She dropped the sword. Her smile gave her face a beauty-queen shine. She said, “I had to try. No offense?” I shrugged. “It’s who you are.”
“You weren’t afraid I would cut you?”
“You’ve already signed a contract agreeing not to hurt anyone in Vayl’s Trust. I know how demons are bound.”
“You understand us, do you?”
“It’s part of my job.”
She smiled again, sisterly, like her next move might be to hug me. I shoved my other hand into my pocket in case she decided to fol ow through. Instead she jerked her head toward the chandelier and the light sputtered out, leaving us in almost total darkness. I yanked out my bolo, but it wasn’t necessary. Al she did was lean forward and whisper, “Then you’l appreciate why I set you up for this next bit.” She kissed me, peck, on the cheek, and ran up the stairs.
I stood with my back against the stairway wal, its tiles so cool I could feel them through the thin material of my dress.
That’s why I’m chilled, I told myself as Cole and Vayl walked out of the lounge and came to stand at the bottom of the stairs.
“Berggia,” Vayl said, his smooth baritone more hesitant than I’d heard it the nearly ten months we’d worked together. “I did have a favor to ask of you now that your wife has gone up for the night.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Do you remember the first evening we arrived here?” Drol humor in Cole’s voice as he replied, “That’l be tough to forget.”
“Yes, you and Madame Berggia seemed quite confused at first. Of course, long periods of travel wil do that to anyone. But then you insisted we play that game with the smal portraits. Remember? You showed me several and asked me to respond if I recognized any of them.” I remembered. The panic. Near desperation.
Bergman’s idea to show Vayl familiar photos, every face we could find online, from vampires he’d lived with in the Grecian Trust, to mass murderers he’d disposed of in the thirties, to members of our present crew.
Cole said, “Yeah. Did you want to play the game again? Do you think—”
“No.” Impatient. Almost like, Get with the program, dammit. In fact, I’d be ecstatic if you could read my mind so I wouldn’t have to say this out loud. Vayl rubbed the back of his neck. Stretched his shoulders. Final y blurted it out. “I am interested in meeting a woman.” I stopped breathing.
Cole said, “Madame Berggia is making your appointment with the Seer in the morning—”
“No!” Deep breath. “I want an entirely different sort of woman.” Long pause.
Cole: “Oh.”
Vayclass="underline" “One of the smal paintings you showed me… I was captivated. I have been unable to turn my mind from her in these days since.”
Me: You fucker. I’m going to kill you. Right here. Right now.
Granny May: He doesn’t know about you yet. You’d be murdering an innocent man.
Me: Like hell! Kyphas was right. I turned to go upstairs.
Maybe I will just—
Cole: “Which one was it?”
Vayclass="underline" “I cannot remember her name. She was a green-eyed beauty with flaming red hair. You told me she was biding in Marrakech with her lover, a vampire named Vayl.” I shoved my palm against my mouth. Two fat tears tracked down my cheeks.
Cole said, “Her name is Jasmine.” Bless him, he pronounced it just like Vayl would have.
I turned back. My sverhamin stood on the bal s of his feet, his entire body tight with anticipation. “Yes! Can you arrange a rendezvous?”
“Sir.” Cole pushed his hands into his hair, pul ed his palms down his face. “Although I’m fairly sure she’s unhappy with her current situation, uh, I don’t think a face-to-face is going to be that easy. Vayl is the jealous type.”
“We shal start with a letter, then. I wil dictate and you wil pen and deliver it, yes?”
Cole nodded, but slowly, like he couldn’t quite believe the conversation. “I guess I could.”
“Excel ent!” Vayl clapped him on the shoulder. Which was when I realized his next move would probably be to bound up the steps and rush to his room on the third floor, next to mine, where he could have the privacy he needed to write his fantasy girl a love letter.
I grabbed my skirt, hiked it up to my thighs, and ran toward my room. My mouth was open the whole way, pul ing in big breaths of air to fuel my race, pushing out gusts of silent laughter. Because 1777 Vayl wanted me too.
Yeehaw!
CHAPTER SIX
Vayl never talked much about his childhood. But I always suspected it included lots of hand-me-downs and skipped meals. Because he’d reached the end of his second century with a wel -developed appreciation for the finest clothes, food, and accommodations.
I could see instances where spending extra dough got you better quality, but to me a room was pretty much just a place to crash unless you lost so many stars you began to see mold and bugs. Yeah, I appreciated my sunset-striped king-size with its wal -length headboard and the silk-cushioned bench at its foot. But Vayl would’ve wanted me to ooh and aah over my yel ow and red bathroom (egad, was there no end to the tile?) and the metalwork decorating the windows and the door that led to my balcony. No dice. I saved that kind of reaction for, say, people who could eat entire lemons without puckering. Now, that’s impressive!
For lack of a better place to put it, I’d set my trunk against the wal between the bench and the bathroom. I opened the lid, dug through a couple weeks’ worth of clothing, most of which Monique had sent out to be cleaned for me the day before. Vayl’s cane nestled between a pair of jeans and a pile of silky lingerie that threatened to depress me al over again. So I concentrated on the item that had been his companion so long that he’d added a metal tip to its base and then replaced that twice. Even if he hadn’t recognized me, he should’ve known his cane. But even it had gotten a REJECT stamp.
Which was, maybe, why I spent time with it every day, curled up on the bench with the cane across my knees, my fingers trailing along the whole length of the black wooden sheath that held a sword Vayl had once wielded like it was part of his arm. Now I wasn’t sure he knew how. I turned the cane on my lap, watching the carved tigers spiral down its length while the blue gem at the top glittered in the light of my wal sconces.
Maybe he’ll ask for it tomorrow, I told myself, as I had every night since we’d arrived. My new mantra. The one I repeated right before I cal ed Cassandra.
Who, once again, had nothing new to tel me. Except that she wanted to put Jack on the phone.
“Cassandra, I’m not talking to a dog on the—”
“Here he is!”
I heard panting. Echoes of my conversation with E.J., only Jack had enough control of his slobbers that Cassandra
wouldn’t
need
to
decontaminate
her
mouthpiece when we hung up.
“Uh, hel o, Jack. This would be Jaz. Talking to you on the phone.” I dropped my forehead into my hands, knowing Cassandra could blackmail me until the end of time now.
Because I would pay, yes, raid my savings regularly to make sure nobody ever heard about this. Even so, I said, “I don’t know how you dogs deal with disembodied voices.