Stake and Dust (Stake and Dust series, Book I) (23 page)

"Stop. I know what you're thinking," Tremayne
said.

"You have no idea," she spat.

Tremayne pursed his lips, but then said: "I
never loved Lorelei. The portrait is just that, a painting I
admired because it's good. The artist had been talented. One of
Lorelei's victims, if you must know, and I thought it a shame to
destroy the one piece of evidence of what he could have achieved.
He'd been talented before Lorelei got her claws into him, but he
never had a chance. She made him famous for a brief time then fed
off him until he withered away. Died of consumption, the records
state, but we both know otherwise."

Maybe Tremayne could talk his way out of why
he had the portrait. In a way, it was kind of sweet if she wanted
to believe his story, but there were other things that didn't ring
true. "Why did you pretend to be Mr. Green?"

He ran a hand through his hair. "Stupidity.
Curiosity. A chance to find out who wanted to leave dead bodies on
my porch… Your voice… Pick one."

"What? My voice?"

"I did mention stupidity as the number one
reason. I heard your voice and I wanted to meet you."

"That doesn't even make sense."

"I never said it did." His gaze shifted to
her weapon for a millisecond before he met her eyes again. "Why
don't you put the weapon down and we'll talk. I'll answer all your
questions." He took a step toward her.

"I warned you," she said and she pulled the
trigger.

"Bloody–," Tremayne's cursed as he dove out
of the way and not a millisecond too soon.

Cassandra didn't waste time. She made her
escape out the door, sprinting for the forest. She needed to think,
needed to work all this out in her mind, and she didn't need to see
his handsome lying face while she did.

* * * * *

Tremayne stood and stared at the arrow
imbedded in his wall before he strode over to the open door in time
to see Cassandra disappearing into the woods. He should let her go.
He really should…

"Oh hell…" He never did listen to reason. He
went after her.

Chapter Thirty-Three

"Dammit, Cassandra." Tremayne yanked the
arrow from his shoulder with a series of curses, both in Gaelic and
in English. The wound would heal in a matter of minutes, but it
still hurt like hell.

"Stay away from me!" Her voice was a shrill
demand.

"Stay away – You're the one traipsing through
the forest – adjacent to my house, I might add – and with the
medieval contraption you call a weapon. You could have shot
Shakespeare."

With the mention of his name, his mutt tilted
his head and whined in agreement.

"Shakespeare is with you?" Cassandra's voice
held a note of concern.

She may hate him at this moment, and was
ready to stake him, but she loved his dog. The big guy was
seventy-pounds of happy, especially when someone scratched him
behind his floppy ears. His mutt may be impressive and looked like
he'd make a perfect watchdog; however, Shakespeare would sooner
lick a thief than bite him
... or her
.

This was why he found her in his study. She
didn't have a key, which meant she broke into his place. She
probably promised Shakespeare treats as she went through his
things, looking for incriminating evidence to prove he was truly a
vampire. All she had to do was chance a peek at his wine cellar
where he stored his blood and wine vintages. He might still have a
few bottles of A-negative blood – the synthetic kind – in his
refrigerator, too. He'd stocked up after the first time he'd taken
the Lugh number three just in case he needed a quick fix.

"I'm rescuing a Chihuahua next time from the
pound," he grumbled. "I heard those dogs are vicious on the
ankles."

Shakespeare snorted with a huff.

"Yeah, well, keep that in mind the next time
you let someone rummage through my things," Tremayne said.

"I have nothing against, Shakespeare,
blood drinker
," Cassandra shouted. She had moved to the
right of him. She wore night gear so she could see in the dark as
well as he could.

The forest backed up to his property, leaving
him secluded from prying eyes. It wasn't like he had anything to
hide, but being a vampire and keeping late hours tended to draw
attention. He liked his privacy. "Now that just hurts," he threw
back. "It's to name calling then, is it?"

"It's what you are," she tossed back.

"I
drink
blood to survive. It is
not
who I am." He moved quickly to the next tree, intending
to circle around to her.

"You should have told me." The raw hurt in
her voice made him cringe. "Omitting the information is as good as
lying."

She was right, but there was not an easy way
of saying
...Oh, by the way, I'm a vampire...
especially
when face-to-face with a hunter.

He'd known the moment she sauntered into the
Eternal Bliss
that she was a hunter, without his heads-up
from her former partner's cell phone.

"Did you expect me to introduce myself as
Tremayne Graystone, vampire extraordinaire?"

"Let's not get carried away. I'm a
blood
drinker
would have sufficed."

He rolled his eyes. He could see she hadn't
lost her wicked sense of humor. "Now you're being ridiculous. I
didn't see you handing me your vampire hunter business card."

She snorted, but he could see her lips twitch
before she bristled with irritation. "You already knew I was a
hunter."

He moved a few steps closer, making sure to
keep a tree trunk between them as a shield. Shakespeare kept pace.
When need be, his mutt could be as stealthy as a preternatural
being. "Tell me truthfully, Cassandra, did you come into the pub
specifically to hunt me? Did you suspect I was a vamp from the
start?"

Her slight hesitation spoke volumes. "The
bureau knew there was a vampire involved, but nothing more. I
didn't know it was you I was sent to –"

"…kill," he finished for her. "Because,
dear hunter
, that is what you were sent to do."

"Dammit. You weren't supposed to be so
charming, but then it's all about the glamour, isn't it?"

He had a hunch she wanted him to admit he
glamoured her into liking him, but too bad for her. "You know I
didn't influence you."

She lowered her weapon a fraction and he took
it as a good sign.

"Why don't we go back to the house and talk
about this like two normal adults?"

"
Normal?
" her voice rose another
octave.

Wrong word choice, but wasn't normal
relative?

"
Normal?
" she repeated in a shrill
tone banshees would be proud to accomplish. "There's nothing normal
about you."

"Says the ninja dressed woman holding a
medieval bow and arrow, but I'm willing to forget all this if you
are?" He was about to move again, but he heard her sniffle. Was she
crying? He regarded her quizzically, his eyes narrowing.
What
the heck?

"Tomorrow is Christmas Eve," she choked.

He knew what day it was, but what did this
have to do with her wanting to stake him? He leaned against the
tree trunk and waited for her to explain.

"I expected chocolates … flowers … maybe
dinner with my
boyfriend
. I did not expect to find out that
not only does he believe Christmas is a frivolous pastime," she
continued without taking a breath, "but he's the blood sucker I was
supposed to hunt, and he's been under my nose the whole time."

"Your family has nothing to fear from me.
I've been minding my own business for centuries before such a job
as preternatural hunters existed. I work, pay my taxes, and I don't
go around killing innocent people."

Shrrrthunk!

He glanced above his head where the arrow
lodged into the tree trunk. When had she moved? "That was damn
close, Cassandra. Now cut it out."

"You've been alive for centuries," she
accused. "Just how many women have you seduced down the line?"

It sounded like she was jealous, but that was
ridiculous.
Wasn't it?
"I don't go around seducing
women."

"You're blooded. Don't deny it. You have the
warrior physique. You aren't a hybrid. So, who was the woman you
married to complete the ritual?"

The Oiche Sith went through a change around
their twentieth year, which involved draining of blood and taking a
mate. Drinking from the female triggered their transformation. The
males would grow larger and stronger, but since their race no
longer produced young, they chose human females. In the beginning,
most didn't survive the blooding ritual. Apparently she was
familiar with the outcome too. "You want to know about the woman,
who I took as my mate?"

"To death do us part ... well, death to her
anyway, isn't that right? Yeah, I want to know what happened to
her."

He didn't have to tell her. It was obvious
she already knew the answer.

He'd been young and arrogant when his body
demanded he choose a mate. Changing a human had been a new concept
back then, and he foolishly believed he knew how the process
worked. He didn't wait for instructions. No, he performed the
ritual, draining the woman of her blood and having her sip his as
if his blood proved a cure-all – even for death. He found out death
came in many forms. The woman who trusted him had paid the price.
She became a fiend, losing all her humanity with his final
bite.

"Well?" Cassandra snapped.

"I took a mate as was expected of me."

She let out a harsh laugh. "In all the
centuries you've lived, you expect me to believe you only had one
marriage."

He let out a tired sigh and rubbed the bridge
of his nose. Shakespeare plopped down at his feet, obviously
expecting this explanation to be drawn out. "I only took a mate
once. Since then I have kept to myself."

"Until now? With me?"

"Aye, until you." What could he say? The
first night she sauntered into his pub, she wore jeans, a button
down blouse, and cowboy boots. He was a sucker for boots and she
wore the sexy boots with a purpose. Now he knew the purpose was to
stomp on his face after she staked him, but at the time thoughts of
who she was and what she did, after she left her
nine to
five
job, hadn't entered his mind. Even when he spotted the
pendent she wore as confirmation she belonged to a hunter's world,
he still had been drawn to her. Only then, it had nothing to do
with her beauty. There was so much more to her. Strong, determined,
and she knew how to laugh. Her whole persona drew him in as if
she
possessed the capability of glamour.

Cassandra was quiet, but he could hear her
breathing, her heart thumping and he knew her mind whirled with
questions. "What happened to her – this wife of yours?" she finally
asked.

He sighed with resignation. "In the end, I
had to kill her."

Chapter Thirty-Four

Of all the responses Tremayne could have
given her, Cassandra hadn't expected the blatant truth, but there
was also something in the
way
he told her. His voice
hitched, sadness poured over the words as if the act of
killing
his wife hadn't been what he wanted to do. She
peeked toward where she knew Tremayne stood, leaning against the
tree trunk. He was tall and fit with muscles of a warrior who
wielded a sword on a daily basis. He said he was alive before her
family went into the preternatural business of hunting. Her family
had been doing this a long time. Just how old was he? Centuries old
and like all preternatural beings that were virtually immortal, he
didn't look much older than twenty-eight.

Her night goggles gave everything a greenish
hue, but enabled her to see as clearly as any preternatural in the
cover of darkness. She shouldn't care why he killed his wife. He
murdered another human being. He deserved to be put down like a
rabid animal that would endanger anything in its path. He
did
not
deserve her sympathy
.
"Why did you kill her?" She
closed her eyes and cursed herself for asking.
Damn these
rollercoaster emotions where Tremayne is concerned.

"She no longer knew right from wrong,"
Tremayne told her. "She thought of blood only and nothing more. She
would have sooner tore my throat out than anything else. She ceased
to be
her
."

"But you were the one to change her. You
turned her into the fiend."

Another sigh left him. "Aye, I changed her.
And I knew I would never chance changing another again."

"And you've never killed since then?
Ever?"

The long pause told her the answer. Centuries
old … vampire … he needed blood to survive …
Killer.

"Depends on if killing includes defending
one's self. I fought in wars. I've had to defend my home from
invaders. I've been hunted by
fanatics
…" He let the sentence
trail off with an accusatory flair.

Then it dawned on her. If she proved a
threat, he'd end her life, too. Survival was his motto, no matter
the consequences. Well, she had the same motto.

Cassandra glanced at the tree nearest her.
She swung the bow over her shoulder and jumped, taking hold of the
tree limb and hoisting herself up. She sat perched like an owl
waiting for its prey. She knew Tremayne stalked her too, moving
closer and using the trees for cover. Perched up here, she'd have
the advantage. She wouldn't give him a chance to taste her
blood.

Even as she thought those words, she wondered
why he hadn't tried to drink from her. They'd been together for
weeks.
And all wonderful,
she cursed under her breath. He
charmed her with his wit and brilliant conversations. He enchanted
her with strolls on the moonlit beach and tantalized her with his
drugging kisses.
And damn him, his plan of seduction worked.
She'd fallen for him, given her heart as surely as if she'd
gift-wrapped it with a bow. She loved him.
She still loved
him
. A gasp escaped her lips before she could clap a hand over
her mouth.
Noooo…
she couldn't love a vampire. She hunted
them.