my brother Declan. Thank you for your company, but I do hope that it won’t come to giving anyone’s life.”
He bowed again, but as he straightened, his dark blue eyes widened until they seemed to take up half his face. “You’re the princess? You’re beautiful,” he blurted out.
Yes. Just like Declan. She managed not to smile. “No, I’m not a princess. Christophe likes to tease me, that’s all. Thank you for the lovely compliment, though.”
She turned to Christophe, who was scowling at Denal. “We should be going.”
“Ready when you are.”
“Sean is pulling the car around to the front so you don’t have to go through the garage in your gown,” Hopkins said.
“Thank you.”
“I’ll have her home early,” Christophe told Hopkins.
“No. You won’t,” she said.
“Discuss it in the car, Lady Fiona,” Hopkins said, herding them toward the door. “Fashionably late is one thing with these charity functions, horrifically late is another.”
“Christophe is nothing if not fashionable,” Denal called, stifling laughter.
Declan grinned and punched Denal in the shoulder. “So, do you like pizza?”
“I have a feeling those two are going to get along famously,” Fiona murmured to Christophe.
“Yep. You’d never know from the look of him that Denal has hundreds of vamp kills to his name, would you?”
Her smile faltered, and she swung around. “Hopkins, you’re in charge.”
Hopkins nodded. “Of course. I’ll just clean the shotguns, shall I?”
Message received, in other words. There was trust, and then there was “trust with her baby brother.” Two very different things, especially from men who could so easily talk about killing vampires. The knot in her chest loosened and she put her hand on Christophe’s arm. “Let’s do this, then. Try not to offend anyone, that’s all I ask. I have to associate with these people.”
Christophe grinned down at her. “When have I ever been offensive? Oh, by the way, this is for you.” He put a hand in his pocket and pulled out an object the size of a golf ball, which he tossed her way.
She caught it and then opened her hand and stared at a large rock. “Lovely. I’ve always wanted a—oh, for the love of Saint George, that’s an uncut diamond.”
Her knees wobbled and she had to lean against him for support. “That—that—it must be—”
“One hundred carats, give or take,” Christophe said. “It should be ample to pay for your share of the Siren, don’t you think?”
Hopkins crossed the room in three paces and lifted the stone from her hand. “That’s ridiculous. It must be a fake.” He examined it, holding it up to the light, turning it this way and that. “But it doesn’t look—This can’t be.”
Fiona nodded, still staring at Christophe and then back at the jewel. “Trust me. I know jewels. Examine it, but I’m fairly certain that’s an actual diamond.”
“Should be excellent quality, too, but feel free to check it out for yourself,” Christophe said. “Should we go?”
Fiona slowly turned to look at Denal. “Does he always do this? Give away fantastically valuable gems?”
Denal was watching Christophe, too. He slowly shook his head. “Never, as far as I know. Never took anybody to a ball, either, though, so what do I know? Next thing I know, we’ll all wake up down Alice’s rabbit hole.”
“You’re worried about rabbit holes, when you’re from Atlantis?” Declan started laughing. “I think we’re all in Wonderland. I also think we need a great huge pizza or two.”
“At least two,” Denal said, following Declan out of the foyer, headed to the games and media room, no doubt.
The bizarre juxtaposition of pizza and hundred-carat uncut diamond boggled Fiona’s mind, and she stood, frozen, staring at the jewel in Hopkins’s hand.
“If you have diamonds like this just lying around to give away, why do you need the Siren?”
“That, my beautiful one, is a very long story, and one I think we should save for later, before Hopkins yells at us again for being late.”
Hopkins looked up, more off-balance than she’d ever seen him. “Late. Right. Go. We’ll talk later.” He closed his hand around the diamond. “Fiona, we can fund so many programs with this, if it really is what it looks like.”
“You called me Fiona. This really is a banner day. Diamonds, book signings, and crime solving.” She turned to Christophe. “Life is certainly interesting with you around,” she told him.
“I was thinking the exact same thing about you.”
Chapter 17
The British Museum
“Are you noticing a theme, here?” Christophe scanned the Great Court as they entered. “Our relationship is built on museums.”
“We have a relationship?”
He was quick with a wolfish grin. “Oh, sweetheart. Are we ever having a relationship.”
“We need to talk about that diamond.”
“That was business. It has nothing to do with us.”
“There’s an us?”
He didn’t answer, at least not in words, and she decided to ignore the implications of his wicked smile and take refuge in lecturing him about their surroundings. “The Great Court is the largest covered public square in Europe, with approximately two acres of space. It was designed by Lord Foster—well, redesigned, really—just in the late nineties and opened by the Queen just after the turn of the century.”
“Turn of the millennium,” he pointed out.
“Well, yes, that, too. You’ll notice the ceiling—”
“Oh, yes. I couldn’t miss that ceiling.” He whistled, staring up at the glass-and-steel canopy.
“They constructed it out of more than three thousand panes of glass and, like snowflakes, no two are alike.” She smiled. “I absolutely love it. I feel a sort of peace in this light, airy space.”
He surprised her by putting an arm around her shoulders and pulling her close. “That’s great news. If you like this, you’re going to
Fiona started to snap out a retort, but the pleasure on his face as he looked up and around at the wonderful space stopped her. Maybe there really was an Atlantis. Maybe he really was from there. After all, it wasn’t that long ago that they were all scoffing at the idea of vampires, and now there were certain to be some in attendance here tonight. Nothing, it seemed, was impossible anymore.
Not even Plato’s mythical lost continent.
“Is it just a city? Or a whole continent?” she whispered, and he jerked his gaze down to stare at her in surprise.
“You believe me?”
“Maybe. Maybe a little.” She laughed. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”
“If you—” He paused and his eyes narrowed. “Who’s the dandy on his way over here? He’s staring at you like you’re on the dessert menu.”
“As did you, earlier,” she pointed out.
“That doesn’t mean any other man can do it,” he growled.
“Lord Nicklesby,” she called out. “What a delight to see you here.”
“Fiona, my dear,” he said, taking her hands in an overly effusive handshake. Now that she thought about it, Christophe was right. Nicklesby was a bit of a dandy. He had more gel in his hair than she did. “I was rather unpleasantly surprised to see you on the telly this afternoon. Bit of a strange situation, hmm?”
“Are you calling me strange?” Christophe’s smile was all the more deadly for its veneer of politeness.
Nicklesby blinked. She’d bet he hadn’t had much experience with Christophe’s form of directness. She bit the
