By Blood We Live (51 page)

Memories rolled across her mind in unrelenting waves. Haiti was a small lush place then. . . too small to hide in. Who would risk their life to give sanctuary to a motherless child? No one was that brave when a mob came calling. They'd easily found her, had mercilessly beaten and violated her, and then dragged her to a pyre to cover their shame. Already half-dead from the abuse and hemorrhaging badly, they'd lit tinder around her. Flames quickly caught the hem of her ragged dress. Heat raced up her legs, but she was too weak to move and could barely scream. Her protest came out as a deep, resounding moan of agony. She would have been their bonfire that night, had a man with honor not shown up. Maybe that's why she loved the weightlessness of vapor so.

That was how Alfonse had come to her, as vapor.

Searing heat had given way to cool relief. The jeers and curses all around her had turned into screams of terror. Something that no human mind could fathom had rescued her from the flames, and now the townspeople knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was more on the island to fear than her. The least likely person, the nobleman of means, wielded the wrath and destructive power of an entity that they were horrified to name.

Humans fled. The beach had returned to a place of peace beneath the moon. A gentle hand had cradled her skull, lifting her throat to his mouth. A gentle whisper offered her a choice with a promise, "I will not hurt you; do you want to live?"

Something human within her recoiled as she swallowed her own blood, but that feral, primal animus within knew she was dying, and it fought with all its might to survive. Blood choked her words; all she could do was nod. But her mind screamed a thousand questions as his beautiful lips parted and the moonlight glinted off his fangs.

Yet, his murmur was so serene. "Relax. I must do this now before your heart stops beating or it will be too late,
chérie
."

She remembered her
making
as though it were only moments ago. More than two hundred years still could not eclipse the horror of what people had done to her, nor could she ever forget what Alfonse had given her.

Through his sanguine kiss, her broken bones and violated flesh had begun to knit as her muscles relaxed. Raw nail beds from fighting rapists and aggressors began to heal. Pain literally ceased with his kiss, and then there was only sweet pressure at her neck. Life was draining out of her with each suckle; the world slowed down, her hearing dulled, her eyes closed against the moon. The burns that had engulfed her legs cooled, the puffiness of her swollen face eased. For a moment, there was a velvet cloak of dark peace that enveloped her, a totality of nothingness so peaceful that if she could have, she would have wept. Initially, she could feel him, then see him within her mind's eye as he threw his head back with his eyes closed, ecstasy staining his expression, chest heaving from the exertion, moonlight casting crimson prisms in saliva and blood against porcelain canines. He was horrifying and gorgeous, this nobleman that had claimed her.

"Breathe," he'd commanded.

A gasp shuddered through her and relief made him hug her.

Tears stung her eyes as she searched for a place to discreetly land amongst the modern day humans that strolled the Atlantic City boardwalk so carefree at night. It was time to return her thoughts to the present. Without Alfonse, the past was a place of pain.

But the memories had a stranglehold on her. Her first question upon her awakening in Alfonse's arms had been so naïve.

"I will live?"

His dark eyes had flashed with both triumph and remorse. "
Non
. You will exist." He'd then touched her disheveled hair with reverence. "I'm sorry, it was the only way."

Even then she hadn't fully understood. All she was sure of was that a strange nobleman had found her and had saved her at her darkest hour. His handsome face still haunted her. . . deeply intense, dark eyes. . . thick brows furrowed in a frown of concern. Square jaw owning a slight cleft. Strong, Romanesque nose. A shock of glistening brunette hair spilling across his shoulders when the wind tired of it. His mouth lush and ruby-stained, punished by the suckle.

"Why didn't you just let me die?" It had seemed fair enough a question then.

"Because you'd fought so hard to live, and what they'd accused you of was a lie. I am a man of principle. Without principles, we are all just animals."

His admission became a sensual murmur that bonded them forever. "I have watched you since I came to this island. . . you are an exquisite beauty that I could never allow to endure the sentence for my sins. Even being what I am, there is a code of ethics. Never take more than you need, never take from those who are innocent,
ma chérie
. Break no hearts; cull the herd of its own beasts. Feed from the damned and don't allow them to wake up. They'd blamed you for my feeds, a convenient scapegoat to give them license to act out their lusts and anger. Fools, the lot of them. How could they think a woman who walks in the sunlight amongst them could be capable of such crimes?"

Still, she wasn't sure of what he'd admitted, but she did understand how a woman of no pedigree, no social standing, born at the wrong time to the wrong majority could be blamed. Her response had pained him as she'd taken up his hand within hers.

"Look at my hand, look at yours. What do you see? Look at your clothes, look at mine. That is enough of a reason for them to excuse you and to lynch me."

She'd expected him to snatch his hand away in offense, but her simple truth had gentled his expression from outrage at the mob that had violated her humanity to something else that she, even now, couldn't describe. His words had become tender like his touch, his fingers dappling the pleasure of a caress against her cheek as he'd spoken in a gentle timbre.

"I see beautiful, cinnamon-hued skin perfumed by oils and flavors of the earth. I see deep, amber-brown, expressive eyes, so gorgeous and with depth so vast that they rival the jewel-blue sea. I see thick, lush tendrils of mahogany hair that appears to be as velvet under the night sky. I see a face of an angel, a mouth so inviting I tremble."

He looked away out toward the surf, his voice becoming distant as he spoke a truth that was hard to bear. "I've also sadly witnessed a soul that was pure have to flee its earthly housing well before its time, heard a heart that was loving stop beating while you were in my arms. . . then, as now, I see a body created in majesty that is still yearning for affection beyond lust. I see a brilliant mind trapped in an era of ignorance, straining for recognition and release. I see a woman held captive by circumstance and accident of birth, a hostage of men who have no right to own another living soul. The small attention I gave you upon arriving here at night caused them to hate you more. . . jealousy is a tireless monster that no one can understand."

It was her turn to look away then. Tears mixed with rage as she remembered the respectful attention the new nobleman had given her, and the way men with lesser wealth had resented her reciprocated charm. Women on the island, black and white, hated her because of the attention she'd garnered from the wealthy stranger. Men on the island seethed with outrage, those of all hues taking offense that she would be so enamored with a stranger that she'd deny their advances.

She hadn't thought she was better, or that they were lesser; Alfonse duBenet had given her a jewel that no man had offered. Respect set in kindness. He didn't presume to own her, hadn't presumed that due to her station versus his that he could simply take her. He'd actually tried to begin the slow process of courting her. That is what had been viewed as scandalous. That was where the true crime had been committed, according to the locals. And she'd blossomed under Alfonse's gifts of emotional tenderness. She'd seen that as his difference, the respect and tenderness he'd offered. Not until the night he'd rescued her had she realized that he was something beyond human. But, then again, so were they.

It was humans that had ultimately abused her, had tried to murder her. A vampire had killed her, but in so doing had saved her. The simplicity of it was both profound and perverse.

Alfonse had released a sigh of frustration when he saw her thinking too hard and had then given her his hand. "Be my bride and let us seek our revenge by outliving them all. We will have to go to the mainland. They now know what I am, as well as will correctly assume you are that, too. If we stay on this small island, they will find us by daylight. . . we must leave tonight,
chérie.
"

His human crew was already waiting. The ship had been loaded, the hull of it prepared. Protection sealed it. That was the first time she'd crossed the sea. New Orleans eventually became her home, but not before he'd shown her the world. She missed Alfonse so terribly that her heart still contracted with phantom pains when she thought about him.

Shaking the memory, she alighted on a deserted section of boardwalk. The night was still young as she considered the moon. Only a little after midnight. Normally she didn't hunt so early and preferred being out in the ocean breeze as long as possible. But the man she'd fed on so reminded her of Alfonse. Yet his physical attributes were where the similarity had begun and ended. The man's mind was repugnant. His thoughts pedestrian. . . common. She had done a good deed—freeing a beautiful body of a stagnant soul. At least the physical work of art could decompose in peace and not be mocked by adulterous misuse from the banal mind that had controlled it. He wasn't even a good lover, thus not worthy of being a vampire.

The shadow of a building provided her reentry into solid form near humans. A quick autumn breeze took up the edges of her little black dress as she stepped into the light, giving passerby men a glimpse of her long, sleek legs and a flash of red thong. Brief curiosity and lust filled their eyes. She dismissed them mentally while she listened to their life stories in her head as she walked toward the boardwalk rails to stare out at the ocean. All average Joes; none worth pursuing, and she'd just eaten. Never take more than you need. The casinos here were just not like those in Monaco. The beaches here so unlike the Caribbean or the Mediterranean. Losing Alfonse was a tragedy.

Tears rose in her eyes and then burned away. Time had bled out the tears, but not the pain or the memory. Nightly survival was a game of chance; the casinos were that as well. The baccarat tables and high rollers' dens were filled with men who thrived on risk and survived. That was the energy that drew her and ignited her. That was the energy that disappointed her.

Bored insane she wondered if she might try a new milieu this century. . . politicians, perhaps. Most were duplicitous, foul creatures that were predatory in nature, so why not? It would be no different than hand-picking criminals to feed from.

However, hiding their deaths would be more problematic. Siphoning a hit-man dry would not create a full-scale investigation. It would go into a cold-case homicide file; police wouldn't expend too much manpower on it. The organization her feed hailed from would retaliate, if necessary, against their assumed enemies, which would allow her to feed off the opposing side for a while until they retaliated—and the authorities would be none the wiser. A beautiful cycle until she moved on. It would all remain in the province of organized crime. Simple, elegant. Going after white-collar political criminals with high-profile posts would be messy, even if more satisfying. Maybe one day.

For now she was stuck in North America until she could develop a foolproof plan to cross the forbidding sea. Daylight was the barrier. One could travel as vapor only so far before depleting one's energy. The specter of being lost at sea at sunrise, decomposing and burning in the water, was compelling enough of a reason to stay on shore. Alfonse had taught her that, too, had taught her how to glamour human helpers to keep their coffins closed in the cargo hull until night. But with new technology and Homeland Security, new maritime laws, as well as the ineptness of this era's baggage handlers were she to dare a plane flight, would mean she'd surely fry in their care. She allowed her shoulders to slump. For now she was not just stuck, but trapped on this continent since Alfonse's demise.

Pushing away from the rail with renewed annoyance, she headed toward the bright lights, not caring which casino she entered. They were all the same; just like the feeds had been. Vegas was a notch up from where she was now, but it lacked a beach, and being a spawn of the Caribbean, the night air for her required surf. Down in the delta the feeds that came into the casinos were so po'boy-southern fried that they threatened to make her kill sloppily in outrage. She'd had to move from there, and her beloved New Orleans just wasn't the same since the flood.

Miami had potential, but there was so much competition to feed on the drug lords that often territorial plunder wars broke out amongst her kind, and she didn't need the hassle. Each coven was so protective of its land rights. Same with LA; California was another world. The northeastern seaboard held the greatest potential at the moment, as did the Connecticut tract, or going up into Michigan and over into Canada. Still, one had to be careful of regional vampire politics. She was older than most, but was also made by Alfonse—whom many had ill feelings about because he'd been merciless in enforcing his code of ethics:
Never the innocent, never take more than you need
. Gorging orgies had been put to a stop in his region. Making children was considered heresy in Alfonse's book.

He had garnered formidable enemies because of his extreme views. . . because of his extreme mercy toward humans. For that mercy, they had colluded to mercilessly expose him to sunlight in a devastating coup. The only thing that had saved her was another male wanted her for himself. Her face became tight as thoughts of vengeance tainted her mood. Yes, she'd played along until she could return the favor of sunlight exposure, but that had left her alone, an outcast from polite vampire society. That was the main reason she couldn't trust a cargo ship or flight abroad.

However, Montreal was beautiful and Quebec was her refuge when she needed a taste of Europe, albeit neither was a seaside town. But up there, any death of a local human was a big deal in that pristine environment and created too much attention. So, until circumstances changed, or her code of feeding off those who'd been predators changed, she was stuck.