Immortal Obsession (3 page)

“Amanda, run!” Her brother screamed, flailing his arms and legs at the man who held him.

She heard a snarl and then the dark figure pulled out what looked like a hunting knife. Ryan tried to pummel the looming figure while she watched in horror as in one sweeping motion, he slit Ryan’s throat from ear to ear. Ryan gurgled as blood poured down the front of his gray T-shirt, spreading out like a dark fan covering his chest. Amanda tried to scream as her brother was dropped to the ground in a heap, his blood gushing onto the sidewalk as the dark figure knelt over him. She felt something warm running down her leg and realized she had just wet herself. The murderer turned toward her, snarling through what looked like exposed fangs.

Sweat trickled down her face as he came toward her, catlike and graceful. Amanda tried to see his face in the shadows. She glanced at Ryan, not moving on the ground.
He’s dead, oh my God, he’s dead.

Her legs would not move; they felt like concrete.
I am going to die here with him.

“Antoine, get away from her.” A man’s voice rang out. The figure turned toward the voice in the darkness.

Amanda heard a swooshing sound and froze, as Antoine’s head separated from his neck, momentarily suspended in the air before dropping and rolling toward her brother. His body crumbled, falling on the pavement going up in flames. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion.

Another figure emerged from the shadows. He seemed shorter, with shoulder-length brown hair. Like the other man, he too was dressed in black. He hovered over her brother’s body, dabbed Ryan’s blood onto his finger, and licked it, like a cat lapping a bowl of milk.

Oh my God.
She heard the words echo in her head, but had she said them aloud?
Is he going to kill me, too?

He hovered over her brother’s body for what seemed like forever. Amanda watched him, wondering what he was doing, then he looked up at her and snarled, slowly getting up off the ground, his face covered in Ryan’s blood. He had something in his hand, a jar perhaps, that he shoved into the inside pocket of his coat.

“There you are my beauty. Come to me, child.” He called to her in a voice that caressed her, and it seemed as if he recognized her. She could not hear his footsteps as he came toward her. It was as if he floated above the concrete. He reached out his hand, and she saw his eyes, dark and bottomless. Something caught her eye as another figure came out of the shadows. He was tall and thin, and wore a flowing black coat. She noticed that his golden hair hung down his back in flowing waves. He was beautiful, and she sensed he would not harm her.

“Get away from her, Lucien, unless you want your head to roll,” the blond man hissed vehemently, his deep voice strangely comforting. He gracefully stepped toward her. Sweat trickled down her face as he studied her. It seemed as though he were making sure she was okay.

The other one hissed at the tall blond figure. Then he was gone, melting into the evening shadows. She stood alone with the mysterious man. She wanted to thank him, but then she noticed the bloody machete in his right hand.
Is he going to take my head, too?
She felt weak as darkness descended.

Chapter Four

G
AÉTAN STOOD AT
the salon window of the apartment he had once shared with Gabrielle and stared down at the Saturday night traffic on the Rue de Rivoli. The lights illuminating the Louvre reflected back into the room. This had been his residence since the turn of the nineteenth century, when La Révolution Française had finally ended and the arrogant Napoleon had come to power. Gaétan folded his arms across his muscular chest and debated whether summoning Gabrielle had been a good idea. They had not spoken since the night he brought Solange back to Paris in 1814. Taking Solange as his lover had infuriated Gabrielle, and had been the final blow to their already stormy relationship. To this day, they shared the city in an uneasy truce.
Yet she has agreed to come here tonight.

He listened for Solange’s return from the Bois de Boulogne. She had gone hunting in the park for the usual fare: a prostitute, a drug addict, or one of Paris’s many homeless. The Bois was one kind of park by day and an infamous red-light district by night. Prostitutes were a dime a dozen; easy prey for his kind. He had not told her about the meeting, fearing her typical reaction: rage. He ran his hand through his sandy brown hair and fought his own hunger. Though he was older and needed less blood to survive, tonight’s meeting worried him and he could not afford to lose his focus. A quick drink would take the edge off, but there was little time to hunt.
Just a sip
, he thought, fighting the urge.

He threw open the French doors and breathed in the late summer air. His sense of urgency grew with each passing night. A warm breeze blew his shoulder-length hair away from his chiseled face and creamy skin. Lucien had returned to him and reported that Antoine had slit the young mortal’s throat, but paid with his own life. Lucien had barely escaped with his own life, yet he had done the unthinkable. He had taken blood from the dead mortal, scooping it up into a vial before the retched Christian had chased him away. When he dangled the blood in front of Gaétan, the older vampire saw no other way. Luring him into the Bois, he had chained him and left him to die in the late summer sun, not before he learned where Lucien had hid the precious blood. When he returned two days later, only ashes remained.

Gaétan reached for the warm vial around his neck and shut the window. He appeared odd, surrounded by feminine finery; the room had been decorated by Solange in Chintz draperies, upholstered chairs, white overflowing book cases, and a white marble mantle adorned with English porcelains. Even the oriental carpet was in pink and blue hues.

He dashed into the masculine master bathroom. Turning on the hot tap, he methodically removed his Rolex watch and numerous silver rings as the sink filled up. Bending over the bowl, Gaétan splashed hot water on his face in an attempt to calm himself and to focus on the task at hand. A million thoughts raced through his mind, most revolving around the vial of blood dangling at his neck.

Solange had been a child when he had seen her for the first time, after following Christian and Michel to London. He had to admit that he had been just as curious about her as was Gabrielle. In all his life, Gaétan knew of only one instance in which a mortal and a vampire had produced a child; that child had died shortly after birth. But Solange had been a miracle. He had kept a watchful distance, intrigued by Christian and Michel’s roles in her life, as well as the little girl.

As he dried his face, he recalled going back and forth between Paris and London under the resentful eyes of Gabrielle, as Christian and Michel had settled into a new life in London and Solange had grown up. Many French aristocrats had fled there out of necessity, yet he found the city unimaginative and boorish. He squirted on his favorite French cologne and studied himself in the bedroom mirror.
It is only Gabrielle you fool, so why are you preening like a teenager on his first date?

Black jeans hugged his thin, muscular legs, and his black shirt lay tucked in at his narrow waist. His black Harley Davidson boots with silver buckles and a high heel gave him the illusion of being taller than his 5’8” frame. Let Solange comb Rue du Rivoli and Avenue Foch for haute couture. He preferred jeans and a T-shirt to the ruffles, great coats, and knickers of centuries past.

He took the vial from around his neck and buried it in his dresser drawer beneath his neatly folded socks. Then, changing his mind, he impulsively grabbed it from the drawer, twisted off the cap, and tapped the vial on his tongue.
Easy there, just a little this time.
The warm blood oozed down his throat, igniting a fire in his veins. Gaétan sat down on the king-size bed, suddenly dizzy; his head reeled with the now-familiar images from the boy’s life.

He lay back and closed his eyes, clutching the sheets as a kaleidoscope of sights and sounds filled his head in a rush. The vampire felt his limbs melt into the mattress as his senses heightened, yet his mind felt calm and at peace.
I have not felt this way since I was a mortal man
, he thought as the blood inside him brought forth the mortality he had long ago lost and strangely missed.

He rolled onto his side and clutched his stomach as pain burst through his guts. He broke out in a sweat, feeling weak and vulnerable. He knew it would pass and the feeling of humanity rather than his predatory nature as a bloodsucker would fill him up. He felt inhumanly powerful, yet mortal again; a hypnotic, seductive combination of sensations.

The images of a young girl morphed into a beautiful woman, both elegant and erotic. She stood with her brother in the park, the night he was murdered. He could see the worry and fear on her face. He fought his erection and ejaculation as her voice and smell caressed him, wrapping him in feelings of acceptance, love, and comfort like nothing he had ever known. Her dark green eyes smiled up at him as she bent her neck for him to drink.

Whether it was the boy’s blood causing these hallucinations or his heart, lonely and desperate for love, did not matter to the ancient vampire. Irrational or not, he had already made up his mind to go to New York to find her.

I don’t care if Christian is guarding her night and day
, he thought as he tried to sit up on the king-size bed. S
he will be mine.

Chapter Five

G
AÉTAN SAT UP
and glanced at his watch. It was midnight. He jumped up to get ready for Gabrielle’s visit. As he passed Solange’s dressing table, he took note of all her perfumes, makeup, and jewelry haphazardly strewn on the tabletop. She never had been a neat person. Even as a young married woman living in London in the early nineteenth century, she had been a slob. Thankfully she had married well and had household servants. He picked up one of her hairbrushes and ran it under his nose. Just then he heard the lock click, the front door open and close. Like a cool breeze, she enveloped him in her thin arms wrapped around his waist. He let her hold him for a moment.

“You seem pensive of late, my love.” She whispered into his back, her upper class British accent as sharp as a knife.

Gaétan closed his eyes, feeling her warm body engorged with blood from feeding pressed up against him. She would want to make love before their night at the opera, and afterward wander the Champs-Élysées until dawn.

She slipped past him and sat down at her makeup table to brush her thick, brown hair. Turning first one way and then another, she studied her impish profile in the mirror. Gaétan knew she was not sure if she liked either her new bob haircut or the highlights the Avenue Foch salon had convinced her were stylish and made her look younger. The torches burned low, giving her alabaster skin a yellowish tint. She applied a pale pink lipstick, and then blotted her full lips before brushing on mascara and a smoky brown eye shadow that accentuated her luminous brown eyes. Her high cheekbones were flushed from feeding.

She began to play with the chain of her heart-shaped necklace a gesture Gaétan knew meant she was impatient. Gaétan followed her into her walk-in closet but said nothing as she began flipping through the hangers, eyeing first one gown and then another. Finally she settled on a strapless black satin Dior.

“Solange, we must talk,” he whispered, checking his watch again. Gabrielle would be there any minute. Taking the hanger out of her hand, he put it back on the rack. “We are not going to the opera tonight. Dress simply and meet me in the living room.”

“What’s going on, Gee?” She asked, using her nickname for him as she followed him into the living room. She was never one to take orders from anyone, even him, without an explanation.

“We have company coming tonight. I need you to be civil, listen, and keep your wits about you. Now please, Solange, get dressed.”

She replied with her usual pout and folded her arms over her chest.

“Pray tell, Gee, who is—?”

Just then, the doorbell rang.

“It will be a surprise.” He smiled and headed toward the foyer with a knot in his stomach. He knew how much she hated surprises.

Gaétan took a deep breath before opening the front door. He could feel them standing just inside the shadows on the pavement, visible to the vampire eye but never to mortals passing by. She stood in a long red gown. She looked just as he remembered her: wild, dark curly hair flowing over her broad shoulders, wide set dark eyes, fleshy lips, long legs, and voluminous breasts. It was not regret, he told himself, but nostalgia for the beautiful and tumultuous eighteenth century.

Then he noticed Étienne; tall and commanding, towering over Gabrielle. Like Solange, he had chosen the path of the nightwalker willingly. Although it was Christian and Michel who had found him on the streets of Paris, it was Gabrielle who had turned him, on his sixteenth birthday, before taking him as her lover. Gaétan wondered if she still pined away for her beloved Christian.
Is that why she has come?

It was Étienne who first stepped into the light, dressed entirely in black. His once long hair was now cropped short, his blue eyes both woeful and intense. They reminded Gaétan of Christian’s eyes; deep and bottomless, hypnotic and unyielding.

“We got your message.” He spoke, his lips barely moving.

“Please come in, both of you.” He turned both palms up in a common gesture meaning no malice. “It is only Solange and I.”

Gabrielle stepped into the light next to Étienne. “How do we know you do not mean to slaughter us as well, Gaétan?” Gabrielle’s voice wrapped around him, feeling painfully erotic and soothing, as it had always been between them.

“As I told you in my message, this affects us all. Please come upstairs.”

Étienne stepped aside, allowing Gabrielle to go first, as her age and status dictated. Gaétan walked beside her into the foyer and up the long flight of stairs to the living room. He could barely hear her breathing as she floated up the stairs beside him. No sooner had they ascended the staircase than Solange appeared in the living room; her eyes dark and brooding.

“What are they doing here, Gee?” She recoiled, pressing herself up against the fireplace.

The two women glared at each other.

Gaétan stepped between them. He could hear their thoughts in his head, an effect of the potent blood he had ingested.

“Solange, I promised them no harm, do you understand? Gabrielle, Étienne, please sit down.”

Étienne waited until Gabrielle was settled before positioning himself behind her. Gaétan watched his former lover glance nervously around the familiar living room, taking it all in. He took a seat in a large overstuffed chair opposite the couch and waited for the right moment to begin. He could sense their apprehension and fear.

“Thank you both for coming.” Gaétan’s voice was raspy yet soothing. “Several months ago, I began hearing talk about a mortal in New York City who had a different kind of blood, a blood that gave us atypical powers. At first I dismissed the gossip, but it persisted. I made inquiries to either substantiate these strange rumors or quell them completely. Solange met up with a vampire named Gilliam who had been in a club in New York and fed from a young mortal there.”

Gaétan watched the masklike faces of the two vampires who sat opposite him for some sort of reaction, but he found none. Solange had taken to twirling a piece of her highlighted hair. He knew she was restless, like a caged lion. He feared her inability to restrain herself and noticed that Étienne watched her as well.

“Gilliam mentioned that this club, the Grey Wolf, is the hangout of Michel Baptiste and Christian Du Mauré.” Gaétan sensed a slight shift in Gabrielle. He thought he saw her face soften in the low lights.

“I don’t think it is any surprise that this mortal sought shelter in this club, under the auspices of Christian.”

Gabrielle straightened the folds of her gown, which distracted him. Solange had come closer; she was now standing beside Gaétan.

He fought the urge to swat her away.

“Is this fact, Gaétan, or merely speculation?” Gabrielle asked in a heavy French accent, her gaze drifting past him to Solange.

“We sent Antoine and Lucien to kill the mortal,” Solange blurted out, a bold grin on her face. “Antoine lost his head, thanks to my father—”

Gaétan reached up and stroked her leg. “Solange, please keep your mouth shut.”

She sat down at his feet like an obedient guard dog, closer now to Gabrielle.

“Solange speaks the truth. Not wanting this mortal’s blood to get into the wrong hands, I send Antoine and Lucien to do away with the boy. Christian ambushed them in Central Park, and although Antoine managed to slaughter the mortal, Christian took his head. Lucien went after the other one, but Christian drove him away.”

“The other one?” Gabrielle blurted out impulsively.

Solange snapped. “Amanda, his sister.”

“Amanda?” Gabrielle whispered, as the name wrapped around the vampire like a fog. “There are two of them?”

Gaétan focused on the murmur of traffic on the street below.

A vision of Amanda filled his head as he fought another erection.

Étienne shifted slightly, his leather coat rubbing against the leather couch cushion.

“What proof did you have that this boy’s blood was such a threat?” He asked timidly. “Christian has been chasing these mortals for decades. Why the sudden panic?”

“Good point. Gaétan, you mention blood falling into the wrong hands. Whose might those be?” Gabrielle smiled and turned her dark eyes on him. She folded her hands in her lap. Gaétan knew she was hiding her anger, trying to remain calm.

“Lucien said the boy needed money for drugs and was offering himself up to anyone. He said drinking from him was like nothing he had ever tasted. It more than fed his craving; it had a power all its own. When I pressed him, he could not describe the sensations.

I believe the word he used was ineffable. His said that his vampiric nature acquiesced to his mortal self and the sensation of the two opposite worlds blending was beyond imagination.”

“Where is Lucien? I would question him myself.”

“Funny, but he hasn’t been around lately.” Solange said with a shrug as she ran her hand slowly up and down Gaétan’s calf.

Gabrielle met his stare and Gaétan knew she was probing. He quickly glanced past her toward the book case.

Étienne leaned forward. “I don’t quite understand the threat, Gaétan.”

Gaétan ran his hand through his hair, debating whether to tell them any more of the powers in the blood. Étienne continued to stare as more thoughts took form.

“This boy was a perceived threat to you, and you took care of it, Gaétan. What is the need for this meeting?” He leaned even closer to the older vampire.

“My father is watching over Amanda like a bull in heat,” Solange blurted out, still rubbing her lover’s calf, arousing Gaétan despite his focus.

“Enough, Solange,” Gaétan whispered, rubbing her head.

“Oh, come on, Gee, he wants her blood for himself, that selfish bastard. Then he will become all-powerful and try to reclaim Paris again.” Solange smiled up at her lover.

Gabrielle jumped up. “You impudent brat! Have you no manners, no self-control? I cannot believe you are your father’s daughter. If he is protecting her, it is not for her blood. It is to keep her away from monsters like you.”

Solange rose to her feet as well. “You make my father out to be so goddamned noble and high-minded. Where was he when I was dying?”

“You stupid girl.” Gabrielle hissed, stepping closer to her. Étienne placed his hand on her shoulder and she stepped back, composing herself.

“What is it that you want from us, Gaétan?” Gabrielle snarled, her usual composure beginning to erode.

“I am worried that Christian is keeping the girl for himself and that if he does take her, he will become powerful enough to return home and slaughter us, taking control of this city.”

“I can’t believe you are suggesting such a thing. All he has ever wanted is to be left alone. Why can’t you let your hatred and jealousy of him go for Christ’s sake?”

“I fear for us, Gabrielle. If he could behead Antoine, there is no telling what he would do to you or me.” Gaétan smiled, his dimpled cheeks and full lips changing his entire face, giving him a warm, welcoming presence. He dared step closer to his former lover.

Étienne stepped between them, feeling the need to defend his old friend. “He has made no contact with us for centuries, and we have worked hard for this truce. Why do you think he would suddenly want to hunt us down now?”

How could he tell them the truth? He killed Lucien and took the jar of the mortals’ blood for himself, that he wanted Amanda like nothing else in his life. He was packed and ready to leave Paris. None of them would try to stop him, and only Solange would want to tag along. She had always been curious about Christian, but the last thing he wanted was her with him in New York. This was something he needed to do alone, and perhaps with their blessing he could carry out his plan. Gaétan sat back down.

“There is something I have not told you both.”

Gabrielle and Étienne took his lead and sat down, while Solange lingered back near the fireplace watching them. Gaétan studied Gabrielle as she never took her eyes off Solange.

“This blood gives a vampire the ability to walk in the daylight hours, impervious to the sun’s rays.”

Étienne jumped up off the couch. “Is this a joke?”

“I wish it were,” Gaétan lied, trying to conceal his own dependency on the blood from them, looking past them with feigned worry.

“Lucien told you this… … he experienced walking in … living and breathing during the day?” Gabrielle shook her head in shock.

“This is what he said.” Gaétan shrugged, thinking back to the morning after the first night he had tasted Ryan’s blood. Solange had already drifted off to sleep, and he too had felt the dawn approaching and sleep descending just as it had every day for the past four hundred and fifty years. Then, just as the sun rose over the Louvre, the feeling had lifted. He stood at his living room window as the sun bathed the room in light, covering his skin and hair in a yellow glow, caressing him in warmth.
Yes, it is ineffable
…

Étienne sat back down on the couch. “There are those that would view this blood as a gift and others who would see it as an abomination, a horror.”

“Exactly, and if Christian can walk during the day, he becomes a god with an advantage over all of us.” Gaétan was suddenly on his feet. “I need to destroy this mortal girl before someone else finds out about her.”