“I should have listened; his looks are deceiving,” she grumbled as she turned her eyes away from him to blink at the glowing monitor.
He ignored them both and took out one of his journals from the period before he was turned, when Savaranola’s bonfires tore through the city of his birth.
Caspar walked over and set a mug of hot tea in front of Beatrice before taking a whiskey to Giovanni. The butler set the tray down on the coffee table and picked up his own book to read in his favorite chair by the fire. It was Beatrice’s third week working at the house, and the three of them had already fallen into a comfortable rhythm.
Giovanni darted around the library, often moving so quickly he startled Beatrice as she sat behind the computer, clicking the keys as she stared at the monitor, searching the vast digital territory he could not access. Giovanni would call out search terms as he worked, and she shooed him away if he got too close to the electronic equipment.
Caspar joined them to read halfway through the evening, often bantering about favorite horror films with Beatrice or needling Giovanni in various languages.
Doyle moved almost as quickly as the vampire, jumping from lap to lap and looking for any imminent treats to be dropped or sneaked behind Giovanni’s back.
“Seriously, Gio. I see one of these houses you list with catalogues online, the rest-”
The kitchen door slammed, and they all started at the sound. Giovanni held up a hand for silence, but didn’t hear any additional noise. Caspar walked swiftly to Beatrice’s desk and stood next to her, looking far more dangerous than one might expect from a sixty-seven-year-old butler.
Giovanni, on the other hand, let out a low growl and slipped out the door in the blink of an eye.
He paused on the stairs, sniffed the air, and relaxed.
“You can hide, Carwyn, but your wet wolfhound cannot. I have company. Stop scaring the guest.”
All of a sudden, something pounced on his back, and Giovanni and the silent intruder tumbled down the stairs in a blur. They rolled toward the entry way, knocking over a green vase that stood in the exquisitely appointed room. A pale white hand shot out, catching the vase before it hit the ground and tossing it toward the plush sofa.
“That is turn of the century Bien Hoa. If you break it, I will break you,” Giovanni gasped out as his friend put him in a choke hold.
“Oh, it’s fine, Gio! You’re such a prissy bastard sometimes.” Carwyn twisted around, trying to capture his friend’s leg in a lock, but failed. Carwyn had never been faster than him. His only advantage lay in his broad shoulders, heavily muscled arms, and the element of surprise, which he had lost.
Giovanni twisted around, finally getting out of the choke-hold and flipping backward over Carwyn’s head to leap on his back. In no time, the Welshman was flat on his face with one arm twisted behind him, and a long leg bent his knees at angles that would have broken a mortal man.
Giovanni decided to shock him, just for good measure. Carwyn hissed when he felt the sharp sizzle course through his body.
“Damn it, Sparky!” he yelped. “Not fair.”
“Yield?”
“Of course, you bloody Italian, I yield. Now let me up.”
Giovanni stood with a grin, holding his hand out to his old friend who scowled at him and grabbed it in a harder grip than strictly necessary. Carwyn walked over to the couch to retrieve the vase.
“See? Not a scratch. I was an expert archer, you know.” He pulled back an arm as if aiming an arrow and sighted Giovanni with one blue eye. “Sired in my prime.”
“Archery does not translate to tossing Vietnamese ceramics, you idiot,” Giovanni scowled and dusted off the vase before setting on its stand. “And where is your dog? It better not be digging anything up.”
Carwyn shrugged his broad shoulders. “I’m sure he is. So, where’s the new blood?”
Giovanni nodded to the top of the stairs.
Carwyn looked to the top of the landing where Caspar stood, looking on in amusement. Beatrice peeked out from behind him, her dark eyes taking in the clearly immortal being now standing in the entryway.
The new vampire almost tripped up the landing, his wild auburn hair flying and a grin overtaking his face as he peeked at Beatrice, who was still hiding behind Caspar.
“Now, Cas, tell her I won’t bite, will you?” Carwyn grinned and shot a wink at her. Beatrice stepped out from Caspar’s shadow to examine Giovanni’s friend more carefully.
Carwyn stuck out a hand. “Father Carwyn ap Bryn, my dear.”
Beatrice shook it tentatively, her small hand dwarfed by the mountain of a man in front of her. “Father?” she asked skeptically.
He winked at her before bending to press a kiss her delicate fingers. “Indeed.” Carwyn brought her hand up, suddenly twisting it to sniff her wrist. “No wonder you wanted to hire her, Gio.” Carwyn smirked and cocked an eyebrow. “She smells delectable.”
Giovanni caught Beatrice’s quick gasp as he climbed the stairs. Caspar was chuckling and trying to shove Carwyn toward the library, and Beatrice hung back, her face flushed with embarrassment and her hand still caught in the Welshman’s grip.
“Give her hand back, old man,” Giovanni muttered in a voice only an immortal would hear.
Carwyn growled a little and shot him a look, but let Beatrice’s hand drop and walked into the library with Caspar. Giovanni stepped onto the landing, observing Beatrice’s reaction carefully. Her heart rate was rapid, but there was no smell of adrenaline in the air, so he knew she wasn’t afraid. Nevertheless, he approached her cautiously.
“He’s harmless, really. Far more harmless than me.”
She cocked an eyebrow at him. “Really? Tell that to your vase.”
He chuckled and, reassured of her mood, placed a hand on the small of her back to lead her into the library where Caspar was pouring a drink from a crystal decanter, and Doyle was hissing at the large Welshman who shoved him out of his favorite chair.
“It’s raining out there, Gio. I come to your place to escape the rain, for heaven’s sake. I get enough of this at home.”
Giovanni was curious what Beatrice would make of one of his oldest friends. Though Carwyn was a priest, he rarely wore any kind of uniform, preferring to dress himself more like a surfer than a man of the cloth when he visited the United States.
He removed his soggy coat and hung it on the back of his chair, revealing a garish shirt with scantily clad hula girls dancing across the back. He must have caught Beatrice’s stare, because he only smiled again and sat down, reaching for the drink Caspar held out to him.
“Thanks, Cas. We don’t have to wear black, you know.” He nodded toward Giovanni, who had shown Beatrice to the small couch in front of the fire and sat down next to her. “This one does it because he thinks it makes him look dashing, or he really is that boring. Haven’t figured that one out.”
“I vote boring,” Caspar quipped. “God knows I’ve tried to break him out of his shell.”
“Though,” Carwyn shrugged. “Look at the girl, Cas. Perhaps he’s met his match in the black wardrobe department.”
“Thanks,” Beatrice finally piped in.
He winked at her. “Great boots, my dear. Do you ride motorcycles? And if not, would you like to?”
Giovanni leaned into the back of the couch, stretching his arm casually behind Beatrice, unable to completely turn off his territorial instincts around another vampire, even his old and trusted friend.
“You’re early, Father. Everything all right in Wales?” he asked nonchalantly.
The sharp glint in the Welshman’s eye told him they would be having a more private discussion once the humans left, and tension made the blood begin to move in his veins. He instinctively moved closer to Beatrice, who was listening to a story Carwyn had begun relating about one of their more outrageous exploits in London in the late 1960s when Caspar had been much younger.