“She isn’t coming,” Mirabella said, “but Corvindale is going to join us in her stead.”
“Here? In the carriage?” Maia froze and Angelica felt rather than saw the tension rise as if someone were filling her sister with something unpleasant. “Why does he not meet us there as he usually does?”
“A shocking concept for the earl to ride with us, I agree, but he insisted,” Mirabella replied. She seemed delighted about the possibility of riding to the fete with her brother. “I believe he’s concerned that we might be waylaid by those horrible men again. Although in another breath, he urges me to have no worries about being in danger.”
“I don’t see why he has to ride—” Maia snapped her lips closed as the carriage door opened.
Corvindale loomed in the doorway, then climbed in swiftly, and so gracefully that he brushed nary a hem nor bumped a slipper as he settled next to his sister. Nevertheless, the generous space shrunk to a much smaller one with addition of his large, gruff presence. The closeness made the mixture of rose water aroma and Angelica’s lily of the valley scent mesh with something sharp and masculine, along with wool and smoke. Dressed in a dark coat, topped with a matching hat and giving the glimpse of a brilliant white shirt and a neckcloth of muted colors, the earl was more formally attired than Angelica could recall ever having seen him, except the first night they’d all met. Apparently he took his chaperonage duties seriously—if not reluctantly.
“Good evening, my lord,” Angelica said. “How kind of you to join us. Maia was just commenting on that event and how gratified she is that you’ve taken our safety so seriously that you’d deign to ride with us.”
Maia wasn’t very subtle as she knocked her pointed slipper into Angelica’s ankle, but the latter had been expecting such a reaction and adjusted her foot appropriately. But any further commentary waned as she glanced over at Corvindale.
The coach had started off with a little jerk, but the man was sitting there with an oddly arrested expression on his face. He seemed frozen, his harsh features even more stony than usual. Dark hair gleamed in the low moonlight, brushed neatly away from his temples, but rough and shaggy around the edges of his collar.
Maia, who had turned up her slender, pretty nose and her face toward the small, curtained window, was pointedly not looking at him. And Mirabella, who seemed to have lost her chattiness the moment her elder brother entered the scene, had succumbed to picking at the embroidery on the back of her glove.
Angelica realized that Corvindale seemed to be staring at her—no, at her ears, and that he appeared to be having difficulty breathing. Had he somehow recognized that her earbobs were from Voss? Was he working to control his fury?
Rather than anger in his face, however, she thought the emotion there was more akin to shock. Or pain?
“My lord?” she asked, tipping slightly into Maia as the coach turned a sharp corner. He didn’t respond.
The light in the carriage flickered as they passed by streetlamps, leaving her with the impression that Corvindale had blinked or given some other dismissive sort of gesture. His fingers curled over the front of his knees, one hand curved around a walking stick that she suspected wasn’t used for ambulatory purposes as much as for weaponry. At least, she hoped it wasn’t.
Apparently despite his intention to protect them from whatever dangers the vampires might have planned, the earl was in no mood to talk. Good. Nor was Angelica.
She turned to look out the window, shoving the curtain aside.
But something bothered her: the uncomfortable silence among them, the sound of harsh, rushed breathing rising just above the rumble of carriage wheels, the fact that she could see no other streetlamps amid the shadows of buildings…and that odd expression on his face.
Angelica turned back to the earl and had the impression in the odd light that his eyelids were fluttering. His lips had drawn back in something clearly like pain and he seemed unable to move.
“Lord Corvindale!” she exclaimed, standing abruptly. Her head brushed the top of the carriage, and she bumped against the wall. Her shrill voice penetrated Maia’s self-imposed pout, and her sister turned back toward them. “Are you ill?”
“What is it?” Maia asked. Any trace of pique had left her voice and she, too, was leaning toward Corvindale.
But the earl seemed to shrink back in the seat, his eyes flashing darkly. “
His lips moved; Angelica was certain that was what he’d said, although it had come out in more of a gasplike whisper.
“Corvindale, what is it?” Mirabella had come to life as well. Sitting next to her brother, she was the obvious one to pluck at his arm, which did nothing but flop lifelessly. “My lord!” She grasped his shoulders with her small hands and tried to shake him, but the man was too large and solid for her to do more than jolt him a bit.
He made a noise that sounded like a groan, or a frustrated gasp, and although his eyes flashed angrily in the dark, he seemed unable to speak further.
Angelica lifted her hand to pound on the roof of the carriage, but just before she did, the vehicle stopped abruptly. She tumbled back into her rear-facing seat, landing in Maia’s lap. Someone shouted outside and the vehicle gave a great jolt, as if something had slammed into the side of it.
Another shout, and then the sound of something like a pistol.
Angelica, trying to disengage herself from Maia’s lap, looked over at Corvindale, whose eyes had become more wild and his mouth even more flattened. He seemed to be struggling against some invisible bonds, trying to breathe, eyes bulging. The walking stick shifted slightly in his fingers, but didn’t rise.
The door opened and fresh summer air wafted in, followed by a pair of glowing eyes.
Mirabella screamed and cowered next to her brother. Angelica stifled a gasp as she saw the flash of fangs. The burning gaze fastened on hers, and then something heavy and dark lunged toward her.
Strong hands closed over her arms and the next thing she knew, she was being dragged from the vehicle.
Maia screamed and tried to pull her back in, and for a moment, Angelica was suspended in midair, being torn in two directions. But with a great jolt, the vampire tore her free.
Whipping Angelica away from the carriage, her captor held her with an immovable grip despite her struggles. The next thing she knew, she was being shoved into another vehicle.
Tumbling to her knees on the small floor space, Angelica clawed the covering wrap from her face and looked up into the burning red eyes of the vampire Belial.
13
“I must speak with the Earl of Corvindale,” Maia said firmly. She shoved the toe of her slipper between the door and its frame.
The main entrance to the infamous White’s—a place she’d heard of but had never even seen before tonight —was on St. James. Its white brick façade was well lit by two lanterns, but this obscure rear door was the one she’d seen the earl employ. Despite the fact that it seemed abandoned and unused, she’d made her way up and rapped on the door.
“It is imperative that I speak with him. I’ll not be turned away.”
“The individual of whom you speak is not in residence,” said the man with a supercilious sneer that was clearly visible in the stream of light coming from inside. “Aside of that, individuals of the feminine persuasion—” and he said this with even more disdain as he raked her with a glance of distaste “—are not allowed admittance into this structure. Ever.”
But Maia had dealt with people of every sort, including slick men of business during the times Chas had been absent. She was not cowed, especially when her sister’s life was at stake. “As it happens, I saw the earl walk into this structure with my own eyes. I know he’s here and it is of great necessity that I speak with him. Now, if you please, you may either find him and relay my message, or I shall do so myself.” She pushed at the door with her gloved hands.
“Indeed, madam, I will not—oh, good evening, sir.” The sneer evaporated from his face as he looked up and
