"Don't let them sway you, Dulcie. We'll figure a way out of this. You will live," he said fiercely, as if by saying it he could make it so.

"I don't think I will," I replied in a small voice.

"I won't let them have you. I won't allow you to become what I am because you have no other choice."

"You don't think I'm strong enough to be one of you."

"Oh G.o.d," he said and pulled me into his arms. I stiffened and then sank into the hard wall of his chest. "I think you're the bravest creature I've ever met."

He pulled back and took my face in his hands. "I want you to have a life, Dulcie. The life you were meant to have. You were born to fine things and fancy houses. You should die a very old lady surrounded by your grandchildren," he said, but there was pain and perhaps a bit of jealousy in his voice as he said it.

I laughed and laid my head on his shoulder. "I don't know that grandchildren are in my future at any rate. I'm a willful old maid who hasn't been attracted to a man in more years than I care to count."

He tipped my head up with one finger. "No?" he breathed.

I opened my mouth but nothing came out. Good grief, I was acting like a green debutante! I was widely known throughout the ton for my sophisticated banter and yet now I couldn't even seem to form a sentence. Instead I did what I'd longed to do last night and this morning. I reached up and ran my fingers along the edge of one sharp cheekbone, down the side of his face, softly skimming his lips. He groaned and pressed my back against the door before his lips fell on mine.

He was wild and hungry, his tongue tangling with mine. My knees nearly buckled and I grabbed handfuls of his shirt to steady myself.

"Michael," I said between kisses, "if I were to become like you, do you think... that is, we seem to have this... thing."

We seem to have this thing? G.o.ds, what was wrong with me? He looked at me in confusion for a moment and I knew I'd bungled it. Then something inscrutable pa.s.sed over his face.

"I could never have dreamed to have such a lady for my own," he said, his voice gone all husky with some unnamed emotion.

It wasn't truly an answer but at the moment I didn't care. That wonderful body was so near mine and oh so very touchable. I pulled his head back down to me, running my fingers through his hair. I moved my hands over his shoulders and down to the b.u.t.tons of his shirt. He pulled back and looked down at me as I flicked open one b.u.t.ton after another until I'd opened them all and pushed the shirt down over his shoulders.

He was breathing heavily but I didn't dare look at his face or I'd lose my nerve. I'd never seen a man's naked chest before. Well, my father's a few times but I'd been only a small child then. I ran my palms over the hard plane of his chest, down over his nipples, along the rigid muscles of his stomach. Those tight squares fascinated my fingers. He growled low in his throat and reached down, grabbing me by the thighs and lifting me to straddle his hips.

"Let me see your hair," he said against my temple, "its true color."

I dropped my glamour and my hair bled to ruby.

"So beautiful," he whispered.

I clung to him, kissing him and running my hands over every inch of him that I could reach. My body felt as if it were made of hot quicksilver.

A loud knock on the door behind my head made me pull back with Jenna Maclaine a small squeak. I braced my hands against the door, my eyes wild. We'd been caught. By whom? Dear G.o.ddess, please don't let it be Mrs. Mackenzie!

"Michael," Devlin's deep voice growled from the other side. "The sun is set. Come."

I could hear his footsteps move down the hall. I had never heard Devlin move before. He was quiet as a wraith. The loud footsteps had been for my benefit. I flushed a dozen colors of crimson.

Michael lowered me to my feet and we stood, leaning against each other and catching our breath. Did vampires really breathe? I wouldn't have thought so. I'd have to ask him about it later.

"You need to go," I said against his chest.

"Yes," he replied, but made no move to leave.

"Don't hurt anyone," I said.

"Dulcie, we do not-"

"I know, I know. I've already gotten the We Do Not Harm Humans speech from Devlin. I just had to say it again."

He smiled and moved away.

"Please be careful," I said.

He picked up his sheathed claymore from where it rested against my dressing table."Don't worry," he said with a grin, patting the huge sword. "Ophelia has yet to fail me."

"Ophelia? You named your sword?"

"All men name their swords," he said, laughing. I had the feeling I was missing something there but I let it go.

"Why 'Ophelia'?" Had he named it after some former lover?

"Have you never read Hamlet?" he asked.

"Oh. Of course. But why choose a name from Hamlet?"

He shrugged. "It seemed like an appropriate play."

I laughed, bemused. "Why?"

"Well, because," he said, looking at the sword with pride and affection, "everyone dies in the end."

Chapter Eighteen

A door slammed closed somewhere in the house. I jerked awake, nearly dropping the large book of Latin that had lain across my lap as I slept. I looked around the library. Mrs. Mackenzie was sitting up on the red leather sofa, her head tilted at an angle that was likely to hurt when she straightened up. Fiona lay curled on her side, her feet tucked under her skirt and her head on her mother's lap. Mr. Pendergra.s.s had nodded off in one of the wing chairs next to the fire, his chin resting on his chest, the book which he'd been reading from laying open and forgotten on his lap. Archie stood in the doorway of the library. When he saw that I'd awakened he beckoned me over. Closing my book of Latin, I moved silently through the room to his side.

"They've just returned," he whispered. "How are you feeling?"

I shrugged. "Fine. The only person in my head is me tonight. What time is it?"

"Five."

I nodded. "Well, whatever Sebastian was doing tonight, it's too late for him to start up with me now. If he were going to be a nuisance he'd have been here by now. I'm going on up to bed. Will you wake them?" I asked, motioning toward my sleeping guardians.

"Certainly," he said, patting my shoulder, "and I'll help keep watch until sunrise."

"Thank you, Archie," I replied and hugged him briefly, pulling away before it got too awkward.

I met Devlin and Justine coming down the hall. She was dressed in her deep purple courtesan's gown again, her arm entwined with Devlin's and a look of promise in her eyes as he guided her toward the stairs.

"Has all been well tonight?" Devlin asked. "You look rested."

"Nary a peep," I replied. "We all fell asleep in the library. Well, except for Archie. He stood watch."

Devlin nodded. "Montford's probably nursing his wound this night. He'll likely be back tomorrow night. We'll go out and hunt again then."

I frowned. "I don't want you to get yourselves killed over me. I couldn't bear it."

"My dear," he smiled, "we're already dead."

"Yes, so Michael keeps reminding me. Don't get yourselves hurt is what I'm asking. If she's too strong to fight, then come back and we'll think of something else."

"Like what?" Justine asked, a faintly condescending smile on her face.

"I don't know. Look, I know this is what you do and you must be good at it if you've survived this long. But the three of you, you're a family. You two are so much in love you fairly glow with it. If anything happened to any of you because of me..."

"Don't worry so much," Justine chided.

"If all goes badly we'll fall back to the house," Devlin said, "and Pendergra.s.s and his boy can take you somewhere safe as soon as the sun rises. Our options are fight or flight and, as I have been reminded recently, we are fighters first and foremost."

"Where is Michael?" I asked.

Justine waved one hand airily. "He said he had something to do. I don't know."

"Oh," I said, not liking the wash of disappointment that swept through me at the thought that I wasn't going to get to see him tonight. "Well, I'm off to bed then. Good night, and thank you again for everything."

I climbed the stairs and walked down the hall to my room. Pausing at my door, I shifted the large Latin tome to one side and put my hand on the k.n.o.b. A frisson of antic.i.p.ation ran through me and before I even opened the door I knew that my room was not empty.

"What are you doing in here?" I asked, closing the door behind me.

Michael whirled around and backed up into the nightstand. I looked at what he held, at the expression on his face, and my heart melted. In his hands was the priceless blue and white Ming bowl from the foyer table. He'd filled it with dirt and planted the bright yellow evening primrose in it. Obviously as a poor crofter's son, a gardener, a soldier, he didn't realize the value of that bowl and that it was not something to be used to plant flowers in.

I smiled at that and my heart gave a little flutter. He stood there, clutching the bowl of flowers, with this look of vulnerability, of uncertainty and insecurity on his face. It was the look that most of my would-be suitors had when they were presented in my mother's drawing room, flowers in hand, the morning after a ball. It made my breath catch in my throat to see that look on someone so deadly, so dangerous, and to know that I was the cause of it.

"I, um, you liked looking at the primrose this morning. I thought maybe they'd last longer if they were in the house where it's warm."

"They're lovely, thank you," I said, setting my book aside and taking the bowl carefully from his hands. I placed it gently on my dressing table. "There. That way they'll get the afternoon sun through the balcony windows."

"So, Sebastian's gone to ground to lick his wounds?"

"Yes, it was a refreshingly quiet evening."

"Good. We'll go out tomorrow night and hunt them again."

"Michael," I said, clutching his arm, "promise me you won't do anything foolish."

"Of course, la.s.s," he said softly. "Promise me you'll all come back in one piece."

"I can't promise that and you know it. This is a fight to the death. Someone will die and hopefully it won't be us."

I wrapped my arms around myself. "I've never had to fight for anything," I whispered.

He was quiet for a moment and then said, "I know. And I've had to fight all my life."

His eyes were distant; I couldn't read anything in them. It was as if he'd retreated somewhere deep inside himself that I couldn't touch.

"I must go," he said, his voice thick with some emotion I couldn't name.

What had just happened?

"Michael, don't go."

He looked at me and shook his head. "Sometimes, la.s.s, I forget what you are."

Icy fingers seemed to squeeze at my heart. "What I am? What does that mean?"

"You're a viscount's daughter and I'm nothing but-"

"I know very well what you are."

He shook his head. "You don't understand. Even when I was human, I was nothing more than a servant. Last night and earlier this evening, I shouldn't have kissed you and tonight I shouldn't have brought you flowers as if I were a man able to court you. You have my apologies; it won't happen again."

"Oh really?" I asked, arching a brow at him.

He raked one hand through his hair. "When I was alive you would have been so far above me, as untouchable as the moon, but now... I'm dead, Dulcie, can't you understand that?"

"And you think I'm not? No matter what you think, Devlin says that this beast can't be killed. If that's so, then I'm a walking dead woman, Michael. Do you think I like that thought? Do you think it brings me joy? I don't want to die, Michael. I want to live. I want to walk along the Seine in Paris; I want to float in a gondola on the ca.n.a.ls of Venice; I want to shop in the markets of Morocco; I want to dance at the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg," I said, hating myself for the catch in my voice and the tears I felt welling up in my eyes. "I don't want to die, but I will. I can feel it like some black cloud hanging over me."

I walked up to him and ran my hands up the front of his shirt, feeling all that silk and muscle under my fingertips. "Right now, the only thing that brings me joy is you. What I feel, it's not something I take lightly. I've been attracted to all of three men in my entire life, Michael. You make me burn and if I'm going to die, don't let me die a virgin. Stay with me tonight," I whispered against the sharp plane of his cheek.

A shudder ran through him. His hands moved up my arms to rest on my shoulders and I thought he would give in. And then his fingers tightened and he pushed away from me.

"You are not going to die. You're going to live and one day when you find the right man and get married you'll look back on this night and be thankful I walked away."

"I very seriously doubt that," I commented.

He looked at me for a long time, not speaking. It was as if he lacked the will to turn and leave. I was pretty certain that if I tried again I could melt his reservations, but in the end I decided against it. My pride wouldn't allow me to be rejected twice in one night. So I let him walk away. When he got to the door I called out to him.

"Michael?" He turned. I propped one hip on the footboard of the bed and crossed my arms under my b.r.e.a.s.t.s, making them swell invitingly over the neckline of my gown. "You were right about one thing. I am a viscount's spoiled daughter and I'm very used to getting exactly what I want. You'd do well to remember that."

He smiled and inclined his head and then shut the door behind him as he left.