Blood Wicked (9 page)

Vampire council? This was insane. “I hate
you
,” she whispered. But she feared it wasn’t him she hated; it was how much her body desired him. “I hate needing you for Sarah. But I am indebted to you forever for helping her. So if you want me locked up in your carriage, I have no choice but to do what you want.”

He winked, the wretch. Then he disappeared out the door. The carriage rocked as he jumped down to his drive.

Heath found Julian in his study, sprawled in a leather chair and smoking a cheroot. Naked, because Julian had shape shifted and flown there.

Heath held up his hand before the vampire could question him. “I know. You want to know what I’m doing, because you must report to the council. Very well. Tonight I am going to go to the brothel in which Lord Cavendish died.”

Julian blew a smoke ring. “And you’re taking Miss Dare. She’s thinking some very ripe curses about you right now.”

It irked him no end that Julian could read her mind and he couldn’t. “There’s no need for you to be concerned about Miss Dare. She is of no significance to them. She is just a former courtesan with an ill child.” He tried to impose his will into Julian’s mind. Normally he could do it with a lesser vampire. But Julian’s mind resisted. The lad was more powerful than he looked.

The younger vampire eyed him suspiciously. “She’s the succubus. I know she is; I saw it in her thoughts. She wanted to seduce you. And she’s slept with the five men who died.”

Raw panic shot through him. “Whatever she is, she didn’t know it. She’s being used by someone, and I need time to find out who. If you turn her over to the council—”

“I’m not going to do that. I don’t like that bunch of old, arrogant vampires any more than you do, Heath. I have to take orders from them. Doesn’t mean I do everything they ask.”

Julian wore a rebellious pout, but Heath couldn’t accept his apparent disloyalty at face value. He still had to be wary. “I have to go, Julian. You’re free to drink my brandy to your heart’s content, but you’re not allowed to drink from my maids—”

“But you think Miss Dare had something to do with your brother’s disappearance.”

“She denies it. And I believe her.”

Julian smirked. “Do you? Are there two reasons? The plump, round ones up on her chest? Or the curvy ones of her backside, equally tempting?”

“Christ,” Heath muttered. He knew it was an odd curse for a vampire. “There is more to women than breasts and rumps, Julian.”

“If this Miss Dare is a demoness and a murderess, what’s going to happen to her? In the mortal world, she’d be hanged. I don’t know what the council would do to her, but it wouldn’t be pretty. It seems a shame to destroy such a beautiful woman. And her poor daughter would be left alone.”

There were times Julian amazed him. The lad saw right to the heart of matters. “I believe she’s an unwitting accomplice,” Heath said. “I need to find out more about that apothecary.” And about the seal that bore the design of his brand. Did it mean his sire was in London? Nikolai was not supposed to be able to leave the Carpathians….

“You aren’t going to send me there again instead of letting me go to the brothels, are you?” Julian asked.

“No. Keep away from there. Go to the brothels.”

“Are you going to let Miss Dare seduce you?” Julian studied him. “You might learn a lot that way. You want her, don’t you?”

“Shut up, Julian. I can’t bed her. It is as simple as that.”

The lad gave a sly grin. “You could bed her once, old man. It takes two tumbles in the hay before you unleash the curse.”

“This
is a brothel?”

Heath watched Miss Dare open her eyes wide as she took in the opulence of the foyer. A fountain bubbled in the center. The walls were covered in crimson silk. Glasses of champagne were whisked through the crowd on silver trays carried by elegant footmen, while prostitutes draped in transparent veils struck enticing poses.

Either she was a magnificent actress or she had never been here before. Her blue eyes were saucer wide. She had forgotten
to glare at him, which she had done when he’d returned to the carriage and set her free. Apparently she did not like being taken prisoner, even though he had acted the perfect gentleman.

She was afraid to give up control. Afraid to trust. She must have been hurt in the past.

“Lord Cavendish died in here.” He saw her flinch.

But her gaze did not dart around like a frightened creature seeking a way out. She faced him with pride. “There was no point in bringing me here. I’m innocent—” Then she saw something behind him that brought her hand to her lush mouth in shock.

“Oh goodness!” she gasped.

In front of her, a woman wearing nothing but a black corset spanked a second woman’s bare arse with a riding crop.

Heath lifted Vivienne’s gloved hand and bestowed a teasing kiss. “I brought you here because this is the perfect brothel for what I have to show you.”

Vivienne sipped from the gold-rimmed champagne flute Heath had brought her. Bubbles exploded against her lips and danced on her tongue, but it tasted like vinegar mixed with her fear. A terrified voice whispered in her head,
What if he was right? How else did those men die?

She was walking at Heath’s side through a surprisingly empty hallway. In brothels she’d heard of, there were always drunken men and women stumbling about, and women were always shrieking and fighting.

But this place looked like a ducal residence. She’d glimpsed two bedrooms through open doors. Neither had been in use, and the beds within looked like fairy cakes. She suspected the linen was clean, which never happened in the brothels of the stews.

The women here were not of a type she’d seen before. They
weren’t cool, calculating Incognitas. Or drunk penny whores, boldly painted, raucous and crude, but with as much real desire for sex as Vivienne had. Which was not very much.

“This is utterly pointless, Blackmoor.” She stopped in the hall. “I don’t see how being here would prove anything. I am not a demoness born in hell, unless you believe London’s East End is the fire-and-brimstone-filled lair of Satan.”

White teeth flashed at her as he smiled. And she saw the elongated ones on the sides of his mouth, like a wolf’s fangs. “You are a remarkable woman, Miss Dare. Making quips when you’re afraid of what I’m going to show you.”

“I’m not afraid.” But she was. After the miracle of what Heath’s blood had done to Sarah, she couldn’t continue to insist magic didn’t exist.

“If I
am
a succubus, what is my daughter? Is she supposed to be one, too? What does this mean for her?”

She cringed at the frightened, desperate sound of her voice.

He stopped, concern in the way he gazed down at her. His hands touched her hips. And his devil-may-care charm was gone. “I don’t know, Vivienne,” he said softly.

“Can succubi have children?” she demanded.

Moans came through the closed door beside them. A crescendo of groans and cries and sobs was followed by one feminine shriek. With Heath’s palms resting on her hips, she half-turned and stared in surprise at the door.

“I believe the lady was enjoying herself.”

She turned back as his mouth suddenly claimed hers. She tried to pull away, but his kiss held her captive. He moved his mouth gently over hers. It wasn’t a kiss of passion; it was the sort of kiss she would brush on Sarah’s hair. And it made tears sting in her eyes.

He broke the kiss and whispered, “The books don’t say anything about whether a succubus can have a child. Most
books on the occult and demon world were written by men. Men with little scientific knowledge and a lot of superstition. It’s possible. But I have no idea what it would mean for Sarah.”

“It isn’t possible,” she said fiercely. She pushed his hands away, spilling the last of the champagne.

“Are you willing to come with me and find out?” Heath asked. He watched her bite her lip. Even without entering her mind, he knew she wanted to say
no
. And run from this. But she lifted her chin. “All right.”

“First, though, I have business to take care of.” He led her down the hallway. “I need to know more about Lord Cavendish. I need to know what he was like as a man.”

She jerked her head up.

“I’m asking you because to find out what happened to him, I need to know who he was.”

“He was quite tall. About six feet and four inches. Very muscular. Powerfully built. He had dark hair, very black. And green eyes.”

“I’ve seen his portrait, love. I know what he looks like. But I suspect you knew quite a lot about him.” They’d reached the end of the hall and he rapped on a blue door. It opened at once, and he led a wide-eyed Vivienne inside. The room looked like an artist’s studio, and gentlemen did use it for painting. They either worked on canvases of luscious nudes or on the ladies themselves, doing naughty things with the brushes.

Several voluptuous women posed. Two of the lovelies were flitting through the crowd of gentlemen, bestowing kisses and rubbing their curvaceous breasts against male chests.

Heath glanced toward Miss Dare. She could not draw her eyes away from the giggling girls. She met his gaze. “They are remarkable actresses,” she said dryly. “They truly appear to be enjoying themselves.”

“At this particular brothel they are. And don’t change the subject, or I’ll invite them over here to kiss and fondle you.”

Her brow arched. She ran her tongue with knee-weakening slowness over her lips. “Perhaps I might like that.”

Lust hit him like a blow. But he couldn’t let her see that. Victory crept into her blue eyes, and he knew she was deliberately tormenting him.

“Cavendish.” The name rasped out of his tight throat. It had been so long since he’d made love. But what he hungered for was the laughter and joy and play that came with pleasure. He missed that so much, and he’d been too big a fool to understand how precious it was when he had it.

Vivienne was not going to seduce him. She no longer needed to. And he should be relieved, not filled with longing like a lovesick boy.

He slid his arm around her and led her to a shadowy corner of a room crowded with men and courtesans. Everyone was too intent on sex and temptation to notice them, but he wanted Vivienne to feel a sense of privacy.

“Cavendish was my lover for only two months.” Vivienne frowned. “I never discuss one man with another.”

“I’m not your lover. I won’t be bedding you, so I don’t need to hear I’m the best, the largest, or the only man who has ever made you come.” He grinned at her surprise. “We males are not as easily fooled as you might think. Now, tell me what Cavendish was like—as a man.”

She pursed her lips. “He liked wild adventure and he liked to take risks.”

“What sort of risks? Risks in your bed?”

“No. He—”

Who would have thought an experienced courtesan would flush?

“He was always on top,” she said. “He liked to hold my arms above my head and trap me beneath him. Half the time I couldn’t breathe. I struggled to survive until he was finished.” She cast a jaded eye on the giggling girl. “If these girls are cheerful,
they can’t have had much experience with men who buy them for sex.” Her eyes looked so empty—the way he felt most of the time.

Madly he wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to tease her lips and show her what she could feel. But he’d taken a risk kissing her once. And all it had done was stoke his desire. “All right. What risks did he take?”

“He gambled heavily. But he generally won, so I would not count that as a risk. He liked to explore. Africa and India, mostly.” She sighed deeply. “I don’t think I can tell you anything about the man that will help you. His heart always appeared to be sound in my bed. And if I took his soul …” Tears glittered in her eyes. “I didn’t know it.”

“What did it feel like when you made love to him?”

“I was struggling to breathe. He was large and heavy. It was hellish.”

“When he climaxed, did you feel heat? A rush of power? Colored lights before your eyes?”

“Sometimes I saw stars from lack of oxygen. I asked him not to crush me into the bed during lovemaking. He refused to listen. I was expected to let him have what he wanted.”

“But you told me he wasn’t paying you.”

“He wasn’t. But he knew I had been a courtesan. I had no right to ask anything of the great Earl of Cavendish, did I?” Bitterness made her voice sharp. “I didn’t remember feeling anything in bed with him. I was doing it to pay the price for Sarah’s medicine.”

“Poor dear.”

“Don’t pity me, Heath. I am neither poor nor a dear.”

He caught hold of her elbow and drew her farther into the corner. Two naked girls were now playfully spanking each other’s bottoms in the center of the room. No one was looking anywhere else. “Did anyone have a reason to want him dead? Help me, Vivienne. It’s the only way I can help you.”

Vivienne knew what he must mean. Sarah. She owed that miracle to this man. “He held some debts of other peers. Some of the vowels represented vast amounts of money.”

“Do you have the names of the gentlemen who wrote the vowels?”

“No. That sort of thing would not be a mistress’s business.”

“So one of those men might have had a reason. Or his heir. Anyone else?”

Vivienne shrugged. “He didn’t talk very much to me. I think the only thing he wanted from me was to struggle beneath him while he pounded into me.” Tears were burning in her eyes and she hoped Heath didn’t see them.

He caught her by the elbow and led her around the room, toward a chaise where a naked blonde reclined. An artist was painting a picture of her. A gentleman stood behind the artist, watching the picture swiftly develop. In the painting, a man with an enormous cock had been added. Obviously it had inspired the gentleman, for he was stroking the front of his trousers.

Then Vivienne felt a nudge, and Heath led her around in a circle throughout the generous salon. She saw how his intense gaze landed on each courtesan and each gentleman and studied them, and how he watched her.

Finally he stopped by an older prostitute and began questioning her about Cavendish. Swallowing hard, Vivienne heard Heath say it was in this room Cavendish had died. Then she heard Heath ask, “And the lady with me—you’ve never seen her before?”