so long as it’s not sticking in their craw.”
The locals’ aptitude for turning a blind eye had enabled Christian to settle in here—for nearly two decades now. He’d bought the land around the river that had bumped North Fork up to
Two
. Many lifetimes’ worth of mercenary fees had kept the town on its shaky feet through the dustbowl years. In return, the people hereabouts ignored his oddities. That meant more to him than they’d ever know. Christian almost felt he belonged here. For a man like him,
almost
belonging was a big deal.
He took Grace’s script as he sought his light-proof fallout shelter under the house. Roy might read the screenplay or he might not, but that wasn’t why he carried it away. As smart as it would be to keep his distance from this project, Christian couldn’t release the thing. Grace had touched these pages. Grace had created them. He couldn’t have left them sitting on that table any more than he could forget what she’d meant to him.
G
race had hoped she and Miss Wei could discuss developments when she woke up. They often strategized how to recruit this or that professional to a film. The great Wade Matthews, their director of photography, was a prime example. His expertise was crucial for shooting in the newly popular wide-screen format. The main reason he’d agreed to work for an up-till-now B director was because they’d hired a young man he was sweet on to head wardrobe.
Grace had collected the useful gossip while playing wallflower at a Hollywood party. Moving from town to town as a kid, having to hide the details of her home life, hadn’t prepared her to be the toast of any gathering. In this case, her social awkwardness had been an asset. Once guests established she wasn’t an actress and only had the vague title “assistant,” she’d become invisible to them. Nothing could have made eavesdropping easier.
Afterward, Miss Wei had complimented her on her initiative.
It seemed unlikely any such praise would be coming her way tonight. Miss Wei emerged from her motel room in a mood Grace recognized: restless, distracted, and about to go on the prowl.
Her strapless red and black sheath dress left no doubt as to what she’d be prowling for.
“Are you sure you won’t have dinner with me?” Grace asked once she’d given her the short version of her news. “Viv Lavelle is going to get a complex if her director’s waist is that much tinier than hers.”
Miss Wei didn’t laugh the way she normally would have. Her gaze settled on Grace briefly. “You’ll be fine with Christian. He knows better than to harm one of my people.”
The idea that he might have harmed her otherwise wasn’t reassuring, but Grace shut her mouth and nodded.
“Good,” Miss Wei said, her attention sliding off toward the county road. “I have faith you’ll seal the deal tonight.”
She strode off into the darkness, in her pointy-toed stilettos. Grace didn’t offer to drive her where she was going. She’d long since learned not to interfere with her boss’s quirks. No injury—that Grace could tell—ever came to Miss Wei from her adventures. Plus, her little feet must have been made of steel. Grace had no other explanation for how she could walk so fast in those heels.
She ate dinner by herself in the Best Western’s diner, jotting notes on her napkin and fending off leering invitations from a pair of traveling salesmen.
They reminded her of her father, past their prime but fueled with liquor to dull their awareness that they weren’t—and maybe never had been—Don Juans. She ignored them until they left, telling herself she knew lots of males who didn’t behave like them. Their brilliant DP, for one, was a sweetheart, the sort of kind, calm figure who made the whole crew happy to come to work. Some of the actors they’d cast as gang members were nice, too. They’d treated Grace with respect even before they realized she was more than Miss Wei’s gopher.
Men aren’t evil,
she assured herself. Very few actually went home and beat their families. Sometimes their hormones and their insecurities just ran away with them.
Grace didn’t know about Christian Durand’s hormones, though he certainly didn’t seem insecure. He was the take-no-prisoners kind of male those traveling salesmen likely wished they could be.
Sighing, she let the tired waitress clear her plates. Her bracelet watch jingled as she checked it. She couldn’t put this off any longer. It was time to go see Christian.
A
t five past eight Christian told Roy he wouldn’t need him anymore that evening. After some debate, he decided the living room was the best place to talk to Grace. In case she was hungry, he set out a plate of cheese and crackers. Lighting the fire would ensure her human limbs didn’t take a chill. A bottle of wine seemed civil, as did the nice crystal.
When he started wondering if he should dash to town and grab a bunch of flowers, he cursed himself.
“Grace is not your girlfriend,” he hissed between his teeth.
She wasn’t his lover, either. Or the guardian angel he’d taken her for when she’d first appeared to his mortal self. Guardian angels didn’t jump ship when their drowning charges needed them most of all.
Just barely, he refrained from tossing the crackers out. He did pour a glass of wine for himself. To hell with waiting for his guest, and to hell with her idea of a manly drink. Red wine was the only alcohol he could drink—not that it affected him like it did humans. The inebriation caused by tossing back a glass was as fleeting as the breeze from a butterfly.
He poured a second glass and forced himself to sip it. He was calm—not
guarded
as Grace put it—just collected and decisive. He checked his glamour, once, in the hall mirror. He wasn’t glowing, wasn’t nervous-looking or marble pale. He’d been passing for human for centuries. No specter from his past was going to rob him of that skill now.
He recognized her car from a mile away, then her footsteps coming to his door. Though he knew she’d knock, her brisk triple rap turned his palms sweaty.
You
are
an idiot teenager,
he reproved himself.
Once he’d wiped his hands on his jeans, he went to answer it.
“I’ve decided to say yes,” he announced. That settled, he held the door and stepped back.
“Oh.” Grace took a moment to gape at him. “I . . . I guess I can throw away my napkin.” She smiled when his eyebrows rose, pulling a folded square from her purse and jiggling it like a flag. “I was writing down more arguments at dinner. It’s a shame you agreed already. Some of them were good.”
This might have been a joke, but Christian hadn’t had his sense of humor as long as his other gifts.
“Come in,” he said, deciding to ignore it. “I opened some wine for you.”
She hesitated just a moment, and her heart rate sped up. The hint of female caution thrilled him. His cock began to thicken and the roots of his fangs to burn. Her fear of him was an aphrodisiac, the smallest taste of the punishment she deserved.
“I shouldn’t stay long,” she said, “but if you have any questions, I’ll answer them as well as I can.”
Unable to speak, he gestured her to the living room. As if one half of him warred with the other, he was suddenly—abysmally—glad that he’d lit the fire. She was dressed as she’d been that morning, in a sleeveless, green flower-skirted dress. The thing was perfectly respectable for her day and age. The bodice came to her throat while the hem floated inches below her knees. Her heels were no different than he’d seen on thousands of women. Perversely, the effect of the outfit on
her
turned his cool blood molten. She was so damned female he could have screamed.
She sat on the couch with her knees and feet nervously together, though she tried to look confident. Every inch of his skin abuzz, Christian poured a glass of wine and handed it to her silently. Grace sipped it and set it down next to the crackers.
Then she stole what was left of his reason by wetting her wine red lips.
He sat down carefully next to her, the part of him that had lit the fire not wanting her to become alarmed. That would have been a bit too exciting for the predator in him.
She saw something in his expression, maybe the intensity he was trying to hide. “Christian?”
He pressed the pad of his longest finger to the seam of her mouth. “Don’t speak.”
“Don’t sp—”
He covered her lips with his, gently molding the contrasting surfaces together. His mouth was cool and narrow, hers pillowy and warm, but the differences between them didn’t prevent them from fusing into one. She gasped when he licked her lushness, and her hands fluttered to his chest. Though her pulse was racing like a wild thing, she wasn’t pushing him away.
She trusted him—or wanted him—enough to let him do this.
Abruptly, he was so happy he couldn’t remember when he’d last felt this good. Not since he was human, he suspected. Well-being washed over him in a tidal wave. He forgot everything but the simple pleasure of being with her again.
“Grace,” he murmured and turned his head to go deeper in.
Her tongue met his tentatively, wet and warm and small. Struggling not to let his desires run away with him, he slid his arms around her, pushing her gently back on the cushions. Their moves were a dance he didn’t have to think about. He pushed, she fell, and their limbs made familiar places for each other. She uttered an unsure sound but not an objection. The couch was firm; it was her delicious body that gave for him. She was the one who let her thighs part, her full skirt and its petticoats frothing around his hips. He remembered the times she’d been no more to him than a ghost, when they’d been grateful for the meagerest brush of sensation. Tonight, her unchanging physicality was like catnip. He wanted to push his hips into the inviting cradle at the top of her legs, wanted to rub his aching erection over the place that was made for it. He knew she wasn’t ready, but he could make her. He slid his hand under her petticoats . . .
“Christian—”
“Shh.” He kissed her more deeply, using all his centuries of practice at seduction. Happily, she wasn’t immune. Her arms tightened wonderfully on his back. There were nylons under her dress, attached to her undergarments by small garters. He found the place between the elastic struts where bare, warm skin smoothed around her thighs. Grace shivered and squirmed as he caressed it.