The Reluctant Vampire (3 page)

“Thank you for staying, Teddy,” Tiny murmured. “I made a fresh pot of coffee shortly before Drina and Anders arrived. Do you want a cup for the road?”

“That’d be nice,” Teddy said appreciatively, finishing with one boot and pulling on the other. Tiny immediately moved to the cupboard and retrieved a travel mug. By the time Teddy had finished with his second boot, Tiny had poured the coffee and added the fixings. He waited as Teddy donned his coat and did it up, and then handed him the mug.

“Thank you,” Teddy murmured, accepting it. “I’ll clean the mug and return it tomorrow when I come to check on things.”

“Sounds good,” Tiny said with a nod, as he walked the man to the door and saw him out.

“Well,” Drina said, pulling the now-empty bag from her fangs and moving around the counter to throw it out. “I guess it’s time for me to go to bed.”

Harper smiled faintly at her grimace as she said it. It was only a little after one. Going to bed now was like a mortal going to bed at four in the afternoon. It was doubtful she’d be able to sleep for quite a while. In fact, he suspected she probably wouldn’t be able to drift off until just before dawn, and then she’d have to get up with Stephanie in the morning. She was in for a rough time until she adjusted to her new hours, he thought with sympathy.

“It’s the room in the front right corner as you come off the stairs,” Tiny said helpfully. “I’m not sure which of the twin beds Mirabeau chose, though.”

“I’ll figure it out,” Drina assured him as she picked up her suitcase. “Good night, boys.”

“Good night,” Harper murmured, along with the others. He watched until she’d left the room, and they could hear her mounting the stairs. He then frowned slightly and glanced up toward the lights, wondering why the room seemed a little darker all of a sudden.

Chapter Two

Drina paused before the bedroom door Tiny had directed her to and eased the door open. The moment she did, someone sat up in the near bed. Mirabeau, she guessed, and backed up as the woman got up and moved to join her in the hall.

“Our replacement?” Mirabeau whispered as she slid the door silently closed. She wore joggers and a sleeveless T-shirt: comfortable enough to sleep in but ready for action if necessary.

“Drina Argenis,” Drina said with a nod, offering her hand.

“Mirabeau La Roche.” They shook hands, and then Mirabeau asked, “Lucian said Anders was coming with you?”

“Yes, he’s downstairs with the others,” Drina said. “I came up to relieve you. I’ll sleep in Stephanie’s room from now on.”

“I can’t say I’m sorry to give up that job. I haven’t slept a wink,” Mirabeau admitted dryly.

“I don’t think I will either. At least not tonight,” Drina admitted on a sigh. She hadn’t slept at night since . . . well, actually she didn’t recall ever sleeping at night. Shrugging, she added, “Although tomorrow night may be a different story. By then I may be exhausted enough that I do actually sleep.”

“Let’s hope,” Mirabeau said, glancing toward the stairs.

“Go on,” Drina said with amusement as she picked up her suitcase. “Tiny is no doubt getting antsy waiting for you.”

Mirabeau nodded and turned away. “Good night.”

“Good night,” Drina murmured, and eased the bedroom door open to slip inside. The room wasn’t completely dark, the curtains were heavy, but a faint glow from the streetlights outside was still slipping around the edges. Between that and her eyesight, Drina could see almost as well as if it were daylight. She set down her suitcase beside the bed, briefly considered changing her clothes, but then decided the sweater and jeans she wore would do. She didn’t want to wake Stephanie, and wasn’t likely to sleep anyway, she thought as she eased to sit on the side of the bed.

“Aren’t you going to change your clothes?”

Drina turned sharply and glanced over her shoulder as the young girl in the next bed shifted onto her side facing her and raised her arm to rest her head on her hand.

“You can turn on the light if you like. I’m not asleep anymore.”

Drina hesitated, but then supposed if they were going to be roommates, she should at least introduce herself to the girl. Standing, she moved around the bed to sit on the side facing Stephanie as the girl reached over to turn on the lamp on the bedside table. Habit, Drina supposed. As an immortal, Stephanie should have been able to see as well as Drina did.

The sudden light was briefly blinding, but after blinking several times, Drina found herself peering at a petite blonde. She’d been told the girl was fifteen, but Stephanie looked younger. She had a lovely face, but a child’s body, still somewhat gangly and flat-chested.

“Hi.” Stephanie shifted to sit cross-legged on her own bed. “You’re Alexandrina Argenis, but prefer to be called Drina.”

“And you’re Stephanie McGill,” she said calmly, supposing that Lucian must have told Mirabeau and Tiny who was coming, and they’d passed it on to the girl.

“They didn’t tell me,” Stephanie said with a smile.

Drina blinked. “Excuse me?”

“You just thought that Tiny and Beau told me who was coming, but they didn’t. I read your mind.”

Drina sat back slightly, her eyes narrowing. The girl certainly sounded as if she’d just read her mind, but it wasn’t possible. Drina was old, older than her uncle Victor, and Stephanie was a new turn. The teenager couldn’t possibly read her.

“Maybe it’s because you’ve met your life mate,” Stephanie suggested with a shrug. “That usually makes you guys readable, doesn’t it?”

“Er . . .” Drina instinctively shook her head in denial.

“Marguerite suggested you to Lucian because she thinks Harper is your life mate.”

“Crap.” Drina sagged where she sat. The kid really was reading her. That was the only explanation since Marguerite had said Lucian hadn’t wanted to know who it was so long as it wasn’t Anders. She and Marguerite were the only two in the world who knew.

“Plus me,” Stephanie said with amusement.

“Plus you,” Drina agreed on a sigh. Apparently just meeting the man had been enough to start affecting her. Great.

“It was smart you’ve played it cool and didn’t just blurt out that he might be your life mate. Harper’s going to be a hard nut to crack,” Stephanie said suddenly. “He’ll fight this life-mate business.”

“Why do you say that?” Drina asked warily.

“Because it isn’t grief that’s making him so miserable over Jenny. It’s guilt. He thinks if he’d never met and tried to turn her, she’d still be alive. It’s eating him up. He doesn’t think he deserves to be happy. He thinks he needs to suffer for her dying. He’ll fight it and avoid you for the next couple of centuries until he feels he’s suffered enough if he finds out you’re life mates . . . unless you creep up on him.”

Drina stared at her blankly, amazed to hear such wisdom from someone so young.

Stephanie suddenly grinned and admitted, “I’m not Yoda or something. I’m just repeating what Marguerite said to you.”

“She did say that, but I wasn’t thinking it,” Drina said with a frown.

“Yeah, you are. It’s nagging at the back of your mind and probably has been since she said it. That and the thought that it just figured you’d finally encounter your life mate, and instead of it being easy like you’d expect finding an immortal life mate should be, it’s going to be even more delicate than it would be were he mortal.” She grimaced. “I know the feeling.”

“Do you?” Drina asked quietly.

“Oh, yeah. Nothing lives up to your expectations,” she muttered, then grimaced and said, “Like, before . . . when I was human, I used to fantasize what it would be like to be, you know, different. Special. I even once or twice fantasized about what it would be like to be a vampire. I thought it would be so cool. Strong, smart . . . no one would pick on you, no one could make you do anything you didn’t want and all that bull.” She sighed and shook her head. “It isn’t like that at all. Sure, I’m stronger, and the kids at school couldn’t pick on me, but I’m not in school, am I? And there seem to be even more problems than when I was human.”

“You’re still human, Steffie,” Drina said quietly, feeling for the kid. Marguerite had told her all about the girl as part of her effort to convince her to accept the assignment. She knew that last summer Stephanie had been a happy, healthy mortal with her whole life ahead of her . . . until she and her older sister, Dani, had been taken from a grocery-store parking lot in cottage country by a group of no-fangers. The girl had been terrorized and turned against her will, and now her whole life had changed. While Lucian and his men had rescued her, she was now Edentate, immortal but without fangs, and she could not return to her previous life. Like Dorothy caught up in a tornado and dropped in Oz, Stephanie had lost her family and friends and been dropped in the middle of an entirely different life not of her choosing. She’d had a rough shake and didn’t deserve what had happened to her. And Drina wasn’t at all surprised this wasn’t what the girl had envisioned when she’d imagined the impossible fantasy of being a vampire.

Realizing that the girl was staring at her oddly, she asked uncertainly, “What?”

“My brothers and sisters always call me Steffie.”

“Oh, sorry,” Drina muttered. Her brother’s name was Stephano and she always called him Steff. She supposed she’d just automatically turned it feminine.

“Your brother’s name is Stephano?” the girl asked with interest. Stifling a yawn, she lay back in the bed. “You’ll have to tell me about him, but tomorrow. I’m really tired now. Sometimes, this reading-thoughts business is exhausting. Good night.”

“Good night,” Drina murmured, as the girl rolled onto her side away from her and settled into her bed. She then hesitated a moment, considering whether she should take the time to change now or just turn off the light so the girl could get to sleep.

“Go ahead. The light doesn’t bother me,” Stephanie mumbled. “Besides, while I know you don’t think you’ll sleep, you’ll stand a better chance of doing so if you’re more comfortable.”

Drina shook her head and stood to grab her suitcase and toss it on the bed. She wasn’t used to having someone reading her mind. She was old enough most people couldn’t. And she definitely didn’t like it. She would have to guard her thoughts more carefully, she supposed, and then stopped thinking altogether and just concentrated on quickly changing into a pair of white joggers and an equally white tank top.

“Good night,” Stephanie mumbled, as Drina closed her suitcase and set it back on the floor.

“Good night,” she whispered back and crawled into bed, then turned out the light and lay down. Even as she did, Drina knew she was about to spend a very long night fretting over what to do about Harpernus Stoyan. She’d heard of reluctant mortal life mates, but this was really one for the record books. Only she could wind up with a reluctant vampire life mate.

Harper didn’t think he’d been asleep long when he was suddenly awake again. Frowning, he peered toward the window, noting the sliver of bright sunlight trying to creep around the edges of the blackout blinds. He listened for what might have disturbed him, but silence curled around him like a blanket. He was actually dozing off again when a muffled peel of laughter brought his eyes open once more.

Frowning, he sat up and listened more intently, but the house was silent, without even the sounds of creaking stairs or floorboards reaching his ears. No one was moving around inside the house, he decided, but then another laugh reached his ears, and he turned toward the window, where he was sure the sound had come from. Harper peered at the blinds for a moment and then slid out of bed and padded across the floor to the window, which looked out over the garage and driveway at the back of the house.

Sunlight streamed in the moment he tugged one of the slats down, and Harper blinked against it, squinting until his eyes adjusted. He then scanned what he could see of the driveway and backyard. It was a moment before he found the source of the sounds he’d heard, and then Drina came into view on the sidewalk beside the garage. She was slip-sliding her way toward the driveway, her running shoes giving her no traction on the icy concrete. Her clumsy efforts elicited another peel of amusement from somewhere out of sight.

Stephanie, Harper decided, sure it was the girl even though he couldn’t yet see her. Turning his gaze back to Drina, he frowned as he took in her winter wear. She wore jeans, which were fine, but the running shoes were completely unsuitable, and her coat was far too lightweight for this weather. She also had no gloves or hat on, which suggested to him that she hadn’t been prepared for a Canadian winter when she’d set out on her journey from Spain.

She’d probably thought she would just attend the weddings in New York, spending most of her time in the hotel, the church, or cars and wouldn’t need heavier gear, he thought, and then winced as a snowball suddenly shot from somewhere off to the side and slammed into the back of Drina’s head. The hit took her completely by surprise and made her jerk. In the next moment, her feet went out from beneath her and she was on her behind on the icy concrete. She was also cursing a blue streak in Spanish that he could hear even over Stephanie’s uproarious laughter.

Concern rushing through him, Harper let the blind slat slip back into place and hurried out of the room, pausing just long enough to pull on a pair of jeans as he went. Once downstairs, he almost rushed outside bare-chested and in just the jeans, but the chill that hit him when he opened the kitchen door, and the sight of the snow-laced screen door, made him rethink that and hurry to the closet in the pantry. Still, he was quick about pulling on boots and a coat, and didn’t bother doing up either before rushing back through the kitchen and out onto the deck.

The walkway was empty, and there was no sign of either female as he crossed the deck. For one moment, Harper could almost have believed he’d imagined the whole thing he’d seen from his window, but then he spotted where the snow had been disturbed by Drina’s fall, as well as the footprints leading around to the driveway. He followed them quickly around the garage, and stopped abruptly. Stephanie was in the front passenger seat of the SUV, bent over and peering at something under the driver’s side, but it was Drina’s derriere waving around in the open driver’s door as she fiddled with something under the dashboard that brought him to a halt.