His focus shifted to his shaky hands. “Uh, just before we left for Florida.”
Verity regarded Deane with a disapproving stare. Deane cleared his throat. “That would have been nine or ten days ago.”
Her eyes went from Deane to Riley. “And that was animal blood?”
“Chicken,” Dean answered.
She focused her attention on her nephew and spoke gently. “You must be hungry. Feeling lethargic?”
Riley nodded in silence.
“If Julian brought you some blood, would you feel comfortable drinking it?” Her voice was in an undertone.
Riley crossed his arms and dared a look at her. “From what?”
“Rabbits.”
Riley wrinkled his nose and grimaced.
Verity laughed under her breath. “I know. They’re cute and cuddly. They also breed quickly and are a great food supply. We prefer the taste of mammals to birds or reptiles.”
The lad brushed his hair behind his ear. “Sure.”
Julian started for the door, and Emery got up, too. “I’m going to tag along.”
Once the sound of their footsteps faded, Verity stood up and went to sit on the settee. She patted the cushion beside her and looked at Deane. “It’s important you understand how all this works. Julian and I have been on an animal diet for decades. It was a choice we made, but through our childhood we consumed human blood. It was the way we were raised.”
“Were you forced to drink it?” Riley asked from under a careful stare.
Deane joined her on the settee, noticing the herbal smell of her hair. He sat back to listen.
A melancholy expression touched her face. “I never knew there were other options. Our father told us it was the only way to survive. But thanks to my defiant streak, we figured out it wasn’t the only way.”
Riley seemed almost detached as he said, “Ramsay locked me in a closet and told me he wouldn’t let me out until I drank human blood.”
Verity rubbed her temple, and Deane noticed her hand shaking. “Ramsay was older than me. He was raised from youth by Lycos, our father, something that made its mark on Ramsay’s psyche. But I should backtrack to the beginning, so you understand.
“Lycos was lonely and affected with increasing madness after the death of his wife, the mother of our siblings Dolan and Nissa. He may have actually loved her, though it’s hard to imagine him putting anyone before himself. He brought our brother and sister and their young to America, claiming too many memories haunted him in Europe. Lycos became infatuated with a lady of the evening he spotted on the streets of Boston. Her beauty and sadness fascinated him. Ramsay was born from their time spent together, though our father left the boy with his mother until he learned of her early passing, when he brought Ramsay to live with his grown children. Nissa tried her best to guide him despite Lycos’s unfortunate failings. He liked playing with his food, killing for the fun of it, something that even Father didn’t condone.”
Reliving her past appeared to be hard on her. She clutched her trembling hands together and exhaled before continuing. “His behavior concerned Father. And Lycos became convinced that the sweetness of a young sister might turn him into a more reasonable man, so he found a woman who he thought would answer all his problems, my mother. I was raised by her alone until I grew ill, sick. I was wasting away. No matter how much food I ate, I did not gain weight and could not recover. That was when Lycos came and took me away from her.”
Riley was raptly staring at his aunt with his mouth agape. He swallowed and interrupted. “That’s like what happened to me. Did he kill your mom, too?”
Verity offered him a heartsick frown. “No, he took me away from her, told me she didn’t want me anymore. That she feared I had the devil in me. It wasn’t until she had passed that I found out it had all been a lie to keep me from her.”
“So were you able to make Ramsay behave?” The teen’s eyes widened.
She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “To a point, yes. He loved me like no other, cherished me. He would listen to what I asked when he wouldn’t comply with Father. I cannot believe it took me so long to realize why I’d been created. But, like I said, I’ve always had a rebellious streak. I would not be forced to… to partner with Ramsay like Dolan and Nissa had. And when Father brought Julian home from his travels in South America, I had a purpose. I had someone to protect and teach. My little brother and I were inseparable. Still are.”
“You’re lucky you’re not alone.” Riley adjusted in his seat.
The sadness in Verity’s eyes was replaced with hope. Her lips parted in a grin. “You’re not alone either. You have us now.”
Deane watched the two study each other and was struck with Verity’s story. She’d been so objectified, used. It must have taken a lot of strength to stand up to her father. He presumed there was more to her story that she hadn’t shared.
The sound of a door shutting reverberated up the stairwell. Julian and Emery’s voices filled the air.
“But have you seen Hamilton?” Emery questioned. “How can you say the best musical was Cabaret if you’ve never even experienced Hamilton?”
Julian came around the corner, holding a glass of red liquid and a horrified expression. “Once you’ve heard the music of Cabaret, the search is over. You’re young, I can tell you’ve gotten caught up in the buzz.”
Emery walked into the room with her hand in the air and extra swing to her hips. “I’m thirty-five years old, not seventeen.” She did a double take at Riley and muttered, “Sorry, kid. No offense.”
The gator wrangler handed Riley the glass of blood without ceremony and rolled his eyes at Emery. “Please, I’m twice as old as you.”
Deane wanted to hear more, though he couldn’t care less about their disagreement about musicals. “Ye look no older than twenty-five.”
Julian and Verity shared a look. It was the gator wrangler who cast Deane a shy grin. “Yeah, we don’t age.”
Deane turned to Verity and cocked his head. She looked only a little older than her brother. He didn’t have to ask the question. She blinked back at him. “I was born in 1902.”
Well, at least she didn’t have him beat in the age department. Emery flopped onto a padded chair. “That’s nothing. Deane’s over a hundred forty.”
Verity, Julian and even Riley stared at him. Julian nodded appraisingly. “Looking good. I’d say you were no more than thirty-two.”
“And change,” Verity muttered with a twinkle in her eye.
“Hey now,” Deane said. “I don’t expect ye want us talking about how old ye look.”
She got up and went to the bar and busied herself behind the counter. Deane knew better than to talk about a woman’s age, but he thought the vampire was holding her own for being over a century old. Damn fine, if he was honest.
Verity brought him a glass with ice floating in it. The liquid was foggy, and a slice of lime had submerged to the bottom. He held his hand up. “I don’t drink while I’m on the job.”
“Relax, it’s just water with freshly squeezed lime.” Verity thrust it into his hand, then gave one to Emery as well, who sniffed it suspiciously.
“It’s not too early for us, right sis?” Julian said over his shoulder. “Not since we have the day off.”
Deane watched her make two more drinks in cocktail glasses and bring one to her brother, who accepted it with a wink. He suspected the creation of drinks wasn’t to loosen everyone else up, but to make Riley feel more comfortable holding a glass of blood. To normalize it. Verity snuck a look at the teen, who was staring at his cup.
“To family and making new friends.” Julian lifted his glass.
Deane raised his as well, clanking his ice around. “May the saddest day of yer future be no worse than the happiest of yer past. Sláinte.”
Everyone held up their drinks, including Riley, and put them to their lips. Verity’s focus remained on her nephew as she observed him take a tentative sip. The muscles in her face relaxed, and
she exhaled in relief. She wasn’t alone, finding comfort in him feeding. Deane had noticed him begin to waste away again and was thankful they’d provided him with sustenance.
“What do you think?” Julian asked his nephew over his glass. “Like rabbits over chickens?”
Riley lowered his drink and licked his lips before speaking. “Yeah.”
Julian’s cheeks lifted into an openmouthed smile. “My advice for you is this. The fresher the blood, the better supply of lifeforce energy. It’s not really the blood your body needs, it’s the energy. In a pinch you can refrigerate blood for a short period, but the longer it sits, the older it is, and you won’t get the needed energy from week-old blood. Feeding on animals will get you by for about a week before you need to feed again. It’s up to two weeks with human blood, though our family doesn’t wait that long. They enjoy the energy rush. Can you feel it?”
Riley’s cheeks flushed as he noticed Emery and Deane watching him. The teen brought the cup to his lips, letting his uncut hair fall over his eyes and took a long drink. His hand was quick to wipe away any residue from his mouth, and he peered at his uncle from behind his hair. “I can. My body’s tingling. I didn’t realize how bad I was feeling.”
By the time Riley had emptied his glass, his complexion had improved. Verity whisked away the dirty glassware and suggested to her brother, “You should show Riley around the place. I bet he’d like to meet the girls.”
Deane muffled a snicker at the comment as the teen shared a look of curiosity with Emery. The two of them got to their feet and followed Julian out of the room.
Verity brushed the folds of her skirt in place. “I guess you’ve probably already rifled through the house while you were looking for dirt on us? Hidden as a mouse or something?”
He stood up and caught her eye, noting the pale shade of blue. “No, I didn’t go through your home. And shifters usually only have one animal form.”
She studied him and raised a brow. “But if you were a tiger and an owl…”
He folded his arms and stood in a wide stance. “There are some circumstances that allow shifters to take a new form.”
“Like?”
Deane took a deep breath, stirring air at the base of his lungs. “Like going through a significant change in your life.”
Verity’s eyes traced over his face, and somehow it seemed as if she understood the pain in his past. She didn’t push the question hanging in the air. Julian walked through the hallway with Emery and Riley following behind. His voice trailed down the stairs. “We converted the lower half of the home for Verity’s veterinary practice, so there’s nothing much to show you there. We barely use the kitchen except to keep produce for the animals and to wash our glasses.”
Deane turned for the door and heard the soft tapping of Verity’s shoes behind him.
Ten
Verity couldn’t get a good read on Deane. She knew her brother trusted the man even after they’d discovered he’d been lying to them. After listening to his conversation with Riley at the zoo last night, she certainly had a different perspective on the undercover shifter. He seemed to care about looking after the boy. As much as a man like him could.
His stoic exterior hid the pain he must have gone through when he lost his wife and child. Maybe that was the change he’d gone through that allowed him to take a new animal form. However that worked.
Deane descended the stairs ahead of her and turned his ear to the sound of her brother’s voice coming from the back of the house. She followed him through the waiting room area and the door into the kitchen.
“You guys want to see a show?” Julian was holding open the back screen for their guests. He was more than happy to introduce his girls to anyone who was willing.
Verity watched Riley walk across the gravel drive to the opposite side of the property where TailGators was located. He seemed reserved and quiet now, but from what she’d gathered, he’d been through a lot. Just like the rest of them.
“How long have ye been around here?” Deane waited for her and they walked together to the shady side of the parking lot.
She tuned out the sound of her brother’s voice as Julian led Emery and Riley to the first enclosure of gators. “We’ve been here about ten years. How about you? Do you live in Denver or Miami?”
They came to a stop under the tree canopy on the walkway. Deane slipped his hand in his pocket. “Emery and I came out from Denver after we found yer number on Ramsay’s phone.”
She thought of her brother and hesitated to ask, “Were you involved with everything that happened? Was it bad?”
“Whenever anyone’s life’s put in danger, it isn’t good, aye?”
Verity stared at her nephew’s profile, recognizing family features in his nose and the shape of his face. He didn’t bear a striking resemblance to Ramsay, she thought in relief. “How’s he doing? Honestly.”
Deane tilted his head back and blinked up at the clouds visible between the foliage and then rubbed the toe of his dress shoe against the walkway. “We found him locked in his father’s closet when we were looking for one of our own. He’d been starving for weeks without blood and had refused to touch the stuff Ramsay tried to give him. While he waited for us to bring his mum to him, we discovered her with her throat ripped out on her floor where Ramsay had left her. Thought she was dead at first, but with her last breath, she made me promise to keep him safe.”
From the point Lycos had taken her to live with him when she was sixteen, she’d missed the woman who’d raised her. She’d suffered the torture of thinking her mother was disgusted with her and had refused to have her in her life. That angst burned in her heart to this day, but she couldn’t imagine knowing your mother had been murdered, taken away from you. Her brother’s actions sickened her.
Deane continued talking in an undertone, “Ramsay found where we were keeping Riley and took him, along with one of our own. We were able to track them down to a cabin in the mountains where we fought to rescue them. I’m told Riley stuck his own father through the neck with a sharp pole, saving a shifter. We got things taken care of with the authorities, and I was rushed through the requirements for being his foster parent.”
He hadn’t been kidding. Riley had been through a lot over the last few weeks. She pressed further. “But how is he doing?”
“He hasn’t talked about school or friends. Not even sure he has any. He stays on his phone all the time, but I saw him smile last night for the first time, so there’s that.”
She looked Deane over. Based on appearances, Riley’s foster parent wasn’t good at cutting loose or having fun. If she got the chance, she’d try to show Riley a good time. There was more to life than misery and suffering.
Trying to break the ice and make the best of their indefinite affiliation, Verity asked, “So, from one century-old being to another, what’s been your favorite decade?”
Deane sputtered, caught off guard and smirked. “Ye aren’t going to ask me something easy like, what’s yer favorite color?”
She shrugged and laughed with him. “Sure, what is it?”
“I dunno.” He paused, “The green hills of Kildare after a good dousing of rain, I suppose. How about ye?”
She gestured toward the bay, though it wasn’t visible from where they stood. “The blue ocean on a clear day.”
Julian had moved away from the enclosure and led Emery and Riley toward the performance moat. Verity and Deane walked after them. When they got to the stadium seating, Julian asked Riley and Emery to take a seat in the front row and went into the gator enclosure attached to the sandy island which was surrounded by water.
Deane and Verity climbed up to the top-row seating and sat in the shade. She watched for her brother dragging one of the gators behind him and into the moat, then leaned closer to Deane. “I wasn’t very excited when he came up with his business idea. I didn’t want him risking his life for the sake of a show.”
Deane’s brow twitched. “There’s a certain look
in a man’s eye when he’s looking to thrill observers. It’s more than that for yer brother. He seems to love those gators.”
Verity turned to him and rested her elbow to her knee and her chin on her palm. “Says a man with experience? You must have lied about working at a circus. I still can’t picture you dirty and scuffed up.”
He stared out at Julian bringing Gertrude into the cement performance ring. The muscles in Deane’s neck tightened, and his eyes narrowed. “I came from nothing, and aye, I worked for years with Berstrum’s Circus and never had myself a proper suit of clothes. I lived in squalor. Did my best just to get by, so forgive me if I want to leave my past behind and have pride in my appearance.”
Obviously she’d hit a nerve. Verity enjoyed finding herself at odds with him, although she wasn’t sure why. She touched his arm and withdrew when he caught her gaze. “I like how you dress. Reminds me of the fifties.”
His eyes searched her to see if she was teasing him, and he went on to say, “That was a good decade. Things were simple then. Crime was next to nothing, and the power of the dollar was at its peak.”
She wasn’t surprised he was a fan. Verity turned her attention to Julian holding Gertrude’s jaw closed before sitting on her back.
Deane crossed his arms and stared at her. “Ye have something against the fifties?”
“No.” She shook her head and shrugged. “It just doesn’t hold a light to the twenties. Now that was a decade of fun. Lycos let Ramsay and me go out together, and it was probably the only time I had fun pretending I was normal like anyone else. I don’t think I sat down for more than a minute. I was dancing, drinking and singing my way through it.”
Verity thought back to all the exciting change happening in the world at that time. Women could vote and had more freedom to dress more comfortably, there was the thrill of drinking during Prohibition and jazz music permeated the air.
Deane made a face.
She put her hands up, totally vexed. “Are you so stiff, you weren’t able to enjoy a little fun on the town?”
“There was a time music filled the air no matter where I went, be it doorways on the street, the next-door apartment, or my mum singing me to sleep, and I do miss it. The patriotism and heart.” Deane defended himself. “But I made more than enough bad decisions in my youth while intoxicated, so by the time the twenties came, I wanted no part.”
Half-Blood Secrets: A Paranormal Series (Half-Bloods Book 2) Page 12