Possessed by An Immortal

by Sharon Ashwood

  She turned around in her seat, checking on her son. “We should find a drive-through for breakfast.”

  The scent of woman was one thing. Tantalizing, dangerous, but good. Mark imagined the stench of human food trapped inside the car, and nearly shuddered. “No.”

  “Kids need to eat.”

  “Kids are sticky.”

  “He’ll be hungry.”

  “I’m the driver.”

  Bree gave him a sharp glance that reproached him and acknowledged his position of power at the same time. “Fine. It’s your car.”

  It was. With a dove-gray leather interior. And she’d managed to make him, a centuries-old monster, feel bad about it. He winced. “We can stop at the Gleeford Ferry. There’s better food in town than just drive-through.”

  She sank back, turning her face to the side window until all he could see was her long, waving hair. Even it looked disgruntled. “This road we’re on is barely a highway. Wouldn’t it be faster to pick up the I-5?”

  “Someone put Puget Sound in the way.”

  She made a small noise of impatience. “I guess we’re farther out than I expected.”

  “We’ve only been driving an hour.”

  “It feels longer.”

  He realized she was nervous, but it was coming across as demanding. He stifled a growl. Being alone on his island was much easier. “There are fewer cars here. I can spot someone following us on this route.”

  With no further comments, Bree pulled a magazine out of her backpack and started flipping through it. From the corner of his eye, he saw it was one of those thick fashion rags. Each page turn was a sigh of impatience.

  Flip. Flip. Flip.

  Mark gripped the steering wheel, trying to ignore the sound. To make matters worse, Jonathan was humming tunelessly, thumping his stuffed duck against the car door. He clenched his teeth, summoning inner strength. You are the lion. The hunter that strikes in the night. You have the patience of the leopard in the tree.

  Thump. Thump. Flip. La-la-la.

  I’m not a thrice-damned cab driver. Another few hours, and he’d be alone again. Breathe deeply. No, then he smelled tasty woman. Open a window. Yeah, that was it.

  This was his nightmare. Once before, he had been responsible for a woman and her young. The Knights of Vidon had destroyed them. And I tore the first Nicholas Ferrel and his animals to pieces in retribution. The centuries that followed had been a bloodbath, an endless feud of vampire against slayer as one act of violence demanded payback, then another.

  But Mark had taken a different path since then, one of healing instead of death. He desperately wanted to stay on it.

  Bree stopped turning pages, gazing out the window again. Her long fingers gripped the magazine so hard the tendons stood out along the backs of her hands. “You don’t think anyone’s following us now, do you?”

  Mark cleared his throat. “Not that I’ve seen.”

  “What have you seen?”

  “Two logging trucks and a pickup full of produce. Unless the gunmen are disguised as squash, we’re safe for the time being.”

  “Good.” The word was as packed full of meaning as her glance had been. “It’s been a while since I had a few hours.”

  He looked over at her. He was wearing dark glasses despite the tinted windshield, and they washed the color out of her, leaving her in shades of gray. “You mean a few hours to not worry?”

  She gave a quick, rueful smile. “To worry about one thing at a time. To focus on normal mom things, like breakfast. Clean clothes. I’ve been carrying this magazine around for weeks and haven’t got past the first ten pages. Getting to read it feels like a scandalous luxury.”

  Something made Mark glance in the rearview mirror. Jonathan was watching his mother, picking up every word. Mark wondered how much of it he understood. Probably everything. Kids in trouble grew up fast. Maybe princelings on the lam grew even faster.

  “Where’s Jonathan’s father in all this?” he asked.

  “Nowhere.” Bree said it quickly, opening up the magazine again. The word was the next best thing to a slamming door.

  Mark watched the road, keeping his face turned straight ahead. They were getting near the ferry that would take them to Seattle. He should start laying a little groundwork to prepare Bree for the safe house. “It’s a lot, raising a child on your own.”

  “Sure it is. But you do it, whether you’re ready or not.” Her voice was quietly matter-of-fact.

  “The guy’s a prince. He can afford child support.”

  Her hands froze midflip. “You know who I am.”

  Got you. Mark shifted his hands on the steering wheel, as if closing his grip on more than the car. “I figured it out.”

  “How?” She pulled herself straighter in the seat. “How did you know?”

  “I have a good memory for faces.” Which was true, though he’d made no connection between this woman and the celebutante who’d graced Crown Prince Kyle’s arm four years ago. But now that he’d met Bree, there was no chance he’d ever forget her.

  She slumped. “Sue me. I had my fifteen minutes of fame.”

  “You weren’t the last girl Kyle showed a good time.” There had been others, including the infamous Brandi Snap, who had nearly wrecked Prince Kyle’s engagement to the much-beloved Princess Amelie of Marcari. “Does Kyle know about Jonathan?”

  She gave him a dirty look. “They’ve never met.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “Oh, but everyone knows about him, don’t they?” Her tone was steely enough to draw blood. “I worked hard to keep a low profile for a long time. Lived my life, raised my son. Then one day the paparazzi must have been having a slow week, because all of a sudden it was all over the papers—the prince’s bimbo had a baby.”

  “Is that who you think is after you?”

  “Photographers shoot with cameras, not guns.” She toyed with the edges of the magazine, riffling the pages. “And Kyle isn’t the one giving the order to chase us. He’s a good guy, prince or not.”

  Mark was inclined to agree. As one of the Horsemen, he had crossed paths with the crowned heads of several kingdoms, including Prince Kyle. He’d seemed pretty levelheaded—but the fact that he’d had this woman and then let her get away—well, that was just foolish.

  Mark turned her story over in his mind, still trying to match the glittering arm candy with the serious, frightened young woman next to him. “Let me play devil’s advocate for a moment. A royal court is a well-oiled machine. Kyle is only one piece of it.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “He might be a nice guy, but there are plenty of people at court who aren’t. It’s not just all parties and polo. Vidon has been at war with its neighbors off and on since the Crusades.”

  “But he always knew he would marry Princess Amelie from the kingdom next door. Their families have been fighting forever. He wanted to end the war and, from what he said, so did she. Marriage would unite Marcari and Vidon.”

  Her matter-of-fact tone surprised him. “You don’t mind that he’s marrying another woman?”

  She shrugged. “He’s a prince. He has to marry a princess. Besides, we were just friends.”

  Just friends. Not the statement he’d expected, but relief eased his shoulders. A silence fell over the car for a moment, leaving only the sound of the road and Jonathan’s aimless humming. Mark struggled to tune it out. Whatever kept the kid from talking, it wasn’t his vocal cords.

  They passed through a tiny hamlet that was nothing but a gas station and a place that sold pies. A bored-looking horse swished flies and stared morosely over a broken-down fence. Mark checked the rearview mirror. Still no one tailing them.

  “Your son can still be used as a pawn, even if he’s not a legitimate heir.”


  Bree snapped the magazine shut. “He’s not the heir. He’s not Kyle’s. I wish people would believe me.”

  “There are people who might benefit from saying he is.”

  “Seriously?” she scoffed. “These are tiny kingdoms. Nice, lots of Mediterranean beaches and all that, but Texas could swallow them both and leave room for snacks.”

  “Neither country is big, but the income from tourism, especially gambling, is huge.”

  “Still, how would kidnapping Jonathan help anyone?”

  Mark wondered how much he should say, but decided she deserved the straight goods. “Not everyone wants the match between Vidon and Marcari. Their feud is so old, it’s become a way of life for some people. Even a means of making money.”

  And then there was the whole supernatural issue. Amelie’s father, the king of Marcari, had an old alliance with the vampires. The Company and the Horsemen had his personal support. But right next door, the vampire-slaying Knights of Vidon had kept the feud between the two nations alive—and had most recently left a fan letter in Mark’s bedroom.

  Which meant the his-and-hers sets of gunmen were probably the same people. Mark had to get her to the safe house, whether she liked it or not. He turned to Bree, who was biting her nails.

  “Think about it,” Mark said softly. “What if people believed Jonathan was the only heir? What if someone stopped Kyle’s wedding to Amelie so there would be no real heirs?” Or what if they killed the royal couple? But Mark didn’t want to say that out loud.

  Bree gave him a look packed with excitement, reluctance and another emotion he couldn’t name. “I didn’t put everything together before now. What you say makes more sense than I want to admit to.”

  “Why?”

  Her grave eyes held a glimmer of something he hadn’t seen before—trust. “Someone tried to sabotage the wedding before. I was there, firsthand.”

  Mark tensed, his gut mirroring the conflicting emotions on her face. Knowing her story would connect them. Part of him wanted that. Another part wanted to run free, back to his island, untethered.

  But that wasn’t an option. He had a duty as a Horseman. Even more than that, Bree’s vulnerable expression made him push on. “Before?”

  “I used to work for a design firm. We got the commission to do the wedding clothes. Weird, eh? I was working on the outfits for my friend’s celebrity wedding. My ex-boyfriend, if you believe the tabloids.”

  Mark nearly veered off the road. He knew this part of the story already. “There was a fire in the design studio. It destroyed the whole collection, except the wedding dress. That was found later.” Mark had been one of the Horsemen who’d returned the gown to Princess Amelie. Jack Anderson, the Horseman called Death, had died doing it. By all the fiery hells!

  Bree closed her eyes, suddenly looking excruciatingly young. “Yes, all the clothes for the wedding were burned up. Except for the dress.” A tear leaked out from under her lashes.

  “What is it?” Mark asked gently, although he felt a wave of anticipation surge through him. He was finally getting somewhere with her.

  She opened her eyes, giving him a long, steady look. “You don’t need to get any more involved than you are.”

  “The dress wasn’t the whole story, was it?”

  She sighed, giving in. “No. There was something else, another reason they might be tailing me besides Jonathan. My boss, Jessica Lark, was murdered before the fire was set.”

  So that was the murder she’d witnessed. Mark felt a chill go through him. “There were rumors that Lark had an assistant, but the name on the payroll records was a fake. There was no way to find out who you really were.”

  “I was hiding from the press. Jessica kept my real identity off the books as a favor, especially when it turned out that we were the ones working on the wedding designs. I wanted my work to be taken seriously and not regarded as fluff because I was a rich girl playing with fashion.”

  Mark felt a knot of suspicion forming in his gut. “You realize that doesn’t look good. Everyone thinks you’re the prince’s ex. The wedding was sabotaged. Lark was murdered. You would have been the prime suspect.”

  “Yeah,” she said, her voice growing hard. “I would be if you don’t know the whole story. But think about it. The police are good at their jobs. The whole thing with Jessica’s records slowed them down, sure, but the police should have been able to get past that.”

  “So why didn’t they?”

  She turned her face toward the window, speaking so softly he barely heard her, even with his excellent hearing. “The murderers don’t want me in police custody. For some reason, they want me and Jonathan for themselves. And to keep hunting all this time, I think they must have a lot of resources.”

  Mark shifted his grip on the steering wheel. He had to get her to the safe house, and now it wasn’t just for her safety. Jessica Lark had been one of the Company’s agents. There would be questions. “Tell me the whole story.”

  Bree’s mouth quavered and she bit her lip. “I was on the phone with Jessica when it happened. I heard the whole thing.”

  Chapter 7

  “What happened?” Mark demanded. Jessica Lark had been his friend long ago. Long before Bree would have joined Lark’s studio.

  But Bree turned away, as if regretting her words. “Look, there’s the ferry. We must be in Gleeford already.”

  “Tell me.” His voice was nearly a snarl.

  Her eyes were shuttered. “I’ve said too much already.”

  He wasn’t sure how to answer that. When he thought of Lark, it was as more than a coworker. Mark didn’t connect with people; he was too old, weary and wary both—but she had been different. “Jessica Lark loved animals, hated housework, didn’t trust banks and was allergic to any kind of jewelry that wasn’t pure gold or silver.”

  Bree made a sound that might have been a laugh. “She loved pretty things.”

  “She was a creative genius who everyone wanted to know but most found a little frightening. Anyone lucky enough to land in her bed quickly bored her but she was too soft-hearted to send them away. Does any of this sound familiar? Do you believe that I knew her and that she was important to me?”

  Bree made a derisive noise. “All the men were in love with her. You, too, then.”

  “Not in the way you mean. But yes, I loved her. We knew each other a long, long time.”

  He caught her glance for a moment, and it was like seeing some small, frightened animal backing into its burrow. Bree was pulling away, giving in to her fear. Silence and running were the only survival tactics she knew.

  Frustrated, Mark turned at the sign for the ferry. Ticket booths guarded a parking lot filled with cars waiting for the next boat to arrive. Puget Sound stretched before them, a broad silver swath of water rimmed in dark forest.

  Mark pulled up to a ticket booth and lowered the window. “Two adults, one child.”

  “The next sailing’s at ten twenty-five. You’ve got a forty-minute wait.” The man took Mark’s cash. He looked cold despite a Cowichan sweater under his coat. The wind off the water was brisk. “You may as well park and go for coffee.”

  “Where’s a good place?”

  “There’s a shop that does its own roasting right over there.” He pointed up at the road. “Good cinnamon rolls, too.”

  Mark thanked him and pulled ahead. There were about a dozen cars ahead of them already.

  “Breakfast,” Bree said, unbuckling her seat belt before the car had come to a full stop.

  Mark caught her wrist. “I have questions.”

  She shrugged him off. “I need to eat. So does Jonathan. We can talk after.”

  Mark hesitated but gave in because she was right. Besides, he seemed to have her trust for the moment. Everything was going according to plan. There wa
s no good reason to insist they stay with the car.

  He waited for her to unbuckle Jonathan. The boy bounced out of the car like a joyous puppy, banging into Mark’s knees. He caught the child before he could zip in front of a moving SUV. Automatically, he hoisted Jonathan into the air, making him gurgle with laughter, the wind tossing the waves of his soft, fine hair.

  Memories. He’d done the same thing long ago in Parma—picking up his own son in the stable yard, keeping him out from under the horses’ hooves. His son had laughed in just that way.

  The image caught him off guard, a jab under the ribs that nearly made him stumble. He slammed into grief and anger he had long tried to forget. He set Jonathan back on his feet, but the boy clung to him as they walked toward the street, the feel of his tiny hand chaining him to the past. Mark wanted to pull his hand away, but stopped himself. The child was innocent. It was up to Mark to swallow down the pain.

  Fear made another lap through his imagination, repeating what he already knew. The first Nicholas Ferrel had killed his wife and children over five hundred years ago. Now his descendant was prowling around, just when Mark had found this woman and child. Surely I’m smarter now. Surely I can stop him this time.

  The threat could be anywhere. Mark tensed, opening his vampire senses to scan the quiet scene, tasting the wind for any hint of an enemy. A low growl thrummed deep in his chest. Jonathan gave him a curious look.

  Fortunately, Bree didn’t hear him. “This is the cutest town ever. And there’s a quilt shop.”

  “I thought you wanted breakfast.”

  “Some women need pretty fabric the way others need air.” But she turned into the coffee shop.

  It was a long, narrow space with a few wooden tables and chairs. Most of the space was taken up by the coffee bar and glass cases of buns and pastries. Jonathan pressed himself against the glass like a determined squid.

  “Isn’t there anything with protein?” she muttered. “Too much sugar isn’t good.”

  “There’s milk,” Mark suggested. “And I don’t think one pastry will hurt. Surely his grandparents have spoiled him once in a while?”