"Merci, ma petite puce," Henri said as I made my way to the kitchen downstairs to find the fridge. Apparently, the brothers had their own blood supply upstairs with them. I didn't understand what Henri said but I could ask Franklin or Greg. They both spoke French.

Rolfe came into the kitchen while I was drinking. "Little Queen," he nodded at me while pulling out a bag of blood for himself. I think those were the first words he'd ever spoken to me.

"No. They say not," I said.

"Mmmph," he growled and walked out, drinking. That expression held contempt. Not for me—for them.

After placing my half-pint back in the fridge, I went upstairs and pulled the book I'd brought from my bag. I unpacked a few things, too—things I'd need for my bath the following evening. I was still reading when I dropped over in bed as dawn came.

* * *

Wlodek murmured in Greek as he removed the book from Lissa's hands and set it on the bedside table, then lifted the covers and slid her underneath. His fingers brushed her face carefully before he left to go to his own bed.

Chapter 3

Merrill was sitting on the side of my bed when I woke. I blinked at him, worried that I'd slept much too long. "Here she is," he said and handed a unit of blood to me.

The blood was cold as usual and I noticed that Charles was standing right at Merrill's shoulder, his hazel eyes twinkling and a hopeful expression on his face. "Hello, Charles," I grumped while I tore the top off the bag to drink. You'd think the sun had risen for the first time in a month the way Charles smiled at my less than receptive greeting.

"Lissa, there is a justified execution the Honored One wishes you to cover up, but we must go soon. You may bathe when you return," Merrill said, his manner a bit cool, although his face was in its usual expressionless mask. He was upset that I hadn't say hello to him as well. And the cover-up Merrill mentioned was part of an earlier lesson—to make any justified deaths appear to be accidents. Lovely.

Sliding off the bed while I drank my meal, I went in search of the clothes I'd laid out the night before. Charles politely took my leftover blood while I went into the bathroom to get dressed and brush my teeth. I had no desire to venture out and about with bloodstains between my bicuspids. Five minutes later, I was ready to go—shoes tied and everything. Wouldn't do to keep the vampires waiting. What shocked me when we walked out of Wlodek's manor, however, was the helicopter sitting on the lawn. Wlodek and Radomir were already inside it, waiting for us.

Merrill sat up front, giving me yet another surprise. I learned that he could also fly, and not just in the vampiric sense. The pilot asked if he wanted to take the controls. Merrill waved him off but put a headset on anyway while I was stuck in the back, wedged between Radomir and Wlodek. Radomir buckled me in, Rolfe shut the door and off we flew. They didn't tell me where we were going and I didn't ask. The trip took forty minutes and Radomir's face revealed nothing to me as we landed. I knew better than to offer Wlodek a questioning look.

"We cannot muddy the scene, Lissa, so you must either turn to mist or allow me to carry you," Merrill instructed. We'd set down half a mile from our intended location, in a quiet field filled with dry, dead grass. It was early March and green tipped shoots might make their presence known soon; a scented layer of expectancy lay about the land. At the moment, however, everything remained still and silently dormant. The imprints of the helicopter's landing skids might be a giveaway, too, if we'd landed closer. Grumbling to myself because I didn't know where we were going and would be following blind, I allowed Merrill to carry me. After pulling me up, he lifted a short distance off the ground and traveled swiftly, the tall dead grasses we rushed over whispering beneath us as we passed. Wlodek came along, flying right at Merrill's shoulder. Radomir stayed behind with the pilot, ready to come swiftly if assistance was required.

The house was old. If I were guessing, I would have said between one and two hundred years—the thick, heavy stone portion, anyway. A frame addition on the back looked much newer. The boards on the addition were painted a sunny yellow on the outside, a harsh contrast to the smell of death inside. Merrill settled me in the kitchen after elbowing his way through the open back door. Was I allowed to ask questions? Probably not. I was there to make things look like an accident. Walking carefully through the spacious, modern kitchen, we found the woman's body in a wide doorway leading into the older portion of the home. There were no visible wounds on her body and her head was still connected. Had I still been human, bile might have risen. I got the idea she'd been asphyxiated, which meant she died after minutes of terror. That in itself angered me—her death had not been swift or merciful. A pile of ash covered a rug nearby. Was this one of the killings Merrill had discussed during my last lesson? Had the vampire refused to give up his human companion? Fuck. The house certainly held the woman's as well as the vampire's scents. It also held Sebastian's; he'd performed the assassination. Another sniff brought an additional scent to me. Something fairly new. Oh, dear God.

"What happened to the baby?" I demanded, whirling around to stare at Merrill.

"There was no baby, Lissa, now do your job." Merrill's dispassionate expression gave way to a frown.

"Yes, there was," I insisted. Merrill reached out to grab my arm but I misted away from him, flying through the house while he shouted after me. I'll give Sebastian props for cleaning everything pretty damn good; he'd taken everything out of the house that was baby related except for one small thing—I misted beneath the bed in the mother's bedroom and found a dropped pacifier that had rolled underneath. The mother hadn't noticed or tried to retrieve it. It was chance. Providence. A miracle, perhaps. I grabbed up the small item and went back to Merrill and Wlodek, both standing in the kitchen waiting. Both angry. That didn't come close to what I felt.

"See?" I waved the pacifier under Merrill's nose, suppressed fury in my voice. "Where did that f**ker take the baby? What did he do with it?"

"Lissa, that is not why we're here," Wlodek had gone completely stone-faced.

"No. It isn't, is it?" I hauled a kitchen towel off the cabinet and wrapped my hand in it, grabbed the kettle off the stove and dropped it in the sink. Then, my hand still wrapped in the towel, I turned on a stove burner and dropped the towel near the flame. It caught in seconds and bits of burning cloth dripped onto the floor. Eventually the kitchen caught fire, Merrill grabbed me and we flew out of the house swiftly, with Wlodek close behind. We waited nearby until the entire house was engulfed in flames. Was I furious? Yes. It was a cold fury I felt that night. I knew the child was dead. I'd smelled its death, along with that of its mother. Sebastian had killed a baby. The vampire's lover had been pregnant and given birth. No, the vampire hadn't been the father. Not only was that impossible, the baby didn't have the vampire scent about it. It was human, just as the mother was. Had they decided to have a child between them, by available means? Was that part of their crime?




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