As Shadows Fade (4 page)

“I'm in search of her.”

The two men remained silent, the footman looking slightly ill at ease; truly, he was little more than a boy. But when Max had been that age—sixteen, perhaps seventeen—he'd already been hunting vampires for more than a year. On his own and without the grace of a
vis bulla.

“I'm not certain—”

Max stepped closer. “I suggest,” he said, pleasantness oozing from his voice, “you desist in prevaricating and tell me where she is. And,” he added, his tone dropping low and dark enough to make the footman's eyelashes flicker, “I suggest you cease from speaking about the marchioness in such unflattering terms.”

The butler swallowed. “She left some time ago, my lord. With…er…”

“Yes?”

“A blond man,” the footman offered, obviously wishing to be of assistance in an effort to dispel Max's obvious anger.

A blond man. Vioget?

“Did she go willingly? That is, was she agreeable about leaving? So early?”

The butler nodded, his face blaring hesitation. He obviously wasn't certain if Max was angry or pleased that Victoria was gone. That made two of them. “She…er…was smiling and laughing a bit just before they left, my lord.”

Definitely Vioget then. That was good. Perhaps they'd made plans to meet here, and Victoria had contrarily chosen not to tell him. That would be no surprise.

“In whose carriage?” Not that it mattered. Vioget would make use of any vehicle, and soon that lush red dress would be crumpled in a pile. Or torn, under eager hands. Its clinging fabric was delicate enough to split at the slightest strain.

“My lady's, my lord. They went out to her carriage.”

Max stepped back, satisfied. Yet…something itched deep inside him. He ignored it and turned to leave. It really wasn't terribly urgent that he see Victoria tonight.

But what if it wasn't Vioget? What if she'd left in a carriage with another man?

“The man…how tall was he? What else did you notice of him? His name?”

And then suddenly there she was. In front of him.

“Max?” Her voice lifted in surprise as she stepped through the door, into the foyer. There was, indeed, a blond man with her. And it wasn't Vioget.

What the hell had she been doing in her carriage with George Starcasset?

Max tore his attention from Victoria and focused on her companion, but not before he noticed her hair was off-center and one of her gloves was missing.

Max turned a cold gaze onto Starcasset. The man didn't even attempt bravado, which was no surprise. After all, he didn't have a gun in his hand to give him ballocks. A tinge of red flushed over the man's round cheeks, and he gave a little bow. “Signore Pesaro,” he said formally. “We've just returned.”

“I see that.” Max didn't trust himself to say much more. There were too many people around, and he'd likely end up with his fingers around the man's throat—which would be a great blow to his reputation for control.

Where the hell was Vioget? Why wasn't he at this blasted dance, protecting his own bloody damned interests?

“Max, what are you doing here?” Victoria asked, moving closer. She was looking at him with sharp eyes that held not a hint of shame, and, quite likely—bloody
hell
—a bit of smugness. Blast. “Perhaps you had an urge to waltz after all?”

“I came to see you on a matter of some urgency,” he said, duly pushing from his mind the one and only time they'd waltzed. He didn't like to dance, but he was damn good at it, and the glow of pleasure—not to mention surprise—in her eyes at the realization had been worth the ridiculous display. Not to mention having her in his arms, and seeing her eyes flash as they bantered.

He glared at Starcasset. “We must speak. Alone.”

In a carriage. With Starcasset.

No.

Victoria's red lips tipped up at the edges, revealing the charming collection of tiny dimples around them. “Of course, Max.” There was that knowing edge to her voice, that allure, as she looked up at him as if she knew—she
knew
—how bloody uncomfortable he was.

Damn and blast. He should have left London weeks ago.

He should have found Vioget and sent him here tonight.

He should have merely lifted his brow and looked down at her with an arrogant expression and asked if she was ready to hunt vampires now, or if it was more important to finish off her dance card.

But it was so much harder now. After. Since.

There was so much hanging between them.

Victoria slipped her arm through Max's before he could react, and she pressed her hip, torso, leg, all alongside him. “Good night, George,” she said coolly, as if she weren't fairly melting against Max. Bloody
hell
. “Remember our agreement. I will keep my promise.”

“Of course. Thank you again, Lady Rockley.”

“Let's go,” snapped Max, easing away from that red dress and the woman in it. As he turned, she bumped closer, and he saw, for the first time, a thin streak of red along her neck. “What the hell is this?”

Without thinking, he touched it, and saw that it was a thin scratch that oozed blood, half hidden by her hairline and around the back of her neck. Not a vampire bite.

Before she could reply, he took her by the arm, angling her away from him, and started them toward the front door. “Get her carriage,” he snapped at the goggling footman, who fairly pissed his pants, presumably at the expression on Max's face.

“My God, Max, you don't have to be so rude,” Victoria said.

He ignored her. And Victoria, for once, closed her mouth and said nothing while they waited for the carriage.

The carriage. The small, dark, closed carriage.

Bloody hell.

+ Three +

In Which Our Heroine Dredges Up a Past Event

To the Dismay of Her Companion

Victoria climbed back into
the conveyance she'd alighted from only moments before. The scent of Maybelle's ash still hovered in the air, and she swore she heard Max sniff as he slipped in after her.

She hadn't even pulled all her skirts up and into the carriage, saving the hem from being trod upon or caught in the door, when he pushed past and sprawled on the opposite seat, settling in the center of the bench in an arrangement that clearly indicated his desire for solitude there.

The footman closed the door, and Victoria heard it latch in place. Inside, the interior felt dark and close. Her corset suddenly felt more restrictive.

“You're losing your touch, Max,” she said, sinking into her own seat across from him. She took her time smoothing the skirt over her legs, perversely allowing it to whisk against his pantaloons, which, in the way of fashion, were held neat and straight by narrow straps beneath his feet.

He raised a brow in question, his face half lit by the small lantern that hung in the corner above Victoria. Of course he'd choose the side that wasn't as well illuminated.

She took the brow quirk as an invitation to explain. “That message,” she said, gesturing at his long, sprawled body, “doesn't have your normal subtlety.”

His lips moved in what looked like a suddenly checked smile.

“In fact,” she continued, “it's a rather clumsy and obvious shield against something you wish to ignore.” She drew off the single glove she still wore and looked expectantly at his stony expression. Her throat had dried, and she swallowed gently, trying to ignore the sudden…awareness…between them.

“Are you going to tell me what you were doing with George Starcasset, or are you going to continue to look for meanings that aren't there?”

“Since you were the one who sought me out, on a matter of some urgency, I should think you'd be more eager to share your news. What on earth was so important that you braved a Society dance fraught with—what do you call it? Social frivolities?” One of her slippers was very close to his shoe. She edged her foot over slightly, just enough to touch him, and waited.

“Brim and Michalas have left,” Max told her. The other two Venators had come to London to help Victoria, Max, and Sebastian foil Lilith's plot to kill the new King of England.

“For Rome?”

He shook his head, and moved his foot. Away from hers. “Back to Paris. We received word tonight another demon was sighted. They went to conduct an investigation.”

Victoria considered him for a moment. Wheels crunched and ground along the street below, and the floor beneath her feet rumbled. The lantern above her jolted, swinging its light gently from side to side, casting larger, then smaller, larger, then smaller, shadows over his face. “And?” she asked when he said nothing further.

“And Kritanu thought that you should be advised immediately.”

Victoria smothered a smile. And thus Max, who was so biddable and who adored social functions, leapt at the chance to join her at the duchess's party. Even for Kritanu, who was as close to him as an uncle?

Not, as he himself would say, bloody likely.

“So why was it necessary for me to leave the dance?” she countered. “If that was the extent of the news.”

“Your hair is mussed, you're missing a glove, and there's a streak of blood on your neck,” he replied. “You look as though you've just returned from some sort of assignation. A violent one.”

“As it happens, I have.” Of course her hair was askew. She'd not quite gotten the technique of pulling the small, hidden stake from her coiffure without messing it up.

“And along the way accosted a vampire? Or was that the purpose of the meeting?” He seemed to relax more, settling those wide, square shoulders against the velvet squab behind him. “You might wish me to believe you had a
tête-à-tête
with George Starcasset, but the thought is utterly ridiculous.”

“If I were to have an assignation in a carriage, it would most definitely not be with George Starcasset.”

His elegant fingers, spread over the back of the seat, straightened. Then curled. “Viog—”

“Nor would it be with Sebastian,” she continued coolly, refusing to drop his gaze.

“Victoria—” His voice was strained. And laced with anger, real anger. He looked away, out of the window. His fingers relaxed again.

She wanted to reach across the gap between them and grab those shoulders and shake him until some sense filtered down through that stone-filled, honor-bound,
cowardly
skull of his.

And she could do it, too. She was so much stronger than he.

But what good would it do?

Silence, full and heavy, sat in the carriage with them.

“This reminds me of the night we had to go to Bridge and Stokes,” Victoria said after a moment. “Do you remember?”

“I remember,” he snapped, still gazing out the window. “We had to save your husband from a vampire attack.”

She took the opportunity to shift in her seat, arranging herself subtly, so the small lantern light fell just so, cutting a swath of pale gold over the front of her gown. “I had to change in the carriage, remember? Into men's clothing, because it was a men's club, and of course I couldn't enter dressed as I was.”

“My memory is perfectly clear; you needn't review the details.”

“Then I'm certain you recall having to unlace my corset—”

“Victoria.” Now he looked away from the window. “What are you about?”

She couldn't make out the expression in his eyes. They were muted by shadow. But by the set of his mouth, she knew he was angry. She knew how his eyes would glare, flat and black and cold.

“I've always wondered about something,” she continued as though he wasn't looking murderously at her. “When I was undressing, and you were sitting shoved back in the corner, studiously looking out the window, or with your eyes closed as you claimed…did you peek?”

She heard what sounded like a stifled snort or strangled cough. Then…“Of course not.”

At that moment, the carriage eased to a halt, and Victoria realized in dismay they'd arrived at Aunt Eustacia's town house already. Max fairly leapt to his feet, looming like a full-winged bat in the small enclosure.

But though he stood in such a way that did not permit her to rise as well, he didn't leave. Instead, he turned to face her, looking down from his half-stooped position. His hands moved to the wall above her head—a position of power that he must have felt he needed—and he looked down, his feet spread on either side of hers.

For the first time since they'd climbed into the vehicle, she could see his face clearly. Emotionless, sharp, closed. So empty it made her heart ache.

Her head tipped back, her neck cradled by the top of the cushion. Her fingers twisted in the shadows, burying in her thin, silky skirt, and her heart thumped audibly in her chest. At least, it was audible to her.

“Max,” she said. Whispered. Begged.

“I can't, Victoria.” His voice was just as unsteady, but deep. And low.

“
You won't
.”

“Don't be a fool.” He'd regained control, and his words were clipped, cool. “You are obliged to do what's right for the Venators—just as I am. And what's right, Victoria, is for you to be with Vioget. A man who is your equal, who can stand at your side and doesn't have to hide from the bloody queen of the vampires.”

“Max—” she began.

But he spoke over her. “Victoria, understand. You are the last of the Gardellas. You have to do what's right for them, for the world. It's your duty, your calling. You can't ignore that because we” —here his voice dipped even lower— “spent one night together. I told you then, it changes nothing.”

“Coward!”

“Good night, Victoria.”

He snapped open the door and was out before Victoria could respond.

She pulled to her feet, suddenly frustrated to exhaustion. How could a man who did what he'd done, faced what he'd faced…made the decisions he'd made…be such a bloody coward?