“Not even then,” said Pierre. “I have standards.”
Dominic laughed. This French vampire was so haughty, even when he was slumped on the floor, probably starving, and all whipstered up.
“OK then,” said Dominic, taking the bag from Pierre’s lap and inserting a straw through the plastic. He took a long pull on it and then grinned and said, “Ahhh. But I’ll admit, it would be significantly better if we had a microwave and we could heat it just a tiny bit. Cold blood is about as good as warm soda, you know?”
“No, I do not know,” said Pierre. “I do not drink your soda. And by the way, the microwave is a horrific invention. A real chef spits on your microwave.”
Dominic cackled at this. He could happily spend the whole night saying things to get this guy irritated. But he and Maloney had a job to do.
“All right, you want to know why we invited you up to our palatial room?” Dominic said, gesturing grandly at the faded wallpaper, complete with water stains on the ceiling. “It’s because we want to make you an offer.”
Pierre cocked his head. He was trying to decide whether he could take Maloney if he could first incapacitate Dominic somehow.
“We work for an American company,” Dominic continued. “The company that makes this brand of synthetic blood, actually. As well as whipster. The guy running the show is…I guess the word for it is ambitious. Whatever big money he’s making, he wants ten times that, a hundred times that. Whatever products he’s got, he wants more, he wants better. Bestseller in the U.S.? Then he wants bestsellers in Europe and Asia. Know the kind of guy I’m talking about?”
Well, thought Pierre, not really. The ambitions of his village friends had been more along the lines of wanting a specific woman, or a new goat. He himself limited his ambitions to things that might happen on that particular day–no looking ahead, no thinking big. That would be a straight road to disappointment, was Pierre’s way of thinking.
“There are vampires in Asia?” he said.
Dominic ignored him. “So why we’re here in Mourency,” he said, “is that your local big cheese, Henri de la Motte, has invented some stuff our boss is very interested in.” He paused and took another long pull on his blood bag. “And by ‘very interested’, I mean he wants it. Whatever your dude’s got, our guy has to have it.”
“How did you find out about what la Motte is doing, anyway?” Pierre asked, hoping it was not obvious that he himself had no idea.
“We have good information,” said Dominic, smiling. “About more people and their activities than you could imagine. Even people from this dump of a village.”
Pierre thought this might be the moment to ask them to turn off the whipster, or whatever you did to make it loosen up enough for him to be unbound.
“Take this thing off me,” he said, “and I will talk business with you.”
Maloney giggled. Dominic took one end of the whipster and squeezed it, and it unraveled itself into a neat coil. Pierre rubbed his arms and legs and scowled at Dominic.
“It left a sticky residue,” he said, glowering.
Dominic rolled his eyes. “OK,” he said. “Let me tell you exactly what we want you to do, and why you aren’t going to refuse.”
It was Pierre’s turn to roll his eyes. But he was listening all right, because honestly, he was glad to have a little excitement in his life.
12
Thierry ran up the path to Henri’s lab and pushed the buzzer. Then pushed it again.
“Henri!” he shouted. “It’s very important!”
Nothing but silence.
One more push of the buzzer.
“HENRI! IT’S AN EMERGENCY!” he yelled at the very top of his voice.
He put his ear to the door, and thought that yes, he heard some shuffling around in there.
The door swung open and Henri was standing inside wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist. His physique was impressive, and Thierry was momentarily startled by seeing his boss half-dressed. “Come on in, Thierry,” he said, waving him along. “What is the matter?”
“It’s Drogo. No, I mean it’s Jo, the American rider,” said Thierry.
Henri waited for more. Thierry was just standing there with a terrified expression on his face. “Yes, what about her?” Henri said finally.
“She went off with Drogo this morning, pretty early. And now Drogo has returned–but without Jo!”
Henri nodded. “They were in the forest?” he asked.
“Yes sir, I believe so, sir,” said Thierry.
Henri wondered for a moment what Thierry knew about who lived in the forest. He certainly seemed to understand that a human on foot was in some danger there.
“Thanks for telling me, Thierry, I’ll see about it right away. May I call you if I need help?”
“Of course!”
Henri closed the door after Thierry ran out. He began pacing. He looked at his watch.
“Oh why did David have to hire that girl?” he said, and then, having said it once, out loud, he was done with the past and intent on the present. He went to a closet and began taking out clothing until he had made quite a pile. He pulled off the towel and tossed it to the floor, his powerful body naked for a just a moment. For someone who spent so much time in the lab, he had a shockingly tight ass, sculpted shoulders, and a belly that looked like he didn’t work out with a personal trainer, he was a personal trainer.
He put on a sort of bodystocking that went from his ankles to his neck and down to his wrists, then long pants and a long-sleeved shirt over that. The shirt was made of a stretchy material and had a sort of pocket you slid your hand into, so that your hand was covered up except for the tips of your fingers. He put on gloves. A jacket. A piece of filmy netting over his head and face. A large hat with a brim. He looked a bit like a tall French ninja–a warrior, but with style, and every square inch of skin covered.
Well, he thought, it’s been long past time to test this stuff anyway. Might as well take it out for a spin and see how it does.
Henri approached the door with a great deal of unease. It was nearly three in the afternoon. He had not been outside at nearly three in the afternoon since he was eight years old, two hundred years ago.
He opened the door slowly, carefully. Then he thought of Jo, walking along that bridle path by herself, probably without a suspicion or care in the world, and he hurried out the lab door, slammed it behind him, and began to run.
David had been tossing and turning for what felt like an eternity. Finally he got out of bed and went into the bathroom for a glass of water. Then decided perhaps a nip of cognac would be better–he simply liked the taste, and the idea of it, even though he felt no buzz. He poured himself a glass and flopped down in an armchair, English-made of all things, since in his private bedroom where no one ever came, David wanted things the way he liked them. And he liked an English armchair. It was bigger and sturdier than its French counterparts. It seemed to invite lolling. All the French chairs downstairs in the salons–they seemed to say, We’re here to look pretty. All right, fine, have your moment of rest. Now get up and go do something.
The curtains, however, and the drapes around the bed, and the slipcovers–all French, silk moiré and damask. On the windows, behind the curtains, were Henri’s special shades for filtering sunlight. With those pulled, David could walk around his room during the day and even go to the window to look out, without getting even the slightest bit burnt.
He took his cognac and wandered over to the window, thinking of Jo. Jo in that blue silk dress. Jo in her riding clothes. Jo looking disappointed in him for not caring about Drogo or the other horses. For not going out riding with her.
Which, more than anything, he would have loved to do. But there’s nothing to be done about it, he thought. Near the top of the list of things he hated was a woman looking at him like that, with that disappointed expression. He wanted appreciation, adoration, unending attention….
What?! What is that tearing across the lawn?
David saw his brother, at least he thought it was his brother–every single bit of skin was covered in a rather strange outfit–as he ran in a straight line, crossing the gravel path and the lawn, straight to the garage.
What in the world is he up to now? thought David. He polished off his cognac and slid back into bed. Whatever it was, surely it could keep until nightfall.
Tristan Durant was a happy man. A superbly, surpassingly happy man. He had not so much as been on a date in at least a year. His last girlfriend had been the depressed Sylvie, at least three years back. He had, he realized now, been too caught up in work and vampires, and let the other parts of his life slide. But now, in the delicious present moment, he was with Jessica Winston in her hotel room, and unless he was very much mistaken, he was not there only to talk business.
Jessica was talking business, so far. She was talking about some bit of vampire history that Tristan was sure he could find online or in a book somewhere, so he was not paying very close attention. He was not even trying to look like he was paying attention. Instead he was paying attention to this lovely, sexy woman, this American, this Jessica, who teased him and looked seriously at him, and by this point, anything she did felt erotic to him.
She walked over to the hotel desk and picked up a pad of paper. Tristan felt blood rushing through his body. She adjusted the curtains, to keep the afternoon sun out of their eyes. He had to stop himself from moaning.
He took a few steps towards her, wanting to get close enough to catch her scent.
Jessica opened the window and leaned back against the sill, her hips pushed towards him, relaxed, a hint of a smile on her face.
“That lunch,” she said, “was without question the best lunch I ever ate in my whole entire life,” she said. “And I grew up going to some pretty excellent restaurants. Including the kebab place down a block from my parents’ building,” she said.
Tristan just looked at her with his warm brown eyes.
“I don’t know why I am talking about kebabs,” she said. She moved away from the window, restless.
Tristan got a pang of uncertainty. Did she want him in her hotel room after all? Did she want to do more than talk or had he totally misinterpreted? He had thought, when she invited him up, so warmly, so–effervescent was the word Tristan thought of–that she was inviting him to get to know him better, sure, but also to kiss. And let his hand go up her short skirt. And furthermore.
Now Tristan went to the window, pushed the curtain back, and looked out. He could see the Eiffel Tower if he leaned rather farther out than felt comfortable. He could see the tops of people’s heads as they went down the sidewalk in front of the hotel; some hurrying, perhaps to their own assignations in hotel rooms, and some ambling along, looking in shop windows. Tourists, he guessed.
When he turned back around, prepared to adjust his expectations downward, Jessica was smiling warmly at him.
“How is it that you are not married?” she asked.
“Never met the right woman,” he answered, his eyes moving all over her body, to her face, her hair, her lovely eyes.
“Perhaps Mourency is too small for a man like you,” she said, walking over to the small sofa, a loveseat really, and sitting down, stretching her legs out and slipping off her heels.
“What’s a ‘man like me’?” he asked, coming closer.
“Oh…unbelievably hot. Unbearably sexy. You know,” said Jessica.
Tristan wasted no time getting to the loveseat and taking her hand. “No, I’m not sure I do know,” he said. “I hope you will elaborate.”
She was really grinning now, as he leaned forward and inhaled next to her collarbone, and then kissed it, barely touching his lips to her skin.
“I don’t want you to think Americans are slutty,” she said, leaning her head back and letting an almost-silent moan escape her lips.
“I very much hope they are,” said Tristan. “At least, the American I had lunch with today. Just that one.”
He leaned close to her now, his body already encircled by her legs while she was still sitting up on the loveseat. He put his face right up next to hers, looking into her eyes, touching her hair, feeling more aroused, and happier, than he could remember.
And Jessica, who was indeed feeling delightfully slutty now that she was about to make love to a man she had just met that day, was feeling very pleased with the world herself. With Paris, with herself, and with this brown-eyed man who felt so good in her arms, so alive.
It’s wrong, she thought, to wish he could bite me. I really have to let that go.
She lifted his face to hers and kissed him with every bit of skill and affection she could find in herself. And that, to her surprise, led to something else.
He was blazing hot, he took his time, and she thought, as they moved to the bed, her body humming with desire, that she would definitely stay in Paris an extra few days.
13
The forest. Another world. Or, a look at what the world was like before people showed up and started building things and making a mess. As Jo walked, she was turning her head and looking all around to get the most complete view she could, the widest possible picture of this place, of the immense trees, ochre leaves, and ferns dying back in advance of winter. She was paying close attention to what she could see and smell and hear, because it was lovely and even majestic, and because she did not want to think about how long this walk might take. A person who likes to ride horses, she thought, is sort of by definition someone who would rather let someone else do the hard work of getting from one place to another.
It was not that Jo minded the work, actually. It was that she minded the speed. Or lack thereof.
At first, after she discovered Drogo had run away, she tried to do a calculation about how far they had come, using the number of hours she had ridden. She was a little pleased to have remembered the formula rate x time = distance. Lot of good that did her. All those naysayers in her algebra class who used to whine about how math wasn’t useful in the real world–here you go, people, a big fat chunk of evidence for you.
In the forest, too many variables remained unknown.
If only she hadn’t been so stubborn about bringing her cell. But she hated the feel of it in her pocket when she rode, and hadn’t wanted to wear a pack either. Well, being sorry about it now wasn’t going to change anything.
By a couple of hours into the walk she had exhausted the top layer of things in her brain, and started in on the next layer down. She was doing her best to stay out of unpleasant territory and trying to stay focused on how her boots pressed into the ground, and how the bridle path was a perfect surface for riding, not too hard and not too soft. Just right for hooves.
Then, unbidden, a memory of coming home from school, her backpack hurting her shoulders, the darkness of an early winter afternoon. She lets herself into the boxy little house, instantly smelling bourbon. Tries to get upstairs before anyone notices she’s home. But her father shouts out, “Hey little mouse, come in here!”
And because she is his daughter, she does what he says.
She comes and stands in the doorway to the living room and surveys the world of her father: the overflowing ashtray, the tumbler with almost melted ice cubes, his greasy face. The rumbling murmur of the television news.
He is drunk, of course, his senses dulled down so far that connecting with another person is not a possibility. But even so, he feels her disgust.
“Something wrong with you,” he says, glaring. A statement, not a question.
Jo steps back. She tightens her grip on the backpack straps.
“Get out of here,” he says. “I can’t stand the sight of you,” he says, triumphantly, even though all he has done is confuse her thoughts with his own.
In the forest, Jo stopped. Oh no you don’t, she thought to herself. Get the hell out of my head, Dad.
She had long practice in training her mind, and when she banished Dad, he stayed gone. At least until the next time.
More horse droppings on the path, very fresh. She wondered if they were Drogo’s. She hoped he had gone back to the barn and not taken off somewhere and gotten himself lost or hurt. Also, she wondered whether she would make it back by dark–but that thought she kept in a sort of ante-room to her brain, holding it there, not allowing herself to think it even though she knew perfectly well it was there.
It seemed oddly quiet in the forest. Jo did not know much about the birds of this particular region but thought she should be able to hear them singing. It’s an October afternoon in the woods, she thought, where is the bird-song?
And then, just at that moment, it was not so quiet anymore.
The path had curved around a low hill, so when Jo turned around to look, the way she had just traveled was mostly out of sight. She saw nothing. But she could hear–what was that? It sounded like sing-song chanting but it wasn’t words, it wasn’t a melody, and it wasn’t anything she would have called a song. It’s…it’s…wow, whoever that is, they have terrible voices, she thought.
She walked faster. She felt a chill of fear fall over her.
Behind her, three women were gaining on her. They were walking together, abreast. They were smiling. One of them was noisily chewing on something. That one called out, speaking either nonsense or a possibly a French word Jo had never heard before.
What the hell? thought Jo, glancing over her shoulder and catching a quick glimpse. She didn’t see the point of running–where would she run to? The five or ten or fifteen miles back to the Château? And it was just three women, what could they possibly want with her? They looked sort of like Goth teenagers, they were probably just messing with her, playing a prank. She kept walking, kept her back to whatever was behind her, and prayed to find Drogo munching on something around the next bend.
She thought she heard–was that a coyote? A wolf? Howling, in the distance.
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