The new barrage of screams had me swaying. Marty put his arms around me, murmuring comforting words I didn’t hear because I was fighting back the remembered horror of that moment.
“You think me a monster?” Vlad went on when I could hear him again. “You are worse, for my child never had to plead for the love you so cruelly withhold from Leila. Think on that the next time you tell yourself you’re justified in your continued emotional abandonment of your daughter.”
My screams ceased, which meant that Vlad had shut off the tape since I knew from awful memory that the skinning had lasted several more minutes. Then I heard a harsh retching sound and tears burned my gaze. Vlad had ordered him to be silent and still, but vampire hypnosis couldn’t prevent my father from throwing up over what he’d seen.
“He shouldn’t have done that,” I whispered, wiping my eyes.
“Yes, he should,” Marty said in a steely tone. “Hugh’s been a shitty father to you ever since you busted him for cheating on your mother. I only wish I’d had the balls to rub it in his face the way your husband just did.”
Gretchen didn’t say anything. She still had the same unconcerned look she’d had since Marty told her she didn’t need to worry. Without superhuman senses, she probably hadn’t heard the tape or Vlad’s ruthless commentary, either.
“Everything Vlad said about losing a child is true,” Marty went on with a deep sniff. “When I lost Vera, I wanted to die myself. Eighty years later, you gave me the chance to be a father again. I’ll never replace your dad, but I love you like you were my own flesh and blood, and I’m so damned grateful you’re alive so I can tell you that again.”
I got on my knees so I could bury my face in his neck while whispering in a ragged voice that I loved him, too. Then I silently thanked God that Marty had caught me scrounging for food in a carnival Dumpster years ago, when I’d been a frightened, lonely teenager trying to deal with abilities that made me a menace to anyone I touched. If unconditional love counted, the man hugging me was my father while the man in the other room was more like a reluctant step-dad.
Then I felt a flash of blindingly intense emotion, gone too fast for me to decipher what it was. I looked over Marty’s shoulder and saw Vlad in the doorway, his expression inscrutable as he watched me embracing my oldest friend.
“I’m sorry you overheard that,” he said in a deceptively mild tone. “After his continued refusal to see you, either I forced your father to watch that tape or I shoved my tablet down his throat, and that would have had more permanent consequences.”
I glanced at the computer Vlad held, images of it sticking cartoonlike out of either end of my father’s neck sweeping through my mind. Worse, I didn’t think he’d been kidding. After all, he was Vlad the Impaler, not Vlad the Bluffer.
Mencheres rose, speaking for the first time since I’d entered the room. “Kira and I were just about to avail ourselves of the various entertainments in this hotel. We’d be delighted, Marty and Gretchen, if you would join us.”
“Sure, sounds great,” Marty said, translating the polite version of, “Let’s leave Vlad and Leila alone now.” My sister didn’t respond. She still stared ahead with that cheerful, clueless look on her face.
“Gretchen,” Marty said, flashing green in his gaze. “Wake up.” After she blinked and the slack look left her, he went on. “Want to party with a former pharaoh who doesn’t need to count cards because he can read minds?”
“Oh, hell, yeah!” Gretchen said, almost running to the door in her excitement. “Just give me twenty minutes to look even more fabulous.”
Chapter 20
“Hungry?” Vlad asked in that faux casual tone when everyone cleared out of the villa half an hour later.
I was, but I was also afraid that if I put off admitting my guilt any longer, I’d chicken out for the rest of tonight. Or the rest of my life, which was what I really wanted to do.
“No,” I said, steeling myself for what I had to do.
His half smile remained although his gaze narrowed. “You always smell of guilt when you lie to me.”
Then I must have stunk up the place since he’d rescued me. “Fine. I am hungry, but I want to talk more than I want to eat.”
“You can do both,” he said, beckoning me to follow as he left the room.
I did, a desperate part of me trying to memorize how he looked. With how he reacted to betrayal, this might be the last time I saw him. Vlad’s hair was brushed back in smooth waves and he’d shaved the excess growth on his jaw until it was that enticing, stubbled shadow again. He wore sand-colored pants and a white silk shirt, an open button at the neck showing only the cleft at the base of his throat. The rest of his body was concealed by the rich material, which stretched to highlight his muscles as he moved with his usual stalking grace. The effect was sexier than all the bare-chested men I’d glimpsed around the pool earlier. Vlad didn’t show off his seething masculinity by wearing fewer clothes. Instead, he wore more to taunt people with what he didn’t allow them to feast their eyes on.
“Here,” he said when we reached the elegant interior pub and he went behind the bar. Then he pulled out a bag of blood.
“It’s warm,” I said in surprise when I accepted it.
“There’s an appliance back here that keeps items at exactly ninety-nine degrees.” He gave me a jaded smile. “We’re not the first vampires to stay in these villas.”
Talk about catering to every type of clientele. The bag even had a spout; how fancy. I unscrewed it and took a long swig before setting it down in suspicion.
“You don’t think they killed anyone to fill this, do you?”
Vlad’s laugh held notes of contempt. “No. They’re probably overrun with volunteers. This town stinks of greed and desperation. Becoming a vampire’s blood donor would be a large step up compared to other ways people make money here.”
“You really don’t like Vegas,” I noted, although his answer mollified me into taking another swallow.
“Why would I? ‘What happens here, stays here’ is a call for people to indulge in their favorite depravities, as if I don’t get more than my fill of those through the thoughts I overhear.”
I could sympathize with that. I’d kept my right glove on not out of voltage concerns, but because I didn’t want to relive any of the essence imprints that these rooms were probably soaked with. And speaking of overhearing things . . .
“Can you, um, send the guards away for a little bit?” I asked, biting my lower lip.
Vlad issued a command in Romanian that had multiple doors opening and closing moments later. Now that we had some privacy, I tried to think up the best way to begin my confession, but as usual, Vlad cut right to the point.
“Why don’t you want me to touch you?” he asked, his light tone belying the intended shock of the question.
“I, ah, that’s not,” I began to stammer.
“At first, I believed you couldn’t stand for anyone to do so, which I understood,” he went on. “For years after my boyhood captivity, I couldn’t tolerate another person’s hands on me. In truth, it’s why I’m so particular about that to this day, although now I’m only angered instead of disgusted when people touch me without my leave. That’s why I honored your obvious aversion before, yet when I saw you embracing Martin and your sister, I realized it was directed only at me.”
My mouth remained open while dozens of thoughts swirled around my mind. For once, I wished I wasn’t a vampire so he could hear them in their entirety instead of me trying to piece together an explanation that would fall short of my intentions.
“I can’t stand the guilt when I touch you,” I finally said. See? Woefully short.
He rested his arms against the bar and leaned forward. “Why? Because you won’t admit that Maximus raped you?”
He still didn’t believe me? “I told you; he didn’t.”
Vlad inhaled, green glittering in his eyes. “Remember how I said you smell like guilt when you lie? Leila, my love, eve
ry time you speak of what happened with Maximus, you reek of it.”
I turned away from the memory—and his hands were suddenly around my face, forcing me to look at him.
“I meant it when I said you don’t have to talk about it, but you can’t keep lying to me or yourself.” His tone was hard, but his fingers caressed me in a way that made me want to lean into him instead of pull way. “It might feel easier now to pretend that someone you trusted, a friend, couldn’t do that to you, but in the end, the pretense will destroy you.”
I couldn’t stop the tears that started to flow, and they flowed even more when he leaned over the bar and kissed them.
“It changes nothing between us,” he breathed against my skin. “I love you, Leila, no matter what he or anyone else did.”
I closed my eyes, something starved in me soaking up the acceptance he conveyed with his words and every brush of his lips. I wasn’t aware that I’d leaned forward until I felt his neck against my cheek. His hands slid down my back, and in one smooth motion, he swept me onto the counter and into his arms. I wanted to stay there forever, but the lie he sensed loomed between us, a wall I couldn’t scale. The only way past it was to blow it—and possibly our relationship—to pieces.
“It isn’t what Maximus did that’s eating me up with guilt,” I forced myself to say. “It’s what I did. Maximus didn’t rape me. He did exactly what I told you, only . . . that’s not the only time he did it, and the second time wasn’t against my will.”
He stiffened and pulled away. The instant chill from the absence of his body struck me almost as much as a physical blow.
“Explain,” he bit out.
I hugged my knees for more than better balance on the bar’s narrow counter top.
“I lost most of the blood in me when Harold skinned me, and Szilagyi kept me starved. I got so weak, so hungry that I couldn’t concentrate enough to link to you even after I realized that it might work. Maximus was rarely allowed near me and he was watched every time he was, so he couldn’t sneak me blood without . . . extreme pretense.”
I started to tremble, but now that I’d begun to tell him what happened, I wouldn’t allow myself to stop.
“I had told Maximus that I needed blood, so he told Szilagyi he wanted to fuck me again. Szilagyi didn’t mind that; he loved how it had driven you to burn your house down. They made Maximus keep the door open and only let him bring in a couple pieces of tape. He put one on my mouth and the other he snuck, um, below. Then h-he did what you saw in the video, only this time, he took the tape off and kissed me to regurgitate the blood he’d just drunk back into me.”
Vlad made a low, visceral sound. My trembling increased and I could barely see from the tears flooding my eyes. This was the part I hadn’t wanted to remember, let alone ever tell Vlad.
“I was so hungry; it threw me into a feeding frenzy. I sucked on his mouth and-and ground against him and pleaded for more. It was like the blood made my body go nuts from need and I-I didn’t care about where I was, who I was with, or what I was doing.”
I whispered those last few words, gripped by the same shame that had plagued me since then. The last thing I wanted to do was to admit what came next, because it was the worst part.
“Maximus played it off like I was getting into his screwing me, which the guard thought was hilarious. When I finally got enough blood that the feeding frenzy lifted and I was back in my right mind, Maximus asked if I-I wanted him to sneak me blood this way again and,” I raised my head and looked square at Vlad despite the pain of the admission, “I said yes.”
He stared at me, his gaze so green it was as though firelit emeralds had replaced his eyes. “And?”
“And?” I repeated in disbelief. “I said yes, didn’t you hear me the first time?”
Shame scalded my tone, making the question almost a scream. Vlad waited, giving me a chance to say something else, then he dropped his fists onto the bar, which shook as though it had been hit by twin sledgehammers.
“Unless you are leaving something out, what you’re telling me is that you’re wracked with guilt over responding to blood the same way every other newly made, starved vampire would.”
I stiffened. The last thing I expected was that I’d need to explain why he should be furious with me!
“I agree I wasn’t responsible for my initial reaction, but I knew exactly what I was doing when I told Maximus to come back. I knew the blood would probably make me whore-out again. I also knew that Maximus might not be able to use tape on me at all the next time, but I didn’t care. All I cared about was getting more blood, even if it meant practically or possibly literally cheating on you to get it. Now is it clear?”
He made that low, guttural sound again. The one I’d taken for an overabundance of rage before, but when he let his walls down and his feelings flooded into mine, I was shocked.
“If I hadn’t heard the word Abkhazia in my mind, Szilagyi would still have you. Cat’s ghosts would’ve searched for you, but it would have taken weeks or months since I didn’t even know what side of the world you were on. Szilagyi would have killed you by then, or at least broken you from the horrors he inflicted on you to torment me. Next to that, Leila, I wouldn’t care if you fucked Maximus, every guard assigned to watch you, and Szilagyi himself, if the result was you getting the blood you needed in order to tell me your location.”
I couldn’t speak. Not because of his words, though they vibrated with vehemence, but because of the emotions that continued to surge into mine like waves breaking over rocks. They contained none of the recriminations I’d heaped upon myself. Instead, I felt the most savage sort of pride, as if he’d been hoping that I had it in me to do whatever was necessary to survive, and now he knew that I did.
If I had any lingering doubts, the way he caught me to him and kissed me put them to rest. When he finally lifted his head, my body throbbed and my lips felt almost blistered from the heat that seemed to pour out of him and into me.
“Besides,” he said, his voice rough. “Even if I did feel wronged by your actions, you were more wronged by mine. I insisted you stay at the castle, I smothered your abilities with my aura, and I turned you into a target by marrying you. If I—”
“Don’t,” I interrupted at once. “Don’t ever again say you wish you hadn’t married me. Szilagyi brought me into this fight before we met, remember? Then later, he knew that you loved me before you did. Whether you had married me or not, we’d still be right where we are now.”
He stared at me with such intensity that I had to blink to keep my eyes from feeling burned.
“Perhaps. I will always have enemies, and though I intend to crush them all, I want your word that you will continue to do whatever it takes in order to survive. You can’t let yourself be crippled by guilt, fear, or hesitation ever again. Promise me.”
“Okay,” I said, the word a little ragged because part of me still couldn’t believe the way he was taking this. “Survival first, no matter what. Promise.”
He smiled while new, much colder emotions began to snake through my own. “Good. Now, since you’ve proven me utterly wrong for stripping you of your abilities before, why don’t you use them to link to Szilagyi so that we can finally kill him?”
Chapter 21
It felt like a lightbulb turned on over my head. That’s right; my abilities were back, all of them. I hopped off the counter in my newfound excitement.
“Oh, hell, yes! Why didn’t you prod me to link to him the second I set foot on your plane?”
I’d been so weighed down over my actions with Maximus, I hadn’t even thought of it. Vlad was right; my guilt had been crippling, and when the stakes were life or death, I couldn’t afford those kinds of handicaps.
He came out from behind the bar. “I told you, your survival is my first priority. If you were too emotionally damaged to admit what I believed Maximus had done to you, then you were in no condition to attempt to link to Szilagyi.”
I started running my hands b
eneath my dress, looking for Szilagyi’s essence trail. I had lots on me from Maximus and a few from Harold since he’d held me down on my new skin to finish slicing off my old. When I finally found Szilagyi’s, I smiled. He’d been so smug about resting his hand near my crotch as he taunted me with my helplessness. Well, look who was smug now?
Vlad saw where my hand had paused. He said nothing, though fury singed my emotions before he closed himself off again. I didn’t object. I wanted nothing to distract me while I attempted to link to the man who’d inflicted so much pain on both of us.
I was surprised when I followed Szilagyi’s essence trail back to him with much more ease than it had taken me to find Vlad. Our mutual enemy was in a car, driving up a windy, steep road with a startlingly handsome black-haired young man in the passenger seat next to him. Maybe being well fed really is the secret to unlocking my abilities, I thought as I walked out of the pub and went into the villa’s version of a kitchen. Then I pulled a knife out of the chopping block on the counter and swung it at my throat as hard as I could—
Vlad grabbed my arm, stopping me before the blade could complete its lethal arc. I tried to hack at my neck again, but all my muscles suddenly lacked coordination. Vlad wrested the knife away and threw it across the room.
“Let me go, I need to do this,” I tried to say, but the words came out unintelligible. Unable to talk, I glared at him. Couldn’t he see that I had to cut my head off? Right now?
His response was to slap me so hard, my teeth ached. The shock of the blow made me lose the last vestiges of my link to Szilagyi. As if coming out of a dream, I realized that Vlad had wrestled me onto the kitchen floor, and the scarlet streaks on me and him were from the blood that had gushed out when I’d half decapitated myself. I was pretty sure I hadn’t just experienced a psychotic break, so I could only come up with one reason for my sudden, uncontrollable urge to commit suicide.