"Okay, then." He kissed her forehead. "Get some rest. I'll stop in and see you in the morning on my way to rounds."

When he left, Alex turned off all the lights and sat in the dark. She was somewhat puzzled by her own lack of emotion over her ordeal. Anyone who had endured what she had was ent.i.tled to be hysterical or at least a little upset, but she felt pretty calm. Had felt calm since waking up in ICU. She also had a new and distinct sense of antic.i.p.ation but had no idea where that came from, either.

I'm waiting...for what? Was there an appointment she had made, one that had been swallowed up along with her memories of the six days she had gone missing? It wasn't a patient; Grace had shuffled all of her open cases over to a couple of colleagues. Luisa was holding her own. No, whatever was nagging at her had nothing to do with her practice. Be patient. Be calm. It will come to you.

He came an hour after Charlie left, and rang the doorbell.

About time. Alex wanted to go to bed, but she'd take care of this first.

The man at her door was better-looking than she expected. Tall, lean, and dressed in a beautiful gray suit and black trench coat. He carried a briefcase like an attorney, but wore his hair too long for court.

Like a lion's mane, she thought, admiring it. Strange how all the hair around his face was dead-white; he looked very young, not more than forty at the most. The faint scent of roses teased her nose and made her breathe in deeply before she smiled up at him. "h.e.l.lo."

"Good evening, Dr. Keller." His voice was low and soft, and had a distinct French accent. "May I come in?"

Do I know anyone French? Alex had never let a stranger in her house in her life, but it was silly not to invite him in.

How else could she find out why she had been waiting for him? Besides, she had to know him, else how could he have found her place?

The appointment.

Of course, that was it. She must have invited him to come and see her. She simply couldn't remember his name or doing it. "Yes, please, come in."

The rose scent grew stronger as he walked into the house. Maybe he grew or delivered flowers for a living. Wouldn't mind getting a bouquet from him, Alex thought as she discreetly checked out his shoulders and long legs.

The man refused her offer of a drink and a seat, and placed the briefcase on the coffee table. "This is yours."

"I don't think so." Frowning, she examined the case. "The one I use is brown, not black."

"What I mean is that I brought it for you." He walked up to her and studied her face. "It is not the rapture. How can that be?" He sounded very upset.

"I'm okay, really." She made a face. "I just can't remember what happened to me. I was... it's kind of a long story."

"I know. I am part of it." He pressed his fingertips to the side of her neck. Warmth spread out over her skin where he touched her. "It is time for you to remember, Alexandra. Remember New Orleans. Remember me." Memories punched through the bewildering la.s.situde, vicious and unforgiving as they flooded into her head. She would have fallen on her a.s.s if the man had not caught her.

Mr. Cyprien is in great need- Your boss had me kidnapped?

I am something of a medical challenge.

Michael- She will not mind- The smell of roses. The touch of his hands. The brush of his hair against her cheek.

Pardonnez-moi, cherie.

Pain slammed into Alex's head, making her reel. In a heartbeat, she knew everything: the abduction, the house in New Orleans, the terribly scarred man, the illegal surgery she'd been forced to perform. And something worse.

Something so horrifying that it couldn't have happened outside of a nightmare. But it had.

Pardonnez-moi, cherie.

His lips had felt soft, but the top of his mouth had been pushed back. His voice had been gentle, but he'd looked like a maniac, an animal. Coming at her with his teeth bared.

No, not teeth. No human being's teeth ever came sliding out like ivory daggers, like a snake's did just before it struck, and he had used them on her-Alex remembered that, too. He had opened his mouth and used them to- "Be calm, cherie." His fingers cupped her cheek.

Alex jerked away from his hand. She knew him, all right. Michael Cyprien, the sick son of a b.i.t.c.h who had torn out her throat. With his teeth.

"You. You get away from me." She jerked away, banging into a chair and nearly falling again. She began shaking, so hard that her teeth chattered. "Wh-wh-what did you do? How did you make me forget all that?"

"It was something that we did together." He watched her, his eyes bright in his grave, perfect face. The face she had made for him. "My people should not have brought you back like this. I am sorry."

"You're sorry?" Adrenaline and rage pumped into her veins. "After what you did? After what... you..." She touched the side of her throat. The skin was smooth and unbroken. "I remember you doing it. Biting me." But there was no wound, no scarring. Nothing.

"I did." He took a couple of steps toward her.

"Where?" She couldn't stop prodding her neck or backing away from him. "You didn't st.i.tch me up. I can't feel anything, not even scar tissue. How did you make me think that?" A horrendous thought occurred to her. "Did you use drugs on me?"

"You were wounded, and I... helped you. My kind, we have ways to heal. It's just that no one..." He seemed to realize he was scaring the daylights out of her, and stood still. "Alexandra, I will not hurt you."

"Like the last time?" If she hadn't been so terrified, she would have slapped his mouth off. "You're a monster."

"I am." He didn't seem too worried about it. "Still, I am not so different from your other patients." He circled around her. "You operate on abnormal structures of the body, to improve function and approximate a normal appearance. In repairing the damage to my face, you restored my ident.i.ty."

She couldn't look away from his eyes. They were bright blue now, but she remembered how they had dilated into those terrible, twin pits of amber h.e.l.l.

Don't look at him.

"What are you on?" she demanded, fixing her gaze on a point past his head. "Did you give it to me?"

"No, I-it is too complicated to explain." He shook his head. "You must make a choice now, cherie. You can come back to New Orleans with me now, and I will provide for you. Or you can stay here and live your life as it was, but you must never speak of this to anyone."

He'd kidnapped her, imprisoned her, drugged her, made her believe he could heal spontaneously and that she had operated on him, on top of the delusion that he had torn out her throat, and he wanted her to make all that doctor- patient privileged? "Get the f.u.c.k out of my house."

He raised an elegant hand. "We must settle this first. I owe you everything. Had it not been for your skills, I would not be able to function normally."

He was still trying to sell her this bulls.h.i.t. What kind of drugs is he on? Is he on them now? Did he come here to finish it? She couldn't keep her hand away from her neck. "Your normal function being, what? Kidnapping and drugging women?

Keeping them prisoner?"

"No, but I must bring them to me, so I can feed."

Feed? She instantly flashed on Jeffrey Dahmer, the serial killer who had murdered and then consumed portions of his victims' bodies. Mother of G.o.d, he was like Dahmer, and she had helped him.

She could hardly make her lips shape the revolting word. "You're a cannibal?"

"Non. I only take blood from them."

"You drank my blood?" Of course he had. With his incredible ability to heal, he'd probably read Anne Rice and watched Buffy and deluded himself into thinking he wasn't human. Some cities even had nightclubs for crackpots like him. "You think you're a vampire, don't you?"

"Vrykolakas. It is almost the same." He shrugged, but his gaze never left her face. "We are called the Darkyn."

Alex was back on-familiar ground now. As a resident, she had done a rotation in a psychiatric hospital. There she had first observed various types of psychosis. Although Cyprien had kidnapped her, attacked her, and drugged her to believe all sorts of crazy things, she was in control now.

Cyprien, on the other hand, was a very, very sick man.

"Michael." Using a calm, reasonable tone took every ounce of nerve she had left. "I think you and I should go for a ride. There's a very good friend of mine I'd like you to meet. He's a terrific guy, and he can help you so that you won't have to bear this by yourself anymore."

"I am not mad, Alexandra." He studied her for a moment. "Without my features and my sight, I could not function.

You gave me back my purpose. I was-I am-in your debt, and I have repaid you poorly."

She'd given him the ability to hunt women again, which despite all her clinical objectivity was really going to make her puke, any second now.

"No problem, I'll bill you." She had to get him over to the hospital, where he could be locked up in a nice, safe psychiatric ward until the police could be called. "Or you could pay me back by coming and meeting my friend. He works at the same hospital that I do." The grin on her face felt stretched and ghastly. "You'll really like him."

"I never meant to call you to rapture. My need was too great, and we were left alone. I was only able to stop before I killed you because..." He trailed off as if not sure about that part.

Rapture? Cyprien was nuttier than a pecan tree in full bloom. "You stopped this time-that's the important part. I'll swear to that." Oops, maybe not a good idea to mention testifying at his trial.

He gave her a decidedly annoyed look. "You must never tell anyone about this. Because you survived, your life is in danger. No one has survived direct exposure to our blood, not in six hundred years. By some miracle you have not been cursed like us. I wish I could shout it to the world, but no one can ever know this about you."

Oh, G.o.d, was she the only one who had gotten away? It was too much for her; she had to get him out of her house and bolt the door and call every police officer in the city. She would need them to surround the house if she was ever going to feel safe again.

Get out the words. Sound sincere. "Yes, of course. I won't tell anyone."

He nodded. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. Are you going back to your home in New Orleans now?" Should she try to get his address? If he was crazy enough to believe she'd keep quiet, that she was some sort of bizarre accomplice in this, maybe he would give it to her. If not, Grace had likely kept the letterhead. Either way.

"No, I will stay here until I am sure you are well." Michael Cyprien took a card from his pocket and dropped it on the table beside the briefcase. "I can be reached at this number. Au revoir." She didn't breathe until the door closed behind him. Then she ran for the phone and b.u.mped into the coffee table on the way. The briefcase bounced to the floor, where the weight of it caused the simple snap locks to pop open. She didn't have to count the stacks of money that fell out to know how much there was.

Four million dollars, in cash.

The limousine that had transported Michael Cyprien from the airport to Alexandra Keller's house whisked him from there to a private estate on Lake Michigan. The driver, a quiet, uniformed German who handled the car as deftly as he had once wielded his sword for a forgotten emperor, said little to distract him.

Go back. Go back and get her. She is yours.

Michael resisted the urge to do just that. The doctor was not dead or in any danger of dying from exposure to his blood. Nor was she enraptured any longer, if she had ever been at all. The only thing preventing her memory from returning had been a lingering trace of Phillipe's compulsion and Michael's expunging, which he had easily dispersed.

She was safe, whole, and human. Somehow in the last week, she had shrugged off madness, catatonia, and death.

Alone. By herself.

The sights and sounds of Chicago blurred past the windows as he considered his options. What Alexandra Keller had done was beyond his experience. Her existence defied both human medical science and Darkyn lore, and the consequences on either side promised to be brutal. Particularly for those who still believed the Darkyn were cursed for eternity.

What is she to us? To me?

Michael didn't realize the car had stopped until the driver opened his door. He looked out at the stark lines of the contemporary structure, which looked more like a sprawling research laboratory than a home, and climbed out.

Valentin Jaus, the suzerain of the Chicago jardin, waited outside the entrance to his home. The short, slim man wore casual, modern clothes that did nothing to camouflage his military bearing. Flanking him were four large, blank-faced bodyguards, all of whom Michael knew would be superbly trained and disciplined. Their master expected nothing less than perfection from his men, and drilled them until they were precision death machines. The five men waited in silence until Michael approached.

"Seigneur Cyprien." Jaus clicked his heels together and bowed his head, as only an Austrian could do without looking ridiculous.

Michael breathed in the faint scent of camellias. "I am not yet seigneur, but I thank you, Suzerain Jaus." Before this, he had never personally visited the Chicago jardin. "Forgive the haste of my arrival."

"You are always welcome here." Jaus gestured to the entrance door, flanked by two more guards.

Michael admired the interior of the estate house, which was spare and furnished in a clean, minimal style. The steel and black colors Jaus preferred reminded him of the industries that had first drawn the Darkyn to come here to Chicago. Where there were factories, there were people-enough to keep the Darkyn safe, nourished, and anonymous.

The English Kyn had moved west, while the French had gone south, but the Austrians and Germans had stayed and flourished. Next to New Orleans, Chicago was one of the oldest, and most prosperous, of their American outposts.

They had experienced their share of troubles, too. The old suzerain, a German named Sheltzer, had been picked up for questioning during the early days of World War II. Anyone with a German name or accent had been fair game, but Sheltzer's odd behavior had attracted the attention of the jail-house chaplain, a rather talkative Catholic priest. Before the jardin could arrange for their suzerain's release, the Brethren took him and tortured Sheltzer to death.

Sheltzer had been the jardin's leader for more than a hundred years, and his loss had terrified his people enough to scatter and drive them underground for three decades. Only when they felt it was safe enough to reintegrate into society did the Chicago Darkyn regroup and timidly pet.i.tion Richard for a new suzerain. Richard had taken Cyprien's suggestion and sent Valentin Jaus to Chicago.

Jaus understood what fear was. He had led thousands of men into battle, and knew that while fear could not be destroyed, it could be trained and channeled. When he came to take over Chicago, he deliberately used the jardin's fears to bind them together in order to train them. The Darkyn were gradually transformed from paranoid followers into paranoid soldiers. Which was what Cyprien knew he would do.

"May I summon my staff?" Jaus was saying. As seigneur apparent, it was expected for Michael to inspect the suzerain's staff, and observe a hundred other formalities. Michael, however, felt suddenly weary and in no mood for the usual pomp and ceremony. "I would rather have a word with you in private, Valentin."

Val seemed startled, but nodded and said something in guttural German to the four guards, who retreated. "Let us go and walk down by the water." He led Michael through the house and out to a wide, paved garden path.

The two men followed the decorative cobblestone edging lush beds of camellias down to the edge of the enormous lake, where the rippling, black surface toyed with reflections from the lights of the city. Although the bodyguards had melted into the shadows, Michael could sense them nearby. They would not listen in to the conversation, but they would not leave their suzerain completely unprotected.

Paranoia has its uses. "How have things been for you, Val?"

"Better than they were twenty years ago. The Brethren never extracted anything from Sheltzer, and we do not challenge them or draw attention to ourselves. The Kyn have many profitable concerns here. The jardin thrives." There was a small amount of irony in that last statement, as Val had spent most of his extended life as a warrior, not a leader.

"It was you who suggested Richard send me here, was it not? Considering how many times we have faced each other's lances on the field, I thought it an unusual recommendation, to say the least."

Before becoming a suzerain, Valentin Jaus had spent most of his extended life, like Michael, following the path of the warrior. Long ago, in England, he had ridden against Michael during many of Richard's tourneys. The fact that he always lost to Michael had never stopped him from battling yet again. But Michael knew him to be a quiet, intelligent man as well as an efficient, cold-blooded strategist.

"In some respects, perhaps, but we have never been true enemies. Only opponents." Michael smiled a little. "You hold steady, Val, and that is what I need here in America."

"I shall try not to disappoint your trust. You have seen the Keller woman." It was not a question, but he added, "My people have been watching over her since she was admitted to the hospital."

"I appreciate your caution."

"We serve." He paused, and only very reluctantly added, "I have said nothing to my people about the few details your seneschal related, Michael, but it is obvious she is yet human. How could she have escaped the curse?"

"I don't know." Michael had his own doubts about the validity of the Darkyn curse anyway, but Val was a traditionalist, and he had no desire to start an argument.

"I have made the usual arrangements with our people in the hospital, the media, and the police department to control information and change records. There will be no exposure. I must confess, however, that this female...

confounds me."

Michael's mouth hitched. "I don't know what to make of her, either."

"Had one of mine called her to rapture, and she emerged thus, I would have had her killed immediately." There was a flat warning behind that brutal statement, and the smell of camellias intensified for a moment. "But she is yours, not mine."