by Lynsay Sands
Drina responded in kind, digging the nails of one hand into his scalp while the other dropped around to clasp his behind and urge him on as he ground his hips against her. They both gasped with relief when he managed to get the last button of her coat undone and jerked the lapels apart. When his hands immediately moved to cover her breasts, she moaned and arched into the touch.
They froze when the door opened beside them. Harper tore his mouth from hers, and they both turned to stare blankly at the waiter, who had frozen halfway out the door. The mortal’s eyes were wide and his expression amazed as he peered through the glass door at them. Their waiter.
“Oh,” Harper muttered, and then, seeming to realize he was still clutching her breasts, released them at once and stepped back from her, only to step closer again when the wind caught her open lapels and began to whip them about. “Here.”
He quickly pulled the sides closed, then glanced around almost desperately. Relief rushed across his face when he spotted the car at the curb, and he caught Drina’s arm and urged her quickly toward it, muttering, “Have a good night,” over his shoulder.
Chapter Seven
Drina nearly fell into the car when Harper opened the door. She quickly scrambled across the seat, her eyes flashing to the driver and then skittering away as she wondered how long he’d been there and what he’d seen. Then Harper was inside, and they were pulling away. A glance out the rear window showed the waiter still standing frozen in the open restaurant door, staring after them, and Drina shook her head and turned to face front, her hands automatically doing up the buttons of her coat.
Once done, she felt a little less scattered and glanced nervously to Harper. Spotting the frown on his face, she bit her lip, worried about what he was thinking. It seemed to her that giving him time to think too much was probably a bad thing at that point, and she opened her mouth to say something, anything, but he was quicker.
“I’m sorry.”
Drina smiled. “Don’t be. It’s not your fault the waiter came out.” He blinked at her words, and she quickly added, “Now it’s your turn. You said you were a cook?”
Harper hesitated, but then relaxed back against the seat. “Yes.”
“Was your father a cook too?”
“No. He was a baron with a large holding of his own, as well as one he gained on turning and marrying my mother. He wanted me to take over running Mother’s holding, but I had other interests.”
“Food,” she suggested.
Harper nodded, and then chuckled, the last of the tension slipping from him. “I loved food. So much so, I think had I been mortal, I would have been four or five hundred pounds by the time I was twenty. I spent all my time in the kitchens, following our cook around and learning all I could. Not to mention sampling every little thing that went through it.
“By the time I was old enough to leave the nest, I had decided I wanted to be the greatest cook ever. Of course, to be the greatest cook, I had to have access to every possible ingredient there was, which meant I needed to work for someone wealthy enough to find and purchase those ingredients. I left home and went straight to the home of the wealthiest person I knew of. Emperor Elect Maximillian.”
Drina’s eyebrows rose, and a smile tugged at her lips. “Straight to the top, huh?”
Harper nodded wryly. “I presented myself in the kitchens, sure they would be glad to have me. Unfortunately, the head cook was less than impressed. He wanted nothing to do with me, but with a little persuasion, I managed to convince him to give me a position.”
“What kind of persuasion are we talking here?” Drina asked with amusement. “The mortal or immortal variety?”
“Immortal,” he admitted ruefully. “But, only enough to convince him to give me the lowest position in the kitchen. I wanted to prove myself and work my way up to chef.”
“Ah,” Drina said, and then asked, “and you did?”
“Yes.” He smiled faintly. “It took me a lot of years though, and then I only got to be his head chef for a couple of years before I had to move on.”
“The not aging can really be a pain,” she said with sympathy.
“Hmm.” He nodded, and then shrugged. “It turned out all right. He gave me the medieval version of an employer reference and wished me well. I spent the next fifty years or so cooking in royal palaces in various countries, extending my knowledge and honing my skills.
“Eventually, however, I grew tired of working for someone else and wanted to open my own business. As much as I love cooking, it wasn’t going to make me the money I needed to do that, though, so I had to hang up my spoon for a bit. I tried various things, but the most successful was working with a band of mercenaries. Much to my surprise, I turned out to be a natural on the battlefield.”
“Why would you be surprised?” she asked with a smile. “Immortals are naturals in battle. We’re stronger, faster, and hard to kill.”
“Yes, but you also need skill, or you’re likely to lose your head, and I’d spent most of my life in the kitchens. Even as a youth, I shunned practice in the yard with the men to trail the cook around,” he said solemnly. “However, I found that I was a natural in battle. And I turned out to be a whiz at planning for successful attacks and defenses, which turned out to be not much different to planning a large feast.”
“What?” she said with disbelief, and he nodded solemnly.
“It’s all in the details,” he assured her with a grin, and Drina burst out laughing. He watched her with a smile, and then said, “Actually, my knowledge of castle kitchens came in handy during sieges. I knew what they were likely to have on hand and how long it would last and so on.” He shrugged. “I did well for myself. Well enough that I made the money I needed to start my own pub. And that did well enough that I was able to start a second and so on, and then I moved on to restaurants, and then hotels.”
“How did you end up moving from restaurants to hotels?” she asked with surprise.
“Well, I had opened one of my restaurants on the main floor of a hotel in Paris. The restaurant earned a reputation and did a booming business, but at the same time the hotel was beginning to flounder. I was considering moving the restaurant elsewhere before the hotel folded altogether, but I was becoming a bit bored. I had lost my interest in food after a couple of centuries, and it took a lot of the joy from cooking. The moment I had noticed that happening, I’d hired the best chefs I could find to take over the actual cooking in my establishments, but it left me basically a pencil pusher. I needed a challenge, so rather than move the restaurant, I decided to buy the hotel and see if I couldn’t make it a successful concern again.
“I renovated it floor by floor, and the restaurant handled the room service. We built a reputation, and the hotel started to flourish as well. So I opened another, and then another.
“Everything rolled along nicely, but I soon grew bored again, and then in. . I think it was the 1920s,” he murmured, then shrugged it away as unimportant and continued, “I read an article about a brand-new technique for preserving food.”
“Frozen food,” Drina said with amusement.
Harper nodded. “I got in on the ground floor. We started with vegetables, and then branched out to entrees, and, as I said, we recently added wine to what we do.” He smiled wryly. “See, I told you that my history wasn’t nearly as exciting as yours.”
Drina shook her head. “I don’t know. It sounds exciting enough. Truth be told, my life wasn’t nearly as exciting as it sounds in the recounting. I mean titles like gladiator, pirate, and madam sound exciting I suppose, but in reality they were just another day in the life. Being a gladiator was hot, sweaty, bloody labor, hacking away at other gladiators. Being a pirate wasn’t much different than being a sailor. It was night after night of hauling rope, raising sails, and steering into a storm with the occasional battle to get the blood going. And as a madam, I mostly greeted the men at the door like a Wal-Mart greeter, reading their minds as they entered the establishment to be sure they ha
d no nefarious plans. Then I sat about, reading or playing cards until the evening ended, and the men left. The only excitement that occurred there was when the occasional fellow got too rough, or tried to make one of the girls do something she didn’t want to. And then that was a momentary adrenaline rush as I saw them off the premises.”
She shrugged wryly. “If I’ve learned anything in all my years, it’s that nothing is as exciting or glamorous as it sounds. I suspect if you read the minds of movie stars and rock stars, you’d probably find their lives were a daily grind with the occasional fan frenzy to scare the crap out of them and get the blood going.”
Harper smiled. “You’re surprisingly sensible for one who has been so rebellious most of her life.”
Drina shrugged. “We all live and learn.”
Harper nodded, and glanced around as the car slowed. “We’re here.”
Drina leaned forward, stretching her upper body in front of his to peer curiously out the window at the very uninteresting building they were stopping in front of.
“Nondescript like our clubs in Europe,” she commented, placing her hand on his shoulder as if to keep her balance.
“Yes,” Harper agreed, sounding a tad husky.
She turned her head and smiled at him, close enough to kiss, as she said, “I suppose it’s to avoid attracting mortals.”
“Yes,” he repeated, this time in barely more than a whisper. His head began to move forward, and Drina moved her own head closer, and then they both froze as the front door slammed shut. Harper glanced past her to the now-vacant driver’s seat, then out the side window, and sighed. “Right, we’re here.”
Drina straightened as the driver opened the door on Harper’s side. She then followed him out of the car and into the cold night. Harper paused long enough to give instructions to his driver before hustling her to the door of the Night Club.
A wave of heat and sound hit them as they entered and Drina peered around curiously, not at all surprised to find it looked like any club in any city. They were in a large room with shadowed booths around the edge of a lit dance floor. Loud music blared from all corners. Harper started to lead her to one of the few empty booths, but she caught his arm and leaned up to ask, “Is there a lounge area? Somewhere quieter, where we can talk when not dancing?”
Nodding, he changed direction at once and led her to a set of swinging doors. They pushed through into another room, this one wholly made up of tables and booths and much quieter once the doors swung shut behind them. They chose a booth along the wall.
Sliding into one side, Drina smiled as she shrugged out of her coat. “We can always go in there to dance as we like, but it will be easier to talk in here when we want a break.”
“Smart thinking,” Harper said, hanging his own coat from a hook at the end of the booth. He then took her coat to hang it beside his.
He slid in across from her, murmuring an apology as his feet nudged hers, then glanced around as a waitress appeared. He smiled at her, but then glanced to Drina, and asked, “Do you know what you want? Or would you like to check the menu?”
For answer, she picked up a narrow menu in a holder at the end of the table and opened it, saying, “It’s probably better to see what they have in case the selection isn’t the same as in Spain or the names are different.”
Harper nodded and turned to the waitress, but she was already slipping away, saying, “I’ll give you a minute.”
Drina laid the menu on the table and turned it sideways so they could both see it. They each leaned forward, head to head to look it over, but then a beeping came from Harper’s coat. Frowning, he straightened and reached in the pocket to retrieve his phone.
Drina politely pretended she couldn’t hear what he was saying, not that there was much to hear. He said, “Hello,” listened briefly, and then sighed, and said, “I did wonder about that. All right. Well, there’s nothing we can do about it.” Another silence followed, and then he said, “I’m not sure. I’ll have to call you back on that.”
Drina glanced at him in question as he hung up, and Harper grimaced.
“It seems it’s officially a blizzard out there,” he announced apologetically. “That was my pilot saying they’ve shut down the airport and are advising people to stay off the highways. He thinks they’ll be closing those soon too, but whatever the case, it isn’t safe to take the helicopter back to Port Henry tonight.”
Drina stared at him blankly for a minute, and then reached for her own phone.
“We can try driving back tonight, but we’d have to leave right away if you want to give it a go,” Harper said, as she began to punch in the number for Casey Cottage. “Otherwise, we aren’t leaving until tomorrow sometime, and then only if the storm lets up.”
Drina bit her lip and nodded to acknowledge his words, then stilled as the phone picked up on the other end.
“Drina?” Mirabeau said by way of greeting.
“Yes, I-”
“Listen, a big storm hit here an hour or so after you guys left. They just shut down the 401 from London to Woodstock, and I suspect the rest of the highway will soon follow. I’m thinking it probably isn’t safe for you guys to fly. You two better not try to come back tonight.”
“What about Stephanie?” Drina asked with a frown. “I’m supposed to sleep-”
“She’s sound asleep on the sofa with the TV on. We’ll leave her there for now. If she wakes up and wants to go to bed, I’ll go up with her. It’s not a problem. Although, that probably isn’t even necessary tonight. Leonius isn’t in the area, and she isn’t likely to try running away in a blizzard, especially with them shutting down the highways. Even if she managed to slip away, there aren’t any buses running to take her anywhere.”
“Right,” Drina murmured. “I guess it’s best we not try coming back then.”
“Definitely,” Mirabeau assured her. “Don’t worry. Everything is good. You and Harper just get a hotel room or something and stay in the city until this clears.”
“I have an apartment here in the city. We can stay there,” Harper announced, apparently having caught the gist of the conversation. He punched a stream of numbers into his phone and turned it toward her so she could read from the small screen. “This is the number, give it to her and tell her to call if there are any problems.”
Drina read off the numbers to Mirabeau, passed along the message, and then echoed her good night and hung up.
“Well,” she murmured.
“Yes,” Harper said.
They stared at each other for a moment, and then Drina caught movement behind his head, and glanced past Harper to see the waitress slowly making her way along the row of booths, taking orders as she moved in their general direction.
“Well,” she said again, turning her gaze to the menu, “let’s see what we have here.”
She ran her eyes slowly down the list of available blood blends, murmuring each aloud as she went, and then paused as she reached-“Sweet Ecstasy.”
“It’s a dose of blood from someone who’s taken the drug ecstasy,” Harper murmured. “The impact on immortals is supposed to be pretty powerful. They say it’s like immortal Spanish fly.”
Drina smiled. “I know. Beth swears by it. She says it’s reawakened her flagging interest in sex and that she has the best sex ever on it.”
Harper’s eyebrows rose. “Does she?”
“Yeah.” Drina chuckled, her gaze dropping back to the menu as she admitted, “She’s always pestering me to try it, and I’ve always kind of wanted to, but I’ve never been with anyone I liked and trusted enough to try it with.” She glanced up and met his gaze, and added, “Until now.”
Harper stared back silently, their gazes locked until a shift in air drew their attention to the fact that someone was standing at the end of the table. He didn’t even glance over to ensure it was the waitress, but simply growled, “Two Sweet Ecstasies.”
“Okie dokie,” the waitress said cheerfully, and slipped away.
The silence drew out for a minute, and then Drina said abruptly, “Let’s dance.”
She didn’t wait for a response, but promptly slid out of the booth and started back toward the door to the dance section of the club. She didn’t have to glance around to see if Harper was following. Drina could feel the heat coming off his body and pouring along her back. The man was practically on her heels and stayed there all the way into the next room and onto the crowded dance floor.
The music was a dance mix, fast and pulsing, the rapid heartbeat of a lover. Drina let it flow through her, allowing her body to move as it would to the sound. She knew Harper was right there with her but didn’t even look at him. Instead, she closed her eyes and moved. When the music slowed three songs later, and he caught her hand to pull her into his arms, she went willingly. The instant electricity between them told her they wouldn’t need any Sweet Ecstasy, but she hadn’t expected they would. Still, when she spotted their waitress moving through the room toward them with a tray holding two drinks, she waved at the woman and smiled as she approached.
“They were going warm,” the waitress explained, pausing beside them.
“You’re a gem. I was getting thirsty,” Drina said with a grin. She then grabbed her drink and downed it in one go as Harper reached for his own drink.
“Another?” their waitress asked with a wicked grin as Drina lowered the now-empty glass.
“Oh definitely,” she said on a laugh as she set the empty glass back on the tray.
“Make it two,” Harper suggested, and then quickly downed his own and replaced it on the tray.
“You got it,” the woman said cheerfully, and swung away.
Smiling, Drina slid her hands around Harper’s neck as he drew her back into his arms.
“Stephanie was wrong about you not dancing since ‘Gone-With-the-Wind-dresses’ were in fashion,” Harper said with amusement as she shifted against his body to the slower beat. “You know how to move to modern music.”