Dark Knights 1: Eternity of Darkness

by Shana Nichols

  “A vampire born. A d’Argent. A hunter of evil vampires throughout Earth.” He looked at her, his look softer now. “A vampire who would die before he’d hurt you. Say you don’t believe I’d...” He looked as though he wanted to say more, yet could not find the words.

  God, but she wanted to believe him. Still, visions of ghouls danced in her head. Stefan was no ghoul. “Of course I never believed those gruesome stories. But I don’t believe you, either. You’re not dead. You’re very much alive.” Tears stung her eyes, threatened to spill over the lids and down her cheeks.

  “Come here, Julie.”

  His tone brooked no argument. Besides, this was the same man -- vampire -- with whom she’d made hot, sweet love. Whose arms had held her safe and secure while they slept. Slowly, she crossed the room, stopped a foot or so from Stefan. “Well?”

  “I’m not dead, but I’m not mortal, either. Put your hands on my chest. Do you feel my heart beating?”

  She did as he asked, felt cool flesh against her fingertips. Still flesh. None of the regular pulsing of life she expected to feel. It must have been his suggestion. This couldn’t be. Telling herself not to panic, she moved her hands, seeking...feeling for the slightest movement. Anything. Affirmation that it had been a mortal being who’d taken her to heights of sensation she’d only imagined.

  Her own breathing grew faster, shallow when she felt nothing, not even the coursing of his blood through the prominent vein in his neck. As though to soothe her, he covered her hands with his own, dragged them to his lips. “Do you believe me now?”

  “B-but I felt you breathing. I felt your heart beating last night.”

  “I can breathe when I choose to. And my heart does beat, but very slowly unless I’m feeding or aroused. Last night, Julie, I was very much aroused. I’m becoming so again, from the mere touch of your hands on my flesh, but I dare not do as my body bids me and take you again now, when I’m in dire need of sustenance.”

  “What...who...” She barely could speak the words. “Do you feed on living humans? Sleep in a coffin or a grave somewhere?” A horrific scene of Dracula, staked, rising from his grave, resurrected with a priest’s spilled blood, flooded her memory. “Dracula Has Risen from the Grave” had given her nightmares for months after she and her friends had watched the classic horror movie one Halloween night. Scenes from that movie, of the vampire draining the blood of women, replayed in her head, taunting her. The worst thing was...Julie still ached for Stefan’s touch, still longed for him to drag her to him and take her, devour her if that indeed was what he desired.

  He met her gaze, held it, compelling her to listen. “Yesterday I fed on a jogger in Lincoln Park. Pierced a vein in his throat and sucked my fill of his blood.”

  “You killed him?” Her mouth gaped open with horror at the stark picture he’d painted in her head.

  “No. He’s fine. Woke up happy, without any memory of what left him feeling so good.”

  Julie’s own blood surged with revulsion -- or was it a macabre fascination? “Did -- did you know Lincoln Park used to be a cemetery, more than a hundred years ago? That they moved the bodies from there to Graceland because the city fathers had concerns about contaminating the water supply?”

  “No. I know almost nothing of Chicago’s history. I chose the park because of the privacy afforded on some of the more secluded jogging trails. Julie. Please listen. I’m not a ghoul. I have no fascination for graves or graveyards. When I’m not chasing vampires who’d hurt people and destroy the good names of all of us, I live in an old, comfortable home built of stone and timbers, overlooking the English Channel. I sleep there as I did here last night, in a comfortable bed.” He shrugged, then shot her a smile that made her heart beat faster, her nipples tingle. “My bed is not as comfortable as I found yours, with your flesh warming mine.”

  “But -- but you drink blood.” If Julie didn’t keep reminding herself, she’d be crawling on Stefan’s lap, seducing him, looking for more of the pleasure he’d brought to her last night. She’d be cuddling up to him much as Noodles was doing now, resting her head on his muscular thigh. She’d be tasting his long, thick cock, stroking satiny skin that stretched over the well-toned muscles in his thighs.

  “Yes, I feed on human blood. My usual habit is to take my sustenance in vampire bars, or on fresh blood purchased from blood banks. I’ve not yet found a source here in Chicago, so I had no choice yesterday but to prey on a mortal. I left the man dazed but quite unharmed. Please believe me. Those of my clan do not destroy mortals. We are an ancient and proud family, descended from Norman noblemen who followed the Conqueror.”

  Julie mentally reviewed her very limited knowledge of vampire history, came up short. “Then you’re from England. Or France. I thought vampires came from Romania.”

  “Some do. My clan hails from Normandy. The vampire who intends to kill you is of the Reynard clan, which I believe may have had its roots somewhere in eastern Europe. The Reynards are all made vampires.

  “You’ve mentioned ‘made’ vampires before. What--.”

  “Made vampires all were once humans. Legend has it that they originally came about when a born vampire fed on a newly dead corpse. They cannot reproduce, so they increase their numbers by that means. Only born vampires are able to reproduce in the conventional way.”

  A sudden chill in the air made Julie tremble. Louis Reynard? Not a kind gentleman but rather... She imagined him in a long black cloak, fangs extended, swooping down on her as she slept, spiriting her away...destroying her. No. This was all too bizarre. Too incredible.

  Stefan cleared his throat. “When the moon completes its waning two nights from now, Louis Reynard will try to make you his twenty-first victim in as many months. I am here to ensure that he doesn’t succeed.”

  Louis Reynard. The kind, gallant gentleman who’d sent her flowers as apology for cancelling their meeting in the park was a vicious serial killer? A vampire? Julie’s mind spun as she tried to process Stefan’s words. “But -- “

  “If you believe nothing else I say, believe this. Four days ago in Atlanta, Reynard brutally murdered his twentieth victim. I tracked him there, but caught up with him too late to prevent another death. I saw him standing over her body, blood pooling around her from the cut in her throat. A white rose much like the ones the bastard sent you lay in her hand. Before that, the bastard slaughtered an Argentinian heiress, and eighteen more young women like her in cities and out in the countryside of every continent on earth.

  “So far Reynard has eluded the best hunters of my clan. He’s cunning, stealthy...appears and disappears without a trace. With each killing he grows bolder. This time he dared to provide us with your name and address, where up until now he has provided just the city...and in Atlanta, a hint as to where he’d kill his victim. I was waiting to see you, hoping for an opportunity to meet you, when I saw him approach you in the park the other evening. It was then I entered his mind, determined that he intends to kill you not on the next full moon, but on the first night of the crescent.”

  “You entered his mind?” Stefan’s story grew more incredible every moment -- yet strangely Julie tended more and more to believe he was telling her the truth. Pieces of articles she’d read in the papers about the “accepted” vampires were filtering back to her. Those articles had fascinated her for a time, making her wonder what it would be like to meet a “good” vampire. What he’d be like, how he’d be different from her...

  “Vampires have telepathic abilities, Julie. Some of us more than others. Mine are said to be among the best developed among the males in my clan, yet I’m unable to connect consistently with Reynard, or to influence his actions at all.” He shot a sheepish glance her way. “With most, mortal or vampire, I’ve been fairly successful at persuading them to heed my will.”

  Julie recalled the voice in her head that had warned her not to invite Louis Reynard into her home, and the ease with which she’d done as Stefan asked and offered him, a complete stranger, h
er couch the other night. “You -- you used that ability to communicate with me.” She didn’t know whether to be furious at the blatant invasion of her mind, or grateful that he’d saved her from disaster, assuming the rest of what he’d said was true.

  “Yes.” He paused, looked into her eyes. “I did it to protect you. Not to spy. And only at first, to get you to let me stay close to you.”

  Julie’s head was spinning. “If what you say about Louis Reynard is true, why haven’t you called the police? Why didn’t you call the police in Atlanta?” Julie searched for an excuse -- any excuse -- to reject what her heart told her must be true. This was all too farfetched to believe -- from Stefan’s declaration that he was a vampire to his allegations about Louis Reynard being a vampire serial killer.

  “Two of my clansmen tried doing that, in London and Brussels. The police have started to believe they’re dealing with a vampire, but they’ve rejected any help or involvement on our part, even tips about where Reynard may strike next. My cousin Alexandre went to the local lawmen in Montana a few months ago, only to get himself locked up for a week or more as a suspect in the murder Louis had just committed at a western resort.

  “They have accused those of us who tried to enlist their help of being accomplices, so now we hunt the killer on our own. And if he keeps on with his killing, we fear law enforcement will conveniently forget we tried to help, and blame us all. We’ve only recently been acknowledged in your society. We’re far from true acceptance.”

  “Surely the FBI -- “

  “Your FBI and Interpol are searching for Reynard, too, but they won’t catch him. If they should get lucky, he’ll escape from any mortal’s prison. It will take another vampire to stop him. Or vampires. He’s nine hundred years old, with powers and cunning no younger vampire can match. Not even a born vampire.” Stefan let out a sigh of frustration, bent, and fished something from the pocket of his discarded slacks.

  “Assuming I believe you’re a vampire -- “ and she wasn’t sure she did -- “and there has been this rash of killings--” That part seemed plausible, for she could easily research it and expose a lie. “How do I know this is for real, that this Reynard is after me, and it is not all an elaborate ruse -- or that you are not the killer?” Instinct and Noodles gave the lie to that question, but Julie wanted his reassurance.

  “As for how I know Reynard has you picked to become his next victim, he sent this to Alina, queen of the d’Argent clan. Here, read it for yourself.”

  The folded sheet of ivory vellum slipped from Julie’s bloodless fingers when she saw her name and address scripted in rusty brown letters. Script reminiscent of another time, another place. Ink that looked suspiciously like...

  “Blood.”

  She shuddered. “Surely not?”

  “Yes, he writes his notes in blood. Fitting, isn’t it?” Stefan picked up the paper, stared at the lettering. “No, we don’t ordinarily use blood except for nourishment.”

  God. He’d read her mind. She wondered, just for a moment, if the letter was a fake, made up by Stefan to fool her into trusting him. No. She did trust him. So did Noodles, who’d strongly objected to Reynard but made instant friends with Stefan. “Do you always know what I’m thinking before I speak?”

  “Not always. Never, if my mind is focused on other things -- such as the lush feel of your breasts against my chest, the incredible tightness of your sex when it’s gripping mine.” His slight smile, the twinkle in his deep green eyes, reminded her as much as his words that they’d been lovers. “I know that now you’re at war with yourself, trying to decide if I’m telling you the truth or spinning an incredible tale. Come. Let’s get dressed and find a library that carries newspapers from around the world. I’ll show you I do not lie about the murders at very least. We can take Noodles with us for her morning walk.” He scratched the sleek red fur on the dog’s back, then set her gently onto the floor.

  “We can’t take her with us. The libraries don’t allow dogs inside. Except guide dogs for the handicapped.” Perhaps they should. Dogs’ instincts tended to be basic, not colored by the nuances of civilization. Then she remembered how Stefan had deliberately closed the drapes a few minutes earlier. “The light? Won’t it bother you?”

  “It will bother me, but it won’t turn me into a crumbling heap of cinders. That’s nothing but myth. Just as it’s pure folklore that vampires sleep in coffins and require the dirt of our home ground in order to rest.” He bent and stroked Noodles’ silky ears. “Supposedly animals recognize us for what we are and steer clear of us. I think it’s that they’re able to sense good or evil intentions in every other creature. Noodles, you’re a smart pup. You must sense I mean you no harm.” Stefan rose, letting the towel drop to the floor. His magnificently sculpted body glowed like ivory in the filtered light from the morning sun. “Don’t worry about me going outside. I often venture out in daylight, fully dressed, with dark tinted glasses to protect my eyes.”

  Julie’s body tingled when she looked at the rippling muscles in his arms and shoulders, his rock-hard thighs and beautiful, gently curved penis and satiny scrotum. She wanted to believe him, did believe his story about the women dying. Then she remembered the roses -- the white roses that had come while he slept. And the single blossom he’d seen clutched in that unfortunate victim’s hand.

  She did believe Stefan. And God, did she want him, vampire or not. “I’d love to paint you,” she said softly, her gaze steady on his perfectly made body. “I thought it the first time I saw you. I’d sculpt you from of a perfect slab of Crème Broule or Tuscany Cream marble, if only I were competent to do you justice. Whatever, whoever you are, you’re one beautiful male. I just...I don’t know.”

  “I’m glad I please you. Come, let me show you I’m telling the whole truth, that twenty beautiful women have met death at the hands of one crazed killer vampire.”

  Julie shrugged out of her robe and stepped over to the dresser. “Why?” she asked as she pulled jeans and a lightweight sweater from a drawer. That was the missing puzzle piece -- the killer’s motive for what seemed senseless acts of violence against women.

  Stefan pulled on his boxers, then looked over at Julie. “Why did he kill them? Revenge on all women who remind him of Alina d’Argent, queen of my clan. When Alina rejected his proposal to merge our clans, Reynard went berserk and vowed to make her regret turning him down.” Pausing, he raked her with a heated gaze. “Alina is as beautiful as you. Could practically be you, except her eyes are a clear, true green instead of the blue of a summer sky.”

  “Like yours.”

  “I suppose so. I’ve been told the d’Argents all share that particular trait.” Stefan lifted his hand to Julie’s face, traced the line of her jaw with what seemed a gentle reverence. “I can almost understand Reynard’s obsession now, for it was all I could do last night to make love with you and not taste you.” As though it pained him to look on her naked body and not drag her back to bed, Stefan turned away and quickly finished dressing.

  It was all I could do last night to make love with you and not taste you.

  Stefan’s words rang in Julie’s ears as she dressed, and later as they made their way down Lake Shore Drive to Congress Parkway, then west to State Street and the Chicago Central Library with its carved stone lions. He was a vampire. He’d convinced her of that much. She hadn’t quite managed to persuade herself that she wasn’t crazy to be encouraging him to show her the truth of twenty gory murders. Or to believe his allegation that Louis Reynard was a vampire serial killer.

  All Julie knew was that she wanted Stefan d’Argent, whoever he was. As perverse, as incredibly stupid as it sounded, she wished he’d completely unleashed his passion instead of holding back to save her from himself.

  Maybe she didn’t want to be saved.

  Chapter Seven

  A mansion in Brussels. A Hong Kong brothel. A hovel in Melbourne, and a second floor walk-up flat not far from Buckingham Palace. The killer must have lingered in England
after that one, because the next murder had taken place in a small town in the English midlands. He’d killed a young Russian aristocrat aboard a houseboat along the Volga River outside Kazan, and a sheep shearer in a little-known town in the Australian outback.

  “Here. Look at this.”

  Local Beauty Slaughtered: Newcomer Suspected. Julie skimmed the front-page article in the Tri-County Journal, a tabloid weekly that apparently served three eastern Montana counties. The account, folksy in the style in which it was written, mirrored the articles she’d seen before. The grainy photo showed the victim before the tragedy, when she’d been crowned queen of the local rodeo a few months before her death.

  “Alexandre caught up with Reynard here, shortly after he’d killed this dude rancher’s daughter,” Stefan whispered, passing Julie the next article. “Alex nearly got himself tried for murder by trying to enlist the help of that Montana sheriff. The trouble there held him up long enough that he and his team arrived too late in Singapore to stop the next killing.”

  He’d mentioned that earlier, Julie remembered. Her doubts faded with every new piece of evidence they found in the newspaper archives. With each account, she found it easier to believe Louis Reynard might be a serial killer.

  He’d slaughtered an Argentine beauty queen in a luxury hotel room in Buenos Aires. And just last week, a woman had been found in a run-down tenement near downtown Atlanta, her throat slit like all the rest. The woman Stefan had described in vivid, stomach-curdling detail. “I arrived moments too late to save her,” Stefan whispered. “We fought, and I thought I had him. To my shame, I let him escape.”

  Reaching up, Julie traced the angry laceration on his cheek. Twenty women had died in all manner of places, but they’d lived in varied circumstances, come from all walks of life. They’d all died in the same horrific manner. “Is that how you got this?”

  “Yes.” He took her hand, brought it to his lips. “It’s merely a scratch.”