Mirror: Book One of the Valkanas Clan (27 page)

Wow, that was incredible.

I almost called out
Dorothy?
before
it registered that it was Tom’s voice I was hearing in my head.

Wait, you could hear all that?
I asked.

Mmm
-hmm—though it looks like you couldn’t hear me until she left. Are you all right?

Yeah, I’m fine, why?

I heard Tom’s chuckle in my head at the same time as I felt his hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes and realized I was curled up on my side on the kitchen floor, clutching my stomach. I slowly uncurled, rolled on to my back, and then curved up and stood, shaking my head to clear the last of my mental fog. As I did this, Tom took it upon himself to share that Joseph’s murder was a trap of some kind, though neither of us could figure out how. He carefully omitted that the source of this new information was Dorothy, for which I was grateful.

“How marvelous.
And you had yet to even display the pictures, much less take her by the site. What a find you have here, Damian. Perhaps Cesar is not as much of a fool as I took him to be—though of course he cannot be allowed to have her,” Marcus said.

I hadn't realized Marcus had returned in time to see my "performance." His tone was both pleased and patronizing, and it rankled. I didn’t turn to face him until I was certain I’d regained control of my facial expressions. When I did, I was slightly pleased to notice that everyone else seemed almost as affected as I was: Tom’s jaw clenched, though I could tell he was working to loosen it; Valerie’s nose was wrinkled, as if she had just smelled something very unpleasant; and Damian, who I had expected to find in complete control of himself, was betrayed by the slight narrowing of his eyes.

“Yes, my
paidi mou
is quite the treasure for our family,” Damian said, and though his tone was light, I had no doubt Marcus noticed the slight emphasis he’d placed on the “my” and “our.”

“Indeed, indeed.” Marcus bowed slightly, looking bored. “So will our plans for the evening change now that we know Cesar may have arranged for some sort of trap?”

I could tell from the renewed frustration in Tom’s thoughts that he saw Marcus’s use of the word “may” as his way of casting doubt on the validity of my talents. Fortunately, before he could land everyone into hot water by tossing off some of the insults that were running through his head—one or two of which were creative enough that I had a hard time not bursting into laughter—Valerie chimed in, speaking with far more formality than I was used to hearing her express.

“Marcus, I assure you that Alyson has never been anything but accurate. But no, her warning will not stop us, merely prepare us. Perhaps you might contact Temora and see if she would care to have her knights meet us in Nashville proper, rather than at Cesar’s, so that we could plan a more cautious approach from there?”

“Splendid idea, Valerie," Marcus said.
"I’m sure she’ll be particularly interested to know the cause of our change of plans.”

One corner of his lip twitched for a moment, as if he were suppressing a smile, and I found myself wishing I could step inside his head for a moment.

Ugh,
you couldn't pay me enough to get that close to something so…arctic,
Tom told me.

Marcus pulled out the smallest cell phone I’d ever seen and stepped into the hallway. As he did so, Damian’s phone rang.

“Yes, Luis? Have you found Samuel?”

“Yes," Luis said, clearly audible, "but do you mind if we drive separately, and meet you there?”

Damian glanced around the room.

“There are five of us here currently," Damian said, "more than comfortably fit in my car. If you will come by
here
first to pick Valerie up to ride with you, then the three of you can drive separately. She can inform you of the changes to our plan as well. We will be leaving here in just a few moments.”

“We’ll be right there,” Luis said, and hung up.

Damian closed his phone thoughtfully. He looked like he was about to speak, but then he glanced at Marcus, who had just returned to the kitchen, and his mouth closed.

“Temora has offered us the use of the spare apartment she keeps in Nashville as our meeting point,” Marcus said.

“How generous,” Valerie said.

“Shall we head out then?” Tom asked.

“Yes,” Damian replied. “Valerie, you don’t mind waiting to ride with Luis and Samuel?”

“Of course not dear—we’ll see you there.”

Damian brushed his lips lightly across Valerie’s forehead as we left, and I realized it was the first physical gesture of affection I’d seen them exchange. I wondered if they just weren’t into public displays of affection, or if a hundred years of marriage had left the physical component of their relationship lacking.

That’s unlikely,
I heard Tom chuckle in my head.
You simply haven’t been here long enough to hear one of their more interesting nights. I’m sure Valerie makes the most out of having a husband with Damian’s skills.

You mean his ability to seduce people isn’t just a mind game?

Not from what I’ve heard.

He chuckled again, this time aloud, earning an inquisitive glance from Marcus and a sharp one from Damian. For a second I thought he’d somehow “overheard” our conversation, but then I realized he was probably just warning Tom and me not to make our telepathic exchanges obvious to our guest. I wasn’t sure exactly why I knew it, since it hadn’t been accompanied by any of my usual clairsentient sensations, but I was positive Damian disliked and distrusted Marcus. It confused
me,
since I was just as certain he admired and respected Temora. But then again, I’d never found human politics that logical, and I was sure things only got more complicated when there were literally hundreds of years of history underlying most Master vampires’ relationships with one another.

Why do you think I’m in no rush to become a Master?
Tom chimed in, and I cast him a quick grin. I couldn’t blame him there. I could see where there would be plenty of advantages to being further down the chain of command, as long as the people above you weren’t cruel or spineless. And if climbing up the chain meant spending more time with vampires like Marcus…I suppressed a shudder.

I couldn't agree with you more,
Tom said, then smiled as I buckled my seatbelt.
You realize Damian has never once had a car accident, yes? Besides, a car crash—unless it somehow decapitated you—could never kill you.

I grinned back.
Yeah, but it could ruin a perfectly good pair of jeans.

Tom glanced down at my legs, and I heard his thoughts take a decidedly different turn.

Mmm
—I can see why you like them. They do cling to you in particularly appealing ways.

His hand slid across the smooth stretch of leather between us and hovered above my thigh. His fingers curled slightly, and he began running his fingers across the denim so lightly that I shouldn't have been able to feel it at all. Instead, however, a rush of heat followed that barely perceptible wake. I bit my lip to keep myself from inadvertently giving us away—I did not want Marcus's patronizing tone raining on this particular moment.

Tom's thoughts picked up the tenor of my own, and his smile widened. He slowed his fingers further. Ironically, the effect on me was the opposite: I suddenly felt like I was flying through the woods again in a headlong rush, my blood racing.

Wait—how could my blood be racing? What was driving it?

Abruptly, the sexual tension took a back seat to my curiosity—not that I wasn't still painfully, deliciously aware of Tom's hand, but my questions were nagging louder.

I hate to see you distracted,
Tom said,
but I'm not sure I understand your question well enough to satisfy your curiosity.

I tried to put my thoughts in order, a task made somewhat more difficult by Tom's lingering hand, but I wasn't about to ask him to move it away.

I guess I just—when I first realized I was changed, I noticed I didn't have a heart beat anymore. But I felt something—some kind of movement, just subtler, barely perceptible. And now I can feel my blood rushing like it used to when I was human. What does that? What can make our blood rush like this, or like it does when I blush, without a heartbeat driving it?

Tom's hand stilled, and I almost regretted my question, but my curiosity won out again, albeit only barely.

It's a good question,
Aly
, and one I'm not sure how to answer. There's a lot we can only hypothesize about when it comes to vampire physiology—when we die, we devolve into whatever form our corpse would have been at as a human—which, for the older vampires, means turning into simple dust—but even for the younger ones there's nothing to effectively examine because it all becomes mere human physiology again. And our bodies heal too quickly to vivisect and see how we function while still alive—if that's what we are. So yes, we know something is moving the blood through our veins—how else could the blood we drink sustain us?—but we don't know what, or how. Most of us just take it for simple magic, and don't think about it too much.

Well that isn't a very satisfying answer,
I replied.

Tom chuckled, fortunately snatching his hand off my leg quickly enough that Marcus's inquiring glance didn't have the chance to catch us. I suppressed the urge to giggle, feeling abruptly like a teenager trying to escape parental notice. Of course, I'd been far too much of a nerd in high school to ever need to sneak around behind my parent's back, so the comparison was an imagined one.

You, a nerd?
Really?
Tom smirked.
I never would have guessed.

I sent him a quick mental picture of me smacking him on the shoulder for his remark.

You better thank your stars we have company, hot shot, or else you'd be in a big trouble,
I told him.

Oh really?
 
he
said. He arched one eyebrow and returned his hand to my leg. I closed my eyes and leaned back against the seat, smiling.

Damian’s lead foot meant we were able to make the drive in under two hours, and I found myself climbing out of the car—and away from Tom's hand—with a regret I hoped wasn't noticeable. We arrived at an extremely posh looking condo complex, which didn't surprise me, given who the owner was. There was a small guardhouse adjoining the front doors, something I supposed made the human residents feel safer—though I wondered how safe that would make them feel if they knew what their part-time neighbor was.

Damian spoke with the guard briefly, then turned and waved us forward.

We entered, rode up ten floors in the elevator, and exited into a hallway lined with plush carpet and pleasantly soft lights. Temora’s unit was at the end of the hall, one of only four on the floor, and her door opened to a beautifully furnished and surprisingly open space with a gorgeous view of the downtown lights.

Wow, this is a
spare
apartment?
I mused.

Yeah, money can’t buy you everything, but…
Tom replied, keeping his chuckle solely on mental channels this time, for which I was grateful. Marcus had lived too long not to guess what was going on if we kept giving him clues about it.