Blood Secret

by Sharon Page

  “She wishes to serve us tea?” Lucy asked the question aloud, not expecting an answer. She paced in front of a window in a parlor that had a view of the street, of people strolling and fashionable carriages rumbling past.

  But the duke decided to answer. His sensual drawl fell into the quiet room. “Mrs. Siddons is quite the lady, my dear. And it gives you a chance to question her.” He sat on a wing chair, looking large and muscular against the delicate pink silk cushions. He leaned back, his hand resting carelessly on the head of a walking stick.

  “But she is a madam. Why would she offer tea?”

  “She is a woman of business, and quite charming and polite.”

  “You know her!”

  Greystone laughed. “That is a very vinegary face. I thought you already believed I was an unconscionable rake.” Instantly he sobered. “I don’t come here, Lady Lucy. And after our two sessions together, I suspect I would never find pleasure in such a place again. I doubt any of these women could compare to you.”

  Heat flared over her cheeks. “I suspect you don’t really believe that—” She broke off, threw her hands up. “I do not understand you! You threaten me one minute and slather on flattery the next.”

  “Worrying about someone has that effect. Wouldn’t you say so?”

  She crossed her arms over her chest. “Worrying about my brother turned me into a madwoman. Until then I was very normal, very proper. Now I am not.” She tightened her arms, pressing against her chest. “Of course I am not normal, am I? You know what I am.”

  “And you know what I am. Neither of us is normal or ordinary. I believe we understand each other.”

  She hesitated, then nodded. “I think we do. Do you think the madam will help us?”

  “You will find out in a moment—I believe she is approaching.”

  Then she heard the footsteps and in a moment a footman opened the door. He entered carrying a tea tray and a voluptuous blonde followed him. Or rather, a prominent pair of breasts entered, and the lady followed those. Rubies glittered at her neck. The madam curtsied, wearing a pleasant and calming smile. “Your Grace. Lady Lucinda, may I wish you a good afternoon. I am told you are in search of your brother, the Earl of Wrenshire.”

  “Yes. I was told he was here.”

  The madam waved to a seat. “Please sit down, Lady Lucinda. Make yourself comfortable.” She poised on a settee and waited for the footman to set the gleaming silver tray on a low table in front of her. “I am sorry, my dear. Your brother was here. One of my most treasured clients and a favorite amongst my girls—how could I deny him when he offered a fortune to stay in one of my rooms for as long as he desired?”

  Calmly, the madam lifted the teapot and began to elegantly pour two cups for her guests.

  Lucy watched, but it was as though the madam moved in slow motion and she was watching the woman through a pane of rain-streaked glass. Everything was blurry and odd, and her heart was thudding so fast she feared it might explode.

  Damn, damn Jack! How could he! They had no money, Helena was contemplating a hellish marriage, she had given up her virginity. But Jack had paid a large amount of money that they did not have ... to hide. In a brothel. All he had thought of was his own skin. When she found Jack ...

  What would she do? Jack would not change. Her heart felt so heavy, and she felt so frustrated, but she had come to accept that. Still, what in heavens was she to do with her brother?

  The madam could give them no more help. She could not suggest where Jack might have gone, except perhaps to another brothel.

  Then the duke casually mentioned that dozens of houses of ill repute operated in London. She had no intention of traveling from brothel to brothel to find her brother.

  A quarter-hour later, she was on the street again. She looked up and down it, foolishly. Certainly she was not going to spot her brother running away. He was long gone. “What do you propose we do next, Greystone?”

  The duke’s hand rested on her small back, and she sharply took a step away from his touch. She would not forget that he had spoken of imprisoning her.

  “Your brother might have gone to the place where my nephew is being kept.”

  She clenched her fists. “And you think I know where it is. You think I will reveal it, because I will go there to find Jack. I keep telling you I do not know where he is!”

  But a thought suddenly shoved its way into her mind. If Father had truly taken the duke’s nephew, he would not have kept it a secret from his most trusted servants. He would have required their help. Father would have told Creadmore. That was a way she could find out the truth, and also find where the boy was being kept, if her family did have him. “I—I might be able to find out, if it is true. We could go there and retrieve your nephew. And I could see if Jack is there.”

  “Retrieve my nephew?” he repeated slowly. His brow quirked.

  She frowned, confused. “You wish to have him back, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” He was staring at her with surprise in his silvery-green eyes. “But are you saying that you intend to just give him to me, Lady Lucy?”

  “Of course. You are his family. You love him. If it is true that my father took him, I think I understand why he did it—he wanted to protect your nephew and help him live with his ability to shift shape. His intentions were good. But he should not have taken the boy away from you.”

  The duke stepped back. As though her words had shocked him. “Thank you, Lady Lucy. You are a unique and remarkable woman.”

  He lifted her hand to his lips. His mouth touched. Heat flared over her skin, even hotter than it did when she turned into a dragon. She gasped. Then Greystone straightened, swept her into his arms, tipped her so she was floating, held by his strong embrace.

  His mouth pressed to hers, and that touch sent showers of sparks through her blood. He kissed her until her heartbeat roared in her ears. Until she was panting against his soft, beautiful mouth.

  It was the softest, most enticing kiss she could imagine.

  Greystone set her back on her feet. His eyes held hers. “Thank you. You do understand I would never willingly hurt you.” But his mouth was grim as he said the words. Then he turned abruptly, away from her. “We should go.”

  8

  Questions

  Lucy did not know a man could kiss a woman so much. Or that a woman could truly be kissed breathless.

  The duke had escorted her into his carriage. Then, instead of sitting across from her, he had braced his arms on either side of her head. As they’d lurched out into the street, he kissed her. An openmouthed kiss where his lips played over hers, hot, hard, and deliciously wet. His tongue tangled with hers. He kept kissing her, even though the carriage swayed as it made haste down the street, winding around other vehicles and carts. She could barely keep her balance, but he did, with his hands splayed on the velvet squabs behind her. He kept steady on his feet and drove her mouth mad with pleasure.

  At first, she’d thought she should push him away, because he had irritated her. But then she thought of what he’d said. That he would never hurt her. He had taken her to her brother. He appeared to have accepted the truth: she did not know where his nephew was, but she was willing to help him.

  Now he was kissing her senseless.

  Greystone drew back so she could catch her breath, but she couldn’t really, she was too dizzy from being kissed. Anyway, before she could take more than two deep breaths, his mouth slanted over hers again. Her lips felt puffy, full from pressing to his, but she loved the sensation.

  She clutched the edge of the seat to stay steady, so her mouth would stay against his.

  She had no idea a kiss could make her so ... hot for more. For his mouth on her breasts, his hand between her legs ... for his body lying between her thighs and his buttocks pumping as he buried deeply inside her.

  The very thought made her privates ache, made a moan slip out as he broke their kiss.

  “I know what you are thinking,” he murmured.
/>   “You could not—” she began, but he surged in again and took her mouth once more.

  Strangely, even though she had no idea where Jack was, she couldn’t help smiling softly against his hot, beautiful lips. She needed this. It kept her from worrying. And the duke looked so beautiful when he kissed her. His lashes lowered—it struck her as odd that such an experienced man would kiss with his eyes half-closed, as though he were shy. Her eyes were wide open, taking in every detail she could, though they were rather too close for her to see properly.

  She could see the oddest things. Part of his right earlobe was missing. A deep scar—no, three scars—ran along his right cheek. His skin was pale, though that was not uncommon for some gentlemen, as men of the ton gambled and drank all night, then were too sick and sore-headed to face the light of day.

  But he wasn’t just a gentleman. He was a vampire.

  Lucy knew nothing more about vampires than the tales that were told in villages—and there were two basic stories. Vampires were soulless beasts who mindlessly fed on blood. Or they were clever and beautiful and lured you into baring your neck.

  When the duke kissed her, it made her want to bare anything for him.

  But then, she’d already let him see, touch, make love to everything.

  He stopped kissing her, rested his lips by her ear, and spoke. “Lovely one, I do not even need to read your thoughts to know. You are hot with desire. As much as you like to be kissed, you want more.”

  “What do you mean you do not need to read my thoughts?” Shock, then fear, tumbled through her. “You cannot do that, can you?”

  He smiled. “Vampires can. But I cannot read yours, and I suspect that is because you are a dragon.”

  Never would Lucy have imagined a man would say that in a matter-of-fact tone. “But you don’t really seem like a vampire.”

  “Because I haven’t gone for your throat? No, my dear, I can control my craving for blood.”

  As though to prove it, he ran his tongue along her neck. It sent sparks of heat shooting through her. She quivered so hard with desire she feared she might dissolve.

  “You are thinking about coaxing me to explore you with my mouth,” he murmured. “Have my lips trail down your neck, down to the scoop of your neckline. You’re thinking about letting me run my tongue over your breasts. See if I can coax them out of your bodice so I can suck your nipples.”

  She moaned against his mouth. The images he was painting in her mind set her on fire. How—how could he have guessed her thoughts with such uncanny accuracy? Could he actually read her mind despite what he’d said? Or had he read all of that in her kiss?

  “You are thinking you want me to push up your skirts,” he continued. His lips pressed softly against her neck. They parted and she felt the scrape of teeth. Instinctively, she tensed, and tried to draw back but the seat resisted. Even as fear coiled in her belly, her skin came alive at the very place his teeth brushed.

  Pursing his lips lightly against her neck, he suckled. She squeaked. Goodness, that felt wonderful. Pleasure snaked down from her neck, warming her heart, heating her belly, making her throb between her legs. She was panting.

  “You want me to undo the falls of my trousers and lie on top of you. You want my hard thrusts. You want me to drive deep into you.”

  She did, but it was as if he’d taken control of her. He could stoke desire in her with only a few sentences, with just a few naughty visions he conjured in her mind.

  Lucy saw, with a jolt of awareness, that when he aroused her, he controlled her. She had always kept such rigid control of herself, but with Greystone, she surrendered control. Too much of it, she feared.

  When she had made love with him, she had turned into a dragon.

  Panic welled. She had to get out of this kiss before he stole all her control away. Never had she felt such a desperate need to escape.

  But he kissed a sizzling path back to her lips. He whispered, “There’s nothing wrong with wanting me. Desiring someone does not make you any less strong.”

  How could he have seen that? “It frightens me, that you seem to know everything I’m thinking.”

  “Apparently, I am beginning to understand you.”

  She pressed right into the seat’s velvet and met his gaze. Surprise lit up his eyes and lifted his brows. He seemed more astounded by his pronouncement than she did.

  The carriage stopped. She heard familiar sounds—the final creaks of the wheels, jingling traces, the shouts of her family’s coachman, the crunch on gravel of her footmen’s feet. Sounds she usually never noticed, but that tonight seemed to echo loudly in her head.

  “What does that mean?” she asked him. “What do you mean?”

  “My dear Lady Lucy, I don’t know.”

  With a soft clunk, the steps from the carriage were lowered. The door was about to open and the duke moved across the carriage with the speed of a bolt of lightning. By the time the footman had turned the handle, Greystone was lounging casually on the other seat.

  She was trembling. She didn’t know why. She did know she didn’t want to stop kissing him. Seeking equilibrium, to stop shaking, to regain control, she said, “I’ll go in alone. I know Creadmore—my family’s butler—would not reveal any secrets in front of a stranger. It is going to be difficult enough to get him to speak to me.”

  He smiled at her from across the carriage—a patient smile. Then he leaned across the carriage and pushed back a lock of her hair. She lifted a hand, asking as she did, “Is my hair a mess now?”

  “A few pins have fallen out, I think.”

  “I’ll say—I’ll say it was while I was searching for Jack. Really, I could hardly be expected to look like the perfect lady while haring all over London in search of my brother.”

  He kissed her once more, this time on the bridge of her nose. “Your brother does not deserve you, my dear.”

  Lucy felt an odd tickle in her throat, and knew, from many tears shed after Father’s death, what it meant. Hastily, she stood. He held her hand to help her, but she said, “I can manage.”

  She opened the door and hurried down the dropped steps by herself. How could kissing do this? She felt as though kissing him had unleashed some kind of magic, magic that let him look into her soul. Then Lucy lifted her hems, and she ran up to the front door of her house.

  Sinjin was hungry. Kissing Lady Lucy had helped keep his need for blood at bay. To overwhelm his hunger, he would flood his body with sexual desire. It gave him the strength to control his instinctual yearning to go find some human prey and gorge on a slender, sweet-scented neck, and made it easier to slake his hunger with blood in a tumbler.

  Hell. He did not want to do that. But now he was thinking about blood—the tang of it, the texture, the way it would fill him, satisfy his craving—and he was damned hungry.

  He had been made into a vampire because his clan believed dragon slayers had to be immortal. He’d wanted to be a dragon slayer, but he hadn’t wanted to become a monster who really did prey on innocent maidens and take their blood. He’d had no choice—he had been turned into a vampire. His clan did it secretly. No dragon knew they were actually immortal.

  But he refused to kill any person just so he could be fed.

  To distract himself from hunger, Sinjin leapt down from the carriage. Lucy was the daughter of an earl, so her family home was an elegant house on Mount Street. Many carriages clattered along the road, and lights blazed in all the homes, for it was the start of the Season. Balls, routs, musicals, and other entertainments were held each night.

  He usually received invitations. He ignored them all. There was no point in being both a duke and a dragon slayer if he couldn’t be known as eccentric, he thought ruefully. And if he went, he was not sure he could survive being surrounded by the smell of so much blood. Likely, he would feed on someone before the end of the night. If his hunger got too strong, he could end up drinking from some debutante on the ballroom floor.

  Hell, the ton thought it had
scandals. They had no idea what he could give them. Not just juicy stories, but abject terror.

  This was humor that didn’t make him smile. He was a duke who had to avoid mortals lest he kill them. He was a beast who had hungers he could barely satisfy. He was a dragon slayer who had committed his soul to protecting England from dragons. All in all, he was in a hell of a situation. He had to get James back, but James carried dragon blood in him, which meant the boy was in danger from other dragon slayers. It meant he had to ensure Lucy believed he would never hurt her.

  He was finding it damned hard to imagine slaying Lucy.

  Damned hard.

  Sinjin paced up and down on the sidewalk. Stepping out of the carriage had been idiocy. The street was filled with people, and he could smell their blood. His fangs had pushed forth and now overlapped his lower lip. He kept his face hidden from the elegant members of the ton and entourages of servants passing by him.

  He thought about Lady Lucy instead. Would she get the information he needed from her butler? What was his next step, if she—

  Something moved in the air. Sinjin sensed the slight rumble of a preternatural being moving behind him. Cold rolled over him. He turned, leaning on his walking stick. With his vampiric vision he could see the “prince”—as the man was called by other dragon slayers. The prince was moving so quickly, he was invisible to the rest of the world. The dragon slayer’s pale blond hair shone beneath a beaver hat, and his eyes were two silver circles of reflected moonlight.

  Coming to a stop, the man became visible at once. A couple walking on the other side of the street stopped and stared in astonishment. But they quickly looked away and strolled on. No doubt they had assumed the prince had just stepped out of the shadows. No one would believe the impossible: that a man had been walking so fast he was invisible to their naked and inferior eyes. No one would believe vampires and dragons existed, and dragon slayers were not just men of myth.