The Vampire Hunter's Daughter The Complete Collection (23 page)

“Can I go shopping tomorrow?” As much as I
hated shopping, I wanted the illusion of freedom and going off the
property would have allowed me that.

Alice came back with his wine and sat it in
front of him. He looked up at her briefly and then dismissed her
with a slight nod. Jeez, what an ass. Alice smiled and nodded at me
on her way out of the room.

“No, you cannot go shopping. There is no
time. Besides, if you were to leave the grounds, I would want to go
with you.”

“Oscar could go with me,” I hopefully
suggested.

“Chloe, there are dresses upstairs. You don’t
need to go buy one. It’s only a simple dinner party.”

“Fine.” I pouted and looked down at my food.
I should have known better, but I also didn’t like him having so
much control. It felt awful not having any say in what I was going
to wear.

After dinner I went upstairs and opened the
armoire. There were four dresses there. I immediately cut the blue
one because it was more of a formal gown, all fluffy and stuff. The
next dress was red, and even though I looked good in red, I thought
it was too flashy for a dinner party. The green one was a color
that reminded me of Christina and her hooker dress, so that left
the always dependable little black dress.

While I tried it on, I considered showing up
in jeans and my Harley shirt. Strangely, I ended up surprised how
nicely the dress fit and how appropriate it was. It had a skirt
that stopped just above my knees, the neckline was scooped and the
straps were about an inch wide. I ran my hands over my hips,
feeling the soft cottony fabric beneath my fingertips. It felt
good, so I decided to wear it. After digging around a bit, I found
a pair of open-toed heels that matched in the bottom of the
armoire.

The next night, after the sun went down,
Alice rushed around trying to prepare everything for the guests.
Hired help prepared food in the kitchen, and I chased Alice around,
asking her every two minutes if there was anything I could do to
help.

“Stop asking me that and go sit down or
something!” she finally snapped at me, pointing at the couch. I was
about to do just that when the doorbell rang. Expecting vampire
guests, I wandered slowly to the door and pulled it open. It was a
complete surprise when I saw Oscar on the other side.

“What are you doing here?”

“I was invited,” he told me and stepped
inside.

I closed the door behind him. For some
reason, I felt like a puddle of goo whenever Oscar was around. I
just couldn’t place the feeling.

“I didn’t know you socialized with vampires,”
I said, attempting to tease him.

“When I am invited by one of the most
prominent vampires in the supernatural community, I certainly do
socialize with them.” He shrugged out of his coat and hung it on
the tall rack in the entryway.

“Well, come on then.” I waved him into the
house. “No one else is here yet, but they should be soon.”

Oscar regarded me with slanted eyes. “You’re
nervous.”

I nodded. “Yes, yeah, I’m very nervous.” I
paused. “What if one of them wants to eat me or something?”

Oscar laughed “I highly doubt that one of
them would try anything like that here, even if they did want to
eat you.”

“It’s not funny, Oscar. I’m actually a little
scared.”

The back of my neck tingled just as the
doorbell rang again. I wondered if that tingling thing was ever
going to go away. I glanced at Oscar and raised my eyebrows. Well,
there wasn’t much else I could do except get it over with. I turned
and opened the door.

On the other side, framed by the darkness,
stood a man and a woman. We examined each other for a moment. He
was tall, with dark hair and bright blue eyes and was dressed in
black slacks and a dark blue button up shirt. His arm was
protectively wrapped around the waist of his lady friend.

She was a pale goddess. Blond ringlets
cascaded her back to her waistline. Her skin was so smooth, like
porcelain. I wanted to reach out and touch it. She had big, wide,
grey eyes, and she wore a dress almost the same color. The dress
was classy: tight-fitting, touched the knees, showed just enough
cleavage, elegant sleeves. I liked it.

“Hello, I’m Chloe.” I greeted them and opened
the door wider. “Come in.”

“I am Vincent.” He ushered the blond inside.
“This is Dahlia.”

He held out his hand for me to shake once
they were fully inside and I was able to shut the door. I grasped
his cool hand and nodded.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

He smiled at me, showing me his perfect white
teeth. I couldn’t see any fangs.

“I’m happy to meet you as well.” I told him.
“Have you met Oscar?”

Oscar stepped forward with his hand extended.
“I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure. I’m Oscar Williams, Chloe’s
tutor.”

I glanced at Dahlia and saw her watery, grey
eyes scale up and down Oscar's body and briefly flashed with
red.

Oh, my gosh!

I hoped she wouldn't try to drink
his
blood while he was here. I thought
I
was going to be the
only one I had to worry about.

Before I could worry about it too much, the
doorbell rang again. This time the couple in the doorway were
women, both dark haired, dark eyed and dressed to impress. I
escorted them in, introduced myself and learned their names were
Vanessa and Constance.

“Do you know Vincent and Dahlia?” I
questioned as we approached the couple, who were speaking with
Oscar in the hallway. Vanessa shrugged out of her wrap, and held it
out for me to take. I stared at her for a moment before grabbing it
from her and hanging it on the coat hook.

What was I, her maid?

Immediately, I took back the mental comment,
because of Alice.

“Yes, I’m quite familiar with Vincent and
Dahlia.” She practically purred Dahlia’s name and ran her
fingertips down the length of the other woman's arm.

Uh, weird.

I was beginning to think all these vampires
were kind of perverted. Maybe that was another reason Trevor had
told them to stay away. Before I could wonder about their odd
relationships, the doorbell sounded again. Trevor swept into the
room in his usual black clothing, only this time instead of jean,
he wore black slacks and button up shirt.

“I’m so glad you all could make it.” He
greeted his guests on his way to the door. Vincent, Dahlia and all
the rest of us moved into the living room to mingle while Trevor
ordered Alice to answer the door and take coats.

Trevor made formal introductions. Turned out
Vincent was his business associate. For some reason, when he told
me that, I thought of Eli and how my mother made it sound like
he
was Trevor’s main man.

I stuck closely to Oscar’s side and spent as
much time helping Alice as I could. At dinner, the twelve of us sat
at the table. I was bombarded with questions: How did I like it
here? What did my mother tell me about my father? Did I have any
vampire abilities? The list went on and on. I lied about all of
them. Lying seemed to be something I was good at lately. Funny, I
could never get one by my mother.

I thought it was just the dumbest thing that
vampires were all sitting around a dinner table and they didn’t
even eat. The whole dinner plate thing was probably just to give
them something to play with while they questioned me.

Alice came in and out, serving us the courses
and keeping our glasses full. Everyone’s goblets were full of some
kind of blood wine mixture while mine only had water. Oscar had
opted for a beer. I didn’t even know we had beer in the house.

Trevor sat at the head of the table while I
sat directly to his right. “Chloe, would you like some of the
wine?”

Oh, how I desperately did want some of that
wine. If it was anything like what my own blood tasted like, then
yes, I wanted some. But, I knew what weakened me, and I knew what I
was here for. I didn’t want to become a vampire. I wanted to kill
them.

“No, thank you. I’ll just stick to
water.”

Trevor nodded and then proceeded to question
the rather ugly looking male vampire to his left. Vanessa sat on
the other side of me and Dahlia straight across the table. Dahlia,
seemed like a quiet one. She hadn’t said anything since she had
arrived. Suddenly, I felt a hand on my leg.

My head snapped over and I glared into
Vanessa’s dark eyes.

“Take your hands off me,” I hissed at her
under my breath.

“Oh, honey,” she whispered back. “I will
place my hands anywhere I damned well please.”

“Take them off,” I repeated.

In complete defiance of my wishes, she ran
her hand up farther onto my thigh. What the heck was wrong with
this chick? Well, if she wanted to play with fire, she picked the
right person. I looked into her eyes and smiled, then reached
underneath the table. I used my fingertips, to gently walk her
short dress up until enough skin was exposed. I then rested my hand
on the cold bare skin of her thigh.

Everyone around us was chatting, not paying
any attention to what was happening between us. Vanessa smiled and
ran a fingernail over my skin.

I gave her one more chance. “I
said
,
Take your hand off me.”

She leaned in like she wanted to tell me a
secret.

“Why don’t you make me,
Hunter
.”

I closed my eyes and pulled in the energy in
the air around me, channeling it down to my hand where I wanted to
release it.

“Ow, damn it!” Vanessa screamed and jumped up
out of her seat, snatching her hand off my thigh.

“Vanessa!” I exclaimed, feigning surprise,
like I hadn't just burn her. “What happened? Are you all
right?”

I hadn’t used fire. I had only warmed my
hand, but against her cold vampire skin, it probably felt like she
had been scorched. Our eyes locked. She read my silent message loud
and clear: Touch me again and it will be worse.

She shook her head. “It’s nothing. I’m sorry.
I haven’t eaten all day and my stomach is paining me today.” She
caught Trevor’s eyes. “You know how it feels when you haven’t
eaten.”

Trevor assessed the situation. I almost
certain he knew she had lied.

“Alice!” he called out. His eyes held
Vanessa’s. When Alice appeared, he asked, “Would you take Vanessa
downstairs and assist her? Her stomach is
paining
her.”

Alice understood the code he spoke and
nodded. “Yes, sir. Come with me, Miss Vanessa.”

Oh, my gosh!
He meant for Alice to
give herself to Vanessa, to give her blood. I didn’t even know
there was a downstairs from the main floor. I thought we were
downstairs. I wanted to get up and go after them, but I knew I
couldn’t. I knew Trevor would never let me near whatever was going
on. I barely touched anything else on my plate for the rest of the
meal because I was so nervous.