“Oleg?” Ben asked.
Tatyana said nothing, but the look she shot him told Ben that he wasn’t far off.
Ben stepped closer and lowered his voice. “Okay, level with me. Does everyone assume Tenzin is my mate?”
“Yes.” The twitch at the corner of her mouth was as close as she’d come to a smile. “Is she not?”
“Tell me about Oleg.”
Her mouth twitched again. “It’s difficult to remain hidden in this world, isn’t it?”
“Which is so weird, because the humans aren’t supposed to know about us.”
“Be serious. Don’t you think most of them know?”
Ben remembered Chloe’s shock when she’d woken up to see Tenzin hovering, fangs out, in their loft in New York. “I think there are a lot of people who don’t know a thing.”
“Then they’re blind.” She glanced up. “Did you always know?”
“No.” He debated how much to tell her, but he decided to offer something to see if she’d open up. “I was twelve. I picked a vampire’s wallet.”
“You tried?”
“Succeeded. Not to brag, but I did. He tracked me down and ended up adopting me.”
“That’s interesting.” She glanced up again. “I was in university.”
“Same as my aunt.”
“I doubt that.” She took a breath. “It wasn’t a pleasant revelation, but I overcame it.”
“So Oleg isn’t your sire?”
She let out a string of unintelligible curses that got the humans laughing. “No. Praise God he is not my sire,” she muttered. “That asshole.”
“Clearly you’re a big fan.”
“He’s a manipulative son of a bitch.”
“Aren’t they all?”
Tatyana looked up. “You tell me. You’ve known them longer than I have.”
Ben didn’t know how to answer her. When he was with Tenzin, he found it easy to call himself a monster. But when he was confronted with calling his aunt or uncle a monster, he felt strangely protective.
“You’ll find your people,” he said quietly. “Eventually you’ll find them.”
“I hope so.”
She put on a good front, but Ben sensed nothing but fear from her. “So what brings you to the Dawn Caravan?”
“What brings anyone?” She lifted the spoon and waved the scent of the stew in front of her face. “I heard about it. I needed to get away. I needed…” She shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea.”
What had she been about to say? What could the Dawn Caravan have that would draw a vampire on the run? Ben glanced around.
Poshani women and children. The young ones ran between the trailers and buses in the swiftly dimming light as human guards roamed the perimeter and vampire guards hovered overhead.
Ah. Of course. “You’re afraid of him.”
“Of who?” She looked up with blank eyes.
“You know exactly who I’m talking about.”
“Sorry, I really don’t.”
She was afraid of Oleg, hiding in a place where protection was guaranteed and Oleg the fearsome Russian fire vampire wouldn’t dare trespass even with all his influence and wealth.
Ben had a feeling that Tatyana had booked her caravan for the whole season.
“What will you do when winter comes?”
Her eyes were all innocence. “Be on my way, of course.”
Ben wasn’t so sure that Tatyana was an innocent. Maybe she hadn’t stolen the goblet initially, but what if she happened to find it in her possession? Surely the Poshani would trade anything for their priceless treasure even if it meant bending the rules for a vampire on the run.
“Here.” She held out a bowl of stew. “Wipe that smile off your face and eat.”
“Does my smile really annoy you that much?”
“You look like a crocodile,” she muttered, “with too many teeth.”
Ben hadn’t laughed that freely in months.
Tenzin looked up when she heard his laughter. Glorious. What had the young woman said?
For the thousandth time, Tenzin debated her strategy. Perhaps she was wrong to follow him so closely? Perhaps he needed to take a few immortal lovers so that he wouldn’t regret—
No.
Her amnis recoiled at the thought, as did her memory. He already belonged to her. She just had to be patient.
Benjamin loved her, and his anger was natural. When he let his temper cool, he would return to her. What was two years? The blink of an eye. The snap of her fingers. Two years was nothing.
Two years was everything.
She hungered for him. When they touched, his amnis roared over her like a crashing wave while hers waited like a tiger. She had to resist the urge to sink her teeth into his flesh and never let go.
She wanted to drown in him, not listen to him laughing at the jokes of another woman.
Her fangs ached in her mouth.
She sipped the glass of blood-wine Radu had poured for her and watched the humans dancing in front of the fire.
“I know you suspect me,” Tenzin said to Radu. “But I am not your enemy. If I was, he wouldn’t even be here.”
“You’re very confident you can control him.”
“Control him?” She smiled. “It doesn’t work that way with Ben.”
Radu glanced toward the kitchen. “I haven’t seen a newborn like him in a very long time.”
“You haven’t seen a newborn like him ever.” The wine was delicious with a hint of berry flavoring the iron tang of blood. “He is unique.”
“Those we love always seem unique.”
“Do you know what happened to all my sire’s other sons?” Tenzin leaned forward.
Radu said, “The world was once a much more violent place. Wars, famines, conflict—”
“I killed them all,” Tenzin said quietly, staring at Radu. “And I didn’t do it for power. I didn’t want their land or their authority. I didn’t want their people or resources.”
Radu stared at her, unflinching. “Why do you tell me this?”
“I’m not after your throne, but others are.”
“Others are always after my throne.”
She glanced at Ben. “We all see what we want to see, Radu. If we take a step back, sometimes the picture becomes clear.”
26
He flipped his pencil in the air, end over point. “Who are the two most likely culprits?”
“Based on what we know so far?” Tenzin was playing some app on her tablet with a rubber-tipped stylus. “Madina and Fynn.”
“Not Darius?”
“Not Darius. I told you, no ambition.”
“I really want it to be René,” he muttered. “Are you sure it’s not René?”
“Yes, Benjamin. Very sure.”
“Why?”
It had been a week since he’d joined the Dawn Caravan, and Ben felt no closer to understanding the dynamics at play. He was confident that Tenzin didn’t have the goblet, but that left Madina, Darius, Fynn, René, and Tatyana as suspects. He wasn’t ruling anyone out.
“René is as confused by all this as we are,” Tenzin said. “I can read him well enough to know. Kezia invited him like she invited me, but she’s more interested in seducing you now, and René’s more than a little put out. He doesn’t like you either.”
“Shocker.” Ben drummed his fingers on the table. “Not that I don’t love the idea of spoiling René’s party, but I really don’t think Kezia is into me.” He was staring at the makeshift board they’d created on his cupboards.
“She is.” Tenzin looked around the trailer. “Do you have a printer?”
“Yes.” He pointed to the corner.
“Good.”
The machine started to hum, but Ben reached for the tennis ball again and started tossing it up and down. “So if Madina and Fynn are the most likely suspects, we need to break into their trailers.”
Tenzin looked up, her eyes dancing. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
She clapped. “I thought you were going to be honorable, but I agree. We really do need to break in.” She hopped to her feet and walked to the printer.
“Day isn’t an option for me anymore, so we have to find a way to distract them as a group, and then the two of us can slip away.”
And have sex!
No. Nooooope. Ben had managed to wrangle his libido under control, but spending every night pretending to be Tenzin’s partner was exhausting. She was as openly affectionate as she’d been before everything went to shit, which meant Ben had to be equally affectionate. And then as soon as they got behind closed doors, the tension was nearly unbearable.
Still, his amnis was happy. His amnis was happy just being in the same room as Tenzin.
Tenzin walked to the cupboards and put three sketches on top of their suspect board.
“Why are you putting pictures of Radu, Kezia, and that weird Poshani guard up? What do they call them? The Hazar?”
Tenzin pivoted to Ben and pointed to the guard. “You think this is a Poshani guard?”
“Yeah.”
She smiled a little. “That’s not a Poshani guard. That’s Radu and Kezia’s brother, Vano.”
“What?” Ben sat up straight. “That guy is the mysterious brother?”
“Yes. Why did you think he was a guard?”
“He was acting like one in Kashgar, standing behind Kezia while she watched me. It was odd, but I assumed he was her guard. He’s kind of…”
“Nondescript?”
“Yes. Then I saw him in Bucharest at Radu’s club—”
“Because it belongs to both of them,” Tenzin said. “Vano is based in Ukraine, but he has invested with Radu in several properties. He’s been here longer than we have.”
“Weird.” This meant something. “What does this mean? What am I missing?”
Tenzin raised an eyebrow. “You can’t tell which vampires are in charge and which ones are guards?”
“No, no, no…”
My sister knows something was stolen—she’s the one who helped me test you—but she does not know all the details. My brother knows nothing, and it must remain that way.
Ben stood. “Vano knows. Radu thinks Vano doesn’t know anything about the goblet being stolen, but he was in Kashgar with Kezia, looking for me.”
“So Vano knows something is up?”
“If he knows what we do, he has to have figured out that Radu lost something important.”
“The icon?”
“Possibly.” Ben started to pace. “But if we were still looking for the icon, then why would I be here?”
“Kezia is wondering that herself. She’s the one who set up the icon theft.” Tenzin used air quotes around the word theft.
“What do you mean?”
Tenzin frowned; then she looked a little embarrassed. “I did forget to tell you.”
“Tenzin!”
“What?” She motioned between them. “There’s been quite a bit of tension if you hadn’t noticed. Kezia’s picture was in that Renaissance triptych I spotted in the chapel.”
“She was a patron?”
“That was her chapel. Farkas is her human.”
Ben’s mouth dropped open. “Farkas is her—”
“I’m guessing a former lover? Current lover? He’s not that old. Or maybe he was just her errand boy, gathering pretty objects as she happened upon them.”
“So the house did belong to a vampire.”
“Oh yes.” Tenzin hovered in the air, sitting cross-legged as she floated in front of the sketches she’d made. “I’d guess the house belongs to her.”
“So Kezia knows about the icon.”
“Yes. She set up the job with Radu to test you,” Tenzin said. “But does she know about the goblet theft?”
“Not according to Radu.” Ben paced in front of the pictures. “She does know something is missing.”
“She might suspect the goblet since the ceremony is coming up.”
“And if she confided in Vano, she might have told him about the goblet.”
“Possibly.”
Kezia and Vano.
Radu and Kezia.
Kezia and Farkas.
Farkas with a vampire.
Was everyone scheming behind everyone else’s back?
Click, click, click.
“I know what’s bugging me. I know what’s not right.” He spun toward her. “I really do think faster now; Beatrice wasn’t lying.”
“Of course she wasn’t. What is going on?”
He walked to the board. He took down Fynn, René, Darius, Tenzin, and Tatyana’s pictures.
“What are you doing? I’m not a suspect anymore?”
Was she disappointed? Ben tossed the pictures over his shoulder and stared at the three portraits Tenzin had drawn. “I know what’s been bugging me about this whole job.”
“The fact that it’s too cozy?”
“No, the tension.” He spun around. “Can’t you feel it?”
She rolled her eyes. “And you used to accuse me of being obtuse.”
“No, not between us.” He snapped his fingers and felt the air snapping back at him. “That rippling… something. It’s just under the surface. The humans are tense and wary. Kezia and Radu are constantly poking at each other. The guard—Vano—is slinking around.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“It’s Puerto Rico,” Ben said. “It’s Naples.”
The light went on behind her eyes. “You think there is some rebellion in the works?”
“I think one has to be. All the signs are there.” Ben turned back to the three pictures remaining on the board. Radu, Kezia, and Vano. “This isn’t a theft; this is a coup.”
Tenzin rose and stood next to him, staring at the pictures. “So these are the trailers we need to break into? Radu is not going to like that.”
“You must be joking.” Radu was unamused. He glared sideways at Tenzin before he leveled his dark eyes on Ben. “I told you that you would need to be impartial.”
Tenzin leaned forward. “What motive would I have to steal the goblet?”
“It’s a beautiful and valuable one-of-a-kind treasure,” Radu said.
“Point taken.” Tenzin leaned back. “He’s right—if I got a chance to steal it, I probably would.”
Radu snorted. “Surprisingly self-aware.”
Tenzin spread her arms wide and smiled with fangs in full view. “I’m evolving.”
Something about her expression made the idea of Tenzin evolving absolutely terrifying. Judging by the expression on Radu’s face, he felt the same.
Ben reached out and took her hand. “Tiny, I don’t think Radu actually thinks you took the goblet.” He looked at Radu. “Admitting that one of your own family members may have it out for you is difficult.”
“My brother and sister had nothing to do with this.” Radu wore a tense smile. “But just to prove that to you, I will create an amusement tomorrow night, something involving all the guests. I will instruct the Hazar to allow you passage through the camp without harm.”
“Thank you,” Ben said. “I promise we’ll—”
“There will be no we.” Radu cut him off. “You may search the trailers if you can get past the safeguards,” he said. “You alone. Tenzin will stay with me.” Radu’s mouth was set in a firm line. “Because I still think she is the one who took it.”
Tenzin and Ben exchanged a look, and Tenzin nodded. “I will stay with Radu.”
“Fine.” Ben wasn’t happy, but he understood. Tradition was everything to Radu. The idea of violating his siblings’ privacy went against everything he believed in.
“I’m not a busybody,” he said. “All I’m going to do is look for the goblet. Don’t forget, you’re the one who brought me here.”
“To find a thief, not accuse my family.”
“I will go where the evidence takes me,” Ben said. “If Vano knew nothing about the theft, then why was he in Kashgar?”
&nb
sp; A shadow flickered in his dark eyes. “To accompany our sister.”
“You know there’s more to it than that,” Ben said. “Radu, I’m trying to help. Think. Look around you. Who benefits most from your loss of legitimacy?”
He didn’t answer, but he didn’t avoid Ben’s eyes. “I appreciate your honesty, Ben Vecchio.”
“I won’t lie to you.” He glanced at Tenzin. “And I didn’t dismiss her outright. But I can tell when she’s lying.”
Tenzin snorted. “No, you can’t.”
“Really?” Ben raised an eyebrow. “The ship in Puerto Rico?” The place she’d told him she was leaving for China and that it had nothing to do with him.
Tenzin narrowed her eyes and looked away.
Why did he persist in irritating her? She was showing admirable restraint as it was.
Ben had no idea how much gold Tatyana had hidden in her caravan. But was Tenzin stealing it? No. Radu kept a chest full of gemstones in his vardo. Had she taken a single one?
Well yes, she’d taken a rather nice sapphire, but then she put it back.
See? Evolving.
She was doing remarkably well on her New Year’s resolutions. Did Ben give her any credit? No. He continued to act as if she hadn’t changed at all.
And he still had iron control over his sexual urges, which was very frustrating.
“Tell me this has nothing to do with me. Look me in the eye and tell me this has nothing to do with you and me and what happened in that cave…”
Why had he brought up Puerto Rico? Three years had passed since that happened. Was he still angry that she’d left? If she hadn’t, she would have lost control, just like she had in the cave. She would have hurt him. She’d nearly killed him while he spent his dying breaths reassuring her that it was okay.
Oh no. She’d needed a long break from the temptation that was human Benjamin Vecchio.
He’d been slowly wearing down her control for years, picking at her, making her lower her guard, trying to reveal the human beneath the vampire she’d become.
Ben thought he knew her, but he had no idea.
“Tenzin?”
Radu was gone. The two of them sat alone at a table on the edge of the forest with a candle burning between them and an open bottle of blood-wine.
Dawn Caravan Page 20