The Vampire Voss

light, he saw it. The smile he’d tried to force wavered.

“What do you want, then?” she said again, still as coldly as before.

This was not as simple as he’d expected it to be. Voss knew he could easily overpower her, remove the stake from her hand and do whatever he wanted. He could take what he needed, and be gone from London within hours.

The sharp, pounding pain radiating over his back urged him to grab those delicate shoulders and drag her to him. Take.

“I have something for you,” he said, pulling two velvet pouches from the inside of his coat. “And for your sister. An apology. To both of you.”

“I don’t want anything from you.” Her voice was cold, and she didn’t even glance at the jewelry bags.

“Nevertheless, I shall leave them. Perhaps your sister will accept them. They are quite valuable.” He turned and set them on her dressing table. The gifts were really more for Dimitri’s sake than Angelica’s.

“Very well, then. You’ve delivered your apology—unwelcome as it is. Now leave.”

“I also came to ask that you use your Sight to give me information.”

Her eyes widened in shock, and those delicious lips pruned up like an old maid’s. “You came to ask a favor of me? Why in God’s name would I do anything for you?”

Voss winced at her use of the name of God—or perhaps it was simply the Mark—and he once again tried to adopt a placating smile. “Because if you assist me, I’ll leave London and I won’t bother you ever again.”

Despite her bitterness and loathing, he didn’t expect her reaction to be quite as quick and businesslike as it was. “You’d leave London? Is that a vow? Because if it is, I would be most happy to make such a bargain.”

Something panged uncomfortably in the vicinity of his heart and even his belly squeezed—like it did in the morning after too much blood whiskey and ale and wine had all mixed up and sloshed around. “You have my word,” he said.

Angelica snorted in that ladylike way that had amused him previously. “What is it then?”

Voss pulled out the slender gold chain from a different pocket inside his coat. When he’d first acquired it, he hadn’t realized that it would be put to use in this way, but now that he knew Angelica’s secret, it made perfect sense.

“It isn’t a glove—I know that you prefer gloves,” he said, looking at her purposely. He forced himself to say it. “You read death on my glove, didn’t you? Will you tell me what you saw?”

“What I saw is not at all to my liking.”

Voss stilled. Waited. But she said nothing further. “Angelica?”

“It’s not to my liking because I saw nothing. I would that I’d foretold a violent, imminent death for you.”

“You saw nothing?” He wasn’t certain whether to be alarmed or relieved. Did that mean he wasn’t to die? Ever? Something like relief blossomed.

“Are you hard of hearing?” She held out her hand. “Give me the chain and be off with you.”

“You will attempt it?”

“Leave it with me, and I’ll meditate upon it. I’ll send you a message in the morning through Rubey with any information I can cull from the chain.” The stake shifted warningly in her hand, its point still aimed at him.

Voss hid his surprise. “But how can I trust that you will follow through on our agreement, Angelica?” He allowed his voice to caress her name the way he had done to her shoulder.

That very same shoulder lifted in a delicate shrug. “You will have to trust me.” Her eyes narrowed and she straightened. For a moment, he saw something else besides hatred and anger there. It might have been hurt.

“And how am I to know that you wouldn’t send me a message simply so that you can advise Corvindale of my direction?”

Her lips quirked a bit. “A brilliant suggestion. Thank you, Dewhurst. I’m not certain I would have thought of that myself in my haste to rid London of your vile presence. Now, if you please, remove yourself from my chamber. And this house.”

He couldn’t leave. “Don’t you wish to know to whom that watch chain belongs?”

Again, a shrug. His eyes followed the shift of moonlight over the hollow of her shoulder and he swallowed, clenching his teeth. “I couldn’t care less about anything in regards to you. Now, Dewhurst, if you please…I should like to return to my slumber. You interrupted a very delightful dream.”

“I don’t suppose I figured in your nocturnal visions,” he said, lowering his voice and allowing his eyes to glow a bit. “But you have appeared in mine. Angelica…” He dug his fingers into his thighs to keep from reaching for her…and to distract himself from the pain.

Her shoulders shifted back and her breasts thrust forward and he nearly lunged for her at that point. “Indeed you have,” she said, surprising him again. But her voice had dropped and for the first time, it was unsteady. “You’ve figured quite vividly—in my darkest nightmares. This is the first night I’ve slept without Maia since I returned.”

Voss couldn’t breathe. Every bit of insouciance fled and he felt as if he’d been slammed in the gut. “Angelica,” he began, searching for something…something to say that would truly placate her. Something real, something to heal her. His thrall seemed to have no effect on her, leaving him helpless.

Her eyes had become haunted circles. “Go away, Dewhurst. I’ll send a message to Rubey’s in your care. And I’ll return the chain then.”

Words failed him.

She truly meant it.

Anger, sudden and inexplicable, flared through him, surging to his hands, down his legs. His fangs shot forth, his eyes flamed hot and the dark room filled with a red haze. Voss’s fingers curled, ready to grab at her, to tear into her, and he even jerked toward Angelica—but somehow caught himself, turning before he touched the bed.

Somehow, somehow he fought through it, battling the white fury that ordered him to take, take, take.…

Something helped him stumble to the window—the cold night air, the smooth slide of moonbeam—and he grasped its sill even as the blast of pain seared in his hands and behind his eyes. Lucifer was intent that he would do his bidding.

Voss held on so that he wouldn’t turn back. So he wouldn’t tear into her.

“Get out of here,” he managed to say. If she would leave… “Go. Now.”

In the recesses of his consciousness, he heard the rustle of the bedclothes. He battled needy red fog and the demands of his body, somehow focusing on the sounds of her sliding the door’s bolt and then the slide as it closed behind her.

When she was gone, he vaulted through the window and landed easily on the ground three floors below.

Angelica stumbled from her chamber still clutching the stake. Her heart pounded and her knees were weak, and she had one thought: to get away. As she turned to rush down the corridor, she slammed into something— someone—soft and warm.

“Angelica, what is it?” Maia automatically caught her in a comforting embrace.

Angelica’s arms went around her sister, but even as she did so, she had the presence of mind to push her down the hall, toward Maia’s chamber.

She didn’t believe Voss would follow her. He’d ordered her to leave, but she wasn’t certain. His face…it had been so terrifying.

Almost as if he’d turned into someone else.

Go. Get away.

No, he wasn’t coming after her.

But she wasn’t going to go back in that chamber again.

“What’s that in your hand?” Maia asked as they went into her room. She caught Angelica’s wrist and held it up so she could see the stake. “A stick?” Then her eyes went wide. “Oh.”

She remembered Granny Grapes’s stories, too.

“What are you doing awake?” Angelica asked, sitting on her sister’s bed. There was something about being in Maia’s chamber, with all of her things cluttering the dressing table, and more pillows than anyone could ever use piled high on her bed and chair, that made her feel comforted and safe.

“I came to check on you,” Maia told her. They sat on the bed facing each other. “What’s happened?”