Embrace the Night

Page 165



Gabriel paused outside, his senses questing, testing the air. He caught Sara's scent, and though faint, it was as easy to follow as a lighted candle in the darkness.

Sara huddled in the corner, paralyzed with fright, while the creature who had brought her to this place paced the floor, back and forth, back and forth, like an animal in a cage.

She tried not to watch him, but she couldn't seem to draw her gaze from his hulking form, from his face. From the long, wicked-looking knife that dangled from one hairy fist. She had begged him to let her go, but he had looked at her through dead eyes, his face totally devoid of expression, as though all trace of humanity, of life itself, had been destroyed, leaving only an empty shell capable of movement.

Hours passed that seemed like days. With the coming of night, total blackness descended on the deserted building, and with it a deafening silence marred only by the creature's shuffling footsteps and an occasional scurrying sound that made Sara think of rats.

Shivering, she drew her knees to her chin, her arms wrapped around her legs. Why had that creature brought her here? Why had she ever opened the door? And yet it had never occurred to her that she would be in any real danger while the sun was up, that she wouldn't be safe on the steps of her own house.

"Gabriel." She breathed his name aloud, using it as a talisman against the dark, the fear that boiled up inside her. He would come for her. She had to believe that.

"Of course he'll come."

Sara scrambled to her feet, her eyes searching the darkness for the source of that smooth, sultry voice. "So," the voice said, "you're the little ballerina who has captured my Giovanni's heart."
"Who… who's there?"

"Don't you know?" the woman asked petulantly. "Surely Giovanni mentioned my name."
Sara frowned. "Giovanni? I don't know anyone named Giovanni."

A soft laugh sounded from Sara's right and she whirled around. She had heard no footsteps, no movement.

"That naughty boy, he calls himself Gabriel now. Didn't he even tell you his true name?"
Sara recoiled as she felt a hand in her hair. "Who are you? Why are you doing this?"

"All in good time." There was a smile in that voice, a cruel, calculating smile. "He may change his name, but he cannot change what he is." Again, that sultry laugh. "But to take the name of an angel! Ah, that is most daring."

Sara gasped in pain as Nina's hand fisted in her hair, jerking her head back to expose her throat. "He was mine first, my little mortal. Mine. And he will be mine again."