Money often makes people do things they would not ordinarily do. You can read their minds much better than I ever could. Do you really think they’re telling us the truth?
Jaxon ran both of her hands through her hair. This all felt wrong. These men should never have broken into her home. And she had felt the vibrations of violence when she first awakened. She had known. She always knew when someone was violent in nature. Their signals had been strong enough to awaken her. Now she felt none of that.
Could someone else have been in the vicinity ? No one,
Lucian said with soft authority.
Jaxon shook her head. Her life had become totally bizarre. The people in her life were totally bizarre. What did that say about her?
Lucian’s palm cupped the nape of her neck.
That you are a very tolerant woman
. His voice caressed her, ran over her like the touch of his fingers, in the same way his thumb slid over her soft skin along the edge of her shirt.
“You have to admit, we were able to penetrate your security system,” Hal continued eagerly with his pitch. A frown crossed his face. “It was more difficult than I imagined. I’ve never run across anything like it before.”
“I designed it myself,” Lucian replied. “I tinker a bit.”
Jaxon sighed and stood up. “I’ll leave you to it. Otherwise, I’d feel bound to arrest everybody.”
You included
.
None of it made any sense to her. When the three men jumped to their feet respectfully, she was more suspicious than ever. With a wave of her hand she dismissed them and sauntered out of the room. Lucian never made mistakes. Never. He had said they were a danger to her, not to him. That meant
she
was in danger. They had come to her home with the intention of harming her, not introducing some alarm system to Lucian. What had he done to bring this act together so quickly? And what was he planning to do? Surely he wouldn’t kill them?
In the kitchen she fixed coffee, determined to get fingerprints. She should have arrested them first thing, and then she would have known immediately who they were and what they were up to.
In the sitting room, Lucian found himself smiling. That was Jaxon’s mind, quick, intelligent. No one was going to fool her for very long.
Fingerprints
. She thought like the detective she was. He leaned toward the three men. “You were sent here to kill Jaxon. You know how wrong that is. She must live. She is the only thing standing between you and certain death.” For one brief moment he allowed them to see him—his power, his fangs, shape-shifting before their horrified gaze into a beast with flaming eyes and the need to devour, to kill.
Paralyzed with terror, they sat ramrod stiff. He had implanted their story, controlling their beliefs for the short
period
Jaxon was in the room. She was becoming far too adept, and he was taking no chances that she would read their intentions. “Hear me now, all three of you. At all costs, you must protect her life. You will return to the two men who sent you here, and you will do whatever it takes to ensure they never send another to harm her. If you should fail, there will be nowhere on this earth that I cannot find you. I will destroy you. Go from here, get on a plane, and rid Jaxon of these two threats to her life.”
His voice was impossible to disobey. He had taken their blood. He could monitor them easily from any distance. He would know the moment their bosses were dead or if they sent others after her. Lucian walked them to the door and watched them leave. He was firmly entrenched in their minds. They would remember only his orders. They would experience them as a great need, always uppermost in their minds.
He turned when he sensed Jaxon’s approach. She had always been light on her feet, but now, with his blood running in her veins, she was as quiet as a born Carpathian. She was carrying an enormous tray with four cups of coffee on it. She was so small, the tray looked as if it overpowered her. He took it from her. “What are you doing?”
“You know what I was doing. Getting fingerprints. But you hurried them out of here as soon as you realized I didn’t buy your ridiculous story. If you’re planning on fooling me, Lucian, you’re going to have to get better at lying.”
He grinned unrepentantly. “I did not tell an untruth.”
“No, you had
them
do the lying and even went so far as to make them believe their absurd story.”
“You were not planning on drinking coffee with them, were you?”
“Naturally, I would have been polite.”
“You cannot drink this stuff. Jaxon, you are not human. Your body would reject it. You cannot do things like this.”
“I figured it might make me sick. But you’ve eaten meals before, haven’t you?”
Where had she learned that? Lucian turned away from her large brown eyes and glided back to the kitchen. She was learning things far too fast. She wasn’t ready yet. He wanted to ease her into his world gently, slowly. She was already immersed in violence and death. She didn’t need her initiation into the Carpathian way of life to be as bad. Most of their people lived calm, productive lives. She was moving easily within his mind, picking out random memories. He wasn’t ready for that. He had things, terrible things, in his past. How could someone in modern times ever understand what it was like in those horrible times? Enemies everywhere. Blood and death and sickness surrounding them. Women and children murdered. How could Jaxon understand the depravity of the true vampire, the evil it was capable of inflicting on humans? The threat the undead held for the species that was Carpathian?
The same way I know the other things, I see them from your memories.
Her voice was soft and beautiful, almost loving. Certainly caressing. It nearly stopped his heart and took away his breath.
“Do not drink coffee or eat any human food. You have recently undergone the conversion, and your body would not simply rid itself of the contents. Instead, you would feel tremendous pain.” He could not allow such a happenstance. It was difficult enough to watch her endure the things outside of his control.
Jaxon watched him place the tray on the counter. “So tell me what you don’t want me to know. Who were those men, and why did they come here?”
Lucian dumped the contents of the coffee mugs into the sink and rinsed them out. “What does it really matter? They are gone, and I doubt they will return.”
“It matters if you placed yourself in danger for me.” She touched his arm because he wasn’t looking at her. Lucian was always so straightforward.
He looked down at her hand against the thickness of his arm. She held quite a bit of power in such a delicate hand. He covered her fingers with his palm, holding her to him, keeping the physical connection between them. “They are human, Jaxon, and I am of ancient blood. It would be difficult for me to place myself in a position of danger. I have knowledge and skill and gifts far beyond their capabilities. No, I did no such thing.”
“But they were a threat to me.” She made it a statement.
“We are leaving this house, honey. I do not wish to have any of your belongings lost to you, should there be an intruder while we are away, so I will remove the things you value highly and place them in the sleeping chamber. Antonio will keep an eye on the house while we are gone.”
“Those men were a threat to me,” she insisted stubbornly.
He transferred his hand to the middle of her back, applying pressure to move her out of the kitchen. “We have only the night to make this departure. We must find a place that will be safe from the sun and one that is easy to defend. The idea is to lure those who wish to pursue us into a trap, not to get caught out in the open.”