A Hidden Fire

She frowned and looked at him curiously.  “Do humans—do they ever give you their permission?”

He avoided the question, diving and surfacing a few feet from her.  She looked away, flustered by his presence, so he retreated a few feet.

“Wh—who is Giovanni di Spada?” she asked.

“Who?”

“Carwyn, he called you that when you were…you know.”

Giovanni frowned a little, faintly remembering the priest calling the name of his more violent past.  “Giovanni de Spada is the name I was using when Carwyn and I met.  I went by that name for almost two hundred years.  He still forgets and calls me that occasionally.”

“So you changed the last name, but you kept Giovanni?”

He nodded, baffled by her questions, but willing to entertain them if it regained some of the trust he had broken.  “It seemed easier to keep the given name.  If I ever traveled back to the same place or the same business and someone happened to remember me, it was easy enough to claim I was a relative.  And, of course, there were no photographs until recently.”

“Oh,” she nodded, “that makes sense.”

“It wasn’t difficult to change your identity for most of history.”

“And now?”

He shrugged.  “Now it is harder, but not impossible.”

She paused and finally met his eyes.  He could see her start to relax and wished he had not agreed to avoid using his amnis on her.  It would make questioning her far more straightforward.

“Who did you meet today?” he asked quietly, slowly moving closer to her at the edge of the pool.

“Who did I—what?  I met…” she cleared her throat, suddenly flustered again, “lots of people, Gio.  What does that—”

“You met someone new.  A stranger.  You had the scent of another immortal on you,” he said, keeping his voice carefully neutral.

She scowled at him.  “I did not!  I had a completely normal day.  I didn’t meet any vampires.  I think I’d know what to look for at this point, don’t you?”  He could hear her pulse pick up, but he sensed it was from anger, not fear. 

He glanced at Carwyn, who moved slightly closer to the pool, his hands in his pockets as he sauntered toward them.

“I smelled it too, B.  It was faint, but it was there.  It’s on your hands.  Gio’s nose has always been sharper.  Did you shake hands with anyone?  Go anywhere new?”

She rolled her eyes and huffed in frustration.  “I went to school and work.  I went to dinner with my grandma and her friends.  I went to a new Thai restaurant where none of the waiters looked any paler than usual, Carwyn.  I didn’t meet a vampire!”

“Something,” Giovanni muttered, swimming over to the edge of the pool and lifting himself up.  “There has to be something.”  He strode over the patio, dripping cold water as he walked.  He only remembered his nudity when he heard Beatrice gasp a little from the steps.

Carwyn rolled his eyes and tossed Giovanni a towel from the end of the chaise.  “Cover yourself up.  We all know she’d rather see me naked.”

He glanced over his shoulder toward Beatrice, who was blushing and staring at his feet.  He smirked when he realized why her heart had been racing.

It didn’t appear to be anger.

He slung the towel around his waist and walked back toward her, holding a hand out to help her up.  She was still looking anywhere but at him.

“Beatrice,” he said, trying to smother a smile.  “I apologize.  My behavior in the living room was unconscionable.  It won’t happen again.”  She still refused to look at him.  He sighed and dropped his hand.

“It’s fine, Gio,” she said, bright red in the face.  “Just don’t scare me like that again.”

“I’ll try not to.”  He held out his hand again; this time she took it and allowed him to help her stand.

“And don’t think I didn’t feel the current thing when you grabbed me.  Do not mess with my brain.”

He allowed her to see the edge of his smile.  “Understood.”

She nodded, resolve clear in her eyes.  “I’m going to go call my grandmother so she doesn’t worry.  I’ll be up in the library when I’m done.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.  Now go put some clothes on.  Because if you want me to concentrate, you can’t dangle that much naked man in front of me.  Vampire or not.”

Giovanni stifled a grin as he walked into the house, punching a laughing Carwyn as he walked by.

“Ow,” the priest pouted, back to his normally gregarious nature.

“Liar.”

“I’m practicing for wrestling!”

Giovanni couldn’t stop the grin that spread across his face or the sense of satisfaction as he ran upstairs to get dressed.

She still hadn’t run.

He met them all in the library, where Carwyn started a fire and Caspar had already brought drinks for everyone.  The butler sat next to the girl on the couch, leaving the two end chairs for the vampires to perch.

Neither vampire sat; Carwyn leaned a shoulder into the mantle and watched the room, while Giovanni roamed the length of the library.  His mind was shuffling information, moving clues like a puzzle.  Now that he could think more rationally, the pieces were beginning to fall into place.  The anger, however, was only beginning to grow.