Serafina and the Silent Vampire

CHAPTER Seven


“You shouldn’t trust him,” Blair said severely after several minutes of fast, silent walking. Again, Sera was following a mixture of “feel” and instinct to decide direction, and Blair seemed content to let her.

She retorted, “I get more trustworthy vibes from him than from you!”

“And why do you suppose that is?”

“Because you’re a vampire that drinks blood and kills people?” she suggested, walking even faster.

“And he’s—what?”

“Just a dude. Probably the wrong dude, since I’m still sensing vampires. I think Jason just walked past that house, probably en route to his own flat in Palmerston Place.”

“He’s just a dude who recognized me for what I am.”

Since the same thought had crossed her own mind, she spared him a glance. “Did he ‘hear’ you?” she asked uncertainly.

“I didn’t say anything. Offhand, I’d guess he sensed me, much as you do.”

“Then he’s psychic?”

“Almost certainly. Was his house the same place you saw the vampires congregated?”

“I don’t know,” she retorted. “You dragged me away before I could look.”

“Well, the girl in the black dress came here the night Jason died. He let her in like an old friend.”

Sera frowned in annoyance. “Then you knew about that house? Why didn’t you say?”

“I was hoping you’d find another place, where the vampires hang out the rest of the time.” He frowned. “A psychic who consorts with vampires,” he mused. “Interesting, isn’t it?”

“Or a psychic who was threatened by vampires,” Sera said defensively, though quite why she felt the need to defend the stranger, she had no idea.

Without warning, he grasped her wrist and swung her against the wall of the nearest building, closing her in with his tall body while he stared into her face. Before she had time to feel afraid, she felt a brush like a butterfly’s wing in her mind, much deeper and totally different from the surface sensation when he spoke to her.

“Get out,” she whispered, trying to push the butterfly away.

“Have you ever been hypnotized, Serafina?”

“No. Several have tried and failed,” she blustered. “My mind was always stronger than theirs.” They’d been therapists, recommended by doctors to one set of foster parents, to try to curb her unruly behavior. She’d laughed in their faces, much as she was trying and failing to do in Blair’s. But he was too close, his hips actually pushing her into the wall, while his eyes, so deep and terrible, glowed with some strange, almost golden fire. A trick of the streetlights, it had to be.

“Well, his is stronger than yours.” As Blair spoke, the butterfly merged into his voice, still present but not battering its wings anymore where it had no business to be. “And he’s a master of suggestion. Why did you suddenly trust him more than me?”

She shoved at his chest with no effect. “Can we go back to the drinking-blood-and-killing-people bit?” Worse than anything, her voice shook. “Get out of my head, you bastard,” she whispered.

A frown flickered across his brow. “You hate that, don’t you? Not being in control. Not doing the manipulating.”

She gazed at him, loathing him, failing to find the words. Although the scary glow didn’t vanish from his eyes, they seemed to soften. His body didn’t. It still pinned her helplessly to the wall. He lifted his hand and touched her cheek, trailing his fingertips down her jaw to her throat. She gasped.

“Serafina,” he murmured in her head. “Some things are just stronger than you. They don’t necessarily hurt you, and they won’t necessarily defeat you.”

Distracting her from his surprising words, the bulge in his jeans was hardening, both alarming and exciting her. After all, he had the kind of face and body to die for. Sera had no intention of dying.

“Okay, celebrate!” she spat. “You’re stronger than me.”

His lips twitched. “I was thinking of Nicholas Smith. But now you mention it, yes, I am.” His fingers lingered over her vein, stroking. She shivered, trying not to feel the spurt of physical pleasure that was in danger of drowning out her alarm, especially when he swayed his hips in a slow, sensual caress. His erection rubbed against her tummy, and she had an insane urge to stand on tiptoe to feel it grind between her legs. “And, you know, I like that too.”

“Why?” she got out, reaching wildly for the smart comment that somehow eluded her.

His fingers slid upward to her face once more, and he traced the outline of her lips. “Because I can kiss you without you feeling the need to stop me.”

She narrowed her eyes threateningly, although her heart seemed to plunge right through her stomach to her womb. “It won’t be the need that’s lacking,” she managed.

“But you like the way I look,” he pointed out, pressing gently on her lower lip to part it from the upper. “I’ve read it in your mind.”

“Doesn’t mean I want you slobbering all over me!” Oh Jesus, what would it feel like?

“I won’t slobber,” he promised and bent his head.

She couldn’t have avoided it. She refused to dent her dignity further by trying. So she glared into his face, daring him, while her heart thundered in treacherous anticipation. His lips hovered over hers for an instant, just long enough for her to panic that perhaps he was changing his mind and wouldn’t do it, after all. She felt an urge to close the distance herself—only to break the tension, of course. And then he did it, sliding his fingers away from her lips to cup her face and sinking his mouth into hers with blatant, wonderful, terrifying sensuality.

There was none of the buildup she was used to, the gentle brushing of lips, the soft, quick kisses that grew deeper and longer. It was an outright assault on her senses, and it was devastating. His lips were cool and firm as they moved on hers, savoring, almost as if he were drinking from her. Oh shit, don’t think drinking here! He opened her mouth wider for his tongue, which swept around her teeth and curled around her own, drawing it into his mouth. She tried to speak, but the attempt got lost in the shock of his long, sharp teeth under her tongue. Blood drummed in her head, a tattoo of fear all mixed up with wonder and sheer, unadulterated lust.

A weird sound came from her mouth, and he deepened the kiss, almost grinding his mouth into hers, demanding the response she found it impossible not to give. There had never been a kiss like this one, fierce and overwhelmingly sexual, driving all thought from her head but the gratification of desire. She melted into it, opening wide for him, winding her tongue around his, sucking and biting his lips, drawing him deeper in.

At some point, he’d begun to grind his hips too, rubbing himself against her, and she found herself moving with him, standing on tiptoe and pressing back to try to assuage the aching need between her thighs.

When she almost ran out of breath, he broke the kiss and smiled. “Oh yes,” he whispered in her mind. “All night with you. All night and day, and all night again…” His words drove her to fever pitch, eliciting a helpless mewl of desire as she reached for his mouth once more.

He gave it with enthusiasm. His hands were on her hips, stroking down to her thighs and dragging upward inside her jacket and over the sides of her breasts. She moaned into his mouth, felt his thumbs caress her desperate nipples over and over. She wanted them on her naked breasts. She wanted no clothes at all between them. She wanted him buried deep inside her, pounding her to the greatest, sweetest orgasm of her life. More than that, she yearned to blast his control to hell, to make him lose himself in the pleasure she could give him. She was sure no one had ever wanted her this much before.

She squirmed against him, dragging her arms free at last to loop them around his neck and comb her fingers through his soft hair. His hands cupped both her breasts, making her gasp, and swept downward to the fastening of her jeans.

She tore her mouth free to gasp, half laughing, “Oh stop! We can’t! This is a respectable street! People are bound to pass.”

“I don’t care. I want you now. Just for starters. I want to make you scream as you come the first time, see your face in the open air as you fall apart around me. Oh yes.”

She caught his head as he plunged back for her mouth, his fingers determinedly unfastening the buttons of her jeans. “Blair, no!”

He paused and raised his head, his eyes black and clouded with lust. “Admit it. You want me to f*ck you.”

She caught the golden flash in his dark eyes, glimpsed the pointed fangs between his parted lips, and swallowed hard. “Does it come with blood drinking?”

“Oh yes,” said Blair again, fervently.

Oh bloody f*ck and shite! “What am I doing?” she wailed, pushing him away. Rather to her surprise, he went. She didn’t imagine for a moment that the choice was not his.

Hastily, with fingers that trembled, she rebuttoned her jeans, straightened her top, and strode up Palmerston Place on legs that still shook. She’d no idea what to do except revert to Plan A—which was to go to Jason Bell’s flat. Appalled by the speed and intensity of the lust that had overwhelmed her in Blair’s arms, she was terrified he’d follow her in a frustration-induced rage and was equally afraid he’d go off and sulk.

What she didn’t expect was for him to stroll along beside her, watching her with a smile that was more predatory than angry.

“It’ll happen one day, you know,” he said softly.

“Vampires read the future now?”

“No, but they know what they want. And they can read desire.”

“You’re dead,” she retorted. “You’re not supposed to feel any desire.”

“On the contrary. Some human feelings are certainly not there anymore, but those that are left are intensified and much more—urgent.”

Her hot body flamed all over again, and as if he felt it—which he probably did—his smile grew. Wildly, she searched around in her mind for something to distract him. But it seemed he’d already moved on.

“Is this where Jason lives?” he asked casually.

Piqued by the speed with which he seemed able to throw off the shatteringly sexy interlude, she walked even faster. “I think it’s that block there. With the scaffolding round it. They’re working on it, which is why he’s meant to be staying with his parents.”

Jason’s was the main-door, ground-floor flat in a Georgian building. She hadn’t needed to track him there; his father had given her the address. But now she held on to the purloined cufflink and reached out for the growingly familiar sense of undead.

Or at least, she tried to. All her senses seemed to be wrapped up in the wrong vampire.

Oh, for Christ’s sake, get a grip! she raged at herself. What are you, some sniveling teenager with a crush? Grow up, and do your job!

With a quick glance at Blair to make sure he hadn’t overheard her thought—he didn’t appear to, since he was staring thoughtfully at the dark ground-floor window—she curled her fingers around the cufflink once more and focused on the being who had once been Jason Bell.

“I don’t think he’s there,” she said at last.

“He isn’t. He’s probably out hunting.”

She glanced at him uncertainly, a thousand questions clogging her lips and dying unspoken. Because right now, she couldn’t really handle the answers. The corner of his mouth quirked upward. “I pace myself,” he said, apparently by way of explanation. “A little here, a little there.”

“I hope you brush your teeth in between,” she retorted and was appalled with herself.

Blair, however, laughed inside her head. It was an extraordinary feeling that communicated mirth so much more effectively than ordinary laughter while his smile grew wide and amused. Sera had to fight down a responsive chuckle.

He said, “Our bodies don’t absorb or pass on toxins. Shall we go inside?”

Since a young couple were passing at the time, and coming the other way, a man was walking his dog, Sera said, “We’d be seen. I’m not that quick at picking locks.”

“That probably counts in your favor,” Blair observed, staring at the lock on the door. “In some circles, at any rate.”

A clear, clicking sound came from the region of the keyhole. Sera felt her eyes widen as she gazed from the door to Blair. “Did you do that? How did you do that?”

Blair stepped past her, pushed open the door, and bowed elaborately for her to precede him. “Vampires have an affinity with doors.”

Like metaphysical doors? Portals, gateways between the states of living and dead, which he seemed to straddle, a foot in either camp. Sera had always looked on her own gifts as a gateway. Perhaps she could do it with solid doors too—they were, after all, built for the same purpose of division as the barriers between the living and the dead. Note to self: try it in secret…

But another issue distracted her. “So how come you didn’t do this to Nicholas Smith’s door?” she demanded in some frustration.

“I wanted to see if you’d stop me.”

Sera gave up and closed her mouth. It was time to concentrate on the present.

Jason’s flat was a mess. There had clearly been some kind of major leak, because the whole place showed signs of water damage. Much of the wallpaper had been stripped off, and the wooden flooring was badly stained. However, signs of Mrs. Bell’s visit showed in the spotlessly clean and bare kitchen, and in the main bedroom, which had been cleaned and aired and the bed neatly made. It hadn’t been slept in.

Sera began a systematic search for information, rifling through drawers and desks for names, numbers, notes, anything that might lead them closer to who’d killed Jason and why. Soon, the absence of any personal papers at all—apart from an electricity bill—led her to sit back on her heels on the wooden floor and say flatly, “I think he’s taken everything away. Or someone has.”

“Then there is a connection to find.” Blair strolled toward the window and looked out into the darkness.

Sera frowned. “A connection between the vampires,” she said slowly. “C & H, for one. A vampire came out of the C & H building with Jason last night. Why would your southern vampires target C & H people?”

“I have absolutely no idea.”

“Someone with a grudge over a bad investment? Do vampires make investments?”

“No,” Blair said disparagingly, then, “Well, sometimes some do.”

Sera stood up. “More of an under-the-mattress type, are you?” she mocked.

He glanced over his shoulder, and the glow was back in his eyes. “Come and look,” he invited.

Blair’s mattress, Blair’s bed, and Sera falling onto it with him, naked, skin on skin, his hard body sliding against her as he pushed inside her. Oh yes, oh God… She held his gaze only from defiance.

They both heard it at the same time, the already familiar click of the front door as someone entered with a key. Jason? Silent and lithe as a cat, Blair sprang toward the door and switched off the light. Great. Now she couldn’t see either; but presumably, Blair felt the darkness gave him an advantage, which meant the newcomer at least wasn’t a vampire.

Didn’t it? Just to be on the safe side, Sera felt in her pocket for the sharp wooden stick and tried to focus.

Human breathing filled the silence—her own and someone else’s. Whoever this was must have seen the light on, must have guessed they were there. The living room door pushed open, widening the arc of dim light from the hall, and someone stepped inside. Blair grabbed him from behind and pushed his head on one side to reveal his throat.

“Blair, no!” Sera yelled through the man’s strangled gasp. “This is Mr. Bell.”

Blair glanced at her without noticeable interest. He was hungry, she saw with a shiver that wasn’t entirely unpleasant. The hunger in his eyes, when he had her pressed up against the wall, had been weirdly enthralling. The memory still was, even now when she recognized it as blood lust rather than sex lust. Bastard.

“Mr. Ferdinand Bell,” she added severely. “Jason’s father.”

Reluctantly, Blair released old Ferdy, and when Sera continued to glare at him, he brushed the old man down with only a hint of mockery.

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Bell,” Sera said. “We didn’t know it was you.”

Ferdy squared his shoulders and adjusted his tie. As nearly always, he wore a smart three-piece suit. “Miss MacBride? What are you doing here?” He sounded more bewildered than angry, although his eyes were wary as he glanced at Blair. “How did you get in? Is Jason here?”

“No. I found the door open,” Sera said with perfect literal truth. “What brings you here?”

“This,” said Ferdy, producing a bag from his pocket. He took out four bulbs of garlic and three roughly bound-together wooden crosses.

Sera looked at him carefully. “You’re protecting Jason?”

“I’m waiting for Jason,” Ferdy said grimly. From his other pocket, he took one of the wooden stakes Sera had made for him the day of the party,

Her throat closed up with shame. “Oh no,” she said, going to him in distress, “you can’t…”

He looked at her with genuine sadness but also with that trace of hamming it up that she’d sensed and misinterpreted so badly before. “You know what he is now. He isn’t my Jason.”

“Even if he isn’t, you shouldn’t be the one to do this.”

“Who better? I couldn’t let anyone else do it.”

“Fair enough,” Blair said cheerfully. “That solves one problem. Let’s go, Serafina.”

“No!” She glared at him while Ferdy’s eyes widened with startlement at her vehemence.

“I’m afraid this isn’t up to you, Miss MacBride.”

Sera dragged her fingers through her hair. “I didn’t mean that,” she said hastily. “But think about it, Mr. Bell. Our only hope of catching whoever did this to Jason is by Jason leading us to him.”

“No, it isn’t,” Blair said irritably. “You’re doing just fine.”

Sera ignored him. “To him or her,” she added. “Jason can’t lead us anywhere if he’s dust.”

Ferdy tapped the stick on his open palm, looking thoughtful. “That is a fair point,” he allowed at last.

Sera exhaled. “I think you should go home,” she advised. “And let us follow Jason.”

Ferdy lowered himself onto the dust-covered sofa. “There is one other point to consider,” he said with obvious pain. “I have to protect my wife.”

“You think Mrs. Bell’s in danger? From Jason?” In a surge of fresh pity, Sera crouched down opposite him, gazing into his face.

“Isn’t it true that vampires go after the people they’ve loved most in life?”

“I don’t know.” Helplessly, Sera looked up at Blair.

“No,” he said. “It’s not true.”

“It’s not true,” Sera repeated in relief.

Blair stirred. “At least, not generally. Depends whether the vampire in question has unresolved issues with his supposed loved ones. I knew a vampire once who did in his entire family because they laughed at his choice of trousers when he was fifteen.”

Sera cast him a glance of dislike. “Was your relationship with Jason good?” she asked Ferdy. “Was Mrs. Bell’s?”

“Oh yes.”

“He didn’t resent you for anything? Even when he was at school? Did you ever have to stop him from doing the sort of unsuitable stuff teenagers always want to do?”

“Not that I can recall.” Ferdy dropped his head into his hands. “To be honest, he wasn’t that sort of a teenager. He was always very—motivated. Brilliant and hard working.”

“Poor bastard,” said Blair.

Sera looked around for something to throw at him before she realized the futility as well as the stupidity. Rising to her feet, she said, “I’m sure you were always very supportive. And I’m pretty sure you and Mrs. Bell are safe from Jason. He deliberately moved out of your house, after all. And he had opportunity to attack you before then.”

Ferdy lifted his head with a sad smile. “You’re right, of course. I’ll take comfort in that.”

“Okay, I’ll be in touch soon. Maybe the best you can do right now is keep out of Jason’s way.”

“Good night,” Ferdy sighed, rising as if he too planned to leave.

There was nothing for Sera to do but take Blair and vacate the flat. At the living room door, she paused and glanced back at Ferdy, who had his back to her as he gazed out the window.

“I don’t suppose,” she said, “that you know a man called Nicholas Smith? Did Jason ever mention the name?”

Ferdy appeared to think about it. “Not that I can recall,” he said at last.

“Okay. Good night.”

“Do you know,” Blair said in the hall, “that’s another odd thing. A newly turned vampire is hungry. I mean very hungry. He’s unlikely to go after particular people; he’d just focus on the feeding. And yet Jason went to his parents’ house the same night and didn’t feed.”

Sera frowned, opening the door and stepping out into the night. “Unless he did feed from them but left them alive? Only they don’t remember. Like Tam didn’t remember what you did.”

“Possible.” Blair descended the front four steps in one stride. “But unlikely. It takes time to develop that kind of skill.”

“I peered at Ferdy’s neck for wounds the next day,” Sera confessed. “Just in case. He didn’t have any. But then again, neither did Tam.”

“They heal very fast if you do it properly. I would expect Jason to leave some kind of mark, at least at first.” He strode off along the street, and Sera scurried to catch up with him—which wasn’t really necessary in order to hear what he was saying in her head, but old habits died hard. “The point is,” Blair went on, “Jason seemed determined to get on with his life. Not his—er—unlife.”

Struck, Sera thought hard about that. “Maybe he didn’t know what else to do. Maybe he was so motivated to work in life that he carried it into death.”

“Maybe.” Blair didn’t sound convinced. “But then there’s the girl belonging to the black dress. From what you say, she’s also carried on working. No one’s supposed to know these guys are dead. How important is she in at C & H? Do you have a name for her?”

“Not yet. But I can probably get one from Ferdy tomorrow. And I’ll see what we can dig up about Nicholas Smith too. Just in case he’s involved.”

Blair glanced at her, not quite smiling. “This sounds like a parting conversation.”

“It is,” Sera said firmly.

“I can’t entice you to my lair after all?”

“Absolutely not. I don’t know what I was thinking of.”

“Sex,” Blair said helpfully. “Lots of it. With me.”

It seemed pointless to deny it after her behavior, so, although her body flushed hot with memory as well as at the current hot gleam in his eyes, she said, “I’ve thought better of it. Much better.”

“Why?”

“Loads of reasons!” she exclaimed. “I’ll stick with the three at the top: you drink blood and will probably kill me; I’m tired after walking around the city for hours and need to sleep; and I do not want the embarrassment of running into Tess again!”

“Who’s Tess?” He sounded genuinely curious.

She stared at him. “The girl at your flat last night. I took her away.”

“She was my dinner,” Blair chided. “I had to go and get more.”

“You can’t talk about—you can’t treat—human beings like that!”

“She was having a good time. Anyway, we weren’t talking about her. We were talking about you.”

“Yes, well, I’m not some floozy you can pick up in a bar for a cheap f*ck and a bite and then erase my memory.”

“Lots of reasons there,” Blair commented after a moment. “But none of them say what you want.”

There was no mockery or humor of any kind in his dark eyes now or in the voice in her mind. There was only six foot plus of gorgeous male whose attention, however temporarily, was entirely focused on her. Her body began to heat all over again. Those butterflies in her stomach ran wild and dived. Again, she imagined falling together onto Blair’s mattress… To have his attention all night, to drown in his eyes while they f*cked…

She drew in a sharp breath. Was he mesmerizing her?

“In this case,” she said, just a shade too harshly, “what counts is what I don’t want.”

He smiled. She could make out the texture of his pale, sensual lips. “Not even a good-night kiss?”

Although he’d made no move to get closer, she flung up both hands to ward him off. If he kissed her again, she’d be lost. “Absolutely not!” she exclaimed.

And that was when a figure fell suddenly from the sky and landed in front of them. He held a bottle in one hand, and his ferocious smile revealed sharp, pointed fangs.