absorbed that information with dawning understanding. “You never told me. I’d thought you only came to me when I was in danger.”
“I’m sorry we haven’t discussed this matter before, Eric. It simply never came up. You only saw me those times you were in danger. There was little time for discretion when a coach was about to flatten you, or when I pulled you spluttering from the Channel.”
“Then you felt the same connection to me that I felt for her?”
“I felt a connection, yes. An urge to protect. I can’t say it’s the same because I haven’t experienced what you felt for the child. But, Eric, many young ones over the centuries have had a vampire as a guardian and never even known it. After all, we don’t go to them to harm, or transform, or even make contact. Only to watch over, and protect.”
Eric’s shoulders slumped forward, so great was his relief. He shook his head once and resumed his story. “I woke one night to sense her spirit fading. She was slipping away so steadily I was barely able to get to her in time.” The same pain he’d felt then swept over him now, and his voice went lower. “I found her in hospital, her tiny face whiter than the sheets tucked around her. Her lips…they were blue. I overheard a doctor telling her parents that she’d lost too much blood to survive, and that her type was so rare no donors had been located. He told them to prepare themselves. She was dying, Roland.”
Roland swore softly.
“So you see my dilemma. A child I’d come to love lay dying, and I knew I alone had the power to save her.”
“You didn’t transform her! Not a small child, Eric. She’d be better dead than to exist as we must. Her young mind could never grasp—”
“I didn’t transform her. I probably couldn’t if I’d tried. She hadn’t enough blood left to mingle with mine. I saw another option, though. I simply opened my vein and—”
“She drank from you?”
Eric closed his eyes. “As if she were dying of thirst. I suppose, in a manner, she was. Her vitality began to return at once. I was ecstatic.”
“You had right to be.” Roland grinned now. “You saved the child. I’ve never heard of anything like this happening before, Eric, but apparently, it worked.” He paused, regarding Eric intensely. “It did work, did it not? The child lives?”
Eric nodded. “Before I left her bedside, Roland, she opened her eyes and looked at me, and I swear to you, I felt her probing my mind. When I turned to go she gripped my hand in her doll-sized one and she whispered my name. ‘Eric,’ she said. ‘Don’t go just yet. Don’t leave me.”’
“My God.” Roland sank back onto the settee, blinking as if he were thunderstruck. “Did you stay?”
“I couldn’t refuse her. I stayed the night at her bedside, though I had to hide on the window ledge every time someone entered the room. When they discovered the improvement in her, the place was a madhouse for a time. But they soon saw that she would be fine, and decided to let the poor child rest.”
“And then?”
Eric smiled softly. “I held her on my lap. She stayed awake, though she needed to rest, and insisted I invent story upon story to tell her. She made me sing to her, Roland. I’d never sung to anyone in my existence. Yet the whole time she was inside my mind, reading my every thought. I couldn’t believe the strength of the connection between us. It was stronger even than the one between you and me.”
Roland nodded. “Our blood only mixed. Yours was nearly pure in her small body. It’s no wonder…What happened?”
“Toward dawn she fell asleep, and I left her. I felt it would only confuse the sweet child to have contact with one of us. I took myself as far away as I could, severed all contact with her. I refused even to think of seeing her again, until now. I thought the mental bond would weaken with time and distance. But it hasn’t. I’ve only been back in the western hemisphere a few months, and she calls to me every night. Something happened to her parents after I’d left her, Roland. I don’t know what, but she ended up in the custody of Daniel St. Claire.”
“He’s DPI!” Roland shot to his feet, stunned.
“So is she,” Eric muttered, dropping his forehead into his hand.
“You cannot go to her, Eric. You mustn’t trust her, it could be your end.”
“I don’t trust her. As for going to her…I have no choice about that.”
Even while Tamara was arguing with Daniel and Curtis, he’d been on her mind. All day she had been unable to get that mysterious stranger—who didn’t seem a stranger at all—out of her thoughts. She’d only managed to cram him far to the back, to allow herself to concentrate on her work. Now that she was home, in the secure haven of her room, and now that she’d wakened from her after-work nap, she felt refreshed, energized and free to turn last night’s adventure over in her mind.
She paused and frowned. Since when did she wake refreshed? She usually woke trembling, breathless and afraid. Why was tonight different? She glanced out at the snow-spotted sky, and realized it was fully dark. She normally woke from her nightmare just at dusk. She struggled to remember. It seemed to her she had had the dream—or she’d begun to. She remembered the forest and the mists, the brambles and darkness. She remembered calling that elusive name….
And hearing an answer. Yes. From very far away she’d heard an answer; a calm, deep voice, full of comfort and strength, had promised to come to her. He’d told her to rest. She’d felt uncertain, until the music came. Soft strains she thought to be Mozart—something from Elvira Madigan—soothed her taut nerves.
She allowed a small smile. Maybe she was getting past this thing, whatever it was. The smile died when she wondered if that was true, or whether she was only exchanging one problem for another. The man from the ice rink filled her mind again. Marquand—the one Daniel insisted was a vampire. He’d kissed her and, much as she hated to admit it, she’d responded to that kiss with every cell in her body.
She rose slowly from her bed and tightened the single sash that held the red satin robe around her. She leaned over her dressing table and examined the bruised skin of her neck in the mirror. Her fingers touched the spot. She recalled the odd, swooning sensation she’d experienced when he’d sucked the skin between his teeth, and wondered at it.
Lack of sleep, and too much stress.
But he knew my name….
Simple enough to answer that one. He’d done a little research on the man who’d been harassing him. Daniel was her legal guardian. It was a matter of public record.
Then why did he seem so surprised when I told him that?
Good acting. He must have known. He just assumed I’d be the easiest, most effective way to get his point across.
She frowned at her reflection, not liking the look of disappointment she saw there. She tried to erase it. “He only wanted to scare Daniel into laying off, so he followed me to the rink for that little performance. Imagine him going so far as to actually…”
She pressed her palm to the mark on her throat, and turned from the mirror. She’d failed to convince herself that was all there had been to it. So many things about the man defied explanation.
