Demon of Mine (26 page)

“
What is it?” Elsie asked when his eyes widened as he scanned
the front page.

His response
was a sort of half-disgusted, half-sick groan. Staring down at the
paper as if it were some sort of vermin that had been thoroughly
squashed beneath a carriage wheel, he handed it to
Elsie.

Chapter 15

Brutal Murders Strike London
, the headline read. Morbid details flew at Elsie as
she scanned the article, trying to absorb as much information as
she could. Three were dead. One man and two women. Two had been a
young couple, while the other had been a slightly older actress.
Elsie’s stomach roiled, forcing her to fight the urge to gasp as
she read on. All three victims’ hearts had been cut out of their
chests and stuffed into their mouths. They’d been found that way,
cold and blood-crusted; their corpses already stiff. The killer’s
identity was a mystery that was baffling authorities.

“
My
God, this is awful,” Elsie said, still staring at the paper in
disbelief. “Heinous. What sort of twisted criminal could bear to do
such a thing?”

“
One of us,” Damon said, his voice low and bitter.

“
What?”

“
I
said ‘one of us’. A vampire.”

“
You aren’t serious?”

He gave her a
level look that showed her just how dark his eyes and the thoughts
behind them were. “I wish I wasn’t, but I am.”

“
How can you know?” Elsie asked, searching the article for some
sort of confirmation. But nothing was said of bite marks – it
seemed that the victims’ blood had drained from their gaping chest
wounds to be wasted on their surroundings, not consumed.

“
I
suppose I don’t know,” he admitted, “but there’s enough information
in this article to make me consider the possibility. Did you read
about how the murderer cut out the victims’ hearts?”

“
Yes.” Elsie nodded, a bitter mix of revulsion and pity for the
murdered causing her to frown.

“
I
suppose you don’t know. That’s my fault, for I’ve neglected to tell
you. There is a way to kill a vampire – just one way.”

This
revelation didn’t frighten Elsie. She hadn’t grown used to the idea
of her own immortality yet. It was more of a shock to think that
she’d go on living indefinitely than to think that she’d eventually
die. She was, however, curious. “How?”

“
You cut out his heart and then burn him to ashes. You must
remove the heart first, for a vampire cannot burn with it
intact.”

Of course one
couldn’t. If vampires were normally susceptible to fire, Damon
never would have been able to rescue her from the flames that had
destroyed her home and killed her parents. “Can a vampire live
without a heart?”

“
Yes, the chest wound eventually heals and a heartless vampire
can function quite well – normally, in fact, unless they’re exposed
to flame.”

Elsie pressed
a hand beneath her breast, tracing the hard lines of her ribs
beneath as she tried to imagine the agony of having her heart torn
out. The absence of her heartbeat struck her for the first time,
sending a chill down her spine. “My heart is still. Is that
normal?” She tried to sound casual, as if the realization hadn’t
shaken her.

Damon nodded,
tilting his head slightly to one side. “Haven’t you ever noticed
that mine doesn’t beat?”

“
No,” she answered after considering it for a moment. “I
suppose I was distracted by your other…qualities.”

“
I
noticed your heartbeat the first time I touched you after you
arrived in Hertfordshire.”

Another shiver
raced down her spine, markedly more pleasant than the last, as she
remembered pretending to be unconscious on the library floor. It’d
taken all the resistance she’d been able to muster to keep from
responding to his touch as he’d pressed his fingers gently into the
hollow of her throat, feeling for a pulse. “I suppose you
did.”

“
I
must admit, it broke mine a little to stop yours
beating.”

“
Doing so had to have been much better than the alternative.”
She wasn’t sure if her allusion to the fact that he’d saved her
from a slow death cheered him or not.

“
Yes. That would have destroyed my lifeless heart.” He laid the
paper back down on the tray and took a step toward her, wrapping
his arms around her waist as he rested his chin on the top of her
head and faced the window. “Speaking of ruined hearts, I cannot
help but feel responsible for what happened to those three innocent
people last night.”

Elsie tensed
inside his embrace, biting back a sigh of frustration. Though the
newspaper headline had shocked her, she’d at least taken a modicum
of comfort in the fact that the gruesome deaths were tragedies that
Damon couldn’t possibly blame himself for, unlike her own past
troubles. “Pray tell, how do their murders have anything to do with
you?”

“
I
didn’t go out last night,” he said, touching his fingertips to the
glass. “I wasn’t there to help them.”

His reflection
was barely visible in the half-opened window. She cocked an eyebrow
at it. “Do you mean to tell me that you patrol the streets of
London every night, stopping heinous crimes?”

“
Most nights.”

Her own eyes
widened, and her expression of surprise was reflected back at her
by the window.

“
That often? Still?”

“
Since I was sixteen. Saving you was so satisfying and so
terrifying that I kept on, afraid that another little girl might be
choking on ashes somewhere. Usually they’re not. Usually they’re
being beaten or raped, but it doesn’t matter. There are always
people out there who need help.”

He turned away
from the window, unwrapping his arms from around Elsie and leaving
her to stare out at the crime-ridden city as he picked up the
newspaper again. “Things have been quiet lately. I thought I could
afford to spend a night in your arms.”

She turned her
back on the cityscape and laid a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t
torture yourself over this. You can’t possibly be everywhere all
the time. It was bad luck that those people were killed, but it’s
not your fault.”

He shrugged
away her touch, staring silently down at the bold
headline.

“
No!” She wrapped her arms around his waist and clung tightly
to him, pressing her cheek against his back. “I won’t let you sulk
over this. Think of all the lives you’ve saved. Think of me, for
God’s sake. I would’ve been reduced to a pile of charred bones
seven years ago if you hadn’t intervened. That one act of
compassion would have been more than enough to set you apart from
the average man, and from the sound of it you’ve done far more. So
no, I simply won’t allow you to blame yourself for this.” She
finished in a rush, glaring across the room at nothing in
particular. Hopefully putting her foot down now would crush the
beginnings of what looked ready to blossom into a lengthy
depression. The only question was: could this vampire be swayed by
a comparatively small female clinging to his back, speaking into
one of his shoulder blades?

He dropped the
paper. “I suppose it doesn’t seem as bad when I think of
you.”

Pleased by
this promising concession, she nodded, which was an awkward
maneuver, considering that her cheek was still pressed flat against
his back.

“
But there’s still the matter of the killer,” he added gravely.
“There could be an immortal murderer loose in London, and I may be
the only one who realizes it.”

Fear sliced
through her heart as she imagined Damon confronting a twisted
killer that knew just how to take his life. “There might not be,”
she said, as much to comfort herself as him. “Even if you have to
cut out a vampire’s heart to kill it, I don’t see why a vampire
would go around doing the same to humans.”

“
To
send a message,” he replied without skipping a beat, clearly having
thought the matter over already. “I’m sure that’s why. I just don’t
know what the message is, or who it’s directed at.”

“
What it
might
be and who it
could
be directed at,” she insisted, clinging to the hope that there
was simply a human fiend running wild with a butcher’s
tools.

A knock on the
door came before he could reply. “Yes?” he called out
instead.

“
I’ve a message from your father, sir,” a voice came from
beyond the door. It sounded quiet, but its owner must have been
speaking quite loudly for them to be able to hear her
clearly.

“
Come in and deliver it then.”

Louise
appeared in the doorway, showing no surprise at the sight of Elsie
clinging to Damon, still in her robe. “Your father wishes you to
join him in his study,” she said, her tone perfectly polite. Though
she’d always liked Louise, Elsie suddenly felt as if she’d never
truly appreciated her. It was confusing enough being elevated from
the household staff to the young master’s wife. Louise certainly
seemed to be handling the situation with more grace than she
herself had managed yet.

“
I’ll be with him shortly.”

Louise
disappeared, pulling the door softly shut behind herself and
leaving the couple alone again.

“
I
should warn you that my father likely wants me to accompany him on
some business matter that will take up half the day, at
least.”

Elsie finally
relaxed against Damon, loosening her hold around his waist as he
turned to face her. “Does it bother you terribly? Being forced to
attend all those meetings and things for a business you detest, I
mean.” The only time he sounded half as cynical as when he spoke of
his immortal nature was when Elsie brought up the industrial empire
he was set to inherit.

He shook his
head. “The meetings are a bore, but I willingly choose to attend as
many as I can when I am in London. I am eager to inherit the
factories from father whenever he sees fit to relinquish them.” His
mouth curved in a wry smile. “I suppose that will occur whenever
he’s kept his iron grip on them for as long as he can manage
without people beginning to suspect that he’s immortal.”

“
Really?” She stared up at him in surprise. “I
hadn’t imagined that you actually looked
forward to inheriting your father’s
business.”

He smiled in
earnest now. “Oh yes. When I finally gain control of the factories,
things are going to change.” On that happy if somewhat ambiguous
note, he opened the wardrobe and plucked out a fine,
business-worthy jacket. “Why don’t you go see what Lucy has planned
for the day? Whatever it is, I’m sure it includes you. Just don’t
let her get too carried away.” Brushing a kiss across her cheek, he
pulled her into a brief but tight embrace. “Have a wonderful day,
love. I’ll see you this evening if not sooner.”

He left in a
surprisingly good mood that, God willing, would keep his mind off
of the morning’s macabre news.

****

“
What do you mean ‘go shopping’?” Elsie asked, slumped in a
damask chair as far from the window as possible. She’d barely been
sitting down for half a minute, but Lucinda was still bristling
with energy.

“
What do you think I mean? We’ve just commissioned a dozen
dresses to be made for you, and you’ve only got one bonnet! The
first gown will be done by the end of the week. We must make sure
you’ve got a bonnet to match.”

“
This very minute?” Elsie asked, casting a cursory glance at
the tall window that revealed a sunny mid-afternoon sky. Though she
herself had been exhausted by the session with the dressmaker,
Lucinda appeared energized. It was quickly becoming apparent that
the lengthy fitting had been a sort of warm-up exercise for her, a
beginning to a rigorous day of fashionable spending.

“
Of
course. We want to have enough time to look around before the shops
close.”

Before Elsie
knew it she was being whisked away, abandoning Lucinda’s bedroom
for the promise of a shop that sold bonnet trimmings galore –
ribbons in every color and the most exquisite lace, according to
Lucinda. Elsie was barely able to steal a moment to snatch her own
plain bonnet from where she’d left it in her and Damon’s
bedchamber. As she prepared to exit the room, something else caught
her eye – the newspaper lying on a small table beside the bed. She
grabbed it on a whim, intending to pick Lucinda’s brain over the
matter during the carriage ride. Would she draw the same sinister
conclusion that Damon had?

****

“
I
suppose it could have been,” Lucinda said for the third time,
looking pensive as she lifted the velvet curtain and stole another
glance out the carriage window, checking to see how close they were
to her favorite shop. Judging by the expression on her face, they
weren’t quite close enough. “Though I don’t think the fact that the
murderer cut the victims’ hearts out constitutes solid proof. A
particularly twisted human might have come up with that idea. It
has a great deal of shock value, wouldn’t you say?” She shot a
sideways glance at the paper, where a bold headline glared from the
front page, announcing the grisly deaths.