Darkness Dawns

Chapter 15

The more immortals Sarah met, the more she understood Roland’s inability to believe she might be of the gifted ones’ bloodline.

Marcus arrived first, garbed in the black jeans, long-sleeved black T-shirt, and boots both he and Roland favored. The blades of the many knives and other wicked weapons that adorned him glinted in the overhead light.

Chris arrived next in dark fatigues similar to the ones David kept on hand for his guests. There was a holstered weapon under each arm and a thick file folder clutched in one hand.

The lovely Lisette soon followed. Sarah had hoped female immortals might show a little more diversity in their appearance, but Lisette’s long, wavy hair was as black as Roland’s, her eyes a lighter shade of brown.

Sarah’s heart sank. One would think that the coloring of the gifted ones would have been diluted at least a little bit after millennia of breeding with ordinary humans. Nothing drastic. A few hazel eyes mixed in. A brown hair woven through the black here or there. Something.

Roland had tried to tell her. No doubt he had wanted to spare her the crushing disappointment that now made her want to weep as Lisette greeted them with a smile.

The only way the Frenchwoman differed from the men was in height and build. She was perhaps five and a half feet tall with a build similar to Sarah’s: slender and athletic, yet shapely. Her long legs were encased in tight black jeans that rode low on her hips. A black tank top clung to full breasts and a small waist, over which she wore a long dark coat similar to the mens’.

Marcus smiled as he moved behind her and removed her coat. “Lisette.”

The inner lining, Sarah saw, contained a number of throwing knives and other blades she couldn’t identify, neatly tucked into loops.

“Marcus.” Her voice was low, warm, colored with a faint French accent, and as beautiful as she was with her porcelain skin and perfectly proportioned features.

Standing next to Roland, Sarah felt jealousy again stir as the woman left Marcus and approached them.

“Lisette,” Roland rumbled.

“Roland, mon coeur.” When she offered him her hand, Roland carried it to his lips for a kiss. “I heard you had left your lair, but did not believe it.”

“It was either leave it or burn with it.”

Even Lisette’s laugh was pretty.

Sarah found herself gritting her teeth.

Roland may not have fallen in love with any woman before her, but he sure as hell hadn’t been celibate. Had he sated his needs with human women, or immortals like this one?

“Is this the woman who saved you?” the Frenchwoman queried.

Roland rested his large, warm palm low on Sarah’s back. “Yes. Sarah, this is Lisette d’Alençon. Lisette, Sarah Bing-ham.”

“An honor to meet you, Sarah,” she said with a smile, extending her hand. “We are all in your debt.”

Sarah shook it and started to mention she hadn’t done anything, but Lisette leaned in.

“He isn’t really my heart,” she said with a smile, indicating Roland with a nod of her head. “I only tease him because he’s shy.”

Across the room, Marcus snorted. “He isn’t shy. He’s antisocial.”

Roland cut him a glare.

Lisette turned toward Chris. “Chris, you handsome devil, what have you found for us?”

He grinned. “You know I hate to repeat myself, chérie. I’ll wait until everyone is here.”

Another Immortal Guardian entered. Six-foot-one. Short, raven hair. Deep brown eyes with surprisingly thick lashes.

This must be Lisette’s brother.

Black slacks clung to slim hips and powerful thighs as he removed his coat. A dark short-sleeved T-shirt showed off a muscular chest, broad shoulders, and bulging biceps. He, like the others, including Roland, was armed to the teeth with numerous knives and a Glock .45.

“Étienne,” Lisette said as he hung up his coat, “come and meet Roland’s valiant mortal. I’ve decided we’re going to be the best of friends.”

Sarah glanced up at Roland, who winked at her and gave her back a furtive caress.

Étienne came to stand beside his sister, bussing her on both cheeks. Then, smiling at Sarah, he extended his hand.

“You must be Sarah. It’s a true pleasure to meet you.” His voice was deep and tinged with a French accent as well.

When Sarah placed her hand in his, he carried it to his lips for a kiss as Roland had Lisette’s.

“Nice to meet you, too.”

“The Internet is all abuzz with tales of your heroics.”

“What heroics?” she asked, trying to discern if they were mocking her.

“Saving Roland’s life, of course. It’s all they’re talking about on the Immortal Guardian website.”

They had a website?

Étienne released her and extended his hand to Roland with a smile. “Good to see you, Roland.”

Roland shook his hand and nodded a greeting.

It was strange, seeing him like this: rather dour and tight-lipped. He was always so warm and open when the two of them were alone.

Étienne turned to Chris and Marcus next. “Chris.” He shook Chris’s hand. “Marcus.”

When Marcus shook his hand, Étienne’s face grew solemn. “I was very sorry to hear about Lady Bethany. If there is any way I can be of service to you, my friend, anything I can do, please let me know.”

Marcus’s lips tightened. “I appreciate that.” His eyes acquired the faintest glow and Sarah was dismayed to see they reflected tremendous grief.

Who was Lady Bethany?

Was Marcus one of the immortals Roland had mentioned who had loved a human? Had she died recently?

As Chris motioned for them to adjourn to the spacious dining room, Sarah made a mental note to ask Roland later.

Lisette and Étienne took chairs beside each other at one end of a table long enough to seat twenty.

Roland guided Sarah to two chairs opposite them and sank down beside her. All business, he propped his elbows on the wood surface, splayed his knees, and shifted slightly so his thigh would press against hers.

“Has Lisette filled you in on all that’s been happening with Roland and Bastien?” Chris asked Étienne as he seated himself in the chair at the end closest to them and dropped his file folder on the table.

The Frenchman frowned. “She tells me you think he’s an immortal, but—”

Sarah gasped and jumped when Seth suddenly appeared beside the table.

Everyone else reached for their weapons, then swore and relaxed.

“Damn it,” Marcus muttered, “give us some warning before you do that.”

Raising one eyebrow, the towering leader seated himself at the far end of the table and looked to Chris. “You’ve confirmed that Sebastien is an immortal.”

“Yes.”

Everyone glanced uneasily at Seth, whose face was like granite.

Even without knowing him, Sarah could tell Seth counted this as a personal failure. Everyone else knew it, too, and seemed to have no idea how to respond. It was a bit like watching children realize for the first time that their parents weren’t infallible.

As if they had never before known Seth to make a mistake.

Nietzsche chose that moment to slink into the room and, giving everyone else a wide berth, jump up into Seth’s lap.

Chris opened the file folder and thumbed through several pages. “Sarah was right. Roland’s enemy is definitely an immortal. He was born Sebastien Newcombe and became the Earl of Marston upon his father’s death in 1807. After faking his own death in 1815—he was presumably killed by highwaymen, though, of course, his body was never found—he adopted the name Julien Marston. Julien for his father. Marston for the title. Since he didn’t have our resources, he left a sporadic paper trail, moving every twenty or thirty years, sometimes varying his name, though he always used family names. The network’s European branches did a phenomenal job locating historic papers that bore his signatures, so we were able to map his movements fairly well.”

He passed each of them, Sarah included, a sheaf of papers.

“Whatever made him want Roland’s head on a platter happened in London,” he continued, looking at Roland, “because he’s been dogging your footsteps ever since.”

Sarah stared at the papers before her. One half of the page (and all of those that followed) catalogued the many cities in which Roland had lived since his sojourn in London in the early nineteenth century in chronological order. The opposite side did the same for Sebastien, aka Julien Marston, Julien Newcombe, Sebastien Marston, and Marston Newcombe.

Wherever Roland had gone, Sebastien had followed. It had sometimes taken him years to find Roland, but find him he would, usually just in time for Roland to pack up and move again.

“What the hell?” Roland muttered.

“You lucked out when you moved to the States,” Chris said, drawing their attention to the last few pages. “He lost you completely and, as you can see, spent the next several decades traveling the globe, I assume in search of you.”

Roland slammed the papers down. “I’m telling you, I have never seen this bastard before. Not until the morning he staked me out for the sunrise.”

Marcus shook his head. “I don’t remember seeing him before either.”

Étienne spoke up. “Well, he sure as hell saw Roland.” He looked to Roland. “Maybe you killed the one who turned him. He’s immortal, not vampire, so he may have been more loyal to the one who infected him.”

Roland waved to the pages in disbelief. “To this extent?”

Seth cleared his throat. “He had no one else. It’s plausible.”

An awkward silence fell.

Chris shuffled his papers. “Anyway, Roland’s self-imposed isolation worked to his advantage. Once you moved to the States, you forwent servants and refused to have a Second. You very rarely interacted with the other Guardians. So he basically had no way to trace you. When he finally found you roughly twenty years ago, it was probably just dumb luck.”

Roland scowled. “So why not try to kill me then? Why wait?”

“This is why.” Withdrawing a multifolded piece of paper, Chris spread it open on the table. “I traced him to an old farmhouse outside of Mebane—Julien Marston was the name on the lease—and took some satellite surveillance photos. Here’s the first.”

It was the size of a road map and showed a large farmhouse and barn surrounded by a sizable clearing, then dense forest.

Sarah’s gaze swept over the others. “You have your own satellites?”

Chris shook his head. “Launching satellites into space would draw unwanted scrutiny. I just have friends in interesting places.”

“Oh.”

“It’s why he’s the best Cleaner,” Marcus commented, then motioned to the map. “So this is his lair?”

“Yes, and this is where the unbelievable factor increases exponentially.” Pulling out a second map, Chris unfolded it atop the other.

Sarah, and everyone else, leaned forward with interest.

“I wanted to find out how many, if any, vamp followers he had left, so I had my friend do a broader spectrum sweep with one of their keyhole satellites. The yellow figures are the humans. The violet ones are the vampires sleeping underground.”

“Oh shit.”

“What the hell?”

Sarah stared at the map.

There were four yellow figures. And dozens of violet ones.

She looked at Roland. “I thought vampires didn’t travel in more than twos or threes.”

A muscle leaped in his jaw. “They don’t.”

Lisette’s eyes were wide. “There mustbe atleast fiftyof them.”

“Fifty-seven,” Chris corrected.

Étienne stood and spread his hands on the map. “This extends well past the boundaries of the farmhouse.”

Chris nodded. “According to the original blueprints, the house had a basement when he bought it, but he’s clearly enlarged it.”

Marcus frowned. “If it were aboveground, it would fill the whole bloody clearing. Do you have a better layout of it?”

“No, my team checked with every contractor employed in North Carolina and the surrounding states and got nothing. Bastien did the work himself.”

Roland tapped the map with his index finger, pointing out a red figure that was distanced from all the rest. Judging by the color, he was too cool to be human and too warm to be vampire. “This is him. He sleeps away from the others.”

Marcus grunted. “Probably doesn’t trust them. They’re fucking vampires.”

“Do you think he knows?” Lisette asked. “Do you think he knows he’s an immortal?”

Her brother shook his head and retook his seat. “Vampires kill those they feed upon. No immortal could abide living with them, knowing innocent lives were being taken.”

“Actually,” Chris said, “that’s another thing.” Out came more papers. “My tech team hacked into his computer via the Internet and found this.”

Sarah studied the papers handed to her. It was a list of names and addresses in various cities and towns throughout North Carolina. Some in Virginia and South Carolina.

“We weren’t sure what it was until we started looking up the people on the list and tracked Bastien’s Internet activity. Or rather his human minions’ activity. Most of it took place during the day.”

“What is it?” Roland asked, still frowning.

“A list of the vampires’ victims.”

“He keeps track of them?” Sarah asked.

“No, he picks them. Everyone on that list is linked to kiddie porn, either as a buyer, a seller, or a producer, and has either recently gone missing or is dead. Sebastien is telling the vamps whom to feed on and making sure the deaths don’t appear to be vampire related.”

Étienne shook his head in disbelief. “How the hell is he controlling them?”

Sarah cleared her throat. “Doesn’t the medical examiner or whoever examines the victims notice the lack of blood in the bodies?”

“Sure,” Marcus said. “But vampire slaying isn’t something that typically comes to mind when investigating apparent homicides, suicides, or accidents.”

Roland nodded. “They usually assume the victims were killed and bled out in an unknown location before the bodies were dumped elsewhere. That sort of thing.”

Lisette stared at the map. “It must have taken him the full twenty years to gather so many. They should all be mad by now.”

“Unless he’s turning them himself,” Roland pointed out grimly. “He could have infected them all only recently.”

Chris sat down once more. “Or not. All our digging turned up something else I found interesting. I can’t be certain, but I’m pretty sure he’s making them eat food.”

Everyone looked at him as if he were nuts.

Except for Seth.

Seth frowned and continued to stroke Nietzsche, who purred like a Harley-Davidson.

“I sent my ops team out to surveil the place this afternoon—”

Roland scowled. “Then he knows we’ve found him and could have already relocated.”

Chris shook his head. “They were quiet and stayed out of sight. He never knew they were there.”

“He’s immortal. Have you forgotten our heightened sense of smell?”

“We aren’t amateurs, Roland,” Chris bit out. “They camouflaged their scent.”

“How?”

Sarah was with Roland. Immortals had noses like friggin’ polar bears. She found it hard to believe Chris’s men could have gone undetected.

“They bathed. No scented soaps, shampoos, or deodorants. Wore clothes washed in fragrance-free detergent. Then hid whatever scent remained with cover scents and animal urine.”

Sarah wrinkled her nose in disgust and saw Lisette do the same.

“Animal urine?” Marcus parroted.

“Sure. Hunters do it all the time. Trust me. No one knew they were there.”

Gross.

“What did they see?” Marcus asked.

“A truck delivering a big-ass load of groceries. Mostly fresh vegetables and fruits. My hackers went to work again and found out Julien Marston has a standing order with the supplier. Every two days enough food to feed an army is delivered. According to his payroll, you’ve cut the number of humans serving Sebastien from thirteen to four but the deliveries keep coming. And even if you hadn’t, it would be too much for the humans to consume so quickly. Clearly the food isn’t solely for them.”

But vampires didn’t eat food. Roland had told her the bloodlust struck them so fast and hard, they lost interest in any other form of sustenance.

“He’s trying to save them,” Lisette declared sadly.

“Will that work?” Sarah asked the table at large. “Will eating food keep them sane?”

All eyes went to Seth.

“No. We tried that. Several times. Those who were already mad only consumed food when forced to through starvation, and it made no difference. Neither did denying them blood straight from the vein and instead feeding it to them in a glass or bag. Once the madness claims them, they’re lost.”

“And the newbies?” Chris asked.

Seth shook his head. “If we caught them within weeks of being turned, feeding them food didn’t prevent the madness from striking. It merely slowed the descent. If they were fortunate, they could have four—possibly five—years, but they were painful ones. The unceasing battle for sanity was exhausting. They had to be watched constantly. And, if they slipped and tried to harm a human, they were tortured by memories of it during their lucid moments. They cannot be saved.”

A somber silence fell, ultimately broken by Chris.

“So what’s the plan?”

Sarah couldn’t see any remotely palatable way to end this.

Roland’s hand tightened around hers an instant before he spoke in a cold, determined voice. “We extract Sebastien, then raze the compound.”

The faces of Roland’s immortal brethren were grim in the aftermath of his proclamation. He didn’t look at Sarah, afraid of the condemnation he might see in her beloved face.

What a cold-blooded bastard she must think him.

As the other Immortal Guardians exchanged troubled looks, Roland braced himself for the moment she would withdraw her hand.

Étienne cleared his throat. “Am I the only one suffering qualms about killing vampires who have never harmed an innocent?”

Marcus sighed heavily. “No.”

“How do you know they haven’t?” Sarah queried, drawing Roland’s surprised gaze.

She was still holding his hand.

Chris held up the list of pedophiles. “Trust me, Sarah, no one on this list is innocent.”

“Yes, but you’re assuming they haven’t killed anyone not on the list. Is there some rule that prevents vampires from killing more than one person per night? Fifty-seven is a large number to keep track of. Couldn’t some of them have strayed without Bastien knowing it?”

Roland had had the same thought. “If they were careful not to get any blood on them so he couldn’t discern two different scents … yes.”

“We don’t know for sure that he would even object,” Lisette said slowly. “He has lived with vampires for two centuries. I know it is unpleasant, but we must consider the possibility that in some ways he may have come to think like them.”

“He certainly shares their hatred of immortals,” Marcus said.

A high-pitched ring pierced the air.

Chris pulled a cell phone from his pocket and gave it a glance. “Excuse me. I have to take this.” Rising, he held the phone to his ear and strode into the living room. “Yeah?”

“Sebastien’s approval or disapproval makes little difference in terms of our goal here,” Seth spoke. “I want him taken alive and handed over to me. The others are to be destroyed. If we let them live and do nothing until they lose their tenuous hold on sanity and kill, hundreds of innocents could fall victim before we manage to hunt them all down. That is unacceptable.”

Everyone murmured their agreement.

When Chris returned, Roland was debating strategy with the others while he drew soft circles on the back of Sarah’s hand with his thumb.

“Well, Sarah was right again,” Chris announced, reclaiming his seat. “Andy got his hands on several of the police reports filed for the dead pedophiles and kiddie porn peddlers and Bastien’s vamps are unquestionably cheating on their diet.” He tapped the list of victims. “Several of these freaks were married and the vamps sent to feed on them killed the wives and children for dessert.”

Shit. “How the hell have we not heard about this?”

“None of the victims lived in the Triangle or the Triad.”

The Triangle was made up of the neighboring cities of Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill. The Triad consisted of Greensboro, High Point, and Winston-Salem.

“And they were spread out and camouflaged in enough different ways that no correlations have been drawn between the deaths.” Sarah looked to Roland. “I wish I had been wrong.” Giving her hand a supportive squeeze, he returned his attention to planning their attack.

The hallway outside the mystery woman’s bedroom was empty when Seth appeared in it, the sheaf of papers Chris had given him clasped in one hand. A quick look inside showed him the room, too, was devoid of her presence.

No big surprise there. The poor girl still wasn’t sleeping.

Worried about her continued insomnia, he had reached out very subtly with his gifts and determined that it was no longer that she was unwilling to sleep. She couldn’t sleep. Not until she felt safe. It seemed to be some sort of subconscious defense mechanism she was helpless to extinguish.

He, David, and Darnell had all trodden carefully around her and made themselves appear as harmless as possible. He didn’t know what else he could do to reassure her.

Of course, she was a tiny thing, barely reaching five feet. It was a little hard to look harmless when one was at least a foot and a half taller than her and outweighed her by a good 100, 120 pounds.

Seth strode down the hallway and began making his way downstairs. The only sounds of life came from the great hall, which—except for the stone walls—now resembled a modern living room. Following them, he saw David standing in the shadows outside the entrance and started to call out a greeting.

David glanced up and placed a finger to his lips.

Seth instantly altered his approach, silencing his footsteps as he joined him and peered into the room.

Darnell was perched on the edge of the sofa, fingers and thumbs working a Playstation controller. On the large-screen television, Tomb Raider’s Lara Croft took a running leap from a ledge and grabbed the end of a rope that dangled over a dark, cavernous room.

The mystery woman stood beside the sofa, out of arm’s reach as she always did, eyes glued to the screen.

“See,” Darnell said with a boyish grin, “I told you she’d make it.”

Seth was shocked to see her eyes light up with what would have been a smile if her lips had moved.

“Now I’ll make her swing, jump to the next rope, swing again, and land on that ledge over there.”

Looking doubtful, she returned her attention to the screen and leaned against the arm of a recliner arranged perpendicularly to the sofa.

The pale blue V-neck T-shirt she wore clung to small breasts and left bare her prominent collarbones and arms that weren’t as skeletal now that she was eating regularly. Black and blue pajama bottoms hung on bony hips that had finally gained a bit of flesh on them. Her small feet were bare.

She was still far too thin and looked so fragile it broke Seth’s heart. And David’s. And Darnell’s.

Her face was less gaunt and had more color. It was a pretty face with full lips, a pert nose, and winged brows. Dark shadows still lingered beneath her eyes, however, a testament to her fatigue.

Bearing in mind the fact that this was her eighth day without sleep, she looked fan-freakin’-tastic.

Seth had once read about a sleep study a university had conducted to see how long a person could go without sleep. The longest any of the participants had lasted was eleven days. By only the fourth, participants’ thought processes and motor skills had become sluggish. Problems with short-term memory had arisen. They had had difficulty concentrating, become delusional, and been extremely moody, symptoms that had steadily increased in severity as the days progressed.

Not so their mystery woman. The only evidence of her lack of sleep lay in the bruising under her green eyes.

Beneath Seth’s scrutiny, those eyes widened as Lara Croft swung from one rope to another and grabbed it.

“Whew!” Darnell sent her another grin of triumph.

Seth’s breath caught when she smiled back.

Darnell went very still for a second but—to his credit—continued as though nothing special had taken place. “Once Lara gets over to the ledge, keep an eye out for medpacks. She’s running low and there should be one hidden around there somewhere.”

Damned if their guest didn’t move to sit on the very edge of the chair’s cushion and lean forward to watch Lara Croft’s progress more closely.

Seth looked at David and raised his brows. “How long has this been going on?” he asked too softly for human ears to catch.

“The whole time you’ve been gone,” he responded, equally quiet. “Darnell needed to take a break from trying to decrypt those files we snatched.”

Music indicating a discovery trilled from the television. “Cool. More flares. And a grenade launcher.”

Seth winced. “Couldn’t he have picked a less violent game?”

David shrugged. “He was already playing it when she came down to watch him.”

“Has Lara shot or been attacked by anything yet?”

“Just some bats. And it didn’t seem to alarm our girl.”

“Good. I’m not sure how much of her rescue she remembers and worry she might not react well to violence, even if it is only in a game. There was a hell of a lot of gunfire that night.”

David smiled wryly. “I’ve never been shot so many times in one night or by such high-caliber weapons. Damned things stung.” He nodded to the papers in Seth’s hand. “Speaking of bloodbaths, what happened at the meeting?”

Seth sighed, feeling infinitely weary. “Sebastien has done the impossible. Excluding the twenty-three Roland and Marcus have already managed to destroy, Sebastien has fifty-seven vampires living beneath his roof.”

David’s eyes widened. “What?”

“He’s trying to save them,” he said, feeling the same sadness Lisette had demonstrated when she had made the declaration earlier. “Making them eat food. Assigning them pedophiles to feed upon instead of innocents. But most are already straying from the path he’s chosen for them.”

“Did he turn them all himself?”

“I don’t know.”

The mystery woman suddenly leapt up and hurried over to the television to point at something on the large screen.

“What is it?” Darnell asked, making Lara backtrack a few paces. “Oh, a crevice. I didn’t even see that.” Lara jumped up, grabbed the edge, and crawled in. “All right! A medpack. Thanks.”

Smiling, she returned to her seat.

“How about that,” David murmured with a smile of his own. “I should’ve known if anyone could make her smile it would be Darnell.”

Darnell was the least intimidating of the three of them. Exceedingly tall with a lean build and medium-brown skin, he was twenty-six years old and had a naturally cheerful disposition few could resist.

Now if he could only entice her to speak, Seth thought.

David sobered. “So, let’s hear it. Tell me what you’ve learned that everyone else doesn’t know.”

“Discerning bastard,” Seth grumbled.

“No more so than you. Spill it.”

Seth hesitated. There was something the others hadn’t caught. Something he feared would have made them refuse to take Sebastien alive if they had known it. “Sebastien has a grudge against Roland. I don’t know the source of it. But he’s been trying to catch up with him for two hundred years, tracking and following him to every city he’s inhabited.”

“Roland doesn’t know why?”

“No.” Seth held up the papers. “Reordon listed many of the countries, cities, and towns Sebastien has visited, along with dates and …” He was loath to say it. “He was in Scotland the year Ewen was killed.”

David swore.

The Scottish immortal had been a favorite and had been mourned by them all.

“There were so few vampires in his region and none were banding together,” Seth continued. “We always wondered how one could have killed a Guardian of Ewen’s strength. It never occurred to us that it could have been another immortal.”

“The others can’t know.”

Seth agreed. “Even if it was in self-defense, they would want his head.” And Seth was now burdened with the knowledge that his own failure had caused it all.

David’s gaze turned piercing, seeing far more than Seth wanted him to. “You must stop blaming yourself.”

“It’s my fault.”

“No, it isn’t,” he insisted. “You can’t be everywhere at once. You can’t be everything to everyone.”

“If I had been there to help him, Sebastien wouldn’t have suffered. He wouldn’t have begun hating immortals and harboring vampires. And Ewen would still be alive.”

“There is no proof he killed Ewen. Only speculation.”

“He has tried to kill Roland three times thus far. And probably would have killed Marcus and Sarah if he felt it necessary.”

David may not blame Seth for this, but the others did. They had not verbalized it or acknowledged it consciously, but their silence had said it all.

Seth had screwed up. He always aided the new immortals after their transformations and, because he hadn’t aided Sebastien …

“Did they object to your intention to rehabilitate him?” David asked, abandoning his attempts to ease Seth’s guilt.

“No.”

“When are you going in?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Are you sure you want me to remain here? Five against fifty-seven could get a little hairy.”

“I’m sure. I want our guest safe at all times and know that, with you here, she will be.”

As one, they turned to look at the mystery woman and were surprised to find her staring back as though she had heard every word.

“Who was Lady Bethany?”

Sarah and Roland lay together in their bedroom as dawn broke, only a dim nightlight warding off complete darkness.

Both were anxious about the coming battle and found sleep elusive.

To take her mind off the danger Roland would soon face, Sarah had decided to ask about the woman Étienne had mentioned.

Lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling, Roland stroked and toyed with her hair as she snuggled closer. “Lady Bethany, Countess of Westcott. Also known as Bethany Bennett.”

“Was she Marcus’s wife?”

“No, but she was the only woman he has ever loved. And he loved her for a very long time.”

Sarah recalled the grief that had flared in Marcus’s eyes when Étienne had offered his condolences. “Did she die?”

“It’s a little more complicated than that.”

Well, that was cryptic.

Shifting, she folded her hands on his chest and propped her chin on them. “Will you tell me?”

Smiling down at her, he drew the backs of his fingers across her cheek. “I don’t know that you would believe me if I did. It’s a very strange story.”

She smiled. “Stranger than vampires and immortals?”

“Believe it or not, yes. It’s why every immortal knows about it. Even the minstrels of my time could not have concocted such a sad tale.”

“Now you have to tell me.”

He nodded his ascent but said no more.

“Well?” she prompted, poking him in the side.

He jumped and laughed when she hit a ticklish spot, then promptly grabbed her fingers so she wouldn’t do it again. “I am. I’m just trying to decide where to start—the beginning or the end.”

“The beginning,” she decided for him.

“As you wish.” He lifted his head and brushed her lips with a kiss, then relaxed back against the pillow. “Have you ever seen those stories on television in which a dog that has been horribly abused is taken in by someone who treats it well and loves it and, as a result, becomes fiercely loyal to its new owner? So much so that it would die defending or protecting him?”

Sarah studied him curiously. “Yes.”

“Well, that’s pretty much what happened to Marcus. He was born Brice, heir to the Earl of Dunnenford, in the late twelfth century. His father died when he was a boy and his mother was pressured into remarrying quickly. His stepfather turned out to be a sadistic bastard who beat Marcus and his mother every chance he could get. After he discovered Marcus’s gift, he abused him even more. This went on for years and he eventually killed Marcus’s mother, claiming she fell down the stairs.”

Dismayed, Sarah felt her heart grow heavy as Roland continued.

“He would’ve killed Marcus, too, if Marcus hadn’t fled, sought out Lord Robert, Earl of Fosterly—a man he knew his stepfather feared—and become his squire. Lord Robert was a good man and treated Marcus like a younger brother, giving him the friendship and affection he had been missing. So, naturally, Marcus loved him like a father or the older brother he had never had, respected him above all others, and would have gladly given his life to protect him.

“Then one day, when Marcus was around seventeen—he had been with Robert three or four years I think at that point—Robert brought home a woman unlike any Marcus had ever encountered.”

“Lady Bethany?”

“Yes. Robert and three of his men had found her in the forest, covered in blood and searching frantically for her brother, Josh. He told Marcus the two had been attacked by an enemy he was dealing with at the time. But Marcus found out later she was actually from the future.”

Sarah stared at him, doubting she had heard him correctly. “I’m sorry—what?”

“Lady Bethany was, in reality, Bethany Bennett, born in Houston, Texas, near the end of the twentieth century. Around the time you were, now that I think on it.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No.”

Sarah sat up abruptly, the covers falling to her waist. “No way!”

His eyes darkened as they fell to her breasts. “I warned you it was hard to believe.”

“How did she go back in time?”

His hands went to her waist. “If I promise to explain it all later, will you let me finish my tale so I can make love to you again?”

Her pulse leapt. Beneath his faintly glowing gaze, her nipples tightened. “Deal.”

“Long story short: Bethany and Robert fell madly in love, married, and lived happily ever after.”

Her jaw dropped. “What about Marcus?”

“Marcus fell in love with her, adored her as much as Robert did, but never told either one of them. He loved them both too much to threaten the happiness they had found together. And, as I said, he was fiercely loyal to Robert. He would never have betrayed him by pursuing the woman Robert loved.”

Sarah stared at him in consternation. “Jeeze. That’s … that’s …”

“Fucked up. I know. What’s worse is Marcus never stopped loving her. After she died a very old woman, he spent the next eight centuries alternately mourning her and looking forward to seeing her again. When the twentieth century finally rolled around …” Roland shook his head. “He was like a child waiting for Santa Claus to arrive. Bethany was born. And Marcus moved to Houston to watch over her while she grew up. He bought the house next door to her when she was sixteen or seventeen, befriended her, Josh, and their father, helped her through her father’s death a year later, became one of her and Josh’s closest friends, and treasured every moment he spent with her until she went back in time to Robert when she was twenty-two.”

Sarah bit her lip. “He never dated her or …”

Roland shook his head. “As far as he was concerned, she was Robert’s wife. Marcus’s relationship with her was always platonic. Even in the future, or present, when it could have been more.”

Sarah didn’t know what to say. “He never found anyone else?”

“No. Some immortals thought he was crazy to pine after her for so many years, then refrain from sleeping with her when he knew her again. But the rest of us are … a little awed by it, I suppose. His love for her never diminished in all those years. And when he met her again and could have seduced her, he chose the honorable path and didn’t because his loyalty to Robert never diminished either.”

“Wow. He could’ve even tried to keep her from going back in time.”

Roland shook his head. “He knew she would be happier with Robert, that they were meant to be together.”

“And she’s gone now? Is that why Étienne offered condolences?”

“Yes, Bethany went back to the Middle Ages seven years ago. So Marcus will never see her again.”

Sarah lay back down. “No wonder he looks so somber whenever he isn’t ragging on you.”

“He still grieves.” Rolling onto his side, Roland slid down until his face was even with hers on the pillow. “I admit that I was one of those who thought him foolish for not pursuing her when they met again.” He touched her face, gently drawing his fingers down her temple and over her cheek.

Sarah’s heart clenched. He was looking at her as though beholding something precious.

“But I understand now. He loved her enough to place her happiness above his own.” He brushed his lips against hers in a tender kiss. “It’s how I feel about you, Sarah. I want you to be happy. It’s why I’ve tried not to pressure you into staying with me after we apprehend Bastien.”

Sarah bit her lip. She had noticed that he hadn’t once asked her to stay with him. “I thought maybe you were feeling ambivalent about it.”

“Ambivalent?” He pressed his forehead to hers. “I love you. I would spend eternity with you if I could. But barring that, I would settle for every remaining minute of your mortal life, then pray you’ll be reincarnated so that I may find you again.”

“I want to have my blood tested.” She knew now she would leap at the chance to spend eternity with him and could not yet bring herself to abandon that hope.

He stared at her, his gaze penetrating. “And if it confirms you’re human?”

“Your scientists are working on a way to mutate the virus in vampires and turn them immortal. Maybe they’ll find something before I get too old.”

“If you were old when you were transformed, the virus would reverse the damage aging had done to your body and you would become young again.”

“Cool!”

“But those scientists have been trying to turn vampires into immortals since before the arrival of modern science, Sarah. The outlook is pretty bleak.”

He seemed determined to burst her bubble.

“Then I’ll spend the rest of my life loving you and laughing with you and will do my damnedest not to let it get to me when you stay hot and I wrinkle like a prune.”

Roland wrapped his arms around her and hugged her so tight, Sarah could barely breathe. “I promise I’ll try to be less antisocial in the future.”

Sarah hugged him back, throat tightening. “And I promise I’ll try not to refer to you as my boy toy when I look old enough to be your grandmother.”

Chuckling, he rolled her to her back. “Shall I also promise to give you at least one orgasm every day for the rest of your life?”

Sarah smiled as he settled his large, warm body between her thighs, his erection teasing her center. “Only if you start right now.”

He dipped his head, lips slanting over hers, tongue dipping inside to send fire burning through her.

She was breathless when he drew back slightly, eyes glowing, and gave her a wicked grin. “It would be my pleasure.”

In the next instant, he glided down her body, kissing, licking, and nipping, until he reached her core.

Sarah threw back her head and sank her fingers into his hair. “Oh, yesss.”