Free Follow The Night (Bewitch The Dark) by Michele Hauf

not fast enough to claim the hero’s role.
    “It appears you are indeed the vampire slayer, mademoiselle. What poison resides in that blood?”
    “None. Just the two don’t mix.”
    “So it seems. Toussaint, fetch a bucket to clean this up. Don’t alert the servants; we needn’t invite unnecessary questions.”
    After the valet left, Gabriel ran his hands over his face and scalp. The beast had come through his second floor window. Had he leapt? “Can vampires fly?”
    “Not sure.” At sight of his wondering stare, Roxane elaborated. “They are very strong, and can, most likely, leap great distances so as to appear as if they have flown. I wager it was not difficult for your attacker to leap two stories.”
    “Why have the vampires of Paris suddenly developed a compulsion to torment me?”
    “Most likely this minion was sent by Monsieur Anjou.”
    “A minion?” Another one of those evil words that tasted macabre on his tongue.
    “He’s likely aware you did not die and wants to take out his enemy before his enemy takes him out.”
    “Splendid. It has been my luck that I attract such ill fortune,” he began, staring up at the oculus.
    “Poor, pitiful swish.”
    At that mocking statement, he eyed the woman across the room. She shrugged as if to say, ‘Well, it is true’’.
    “You think so poorly of me?”
    He wanted to know. He needed to know. Certainly he had his favorable points. Women did admire the vicomte Renan’s sexual prowess. He could make a woman think very highly of his prowess. Rather, he once could. That was until the insipid Leo had flounced onto Gabriel’s territory.
    But of a sudden it mattered what this woman thought of him. Outside the bed chamber. Even, in a nonsexual manner, despite the fact she’d kissed him last night.
    “You are simply feeling sorry for yourself.” She sighed. “The poor swish was attacked by a vampire. Pity, he cannot take care of himself—”
    “I take very good care of myself, I’ll have you know. I’ve this house, a full staff, and immense fortune.” A fortune he was trying desperately to dispense, for he could not bear to benefit from the rewards of his parents’ illicit booty.
    “But your horrid luck?”
    “What can one expect? A man cannot have the good without the bad. And what in your life has been so horrible? Did you send out your lace to be cleaned and have it returned in tatters?”
    Oh, but the woman deserved a fine pummeling. Of the between-the-sheets sort. She wanted to know about his life? Memory painted a dreary veil over the past.
    “It isn’t important,” he whispered. To think of his parents and their comfort dredged up miserable emotions. “This swish has gotten everything he has ever deserved. On the other hand, I don’t know what it is I have done to deserve such a fresh breath of air as you. Thank you for saving my hide from that minion, Roxane.”
    “No man deserves what you are going through right now.”
    She approached him, and he felt his blood rise, as it had the other night when she’d kissed him of her own volition. Drawing her palm across his hair, she brushed the strands over his ear. A tingle of erotic expectation shot through him. Be damned the monsters, he wanted to think of nothing but softness.
    He captured her wrists and pulled her against his body. Before he could suggest, or intimate, she kissed him. It wasn’t a tentative, consoling kiss. `Twas heated, rushed, and a bit angry. Intent in what she wanted, she threaded her fingers through his hair, her fingernails drawing skittering thrills across his skull. Did the woman realize what she was doing?
    She must feel his want for her.
    Deepening the kiss, he moaned as the taste of her sweetened his tongue.
    “I could take you right now,” he said into her mouth, as he slipped a hand beneath her skirts. The textured wool stockings she wore served a delicious tactile sensation against his surfing palm. The scent of—of something horrible disturbed him.