Seducing the Vampire (24 page)

If she were not to choose life, perhaps he would give her exactly as she desired.

“No,” he said. And then, more decidedly, “No. I don't want my brother dead. If he is dead, he will not feel the anguish of my revenge. One that will require your assistance, Grim.”

“I am at your service, my lord. What do you require?”

“I must see to the details first. If it is even possible. There is a glass-smith on the Rive Gauche. Yes, that is how it will be. I shall exact the perfect revenge and bring the dog to his knees.”

T
HE PACK SHIFTED TO WEREWOLF
shape and stalked toward him. Rhys shifted in preparation. His werewolf roused and snarled, snapping his toothy maw, but it maintained deference. His vampire mind sensed it was in no position to fight, so did not prod him to lash out.

Behind him chains clinked as Antoine released Viviane. Claude would ensure honor was maintained. The pack wanted his blood now.

So long as someone's blood flows,
his vampire mind hissed with macabre glee.

There was one brand of pack justice. First strike took Rhys across the forehead, the talon cutting through flesh and skull bone. He did not cry out. In werewolf form he could not speak—nor would he howl.

Talons went at all angles to his body, tearing fur, muscle and bone. The vampire in him roiled in vicious delight as blood coated fur spattered the air.

It seemed the torture went on forever, but finally, when Rhys could barely stand, the pack shifted. In were form they stood, their bodies bloodied. Two jumped onto the cart and hastened it away, while two had shifted to wolf form and loped along behind the cart.

The pack leader said not a word to him. A scornful look spoke volumes.

Rhys collapsed, landing in a thick nest of leaves beneath an oak tree. His vision red, the world smelled of
blood, pain and agony. He hated his vampire, who writhed in near sexual climax at the joy of it all.

At this moment he could curse his mother her indiscretions, but then his wolf mind grasped hold of the vampire and shook it. He shifted, crying out as the painful cuts tortured anew his human flesh. He would heal in were form but not as quickly as if he'd remained in werewolf shape.

Exhausted, completely shifted to vampire form, yet in his werewolf mind, he could barely lift his head to scan the sky. Dawn crept upon the horizon.

“Viv…” he gasped out. He prayed she had gotten to cover before the sun rose.

“Rhys!”

She landed at his side and stretched an arm across his chest. Rhys groaned as the contact abraded the cuts and tore at the open wounds. Yet her presence worked a balm to his bare and shivering soul. “You should not…”

“Oh, my love, they could have killed you.”

“Never. Claude does not condone murder. I am…no longer welcomed by the pack.”

“
Sacre bleu,
you're covered with wounds. Does it hurt terribly? No, that was a foolish question.” She touched his neck and looked at her finger. Would the vampiress lick off the blood?

“I'll heal.” He clasped her hand.

“Rhys, you shouldn't have done that. I killed the boy.”

“I love you more than my werewolf family, Viviane. I would sacrifice my life to save yours again and again.”

“Don't say that. I want you alive, in my arms.”

Her mouth brushed his cheek. Pain flickered into the background. Blood wet his skin, and she could dash out her tongue and taste it, but she did not. Instead she
tendered gentle kisses over his face. He felt his muscles band tightly and a few rib bones snapped into place.

“You need clothes,” she said, as if just noticing his nudity.

“More important, you need protection. We'll never make it to Paris before the sun rises. But we might make it to my home.”

“You live close? But you can't walk.”

“Give me a few moments, and more kisses, and I'll have healed enough to hobble. Tear your skirts, love. Make some protection.”

She ripped her skirts and fashioned a hood to pull over her head and face. Rhys arched his back, and popped one last vertebra into place. A satisfied groan masked the yip of pain. A flash of orange light hit his eye.

He lifted Viviane into his arms. “Pull the fabric over your face. Quickly!”

He dashed deep into the forest, tracking the scent and indications his home was near. But when he arrived on the west side edging his property, Rhys stopped and pressed his shoulder to an oak tree. His breaths exhaled across Viviane's hooded head. The pain returned, but it was not because of torn muscles.

“What is it?” Viviane peeked out from under the hood and gasped. “That is your home?”

Rhys swallowed back a howl. “It was.”

Flames engulfed the small country cottage Rhys had lived in for three decades. He had built it himself, cutting the wood and taking care in fashioning the joins to create an airtight fit in the walls. Fieldstones that he'd plastered about the fireplace tumbled to the ground. Fire sparks danced hundreds of feet in the air. A few pine trees had ignited close by.

The pack had shown their disapproval over his actions.
No longer could Rhys claim an alliance with either side of his nature. The vampires hated him on principle. The werewolves, he had betrayed.

Even Faery would haunt him relentlessly, yet never embrace him.

Wrapping his arms about Viviane he squeezed away the need to shout his anger to the world. Because he could not be angry for the choices he had made. He would make the same choice again if he knew in advance the results would be so devastating.

“You can live with me,” she whispered against his ear. “We'll return to my home in Venice. You will like it there.”

“We will take care of one another,” he agreed.

He turned and stomped into the forest, where sunlight filtered through the tree canopy, and laid Viviane on a bed of leaves. Not nearly as soft or fragrant as the roses she deserved. “I'll gather pine bows to make you a shelter. Stay put.”

 

T
HEY EMBRACED BENEATH THE
shelter all day. Rhys snoozed. Viviane sensed he needed the rest for his body to completely heal. She drowsed, but was aware, not far off, of the fire that tore apart her lover's home.

By late evening, the couple broached the gates of Paris. Viviane stood a-tatter, a gray wolf at her side. Viviane was able to slip through behind a large tumbrel packed with cabbage heads nestled in hay, Rhys loping ahead of her and using the shadows as cover.

By the time she reached Henri's home, her feet ached, for she'd not been wearing shoes when the wolves had kidnapped her, and her back felt as though she'd carried a load of stones for leagues.

Rhys was tired as well, for as soon as they reached
her property, he scampered to the back courtyard and lay down, panting, his tongue lolling out his mouth.

“I'll bring out some water.”

Rhys whined and tucked his nose under a paw. He lay before Orlando's grave. So much he had lost.

“Because of me.”

She turned and stepped on a scatter of roses. So many of them, wilted and strewn by a breeze. She bent and collected a few white petals and pressed them into her palm. If only he had arrived with these earlier, before the wolves had taken her.

Sniffing away tears, she found a bucket, and filled it from the well inside the tepidarium.

 

A
FTER SHIFTING,
R
HYS WRAPPED
up in the wool blanket folded neatly and left outside the back door. Viviane had brought his wolf water, and left him alone, which he appreciated. The waxing moon shimmered the water remaining in the bucket.

He glanced to the grave. “Forgive me, Orlando. And blessings for your rest.”

He tried the door handle, finding it open. Navigating the dark town house on bare feet, his fingers tracing the walls, he felt the gouges his werewolf had left behind when chasing Viviane. It was a part of him he could never change. She would have to accept that if she truly loved him. Pray, she could.

He ascended the stairs and sought the small glow of light lacing a guest chamber door, and walked in. Viviane sat in a copper tub lined in white linen.

“Come to me,” she pleaded on a whisper.

He dropped the blanket and settled into the tub. There wasn't much water and it was tepid. She soaped his hair
and picked out leaf fragments and sticks. The talon wounds had all healed.

Viviane eased a cloth gently over his skin. Could she touch the wound that had bruised his heart? He didn't want her to. It should remain a reminder of his faithful companion, Orlando, and of what Rhys had sacrificed for his own happiness.

Two scars he wore on his heart now. Orlando and Emeline.

Meeting her silent eyes, he was not sure he could endure taking another scar, yet he would fight vampires and werewolves and any other who attempted to part the two of them.

He nestled his cheek against her breasts and closed his eyes. “Mine,” he whispered. “You are mine.”

She kissed the crown of his head and traced lazy circles across his back. No longer did he care his physical home had burned to the ground. In Viviane's arms he found home. A man required nothing more than love and acceptance to survive.

“I love you.”

“You are loved,” she replied.

He melted against her breast and dared to sleep.

 

R
HYS WANTED TO START
putting affairs together for William Montfalcon. He would tidy up his home and find the title and ensure Claude Mourreigh received it all.

Viviane had come along because leaving her behind was unthinkable. The two could not move more than arm's reach from one another without feeling alone.

They closed the front door and Rhys did not have to seek a candle. The moon was high in the sky, but a day until it was full.

He stroked the hood from Viviane's head and it caught
on the lacquered stick piercing the chignon. Midnight hair spilled over her shoulders.

“Mmm, I've undone you, LaMourette.”

“Not completely, lover.” Drawing her fingers over her neck, she lazily moved across her breasts, then tugged the thin blue ribbon, which barely closed the gray bodice over the black corset beneath.

Rhys bent to bite the ribbons free from the tight bow. They didn't make it upstairs to the bedchamber. This evening they christened the chaise longue with their sexual antics. And the Aubusson rug stretched between two chairs in the sitting room. And the wall of books where Rhys's fingers slipped into the space left by the missing volume of sonnets as he plunged himself inside his lover's hot body.

Well after midnight, they had made it to the stairs.

His shoulders and arms stretched across a stair riser, Rhys dropped his head to rest against the next step.

“I don't want to leave you for a night,” he decided of his departure tomorrow evening.

“We sated your wolf tonight. Why can we not do it tomorrow?”

“The full moon is the one night I must give my werewolf rein. Or rather, my vampire.”

“Twice now your werewolf has not harmed me.”

“Which baffles the hell out of me.”

“Perhaps your werewolf was confused?”

“Please, Viviane, let's take this slowly.”

“Very well. I am willing to do that because I love you
and
your werewolf who is ruled by a bloodthirsty vampire. I've been thinking about what you said, the boon you owe Faery. I would sacrifice our child for you.”

He touched her mouth, seeking with his silence.

She nodded. “I have seen your vampire's rage, and
know it is a good thing it is not allowed release more than a day or two a month. Besides, I could have more children. To be honest, I am not sure I'd make such a good mother.”

“You would be a fierce mother, Viviane. You've a protective instinct about you. And I would marvel to stand over you with our child cradled in your arms.”

“Our second child,” she corrected.

That she accepted his bizarre bargain warmed Rhys's soul. He did not deserve Viviane, but he would challenge no man to take her from him.

“What shall I do with myself when you are gone? I'll miss you desperately.”

“Whatever you do, be sure you don't go out on your own. Promise me, Viviane.”

“I promise. But I don't believe Lord Salignac is going to do anything to me. He's more bluster than bite.”

She knew the enemy so little. Constantine had allowed Emeline to die. He made it clear he would kill or torture Rhys if given opportunity.

“You need to understand Constantine is never the one who wields the killing blow, but rather the one who orchestrates heinous deeds. Viviane, I did not want to tell you, but…”

“He sent William Montfalcon after Henri,” she guessed.

Rhys nodded. “I figured it out after seeing the bill and confronted him about it.”

“As a Council representative what will you do to him?”

“I must report him to win my position with the Council.” He hugged her tightly. “They would kill him. I don't know if I can do that to my brother.”

“He killed your lover.”

“I want to tell you how it happened, so you will understand why it is not so easy for me to condemn my brother. Constantine did not kill Emeline.” Rhys exhaled heavily. “He allowed her to die.”

“But you said—”

“I know. At times it feels as though he was the one to draw the silver blade across her throat, but in reality, he merely stood back and let it happen when I could not get to her fast enough.”

She drew up his hand and pressed her lips to the palm. Her breath tickled. “Tell me?”

And so the last of his secrets would be out.

“We had come to heads, Constantine and I. A few decades ago I had the grand idea to start a tribe of half-breeds. I located a few here in Paris. Same as me, half wolf, half vampire. Naturally, Constantine was appalled and he attacked.

“We were battling one another at the edge of a forest west of the city. We faced Constantine and three vampires. I don't believe in shifting to werewolf form to gain the advantage, and he was my brother, you understand. Emeline was strong and fancied herself a warrior. I didn't like that.”

“Were the others in your tribe like you? Enchanted to tame their wolves.”

“No. Far as I know, I'm the only one with the particular problem where my mind is not as my body. Anyway, I was standing off two vampires, and I noticed Constantine standing inside the forest before two hunters.”