Stepping forward, I let my hands rest on the high back of one of the waiting chairs. “What did you do to him earlier?” I asked.
A faint wash of surprise tipped Nigellus’ eyebrows up. “Do to him?” he echoed. “Whatever do you mean?”
I didn’t shift position or break eye contact. “It’s a straightforward enough question. He was fine when you two left together, and when he came upstairs afterward he was a wreck. What did you do to him?”
Nigellus leaned back in his chair, his gaze boring into me. I had a feeling that on a normal day, I couldn’t have stood up to that gaze for five seconds. Right now, though, I was pumped up on vampire sex mojo and I was damn well getting some answers.
“Ransley is like a son to me, Ms. Bright,” Nigellus said slowly. “I assure you, I’ve done nothing to harm him.”
I narrowed my eyes. “So he was fine when he left you after your little talk, and somewhere between your tête-à-tête and the upstairs bedroom, something happened to make a badass, seven-hundred-year-old sword-wielding vampire lose a chunk out of his memory and nearly stumble over his own feet trying to walk through a doorway? Bullshit.”
Edward was watching me with a slightly wide-eyed expression. “I’ll just go check on dessert, sir, shall I?” he asked, and beat a hasty retreat toward the kitchen.
“Answer me, damn it,” I snapped.
Nigellus continued to regard me like I was a mildly interesting art exhibit, though I couldn’t detect any hint of either anger or defensiveness in his demeanor.
“Ms. Bright,” he began in that urbane voice, “you’ve only recently been thrust into this world, and there are many things you don’t yet know about Ransley’s past. This is completely understandable, of course, since there are many things he doesn’t know about his past. Ransley is... somewhat obsessed with unraveling the mystery surrounding his escape from the fate that befell his fellow vampires.”
“And what fate was that, exactly?” I interrupted. “You said they were killed in the war—every single one of them except him. How is that even possible?”
“They fell to a Fae weapon,” he said. “One that utilized a form of magic never seen before.”
My breath caught, but I refused to be sidetracked. “And Rans?”
“That is the mystery, is it not? One he seems determined to solve, no matter the cost.” For the first time, Nigellus looked away, and I thought I could detect a hint of frustration in his manner. His voice was quieter when he continued. “Perhaps I should not support him in his self-appointed quest. Yet whenever I come across anything anomalous that seems as though it might be related, I share it with him.”
“Was that what you wanted to talk to him about earlier?”
“Indeed it was. I think discussing the subject is sometimes... harder for him than he lets on. I assure you, though, that he did seem all right when he left me. Merely distracted.”
I mulled that for a few moments. Nigellus seemed utterly sincere, and it wasn’t the first indication I’d glimpsed that my vampiric knight in black leather was... not completely okay. If he was suffering from some kind of centuries-old PTSD, I supposed it could fit with memory lapses and the desire he’d expressed earlier to shut off his endlessly circling brain for a bit.
“Okay,” I said eventually. “I can understand that. And I apologize for storming in here and spouting accusations at you.”
“You’re his friend, and you’re worried about him,” Nigellus said without rancor. “You may not believe it, but that pleases me. It really does. Ransley has many friends, but none, I think, who might be inclined to protect him from his own worst impulses. His recklessness concerns me at times, as does his single-mindedness when it comes to the subject of the war.”
“Well,” I said, “that recklessness recently saved me from ending up a prisoner of some very nasty characters. But I don’t want to see him hurt, Nigellus.”
Nigellus smiled. “You’ve already proven that most effectively, my dear. Now, would you care to dine with me this evening? I fear the dishes are getting cold.”
I shook my head, not feeling hungry and not wanting to prolong what was fast becoming an awkward conversation. “I think I’ll pass, though I truly do appreciate your hospitality.”
He shrugged easily. “You’re demonkin, Zorah. There aren’t so many demons that we can afford to turn our backs on our own.”
I tried on a smile, though it felt a bit forced. “I do have one request,” I said. “I don’t suppose you know a way that I could contact my father in Chicago without putting either of us in danger? I have his cell phone and landline numbers, as well as his email.”
Nigellus looked thoughtful. “Perhaps. Why don’t you speak to Edward about it? He’s the expert on such things. Personally, I have a hard time keeping up with human technology these days. Everything changes so quickly.”
“All right,” I said, trying to hide my skepticism. Normally when I was looking for tech advice, asking the eighty-year-old butler wasn’t my first instinct, but... “I’ll, uh, see if he has a moment before he serves dessert.”
* * *
Forty-five minutes later, I ascended the stairs in something of a daze. Edward’s rheumy eyes had lit up with excitement the moment I’d asked about contacting Dad securely, and I now knew more than I’d ever wanted to about using voice over IP across a secure VPN based in the Netherlands.
After hearing me relate the concerns Rans had raised about bringing Fae attention to my father, Edward had insisted that he be the one to actually place the call. We devised a sort of informal code that would make it sound like a routine call relating to a shipping screw-up, but which would—hopefully, anyway—make it clear to my father that I was safe, but couldn’t make it to Chicago.
That had been the plan, at least.
Too bad
