Shadows in Savannah (2 page)

“Did I? And what was tonight’s wager?”

“The only thing we have to bargain with, of course. Time.”

Jorge joined in on the laughter. It was true. None of them had anything of material worth that another couldn’t procure for himself with minimal effort. But they could bet time. More or less. Being otherworldly or creatures of death, they could manipulate time to their liking. Extend it or lessen it. Of course, that’s where demons came in handy as well as witches and warlocks. Vampires felt time differently.

They also, depending on their age, when and how they were made, could adapt through time and space. They could appear exactly as a human and could tolerate being exposed to the sun, if they so desired. Or, they could become little more than a wisp of haze in the air.

What make and model was his current crush? Did the beautiful creature enjoy his existence or did he loathe it and wish for it to end?

“You’re quiet of late,” Roberto commented, coming to stand beside him as Jorge stared without seeing at one of the tapestries. “You haven’t been in our delightful city long enough to be bored of her just yet.”

“No, no. I am not bored,” Jorge assured him.

“But I don’t sense that you’re troubled, either. Yet, there is…something.”

“There is… A man. A vampire. He lives in the small hotel overlooking the river.”

“Ah, yes. Dane, is his name.”

Jorge turned, shocked that Roberto would know anything about the man. “How do you know him?”

“
Mi amico
, I know every creature that ventures into Savannah, whether they come by way of the tunnels or not. I have not always resided below the streets.”

“What can you tell me about him?”

“He’s a young vampire. Maybe two hundred years old. He is a very wealthy one, though, even by human standards. He owns the hotel you mentioned and the restaurant below it. He owns several other businesses and companies, secretly, of course. But his favorite is a bookshop. He is there more than anywhere else. He has traveled extensively to stock it. He also was not willingly made.”

Jorge listened intently, hanging on every one of Roberto’s words. Dane. A beautiful name for a beautiful man. And a love of books. Enchanting. Jorge wanted the younger vampire more than ever now. But that Dane did not come to the immortal life by choice, but instead by force…? That made him unpredictable in temperament. “Where is he from?” Jorge asked, wanting every piece of information he could get, every angle, every weakness. He had no intent beyond pleasure, but he also had to know what he was getting himself into by engaging.

Roberto shook his head. “That I am unsure of. I have never heard him say. Being that he was forced, he may not know his human history. What is your interest in him?”

“I don’t know, yet. Well, I don’t know beyond the pleasure of his body.” Jorge hadn’t been with men nor had he wanted to be with men before he became a vampire, but most didn’t pick just one sex to explore the intensity of physical need with. Most wanted both, male and female. Most gloried in no disease, no need for caution, no ability to procreate. There were only delicious orgasms so pleasurable, so painfully exquisite that they could become an addiction if one wasn’t careful.

And Jorge was always careful.

“He mixes with humans well. Is completely immersed in their world and dealings. He’s terribly sharp.”

Jorge loved intelligence. He loved to learn. He loved everything about it and that his crush was smart only made Jorge want the young vampire more.

“Just take care with him, Jorge.” Roberto rarely called Jorge by his given name and when he did, Jorge knew to listen. “He is beautiful, yes. It would be so easy for you to become taken with him. But you know how those who were not willingly made, who never consented to this existence, wish to die. I would hate to see you hurt in anyway.”

“That makes two of us,” Jorge said with a short laugh, trying to lighten the mood. He clapped Roberto on the shoulder and moved them back toward the table in the center of the alcove. “What do you say to more card games? I find I am feeling very lucky at the moment.”

Chapter Three

He was hard. He was always hard when he woke, as most human men were from what he’d heard over the years, but his hardness, his stiff erection wasn’t painful. Even when tight and standing straight, his balls full and drawn up close to his body, he wasn’t in pain. It was a sensation akin to… To… He didn’t know. He didn’t have the words to describe it. It stole his breath and gave it back. If he touched himself, he wouldn’t want to stop. He would want to continue for hours, even days. He had done so before. Getting so lost in the sensations he couldn’t name, he had stayed in his bed for two days, stroking himself, existing only for the pleasure of his cock, neglecting his businesses, his responsibilities.

That was months ago. He hadn’t touched himself since. He hadn’t been this achingly hard since, either. And the only thing that had changed was the feeling, the knowledge that he had been watched last night.

He wanted to know who had done so and that thought propelled him out of bed and into the shower. He was a vampire. He didn’t get dirty. He didn’t sweat. He didn’t smell and his hair didn’t get oily. But the ritual helped him as he moved in and around the humans he dealt with on a daily basis. It helped him feel more like one of them if he shared in their simple experiences.

He could say, however, that he enjoyed the warm water as it slid over him. It was like being caressed and he relished the feeling of heat. It was why he slept wrapped up in blankets, why he kept the temperature in his penthouse set low enough he could tolerate being beneath the covers in his bed.

He had at one time been human and he often wondered if his need to cocoon himself when he slept was his way of trying to feel what it was once like for him. There was no way for him to find out. He had no idea who made him. He had no idea of anything before he was made.

Some days it grated on him, the mystery that was his life before. Other days, he never thought about it.

But what he couldn’t shake was how being watched made him feel and how ravenous he was for sex. For male sex. For cock.

He knew the one who’d watched him was not female. Their scent was different, even the undead ones. It was sweeter, almost too sweet at times. Arousal being one of them. Not that he’d ever said no to a female partner, but last night the scent wasn’t sweet. It was musk. Heavy. Full of lust. A predator having found prey.

Dane loved being preyed upon. Loved it and hated it. It was a constant war inside him and he wasn’t ever sure which side won out when he’d give in to whoever was preying on him. It turned out pleasurable for both in the end, but he had a feeling it would be different with last night’s predator.

Once out of the shower, his erection still full, Dane dressed for the day. Suits were his favorite. Classic suits. Three pieces expertly tailored. Crisp shirts. Pure silk ties. Hand crafted shoes. Every thing suited to him, chosen specifically and made just for him. He paid whatever the price because he found the feeling of confidence immeasurable when moving among humans.

The first stop of the day would be London. It was a wonderful place to start his week. Small bookshops throughout the city, ones that were tucked away where no one ever saw them, held some of the most incredible volumes of Victorian erotica. It was an acquired taste, the books he loved. He often thought, hoped, perhaps, that he’d been born during that age. The history, the beauty, the facade, fascinated him as no other time he’d read about.

The air still held crispness, if the attire of the humans was any indication. It wasn’t freezing, based on the temperature listed on his phone, but people dressed as though it was. His phone also alerted him to rain in London and he hid a smile. Of course.

From the deserted kitchen of his restaurant, Dane closed his eyes, took a step forward, and when he opened them again, the bustle that was Harrod’s appeared around him. Or rather, appeared outside the changing room walls and assaulted his ears. No one would notice him coming out of the small room and exiting the store onto the street. No one would pay him any mind as he worked his way through London’s streets to the bookshops he so loved. And no one would notice when he vanished again.

“I would notice.”

Dane stepped to the side out of oncoming foot traffic and stopped. He hadn’t spoken out loud any of his thoughts, but the voice that spoke back had very much been in his ears.

He didn’t have long to wait to find out who the dark, melodic voice belonged to. “It’s you,” Dane breathed, taking in the vampire who came to stand before him.

Black hair and otherworldly blue eyes. They were bright and brilliant amid the grayness of overcast London.

He was as tall as Dane, a little more broad through the chest and shoulders, and solid, strong. From when he’d been human. Not only as a vampire.

“Yes, Dane.”

“How did you know I would be here? How did you know my name? Why were you watching me last night?” The questions flew off his tongue before he could stall them or swallow them. But the vampire simply smiled and lifted a hand toward Dane’s face. He lifted a lock of hair from Dane’s forehead.

“Inquisitive, aren’t you? No wonder you run a bookshop.”

“How do you know that?” Dane asked, wondering if he would receive an answer that time.

“You’ve been studied.”

“Why?”

“I always watch the ones I desire before making my move. I need to know who they are before I can reveal myself.”

“And so you can gain the upper hand on them, yes? You with all your knowledge and them with nothing.” Dane moved and slipped around the beautiful creature and continued his trek.

“Jorge is my name,” the creature said, falling into step with Dane. “I was born in Portugal in the seventeenth century. I was made on my twenty-fifth birthday.”

“By choice?”

“Yes. My family was all dead. I had no ties any longer, no way to survive unless I wanted to beg on the streets or whore myself. Neither appealed to me.”

“What happened to them? Your family.”

“A small uprising in my village. My family held a small seat of power and were forcefully removed.”

“How horrible for you.”

“At the time, yes. I learned later that my father had cheated and lied about the village’s finances. They were broke as a city. People took their anger out on him and I can’t say I blamed them. He ruined lives and my mother was just as culpable.”

“Who made you?”

“A traveling band of gypsy vampires.”

The words made Dane ache. “What’s that like? Knowing?”

“It’s comforting. You don’t have that same feeling. I am sorry. It must be terrible for you.” The tender quality of Jorge’s voice, the softness in the words led Dane to believe Jorge was sincere in his sympathy. There was no pity and for that, Dane was grateful. He’d had enough of pity from other creatures and vampires and while he was always graciously accepting of it, for some reason, he doubted he would have been with this particular vampire.

“I imagine it’s close to the way an orphaned child feels. Why are you here?”

“Because you’re here.”

Dane cut his gaze toward the other vampire. They walked down a busy thoroughfare in London in the middle of the day. The sun wasn’t out and Jorge didn’t look any different than any of the humans milling around them. He looked as though he belonged there.

The contrast between them was as old as time. Fair to dark. Light to shadow. Jorge looked like sin and Dane, an unimaginable angel.

Dane couldn’t deny the visceral attraction. His erection flared to life again as Jorge strolled along beside him. No one looked at them askance. No one thought it unnatural for two men to walk side by side in the middle of the day. No one knew they weren’t men in the human sense of the word.

That was powerful and heady feeling.

“My birthday is Friday.” Dane hadn’t intended to blurt the statement. At least, not like that. They both knew what birthdays meant, what many in his situation attempted or wanted to attempt.

“Big plans?” Jorge asked quietly. Even among the noise on the street, Dane heard him.

“I’m not sure.”

“I see. Was it a warning not to get too close between now and then?”

Had he had a motive? “Perhaps.”

“Then I’ll take the warning under advisement. But I don’t scare that easy. Now,” Jorge said brightly. “What are we doing in London?”

Chapter Four

For the next several hours, the two vampires walked from one end of town to the other. They’d spent hours in musty bookstores, in secret out of the way shops, one had to know just where to look spots or they’d miss it completely.

Jorge could honestly say he’d never seen so many books in all his years of existence. He’d never carried so many, either. But Dane’s thrill was infectious when he found a piece he’d been waiting for and wanting.

Seeing the blond vampire talking with and interacting with the bookshop owners was interesting. There was rapport, deep affection for the tomes, and if anyone sensed that Dane wasn’t quite what he seemed to be, they didn’t let on.

There was respect and it was something Jorge rarely saw among their kind, whether between vampires or vampires and humans.

Several of the owners even referred to Dane by name, as though they were old friends.

“You’re different,” Jorge remarked, as they walked down Shaftsbury Avenue. The theaters were brightly lit in the early evening hour and a more eclectic mix of humans descended on the area.

He imagined Dane inside a theater, taking in a show, wonder and joy on his face. And he suddenly wanted to whisk them in, to see firsthand the look he knew would be in Dane’s eyes.

“Different? How?” Dane asked, bringing Jorge back to their conversation. They wove their way around a large group of young people who didn’t seem to see or think of anyone but themselves.

“You like being around humans.”

“Yes. I do.”

“You don’t see them as your next meal or creatures to be toyed with.”

“I don’t need their blood and they aren’t here for my pleasure. I have never turned one or fed from one directly and I never will.”